Glory to God for All Things
The Nature of Things and Our Salvation
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A number of you will remember this post from a year ago. It is foundational to many discussions on this site. I thought it might be helpful to post again – after all – new readers are always coming on board. +++ The nature of things is an important question to ask – or should I say an a priori question. For once we are able to state what is the nature…
Glory to God for All Things
The Freedom of Love - Two Selections
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“God created man like an animal who has received the order to become God,” says a deep saying of St. Basil, reported by St. Gregory of Nazianzus. To execute this order, one must be able to refuse it. God becomes powerless before human freedom; He cannot violate it since it flows from His own omnipotence. Certainly man was created by the will of God alone; be he cannot be deified by it…
Glory to God for All Things
The Wisdom of Man and the Foolishness of God
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The Feast of the Nativity, known sometimes in Orthodoxy as “the Winter Pascha,” is one of the great examples in the story of our salvation where the “foolishness of God” defeats the wisdom of man. It is not the story of an underdog defeating the mighty, but a revelation of who God is, and who we are – and what our salvation is all about. Nothing in the story of our salvation…
Glory to God for All Things
On the Porch in Nazareth
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During my pilgrimage to the Holy Land in September, I had an occasion that has become unforgettable. I had been in the Church of the Annunciation (Roman Catholic) which contains the home in which Mary lived when she was greeted by the angel Gabriel. Orthodox tradition holds that there was also a greeting at the well – and the Orthodox Church of St. Gabriel contains that holy site. Our pilgrimage had visited…
Glory to God for All Things
Traditional Byzantine Christmas Hymn in Arabic
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Glory to God for All Things
In Christ
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One of the most common phrases in the writings of St. Paul is “in Christ.” He uses this phrase so frequently that it is easy to overlook it and move on to something more interesting. My computer Bible program lists 73 verses in which he uses the phrase. As commonplace as it may be, it holds a world of understanding. It is interesting as well for what it does not say. St.…
Glory to God for All Things
The Smallness of God
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An annual December posting: Whom have we, Lord, like you – The Great One who became small, the Wakeful who slept, The Pure One who was baptized, the Living One who died, The King who abased himself to ensure honor for all. Blessed is your honor! St. Ephrem the Syrian We draw near to the Feast of our Lord’s Nativity, and I cannot fathom the smallness of God. Things in my life…
Glory to God for All Things
Lossky on Freedom and the Person
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Vladimir Lossky, who can be notoriously difficult to read, offers this observation on freedom and the person. It is taken from his essay, “The Creation,” in the small collection, Orthodox Theology: an Introduction. A personal being is capable of loving someone more than his own nature, more than his own life. The person, that is to say, the image of God in man, is then man’s freedom with regard to his nature,…
Glory to God for All Things
Living the Paradox
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The doctrines of the Christian faith are full of paradox. It is a reality that we sometimes forget – our familiarity can make us deaf to its jarring sounds: A virgin is a mother. Death is defeated by death. He who seeks to save his life will lose it. He who loses his life for my sake will save it. I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live. Yet not I, but…
Glory to God for All Things
What Do Angels Guard?
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It is a commonplace in our culture to speak of guardian angels, particularly when we have come close to a physical disaster and survived. Thus, a near-miss in an auto-accident, or even a survival from a terrible accident, conversation often lightly turns to mention of “my guardian angel.” Of course, such references also raise the question about those who do not survive their accidents, or when near-misses become “head-on.” Are we to…
Glory to God for All Things
Would You Believe...
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Would you believe that this is absolutely the most popular post on Glory to God for All Things? I mean, it has about 15,000 views. The comments are quite interesting, including a comment from a direct descendant of Mother Goose. To read the comments, go here. This delightful old English prayer said by children and their parents at bedtime has long ago been shortened to only its last verse. There is more (as…
Glory to God for All Things
The Luminous Eye
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Blessed is the man who has acquired a luminous eye with which he will see how much the angels stand in awe of Thee, O Lord, and how audacious is man. St. Ephrem the Syrian The Seraph could not touch the fire’s coal with his fingers, but just brought it close to Isaiah’s mouth: the Seraph did not hold it, Isaiah did not consume it, but us our Lord has allowed to…
Glory to God for All Things
Bad Icons
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And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being changed into His likeness from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit (2 Corinthians 3:18). It is a teaching of the Fathers concerning the holy icons that we do not truly “see” them if we have no reverence for that which they depict. Icons are “windows into heaven,” but…
Glory to God for All Things
Apophaticism
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It is impossible to know God – but you have to know Him to know that.
Glory to God for All Things
The Soul as Mystery
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Readers would not be surprised to know that I am particularly drawn to the writings of Dostoevsky and of Solzhenitsyn. What draws me is the Orthodoxy that underlies them – especially their treatment of the human soul. Both authors have a reverence for the human soul that allows their characters to be more than words on a page. There is a mystery that is unknown to the character and, more especially, unknown…
Glory to God for All Things
Waking Up
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The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom (Psalm 111:10). This fear descends on us from on High. It is a spiritual feeling, firstly of God and then of us ourselves. We live in a state of awe by virtue of the presence of the Living God together with awareness of our own impurity. This fear places us before the Face of God to be judged by Him. We have…
Glory to God for All Things
Memory Eternal!
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His Holiness, Patriarch Alexei II of Moscow and of All Russia, fell asleep today in his home near Moscow. He was elected as Patriarch in 1990 at the critical moment when the winds of freedom were at last blowing through the Orthodox Church in Russia. The nearly two decades since that event have been years of tumultous change in Russia and in the Orthodox world. There were no clear road maps for…
Glory to God for All Things
What Shall This Man Do?
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From the Desert Fathers: A brother asked the abba Poemen, saying, “If I should see my brother’s fault, is it good to hide it? The old man said to him, “In what hour we do cover up our brother’s sins, God shall cover ours: and in what hour we do betray our brother’s shames, in like manner God shall betray our own.” Recent comments have raised the perennial question of our responsibility…
Glory to God for All Things
Don't Do That
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A dear friend, who is a Russian monk, was among the earliest Orthodox clergy to visit in our mission in its first two years. Most of my parish had never met a monk, much less one who was as serious in demeanor. My son (now an adult) was then 11 years old and served in the altar. The monk had a simple way of correcting the altar servers (and occasionally parishioners who…
Glory to God for All Things
Sitting in a Cave
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During my pilgrimage to the Holy Land in September, I had the opportunity to spend time at the Monastery of St. Saba in the Judaean Desert. Clinging to cliffs overlooking the Valley of Jezreel, it is the oldest continually-functioning monastery in the Orthodox world. It is hot (particularly in the summer), and even the caves give little relief during the day. There have been many great monastics and martyrs who have lived…
Glory to God for All Things
It Is But A Small Thing
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I have noticed in my daily struggle that most of the things that are of importance turn on very “small things.” The decisions that set me on the course of prayer or kindness are made not with fanfare or even large efforts, but on a moment’s turn. By the same token, the decisions that set me on a course of sin are often so small that I can hardly notice that they…
Glory to God for All Things
Beauty and God
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This is a reprint of an article from earlier this year. I found it worth re-reading. Everything is beautiful in a person when he turns toward God, and everything is ugly when it is turned away from God. Fr. Pavel Florensky I come to the end of a day that has been filled with other activity and little time for writing. But in my reading at bedtime I came across the above…
Glory to God for All Things
The Problem with Lying
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Anyone familiar with Scripture will be aware of the commandment: “Thou shalt not bear false witness.” Lying is treated as a problem from the earliest moments of Scripture. Adam and Eve fail to speak the truth in a direct manner when questioned about their breaking of the commandment and eating of the forbidden fruit. The New Testament shows at least as much concern with the subject. St. Paul states in very simple…
Glory to God for All Things
The Act of Giving Thanks as a Way of Life
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The act of giving thanks is among the most fundamental acts of love. It lies at the very heart of worship – in which, in the words of Archimandrite Zacharias, there is an exchange. In giving thanks we make an offering which itself is always inferior to what we have received – but which is itself an enlargement of the human heart. To live rightly in the presence and communion of God…
Glory to God for All Things
Give Thanks In All Things
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I heard this from Archimandrite Zacharius, the disciple of the Elder Sophrony: The Elder Sophrony once said that if a man would give thanks always and for everything, he would have kept the saying which Christ gave to St. Silouan: “Keep your mind in hell and despair not.” I pondered this statement for a long time. For more than 30 years I had been aware of the famous dictum of St. Silouan…
Glory to God for All Things
The Tree in my Backyard
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I have given this posting a very prosaic title in order to help readers focus on precisely what I am saying. In my previous post on icons – I noted that even the world functions as an icon – but, undoubtedly, having put that in a very theological context, most readers think simply about the traditional icons found in Orthodox Churches. Instead I want to talk about the tree in my backyard.…
Glory to God for All Things
The Role of Icons
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Icons are not about art. Icons are not about left-overs of Byzantine style. Icons are not about the idolatrous impulse within fallen humanity. Icons are about the very nature of our salvation. The history of Western theology, particularly the opposition to icons within the Protestant movement, has removed one of the most traditional components of Christian theology and handicapped the modern imagination and understanding of our relationship to God. Our encounters with…
