September 22, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: liturgy, prayer, worship, orthodoxy, Orthodox Christianity, Eastern Christianity, Russian Orthodoxy, Christianity, religion, salvation, Eastern Orthodoxy, sin, Scripture, Bible, Patristics, doctrine, saints, monasticism, Orthodox liturgy, temptation, Theosis, Divinization, Fathers of the Church, Divine Energies, Divine Energy, Hesychasm, spirituality, glorification, deification, asceticism, Mary, Theotokos, Mother of God, women saints, Blessed Mother, Early Church Fathers, mysticism, ascetic theology, religious controversy, apocryphal gospels, early Christian writings, Temple (Jerusalem), Second Temple, hymns, Immaculate Conception, Mother Mary, Blessed Virgin Mary, Mary of Nazareth, mother of Christ, mother of Jesus, religious doubt, religious questioning, Orthodox Tradition, Scripture and Tradition, St Gregory Palamas, Gregory Palamas, Palamism, free will, grace, Uncreated Energy, Uncreated Energies
I know nothing about the recent controversy over this, referenced at the beginning of this article from St. Tikhon’s Monastery in Pennsylvania (anonymous), and was surprised to hear about it. But this article seems to address it well, briefly, and Orthodoxly. It also highlights the misinterpretation or misunderstanding of Patristic writings that is possible unless one [...]
June 11, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Christian spirituality, Christianity, Church Fathers, church history, deification, Divinization, Early Christian Writers, Early Church Fathers, Eastern Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, Evangelicalism, Fathers of the Church, glorification, heartland, kansas, Middle America, Orthodox Christianity, orthodoxy, Patristics, Protestantism, religion, Roman Catholicism, salvation, spiritual guidance, spirituality, theology, Theosis, wichita
Says an Antiochian Orthodox bookstore owner in Wichita, Kansas,* in this 2002 Publishers Weekly roundup / preview of then-new Orthodox books entering the mainstream book market (in English in the United States).
(*–For the record, home of 5 Orthodox churches, visible at orthodoxyinamerica.org.)
…is a Patristic characterization of the Orthodox attitude during the Great Fast. Archbishop LAZAR (Puhalo) from Canada expands upon this:
The Holy Prophet said, “Let the four fasts of the year be joy and gladness to Israel.” Truly, it is a time for repentance. But repentance is a joyous experience, a lifting of burdens, an illumination [...]
March 29, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Ancestral Sin, baptism, Catholic Church, Catholicism, Chrismation, Christ, Christianity, confirmation, councils, Dark Ages, Eastern Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, ecumenical councils, Fathers of the Church, Great Commission, Great Mandate, Holy Spirit, initiation, Jesus, Jesus Christ, Jn 3:22, Jn 4:1, Jn 4:2, John 3:22, John 4:1, John 4:2, Middle Ages, mission, oikonomia, Original Sin, Orthodox Christianity, Orthodox mission, orthodoxy, Patristics, pseudomorphosis, religion, Roman Catholic, Roman Catholic Church, Roman Catholicism, sacraments, Scholastic theology, Scholasticism, Schoolmen, Spirit, Theophany, Western Christianity
The main meaning of the Greek verb baptizo, from which the English word baptism is ultimately derived (as Mr. Portokalos advised us!), is to dip, as in water.
Christianity as such didn’t invent the practice of dipping converts in water. The Old Testament Church sometimes baptized proselytes, and so did some other Near Eastern religions. But dipping [...]
March 9, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Bible, church history, converts, evangelism, evangelization, Middle East, Orthodox mission, Patristics, religious conversion, Russia, Scripture
The interview, conducted by email by a magazine, is mostly reproduced by another blogger here, though he re-posted it in installments, so start with Number One at the bottom of the page and work your way back up.
I might offer for clarification, first, that there have been several more-or-less intensive missionary periods in Orthodox Church history:
the first [...]
November 18, 2005 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: church tradition, Eastern Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, Fathers of the Church, fear, Orthodox Christianity, orthodoxy, Patristics, persecution, terror, terrorism, tradition
From Eusebius, Oration of Constantine 12:
[D]octrine was entrusted to wise people. The truths they communicated could then be kept carefully and with pure consciences by their households. Then true, steadfast obedience to God’s commands could be established and produce boldness in the face of death. Such boldness comes from a pure faith and genuine holiness [...]
November 17, 2005 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: deliberation, Eastern Orthodoxy, Fathers of the Church, feast days, gender, iconography, icons, liturgy, OCA, Orthodox Christianity, Orthodox Church in America, orthodoxy, Patristics, relationships, saints, sex, theology, women, women in the church, women saints
What follows is an extended quote (from pp. 9-10) from Women and Men in the Church, a 1980 work/study by a committee of the Orthodox Church in America (OCA). I’m still wrestling with all its implications, myself, but thought I’d offer it here as an example of an Orthodox approach to questions and issues:
Sacraments and [...]
October 28, 2005 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Catholicism, Christianity, church history, conciliarism, conciliarity, contraception, deaconesses, divorce, Eastern Orthodoxy, economic justice, Fathers of the Church, first among equals, Liberal Catholicism, liberalism, liturgy, Orthodox Christianity, Orthodox mission, papacy, Patristics, pope, progressive, religion, Roman Catholic Church, Roman Catholicism, sobornost, social justice, spirituality, theology
(Polished and expanded a little on 18 January 2008.)
How can Orthodoxy possibly dovetail with liberal Roman Catholicism?
Collegiality and conciliarity; no Papal Infallibility. While the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople has some very supportive supporters, he’s really not supposed to be a worldwide ecclesiastical autocrat, merely “first among equals” among the bishops of the Orthodox Church, permanent [...]
By Matthew the Poor, ORTHODOX PRAYER LIFE:
In prayer, God’s personal will and ours meet. Christ’s will is sharply focused upon our own salvation, renewal, and rescue. Nothing can thwart Christ’s will for us except our failure to pray. All sick, blind, lame, and paralyzed who prayed and asked Christ to heal them are those whom [...]
…is the theology and spirituality of the Fathers and Mothers of the Eastern Church! We’re deprived of it in the West! So we have to dig it up on our own. Thank God for the internet!!!
