Glory to God for All Things

Some part of me issues a “knee-jerk” reaction to the way our culture treats Christian holydays. We did this at Christmas, and we’re doing it again. For whatever reason, mainstream media have largely decided that Christian holy days are occasions for airing the most specious programs. Whether its more of the DaVinci nonsense or a focus on the “Christian Right,” almost everything but a quiet and reverent moment of reflection or something…

Today, is suspended upon the Cross, He Who suspended the Earth upon the waters. A crown of thorns crowns Him, Who is the King of the angels. He, Who wrapped the Heavens in clouds, is clothed with the purple of mockery. He, Who freed Adam in the Jordan, received buffetings. He was transfixed with nails, Who is the Bridegroom of the Church. He was pierced with a lance, Who is the Son…

  On this day the Church remembers Our Lord’s institution of the Sacrament of His Body and Blood. The Liturgy is that of St. Basil’s, which is used on all the Sundays of Lent as well. It is one of the most complete statements of the faith, despite its brevity (compared to Catechism or a book). Printed here is a portion of the Anaphora of St. Basil’s Liturgy, in the translation of Archbishop Dmitri…

Behold, the Bridegroom comes at midnight, and blessed is the servant whom He shall find watching; and again, unworthy is the servant whom He shall find heedless.  Beware, therefore, O my soul, do not be weighed down with sleep, lest you be given up to death and lest you be shut out of the Kingdom.  But rouse yourself crying: Holy, holy, holy, are Thou, O our God.  Through the Theotokos, have mercy…

Holy Week has long been my favorite time of year. I remember coming to it rather slowly in my college years. My wife and I were active Episcopalians at the time (while in college we volunteered to be in charge of the junior youth group – some 60 teenagers – that qualifies as being “active”). For whatever reasons I had never paid much attention to Holy Week before. There was Palm Sunday…

“Are we really going to do this?” Those were the words I greeted by dear wife with upon waking in our hotel room on February 15, 1998. We were in Columbia, SC, for the purpose of being received into the Orthodox Church by Father Peter Smith (then Rector of Holy Apostles in Columbia). Along with us were our four children, the oldest being 17 and the youngest age 7. This day that…

The title of this post is a chapter heading in George Gabriel’s Mary the Untrodden Portal of God. Gabriel occasionally strikes hard at the West and the book would perhaps be strengthened with a less combative approach to the differences of East and West in the faith (my own opinion), but I liked the book and found Gabriel addressing many things, well foot-noted, that are not found in many other places. I share…

Most of the services and words of Holy Week are the ones I expect – I’ve heard them before and though something will leap out at me as though I had never heard it (this always happens), I still feel somewhat secure that I know what is coming. In the Orthodox calendar, Holy Week begins on Lazarus Saturday, the day before Palm Sunday. The services bear some similarity, as is appropriate, to…