Glory to God for All Things
Where the Heart Resides
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One of the questions that surrounds the knowledge of God, as spoken of by the Scriptures and the Fathers of the Eastern Church, is that of where the heart resides. By this, I do not mean where the heart is located (in the chest or wherever), but where the heart itself lives. Though the heart is by no means disconnected from our rationality, it is also resident in many other places of…
Glory to God for All Things
Many years! Fr. Al
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I read with sadness that Fr. Al Kimel is ending his blog, Pontifications. I would not be writing here except for his gracious invitation several years ago to write occasional pieces on his blog. It was his suggestion as well that I try to do this on my own. These are only two of many kindnesses (and among the smallest) I have received from him over the years. His farewell note goes…
Glory to God for All Things
Ars Gratia Artis
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This is for my daughter – who is a young artist and in the Governor’s School for the Arts this summer. I say this is for her – though I’m not sure she reads the blog everyday – and, of course, I’m letting the rest of you thousand or two people read it, too, so I guess this is for all of us. The question: what is art? I watched a wonderful…
Glory to God for All Things
Fools for Christ - Remembering What Matters
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I have been viewing the movie, Ostrov, which I reviewed here, simply because watching it feeds me where watching something else would not. I think I have been particularly fed by mediatating on the actions of the character of Fr. Anatoly, who is something of a “fool for Christ.” He is not the most learned (not learned at all particularly) but he knows what a man must know: God. In that, he…
Glory to God for All Things
On a Birthday - Many Years!
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Please indulge me in a personal post – I will be in Murfreesboro, TN, visiting with my youngest daughter who is in Governor’s School this summer on Saturday of this week, and on Sunday, my family and I will observe the birthday of my wife. My wish for “Many Years!” is for my wife for whom I give thanks to God constantly. I will be back to blogging regularly come Monday morning.…
Glory to God for All Things
The Struggle in Prayer
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Prayer is infinite creation, the supreme art. Over and over again we experience an eager upsurge towards God, followed only by a falling away from His light. Time and again we are conscious of the mind’s inability to rise to Him. There are moments when we feel ourselves on the verge of insanity. ‘Thou didst give me Thy precept to love but there is no strength in me for love. Come and…
Glory to God for All Things
John the Baptist and Forerunner of the Lord
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We approach the feast of the Nativity of the Forerunner of Christ – a feast noted around my household for also being the birthday of my wife (and of her brother). Thus we celebrate and are sometimes slightly distracted from the ecclesiatical meaning of the day. But a family cannot be faulted for the joy it takes in its mother, nor I in my spouse. But I want to turn my thoughts…
Glory to God for All Things
Orthodoxy and Torture
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I generally try to respond to questions, when asked, though my main guidance in writing is to follow what seems good to me and that which I have some experience in. Therefore the limited range of topics… However in one of the comments recently, I was asked to consider a post on the Orthodox Church’s view on torture and “enhanced interrogation.” First, let me say that I have never served in the…
Glory to God for All Things
To Know God
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I have had some correspondence recently on the subject of knowing God. The knowledge of God, generally spoken of in a very experiential manner, is an absolute foundation in Orthodox theology. Nothing replaces it – no dogmatic formula – no Creed – not even Scripture – though Orthodoxy would see none of these things as separate from the knowledge of God. But the questions I have received are very apt. In a…
Glory to God for All Things
The Church of the Unanxious God
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The story of the conversion of Metropolitan Kallistos Ware to Orthodoxy has more or less passed over into modern Orthodox legend. He accidentally stumbles into a Vigil service in order to get out of a rain storm. Discovering Orthodoxy and its beauty he begins to inquire into conversion only to be told to go back to his Anglican Church (he was not a clergyman, by the way). When eventually he does convert,…
Glory to God for All Things
Moses and the Unknowable God
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Last week, while conducting a retreat for youth at Sts. Mary and Martha monastery, we concentrated on the topic of “Who Am I?” It seemed to me an appropriate topic for an age where youth are frequently struggling with issues of identity. They live in a socially dangerous world – the cruelty of young teenagers towards one another can be brutal – thus it is not an age of risk-taking. Young people…
Glory to God for All Things
Now Lay Aside All Earthly Cares
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Glory to God for All Things
A Day at a Time
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One of my favorite books, for many years, has been Solzhenitsyn’s One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich: A Novel. It’s hard at first thought to say what draws me to the book (I’ve probably read it ten times). It makes occasional remarks that are religious but it would not be described as an overtly religious novel. Though it’s set in largely the same place and time of the books on…
Glory to God for All Things
The One Thing Needful
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Having spent half of the last week at Sts. Mary and Martha Monastery, it is unavoidable to think about these Holy Myrrhbearers. Among those who were the first witnesses of Christ’s resurrection, these Myrrhbearing women are perhaps better known for their conversations with Christ when he visited in their home and at the time of their brother Lazarus’ death. In our encounters with them in the gospel we learn that Martha was…
Glory to God for All Things
Why is Love so difficult?
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As I’ve noted, I’m on retreat with about 15 youth at a monastery. Our topic has been freedom and love – the two most important things necessary in our journey to become fully what God has created us to be. It’s not a complicated subject. “Everybody’s in favor of love,” Fr. Thomas Hopko says. What then, is so difficult about love? Of course, love is not difficult as a topic. As discussions…
Glory to God for All Things
On the Shoulders of Giants
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One of the peculiar things (though not really) about the Orthodox Church in America (and by this I mean all the jurisdictions) is the fact that in a little over 200 years on this continent, we have been blessed by the showing forth of many saints. And not only have saints been shown forth, but many of those saints have been among our hierarchs. Men such as St. Innocent of Alaska and Metropolitan…
Glory to God for All Things
From a Monastery in the Deep South
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I am leading a retreat with young teens this week. All prayers are welcome. This is my evening break time to read comments and relax a moment. My thanks to my wife for checking on comments during the day and clearing the spam. The joy is to be with youth and to here their voices lifted to God. This has been an almost annual event for me since 1999. I have much…
Glory to God for All Things
The Level of Difficulty
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In the past weeks and months I have posts entitled, “How hard is it?” “How much is enough?” “How Much is Too Little?” “What is at Stake?” In all of these I have pointed towards the maximum as the standard by which we live the Christian faith – even if we cannot live at the maximum standard. This neatly coincides with the Scriptural notion of sin as “missing the mark.” Of course,…
Glory to God for All Things
Music from Heaven
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Glory to God for All Things
On Hope in God alone and on Confidence in Him
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Although, as we have said, it is very important not to rely on our own efforts in this unseen warfare, at the same time, if we merely give up hope of ourselves and despair of ourselves without having found another support, we are certain to flee immediately from the battlefield or to be overcome and taken prisoner by our enemies. Therefore, together with complete renunciation of our selves, we should plant in…
Glory to God for All Things
A Prayer Request
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I was deeply embarrassed when I came home this evening, checked the web site and found that a flagrant piece of filth had managed to slip through the various screenings and post itself on my site. I apologize to any who may have seen it before I was able to remove it. I will continue to work with the WordPress management to prevent such things. More than that – if you are…
Glory to God for All Things
New Martyrs from Optina
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Glory to God for All Things
Can There Be Morality on the Moon?
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I rarely refer people to a blog article by someone whom I don’t know. But I was recently directed to an article by William Gairdner that does an excellent job of looking at the fact that none of us lives in a “moral bubble.” Our lives are always connected to the lives of others. In Orthodoxy this is a fundamental doctrine of the nature of persons. His article, though largely exploring the…
Glory to God for All Things
Lost in Translation
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Engaging in conversations about the Orthodox faith – with others born and nurtured in the West – I sometimes feel that something is “lost in translation.” I say, “Church,” and something else comes to the listener’s mind: either something Roman or something Protestant, perhaps Anglican. I begin to explain that Orthodoxy cannot be explained or defined in terms of either Rome or Protestantism, for Orthodoxy did not come from Rome or from Protestantism…
Glory to God for All Things
What Is at Stake?
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In the struggle to come to the wholeness of Personhood – to become the “true self” rather than to sink into the “false self” our very existence as spiritual beings is at stake. If you read across Orthodox books that center on the issue of Personhood – a common theme becomes visible. Our fall and our brokenness leave us vulnerable, even in our religious efforts, to the development of a “false self”…
Glory to God for All Things
Hopko on the Cross of Christ
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An excerpt from Fr. Thomas Hopko’s commencement address at St. Vladimir’s. The whole is the address is exquisitely true and I would encourage you to read all of it. The link to the whole commencement address is given at the bottom of this post. …I can tell you that being loved by God, and loving Him in return, is the greatest joy given to creatures, and that without it there is no…
Glory to God for All Things
Hope and the Heart - Fr. Dmitri Staniloae
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The following comes from Fr. Dmitri Staniloae’s Orthodox Spirituality. (pg. 178) You have the experience of the congestion [crowdedness] of the heart when you are disturbed, and “ample room” when you are peaceful. But uneasiness, in regard to the future is the fruit of uncertainty, just as peace is the fruit of certainty. Care is the offspring of the fear of the future, thus of uncertainty, of the timidity that it won’t…
