Glory to God for All Things
Single in the City
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I’ve been in London the past two days, as we are making our way to the Holy Land. London is a marvelous city, one of my favorites. It is quite English, very international and increasingly Euro. Like many places in Europe, secularism is far more advanced than in America (or America expresses its secularism in a far more “religious” manner). Today I was thinking about clothes as we traveled around the city…
Glory to God for All Things
Scattered Thoughts Revisited
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We have noticed with sadness that nowadays men suffer dreadfully because their mind is fragmented. Imagination, which is only one of the mind’s activities, is overindulged and dominates men’s lives, leading some to hardness of heart due to pride, and others to mental illness. According to the teaching of the Gospel and the Scriptures, the mind works naturally only when it is united with the heart. Mind and heart are naturally joined…
Glory to God for All Things
In the Great Sweep of History
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“The Great Sweep of History” is an event that occurs in the rear-view mirror, easily characterized in various fashions as we choose to label certain events as important and certain event as without significance. I believe that for the Christian there is no great sweep of history and that the temptation to view history in such a manner is Just that: a temptation. Thus it is a temptation to look at the…
Glory to God for All Things
I Have Set My Face To Go To Jerusalem
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This Thursday, my wife and I, two parishioners and their son, will be traveling towards the Holy Land. We make connections on Sunday in Tel Aviv with a group of pilgrims, mostly Orthodox, led by Met. Kallistos Ware. We will spend two weeks in the Holy Land, meet with the Patriarch of Jerusalem, and generally pray a lot in various places (I’d spend 2 weeks with Met. Kallistos anywhere). I am traveling…
Glory to God for All Things
Deliver Us From the Evil One
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The following words of St. Silouan are fairly straightforward. God give us grace and good hearts to hear him. If you think evil of people, it means you have an evil spirit in you whispering evil thoughts about others. And if a man dies without repenting, without having forgiven his brother, his soul will go to the place where lives the evil spirit which possessed his soul. This is the law we…
Glory to God for All Things
Prayers By the Lake XCV - Children and Saints
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XCV   Children and saints cling to You, O Lord, the rest rebel against You. Children and saints are the boundary between the Kingdom of existence and the shadow of nonexistence.1  Guardians call themselves parents and cast Your children off crags into chasms.  Guardians presume that they are parents, and so they direct Your children as though they were their own property. Truly, they are directing nothing but aberrations…
Glory to God for All Things
Raising A Saint
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Most of us would be satisfied to raise children who remain faithful believers. It is not always an easy thing and every parent who has such a child should rejoice constantly. There is no method to raise a child to be a saint, for God alone gives the grace that results in the mystery of such wonderful lives. However that may be, I am often struck in reading the writings of St.…
Glory to God for All Things
Pray for the Gulf Coast
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I have a daughter and her husband (Khouria Kathryn and Fr. Philip Rogers) who live in Lafayette, LA. They and some other parishioners are riding out Gustav in the home of a parishioner that is “hurricane proof”. That entire area of the gulf suffered so greatly when struck by Katrina – please keep all in your prayers that they be protected from the ravages of the storm. May God have mercy on…
Glory to God for All Things
Global Cooling
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The following is a reprint of an article I published back in December. Thought I’d offer it again. The reference to “Global Cooling” is a play on Kalomiros’ description of the coldness of the modern heart. I have been listening to a tape of the talk, “The River of Fire,” given by Dr. Alexander Kalomiros in 1980. By now it has become a very frequently cited and discussed document within the modern…
Glory to God for All Things
How Simple Should Christianity Be?
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There is a tendency in our modern world to make things as simple as possible. We hide the complexities behind a keyboard (I don’t know how my computer works – or not very well) or we treat things that seem complex as unnecessary obfuscations. This same drive to simplify was very much alive in the 16th century as Christianity underwent reform in many places of the world. Thomas Cranmer, the English Reformer,…
Glory to God for All Things
He Shall Exalt the Humble and Meek
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All heaven and earth exalt the humble Saints, and the Lord grants them the glory of being with Him. ‘Where I am, there shall also my servant be.’ The humility of the Mother of God is greater than any, wherefore all generations on earth exalt her, and all the heavenly hosts serve her; and this His Mother the Lord has given us to intercede for us and be our help. There is…
Glory to God for All Things
Prayers by the Lake - XIX - by St. Nikolai of Zicha
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XIX Amidst the racket and ridicule of people my prayer rises toward You, O my King and my Kingdom. Prayer is incense, that ceaselessly censes my soul and raises it toward You, and draws You toward her. Stoop down, my King, so that I may whisper to You my most precious secret, my most secret prayer, my most prayerful desire. You are the object of all my prayers, all my searching. I…
Glory to God for All Things
Truth and Existence: Conclusions to be Drawn
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Reflecting on the previous posting on Truth and Existence, there are a number of conclusions that can be drawn for our lives and our communion with God: 1. God is generous. He does not begrudge existence to anything that exists. Even the devil is not begrudged his existence. 2. This generosity of God is not an indication of laissez faire, but of love. God has given us existence as a gift, not…
Glory to God for All Things
Truth and Existence
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Perhaps one of the greatest contributions of Orthodox theology to contemporary thought is the correlation between truth and existence. I am not well-enough versed in writings outside of Orthodoxy to know whether this correlation is made by others as well – I have to drink the water from my own cistern. This understanding has been a particular emphasis in the teachings of St. Silouan, the Elder Sophrony of blessed memory, and the…
Glory to God for All Things
Facing the Consequences
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Some thoughts on a comment by Archbishop DMITRI of Dallas: Commenting on the stories of the Transfiguration in Matthew, Mark and Luke, Archbishop DMITRI of Dallas observed that each of the stories contains the phrase “coming down” in reference to the disciples’ descent from the mount of glory into the world of daily ministry. In each gospel, he noted, they come down to controversy and difficulties. In drawing a conclusion he stated:…
Glory to God for All Things
In the Cleft of the Rock
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God placed Moses in the “cleft of a rock” and His “glory passed by” and Moses was granted a vision of God. The great protestant hymn, “Rock of Ages, Cleft for me,” makes reference to this story, understanding in proper patristic fashion that the story points to Christ, who is our Rock, standing within Whom we may see the glory of God. These, of course, are the most wonderful of things. There…
Glory to God for All Things
Humility - The Only Path Forward in Orthodoxy
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Humility certainly figures prominently in anybody’s list of virtues, and most people are more than a little aware of pride playing some role in their spirtual failures. However, knowing that pride is a problem and that humility is a virtue is not saying that we know anything about humility. First, humility is not precisely the opposite of pride nor is it merely the absence of pride. It is not an absence, but,…
Glory to God for All Things
St. Silouan on Humility
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From St. Silouan the Athonite. Enlightened by baptism, people believe in God. But there are some who even know Him. To believe in God is good but it is more blessed to know God. Nevertheless, those who believe are bless, too, as the Lord said to Thomas, one of the twelve: ‘Because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.’ If we…
Glory to God for All Things
The Fathers and Scripture
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This is a reprint – and earlier follow-up on the Orthodox reading of Scripture. I pray it is timely as well. It is easy from the outside to form an incorrect picture of the Orthodox interpretation of Scripture. There is actually quite a bit of variety among the Fathers when it comes to reading the Word of God. Even in the earliest centuries there were noted differences in the approach that obtained…
Glory to God for All Things
John Chrysostom on Romans 9
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Many puzzle about Romans 9 and what some claim to see as a teaching of “double-edged” predestination, that is, that God predestines some for hell. It is useful to see what the Fathers do with such a passage. Here is an excerpt from John Chrysostom’s sermon on Romans 9 that addresses the subject well and demonstrates that God does not predestine anyone to damnation. The question was raised in a recent comment…
Glory to God for All Things
A Brief Excursion
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After Liturgy on Sunday, I fly to California to attend the Baptism of my grandson, Peter Alexis Holste. His father, Priest Hermogen Holste, is Rector of Nativity of the Holy Virgin Orthodox Church in Menlo Park, CA. His wife, my first-born, is Matushka Mary Holste. Many years to all of them on such a great occasion. I fly out after Church on Sunday and fly home on Tuesday. My joy is increased…
Glory to God for All Things
Reading Scripture in an Orthodox Manner
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Recently my site has been visited with questions about Scripture, in particular (to start with) the Orthodox use of the title “Father” when Christ said, “Call no man on earth your father.” Actually I thought the response posted by William amply demonstrated how this verse should be understood. But there is a larger question – that of the use of Scripture and how it may be interpreted. The questioner claimed only be…
Glory to God for All Things
The Most Holy Mother of God
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On August 15, the Orthodox Church (new calendar) commemorates the Dormition (falling asleep) of the Most Holy Mother of God. The feast is considered to be one of the 12 Great Feasts of the year and thus an integral part of the proclamation of gospel of Jesus Christ. Many who are not familiar with Orthodoxy, or its manner of understanding saints, easily see feast days and the veneration of saints as distractions…
Glory to God for All Things
Healing the Heart
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The heart itself is but a small vessel, yet dragons are there, and there are also lions; there are poisonous beasts and all the treasures of evil. But there too is God, the angels, the life and the kingdom, the light and the apostles, the heavenly cities and the treasuries of grace—all things are there. (H.43.7) St. Macarius If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were…
Glory to God for All Things
St. Silouan and Love for Enemies
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The following is from the writings of St. Silouan, published in Elder Sophrony’s St. Silouan the Athonite. +++ The grace of God is not in the man who does not love his enemies. O merciful Lord, by Thy Holy Spirit teach us to love our enemies, and to pray for them with tears. O Lord, send down Thy Holy Spirit on earth that all nations may know Thee, and learn Thy love.…
Glory to God for All Things
Orthodox Patriarchs Call for Cease-Fire and End of Violence
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Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II of Georgia Tbilisi, August 8, Interfax – Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II of All Georgia is concerned with the situation in South Ossetia. He urged, “Both Georgian authorities and Ossetians, everyone who values human life and peaceful development of the country to spare no effort to cease fire and solve disputes peacefully.” “Georgian authorities stand for peaceful settlement of the conflict and are ready to carry out the policy of peace.…
Glory to God for All Things
Intercession
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I live in a small town that has a history of very active, civic involvement. It is not unusual to be approached and asked to sign a petition. Generally, I do not sign petitions. Often it is someone else’s issue and I’m not always clear what is being asked of me. By the same token, I am skeptical of democracy, except that everything else seems worse. When it comes to prayer and…
