Faith Encouraged
Holy Tuesday – 5 Wise and 5 Foolish
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On this Holy Tuesday: Let us pray to the Lord. O you who observe all things with your eye that never sleeps, who afford us such saving lessons in your desire to grant mercy to all who seek it: We give thanks to you for raising us from bed and sleep to enjoy the light of another day. Receive this morning worship we offer you as we continue to follow the passion…
The Morning Offering
Praying Always
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Keeping Saint Paul’s challenge to pray always Although most of us can’t pray constantly, we can turn our entire day into one continuous prayerful offering by asking the Lord to accept all our good works, and our acts of charity, as prayer. We can even take a few moments throughout the day to utter what are called Arrow Prayers, where…
Glory to God for All Things
Let's Get Out Of This Place
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The Saturday before Palm Sunday is known as Lazarus Saturday among the Orthodox, and they celebrate Christ raising him from the dead just prior to His entrance into Jerusalem (gospel of John). It is a feast that offers something of a preview of Christ’s resurrection, and a foretaste of the General Resurrection at the End of the Age. Some years back I sat in a cave that is purported to be the grave of…
Father Bill's Blog
117. Holy Monday evening Bridegroom Matins, Holy Tuesday morning Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts
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It will help if you read the Gospel passages before you read this Post. Holy Monday evening Bridegroom Matins Gospel Reading: Matthew 22:15-46; 23:1-39 In tonight’s Gospel, the confrontation between Jesus and the authorities continues. They must stop this man. Killing him was the last option. The better way, the cleanest way was still to outwit him, discredit him. They’d had no success at this so far but now they try one more…
No Other Foundation
“It’s Like Déjà-Vu All Over Again”: Holy Week
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Walking an Ancient Path
Holy Week for Weary Pilgrims
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Faith Encouraged
Holy Monday – Fight Mediocrity!
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On this Holy Monday: Let us pray to the Lord, O you who observe all things with your eye that never sleeps, who afford us such saving lessons in your desire to grant mercy to all who seek it: We give you thanks for this evening that brings us before you once more. Now that we have completed the Lenten season, enable us to enter into the week of the Savior’s passion…
The Morning Offering
Palm Sunday
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Beholding our King on Palm Sunday Palm Sunday is the feast of the Church where we believers greet our Lord our king: the Word of God made flesh. He is greeted not simply as the One who came to us once riding on a donkey, but as the One who is always present with us, coming to us in at…
Father Bill's Blog
116. Palm Sunday evening Bridegroom Matins, Holy Monday morning Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts
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This week I’ll post articles daily to explain the services of this blessed Week. This is especially for the benefit of those who can’t make it to church. It will help if you first take out your Bible and read the Gospel lessons as noted, since I’ll do a lot of paraphrasing of the actual text. These Posts are based on Holy Week homilies I’ve given at Saint Nicholas, Cedarburg, over the last thirty…
The Morning Offering
Becoming a Philanthropist
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Becoming a home grown philanthropist As any history buff knows, these times we are living in can sometimes seem like reruns. News reports are filled with stories of wars, disasters, dictators, attacks on the innocent, increased crime, and the ever present persecution of Christians in various parts of the world. Political unrest is ramped, and genocide is being perpetrated upon…
Eastern Christian Insights
Accepting the Tension Between Our Expectations and God's Fulfillment : Homily for Palm Sunday in the Orthodox Church
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Philippians 4:4-9; John 12:1-18 In religion or anything else, we get used to whatever we get used to. We tend to take for granted whatever becomes normal, expected, and routine in our lives. Once we learn to see ourselves and the world in a certain way, it is easy to become blind to even the most obvious truths that challenge our perspective. The chief priests and Pharisees…
No Other Foundation
“It’s Like Déjà-Vu All Over Again”: Palm Sunday
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I have recently been asked to make available material from previous years’ blog pieces about the days of Holy Week and Pascha. The task reminds me of the memorable aphorism attributed to Yogi Berra, “It’s like déjà-vu all over again!” (The baseball star was known for such wonderful malapropisms, such as “Ninety percent of baseball is mental; the other half is physical” and “Always go to other people’s funerals; otherwise they won’t…
The Morning Offering
The Homeless
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Recognizing our shared humanity with the homeless Some forty years ago, I was walking with an elderly bishop of the Russian Church, on a street in San Francisco. I had spotted a filthy homeless man walking towards us. This man’s hair was disheveled, filthy with years of dirt, and was wearing torn clothing. He had no soles on his shoes,…
Glory to God for All Things
This Time Is That Time - Holy Week Thoughts
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At the very heart of traditional Christian worship is an understanding of time. “This time is that time.” When the Jews gathered for Passover and recited the words given to them, they said, “We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt.” Passover was not (and is not) a historical re-enactment, nor a simple memorial in which things done long ago are remembered. The key word is “we.” The events in Egypt and at…
The Whole Counsel Blog
The Testament of Jacob
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In preparing his Latin translation of the scripture, St. Jerome translated the Greek word “diatheke” and the Hebrew word “berith” with the Latin “testamentum.” From the latter word, the English word “testament” is derived. The original Hebrew term, “berith,” refers most commonly to treaty documents, and in its usage in the Torah particularly refers to a particular type of treaty, that issued by a suzerain to a vassal at a king’s accession to the throne. This usage is in view in the New Testament in every instance of its usage but one. To convey this usage, the word is generally translated “covenant.” The translators of the Hebrew scriptures into Greek translated the word with the Greek “diatheke” which is likewise…
Father Bill's Blog
115. An Introduction to Holy Week
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Lazarus Saturday There had been fake Messiahs here and there before. The authorities had always been able to discredit them, and their followers had disappeared into the woodwork. But now here was this Jesus at Bethany only two miles from Jerusalem, still going strong – pulling off this ‘fake miracle”, this supposed raising of a dead man. Many people were beginning to wonder: “Is this one really the Messiah?” He must be…
Faith Encouraged
The Freedom of God’s Judgement
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It’s got to be terribly frustrating to the enemy of our souls when God takes what the devil meant to harm us and turns it around to be for our benefit! I mean how would you feel if your best weapons turned out to harm you rather than your intended target! Take physical death, for example. We humans avoid the topic as often as we can. The fear of death drives most…
The Morning Offering
Complaining
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Complaining weakens our resolve If we are always complaining about how unfairly we are treated, we will have failed in our imitation of Christ, Who was abused by His enemies unto death. We should strive to reign with Our Lord by loving our enemies and never complain. Christ looked towards His Heavenly Father and when we are tempted to complain…
Roads from Emmaus
Should It Matter to Christians When Churches Burn?
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No Other Foundation
A Psalm for the Despairing
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There is a psalm found in the Six Psalms chanted at every Matins in the Orthodox Church that is unique among the psalms of the Psalter. Psalm 88 (87 in the Septuagint numeration) is a psalm that contains not a glimmer of light or hope. It begins with the words, “O Lord my God of my salvation, I call for help by day, I cry out in the night before You! Let…
Faith Encouraged
God Prevails
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There’s an old Gospel song I remember from my youth: “If heaven was never promised to me; even God’s promise to live eternally; it’s been worth just having the Lord in my life. Living in a world of darkness, He came along and brought me the Light.” People of faith have always been secretly envied by people who just can’t seem to believe. I guess that’s why others have treated people of…
The Morning Offering
An Update from the Old Monk
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An Update from the Old Monk I should be filled with rage against a brute who could perpetrate such an unwarranted attack against me, especially since I’d smiled at him, just prior to the sucker punch. In my mind I assumed he was approaching me with a request for money, or wanting to know what I was. Since I try,…
A Light So Lovely
What Aristotle Can Teach us About the Power of Literature
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Part of what I hope to achieve with this blog is not only a theoretical basis for cultivating a new Christian culture. I hope to show practically how it can be done. To begin that rather difficult process, I’d like to share the first half of a paper I wrote for my philosophy class in Holy Trinity Seminary. I hope this paper inspires your own input in the comment section. The Death…
Roads from Emmaus
Henry David Thoreau & Mary of Egypt
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Faith Encouraged
The Freedom of Love and Forgiveness
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It hurt. If I’m honest, it still hurts. I was taken advantage of. I was treated badly. I was embarrassed by my naivete, and I was angry at the one who had taken advantage of me. It was especially hard because I thought they loved me, and it was painful to finally realize they didn’t love me at all. I wanted revenge! But then I remembered the saying by Confucius – “Before…
The Morning Offering
PRAYERS REQUESTED
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PRAYERS REQUESTED Abbot Tryphon of the All-Merciful Saviour Monastery was attacked while pumping gas at a Burien, WA gas station Tuesday around noon. A random man came over, and sucker punched Abbot Tryphon in the face, knocking him to the ground. They had to wait for paramedics, and a sheriff came and took his report. Father Tryphon was with Father…
Faith Encouraged
God Transforms Unfairness to Advantage!
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There is a modern poverty, almost a sickness of the soul and mind, of we moderns that we seem to insist that there be an equality in outcomes rather than work for an equality of opportunity for everyone. When we fall into the trap of insisting there be an equality of outcomes, we easily fall into the prison of the illusion of “fairness.” And that always leads to someone being a perpetual…
