February 5, 2009 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: bishops, child raising, Christianity, Doctors of the Church, Eastern Christianity, Eastern Orthodox Church, Eastern Orthodoxy, eastern religion, Evangelicalism, Fathers of the Church, Fundamentalism, good works, grace, grace alone, grace and works, grace vs works, Martin Luther, Orthodox bishops, Orthodox Christianity, Orthodox Church, Orthodox monks, Orthodox saints, orthodoxy, podvig, Protestantism, raising children, Reformation, religion, Russian Christianity, Russian Orthodox Church, Russian Orthodoxy, saints, sin, spiritual fathers, spirituality, struggle, temptation, Theophan of Poltava, Theophan the Recluse, virtue, works, works righteousness
Short reflection inspired by St. Theophan the Recluse is here.
(Theophan, sometimes called Theophanes [the original Greek version of his name], was a 19th-century bishop in Russia who retired early from the active episcopate – hence “recluse” – and became an incredible spiritual father and writer! A real latter-day Father of the Church. He even wrote [...]
December 21, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Christianity, Eastern Christianity, Eastern Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Eastern Orthodoxy, icons, icons of saints, medieval saints, Orthodox Christianity, Orthodox Church, Orthodox icons, orthodoxy, religion, religious icons, religious images, saints, Western Orthodox saints, Western Orthodoxy, Western saints
I just learned of the demise last year of the Milan Synod’s St. Hilarion Monastery in Texas, and of their website, odox.net. This group was not in communion with the Orthodox Church, but the Wayback Machine seems to have stored at least their images of Western Saints icons, which I have always found edifying.
October 8, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Christ, Christianity, deification, distractions, Divine Energies, Divinization, Early Christian Writers, Eastern Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, Fathers of the Church, God, heart, Hesychasm, hesychia, Jesus, mental health, mental illness, nepsis, neptic, noetic, nous, Orthodox Christianity, Orthodox Psychotherapy, orthodoxy, psychology, psychotherapy, purification, religion, saints, sin, spiritual direction, spiritual discipline, spirituality, temptation, Theanthropos, Theosis, Uncreated Energies
From Saint Symeon the New Theologian, one of the key Fathers of the Church (his feast is commemorated this Sunday 12 October, and two hymns of his feast are here):
Our holy fathers have renounced all other spiritual work and concentrated wholly on this one doing, that is, on guarding the heart,* convinced that, through this practice, they [...]
October 1, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: ceaseless prayer, Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, Jesus Prayer, Orthodox Christianity, Orthodox Church, orthodoxy, pray without ceasing, prayer, prayer in the Spirit, prayer of the heart, prayer to the saints, prepared prayer, quiet time, relationship with God, religion, religious icons, saints, self-acting prayer, spirituality, worship
A very insightful post at Alana Roberts’ blog. She’s converted from Evangelicalism.
September 22, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: apocryphal gospels, ascetic theology, asceticism, Bible, Blessed Mother, Blessed Virgin Mary, Christianity, deification, Divine Energies, Divine Energy, Divinization, doctrine, early Christian writings, Early Church Fathers, Eastern Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, Fathers of the Church, free will, glorification, grace, Gregory Palamas, Hesychasm, hymns, Immaculate Conception, liturgy, Mary, Mary of Nazareth, monasticism, Mother Mary, mother of Christ, Mother of God, mother of Jesus, mysticism, Orthodox Christianity, Orthodox liturgy, Orthodox Tradition, orthodoxy, Palamism, Patristics, prayer, religion, religious controversy, religious doubt, religious questioning, Russian Orthodoxy, saints, salvation, Scripture, Scripture and Tradition, Second Temple, sin, spirituality, St Gregory Palamas, Temple (Jerusalem), temptation, Theosis, Theotokos, Uncreated Energies, Uncreated Energy, women saints, worship
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 [...]
July 13, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Christianity, church councils, conciliarism, conciliarity, Eastern Orthodoxy, Orthodox Christianity, orthodoxy, religion, saints, sobornost, synodal church government, synodality, synods
…is discussed, along with a good presentation of the theology of ecumenical synods (councils), here.
Conciliar theology has also been the subject of a series in The Orthodox Herald by Fr. Michael Dahulich of St. Tikhon’s Seminary (OCA) in Pennsylvania. It’s not available online, but I really recommend getting it if you can.
July 13, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Bible, Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, Gospel, healings, hemorrhage, married saints, Matt 9, Matt 9:20, Matthew 9, Matthew 9:20, miracles, Mt 9, Mt 9:20, Orthodox Christianity, orthodoxy, religion, saints, Scripture, women saints
Yes, Orthodoxy still commemorates and venerates her (today, Saturday), because we still remember not only that she ministered to the Lord in His time of need on the way to the Cross, but also, by Tradition, that she was the woman He’d healed from her continuous flow of blood (Gospel according to St. Matthew 9:20 and parallel [...]
July 4, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Artois, Blangy, Blangy-sur-Ternoise, Christianity, coincidences, Dark Ages, Eastern Orthodoxy, English Orthodox saints, English saints, France, Frankish, Franks, French Orthodox saints, French saints, hurricanes, Middle Ages, Orthodox Christianity, orthodoxy, Pas de Calais, religion, saints, tropical cyclones, Tropical Storm Bertha, tropical storms, weather, Western Orthodox saints, Western Orthodoxy, Western saints
Weird coincidence: The other day my aunt wrote her nephews and nieces that she’d read about St. Bertha of Blangy-sur-Ternoise, Artois, France, a 7th-8th-century Anglo-Saxon (Kentish) and Frankish princess, wife, mother, widow, and abbess, because her mother’s, my paternal grandmother’s, name was Bertha Rider Filon (God be good to her).* Today happens to be St. Bertha’s [...]
June 25, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: angels, asceticism, Christianity, deification, discipleship, discipling, Divinization, Eastern Orthodoxy, Faye Flam, glorification, heaven, John Romanides, marriage, monasticism, Orthodox Christianity, orthodoxy, philosophy, religion, saints, salvation, self-discipline, self-restraint, sex, sexuality, Theosis
I just ran across local newspaper science columnist Faye Flam’s old article (PDF) about speculation around, let’s say marital relations, in the afterlife. She does remind us that the Lord Himself reported that in Heaven the saved do not marry [and therefore do not have sexual relations], but live as the angels. (In fact Orthodox Monasticism [...]
June 25, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Christianity, Divine Energies, Divine Energy, Eastern Orthodoxy, Greek Orthodoxy, icons, images, Long Island, miracles, New York, Orthodox Christianity, orthodoxy, religion, religious icons, religious images, saints, Santa Claus, St. Nicholas
The homepage of St. Paul’s now reports that although the Theotokos has stopped weeping, St. Nicholas has started, so they’re continuing twice-a-day Paraklesis with hymns to him also.
Recall that the original instances in 1960 were also in quick succession, as they mention.
This icon of “St. Nick” demonstrates the Orthodox experience that even store-bought print-icons (mounted [...]
May 13, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: astrology, astronomy, Byzantine, Byzantium, calendars, canonization, Catholic Church, Catholicism, Christianity, computer analogies, computer programs, computers, computus, Divine Liturgy, Easter, Eastern Catholic Church, Eastern Catholicism, Eastern Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, Eucharist, fasts, feast days, glorification, Gregorian Calendar, High Church, Holidays, holydays, Hours, Julian Calendar, Latin Christianity, Latin Church, liturgical reform, liturgy, Liturgy of the Hours, medieval, Middle Ages, name-day, New Calendar, nonviolence, nonviolent resistance, Old Calendar, order of worship, Ordinarius, ordo, Orthodox Christianity, orthodoxy, Pascha, paschalion, religion, Revised Julian Calendar, Roman Catholic Church, Roman Catholicism, Rome, saints, science, seasons, Second Vatican Council, slava, snow, software, Southern Hemisphere, tradition, Tridentine Mass, Typicon, Typikon, Unia, Uniates, Uniatism, Uniats, Vatican II, weather, Western Christianity, worship
Christ is Risen! Indeed He is Risen!
Yes, on the Third Monday of Pascha yesterday morning – May 12 (NS)! - some snow stuck to the ground in higher elevations of southwestern Pennsylvania (link may break), the Commonwealth where I and alot of other Orthodox live!
This discussion goes back to my recent post occasioned by the (Western) Good [...]
April 27, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Celtic Christianity, Celtic Orthodoxy, Christianity, Eastern Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Ireland, Irish Orthodoxy, Orthodox Christianity, orthodoxy, religion, saints, Ukrainian Orthodoxy, Unia, Uniatism
This discussion is from someone who usually seems to know what he’s talking about, a Ukrainian Canadian who seems to interact with both Orthodoxy and Eastern Catholicism.
April 24, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Christianity, deification, Divine Energies, Divine Energy, Divinization, Eastern Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, glorification, Orthodox Christianity, prayers, religion, saints, Theosis, translation, Uncreated Light
NEOPHYTE OPINION ALERT
Numerous Orthodox hymns and prayers include the past tenses of the verb to shine, referring in one way or another to light, often God’s Uncreated Energies as Light, as frequently discussed in this blog, whether directly from a Person of the Trinity, or indirectly through a Saint, Angel, or the Theotokos (God-Deliverer).
Allow me [...]
March 29, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Arab Christians, Arab Orthodox, Arabs, bishops, Brooklyn, Christian Arabs, Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, missions, Orthodox Christianity, orthodoxy, religion, saints, Syria, Syrians, Syro-Arabs
The impending arrival of St. Raphael (Hawaweeny) of Brooklyn (1860-1915) as a priest-monk to serve Arab Orthodox in North America was announced on page 16 of the NY Times on September 15, 1895. In true human-interest fashion, the “lede” is buried down in paragraph 11, although the preceding grafs provide interesting Victorian-Era-style information about the Arabs [...]
March 27, 2008 in Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Tags: Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, icons, Orthodox Christianity, Orthodox mission, orthodoxy, relics, religion, Russian Orthodoxy, saints, Serb Orthodoxy, Serbian Orthodoxy
Archimandrite Sebastian (Dabovich) (1863-1940) was the first person ordained to the Orthodox priesthood who had been born in what was, at the time of his birth, United States territory, to wit, San Francisco, California, the son of Serbian immigrants.* He was one of the pioneers in the service of the Moscow Patriarchate to Orthodox immigrants of many ethnic backgrounds in [...]
