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ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ ΑΝΕΣΤΗ! CHRIST IS RISEN! The Fifth Monday of Pascha: Living the Apocalypse

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, May 3, 2016  The world ended [this Pascha]. No. You weren’t “left behind.” But you might not have noticed. And our not noticing is, strangely, at the very heart of our problem. It is also at the heart of the Christian faith. What I am describing is the “apocalyptic” character of Christianity – the fact that it is a revealing of something hidden. And this is not a “one-time” revelation. It

The Friday of Meatfare (Judgment) Sunday: The Last Judgment

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, March 2, 2008  This Sunday, as part of the pre-Lenten calendar in the Orthodox Church, is known as the Sunday of the Last Judgment, because the gospel reading is taken from the Parable of the Last Judgment in Matthew 25. It is a very proper subject for meditation as the Church makes preparation for Great Lent and its call to repentance. When I think about the Last Judgment, apart from whatever

God by The Numbers

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, November 11, 2015  Math is very strange stuff. A serious question within the community of science and math is whether math is an invention or a discovery. Is it something that we have just made up out of our head, or is it something we observed and discovered (because it is already there)? This might sound like a silly thing to wonder about, but it is indeed most serious. The ancients

Fourth Thursday of Pascha. Holy Mountain: A Universal Presence and a Heavenward Orientation (Part 3)

By Metropolitan Nikolaos of Mesogaias and Lavreotikis The Mountain reveals the extremity of human situations. It is moderate in its discreet character but also displays a divine extremeness – though without foolish extremes – in its absolute and uncompromising lifestyle and philosophy. The daily vigils, the absence of a comforting female presence (even in pictorial form), the customary obedience, the life devoid of personal choices emphasizes the naturalness of the ‘supernatural’ state. The Mountain is

Entering the Mystery of Christmas

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, December 9, 2017 Orthodox Christianity is deeply associated with the word “mystery.”  Its theological hymns are replete with paradox, repeatedly affirming two things to be true that are seemingly contradictory. Most of these things are associated with what is called “apophatic” theology, or a theology that is “unspeakable.” This same theological approach is sometimes called the Via Negativa. This is easily misunderstood in common conversation. An Orthodox discussion takes place and reaches

The Fourth Monday after Pascha. CHRISTOS ANESTI! CHRIST IS RISEN! Salvation as At-One-Ment: Divinization

…. we [have] explored the metaphor of a wedding to describe what God is doing—preparing and drawing us toward deeper intimacy, belonging, and union. The Eastern Fathers of the Church were not afraid of this belief, and called it the process of “divinization” (theosis). In fact, they saw it as the whole point of the Incarnation and the very meaning of salvation. The much more practical and rational church in the West seldom used the

The First Day (Pure Monday) of Great Lent: The Journey to Pascha

By Alexander Schmemann When a man leaves on a journey, he must know where he is going. Thus with Lent. Above all, Lent is a spiritual journey and its destination is Pascha, “the Feast of Feasts.” It is the preparation for the “fulfillment of Pascha, the true Revelation.” We must begin, therefore, by trying to understand this connection between Lent and Pascha, for it reveals something very essential, very crucial about our Christian faith and

The Three Hierarchs

During the reign of the Emperor Alexius Comnenus (1081-1118), a controversy arose in Constantinople among men learned in the Faith and zealous for virtue about the three holy Hierarchs and Fathers of the Church, Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian and John Chrysostom. Some argued for Saint Basil [known as Basilians] above the other two because he was able, as none other, to explain the mysteries of the Faith, and rose to angelic rank by

The Twenty-Seventh Day of Christmas Advent. Emmanuel, God with Us.

Christmas is about Emmanuel, God with us. The accent is on the immanence of God. We cannot understand the miracle of the immanence unless we understand the glory of the transcendence, and the other way around. “In the poorest of the poor we see Jesus in distressed disguise.” So said Mother Teresa as she and her nuns ministered to the abandoned babies and dying aged whom they gathered in from the streets of Calcutta. Disguise

“You are Loved”

“You are loved” “My child,” God declares, “this word that I speak to you places you in the very heart of the Burning Bush.  You are no longer on the threshold of the mystery, you have entered it fully.  You are loved. If you truly want to receive them, these three words can shake and transform your very life. “You are loved.  We have to begin at the beginning.  In the first place we have