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The Third Tuesday of Great Lent. Finding the Deep Heart during Great Lent

By Archimandrite Zacharias Zacharou, April 4, 2017 The grace of God has gathered us together today at the heart of Great Lent in order to express to the Lord our longing for His salvation, for the acquisition of the spirit of wisdom and for understanding of His commandments. Holy Scripture, however, warns us: ‘It is impossible for a heartless man to purchase wisdom.’[1] What is the ‘heart’ for us as Christians, and what kind of

First Tuesday of Great Lent. It’s “Go Time!”

By Fr. Stavros Akrotirianakis, March 9, 2019 Besides this you know what hour it is, how it is full time now for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed; the night is far gone, the day is at hand. Let us then cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; let us conduct ourselves becomingly as in the day, not

Christ is Born! Glorify Him! Merry Christmas!

Christ is Born! Glorify Him! Merry Christmas! By Georges Florovsky St. Athanasius writes that the Logos [Word] became man, similar to us in all respects. […]  By virtue of its union with the Logos, “because of the Logos, which was in a body,” the body was freed from its weakness and subjection to decay. […] The Logos was not bound by the body but freed the body from its limitedness and its inclination to sin.

Prayer of the Heart in an Age of Technology and Distraction, Part 1

By Fr. Maximos (Constas) I was intrigued by the organic connections that the feast of the Presentation which we’re still celebrating and obviously of the Mother of God with the Crucifixion and Resurrection, largely through the prophecy of Symeon, who at this remarkable moment in the Temple says that this Child is a sign that will be spoken against and is set for the rising and falling of many in Israel, and turning to the Theotokos he

Why the Orthodox Honor Mary

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, July 30, 2015  The most difficult part of my Orthodox experience to discuss with the non-Orthodox is the place and role of the Mother of God in the Church and in my life. It is, on the one hand, deeply theological and even essential to a right understanding of the Orthodox faith, while, on the other hand, being intensely personal beyond the bounds of conversation. I am convinced, as well, that

Monday of the Holy Spirit

On the day after every Great Feast, the Orthodox Church honors the one through whom the Feast is made possible. On the day following the Nativity of the Lord, for example, we celebrate the Synaxis of the Most Holy Theotokos (December 26). On the day after Theophany, we commemorate St John the Baptist (January 7), and so on. Today we honor the all-Holy, good, and life-creating Spirit, Who descended upon the Apostles at Pentecost in

The Ascension of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ

Jesus did not live with his disciples after his resurrection as he had before his death. Filled with the glory of his divinity, he appeared at different times and places to his people, assuring them that it was he, truly alive in his risen and glorified body. To them he presented himself alive after his passion by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days, and speaking of the Kingdom of God (Acts 1:3). It

The Sixth Wednesday after Pascha. CHRISTOS ANESTI! CHRIST IS RISEN! Persons in Communion: From Individual to Person (Part I)

The Body of Christ is not only unity but interchange, by which the ‘movement of love’ of the Trinity is conveyed to humankind. This movement, in which each effaces himself in order to give, is the transition from individual to person, a growing to maturity certainly, but only achieved by means of a succession of death-and-resurrections, in the course of which we are stripped down and recreated. We become unique, escape the repetitive character of

The Fourth Friday after Pascha. CHRISTOS ANESTI! CHRIST IS RISEN! The Paschal Gift

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, April 18, 2017  It is impossible to describe the joy of Pascha, particularly as I experience it as a priest. This year, I was deeply aware that I stand in a place that was both created for me, and for which I am unworthy. The joy of such a combination is the realization of the Gift. When you are trying to find a gift for someone, the most difficult part, it

The Third Friday after Pascha. CHRISTOS ANESTI! CHRIST IS RISEN! A Pascha of Beauty – In a Soviet Prison – 1928

Fr. Stephen Freeman, April 8, 2018  Serge Schmemann, son of Fr. Alexander Schmemann, in his wonderful little book, Echoes of a Native Land, records a letter written from one of his family members of an earlier generation, who spent several years in the prisons of the Soviets and died there. The letter, written on the night of Pascha in 1928 is to a family member, “Uncle Grishanchik” (This was Grigory Trubetskoi who had managed to emigrate