About two weeks ago I issued an extraordinary personal appeal through this blog asking for the support necessary to meet an unprecedented financial need, as our parish of St. Herman’s Church in Langley, B.C. struggled to meet a huge and unforeseen challenge in completing our building programme and erecting a new temple.  I am happy, relieved, and (truth to tell) more than a little surprised to report that, thanks to the extraordinary…

The story of Cain and Abel is the story of the human race.  It is tragically timeless, for it is tirelessly enacted over and over again in every generation.  As Larry Norman once queried (as aged historians may remember from his song “Nothing Really Changes”), “Will Cain kill Abel—with a bayonet?”  Regardless of the choice of weapon, somewhere and some place that murder is happening even now as you are reading this.…

The title of this blog piece is the title of a book written by Bishop Maxim Vasiljevic, bishop of Los Angeles and Western America of the Serbian Orthodox Church.  (I trust he will forgive not being capitalized.). The book is an extraordinary one, containing a series of disconnected essays on various themes, each preceded by a painting done by His Grace.  That a bishop should be an artist as well as a…

In my Protestant days, I had no problem with anyone talking about Mary—so long as it was Christmas.  On Boxing Day, that was it.  Over.  No more talking about Mary.  What are we anyway, Catholics?  It was understood that when we packed away the Nativity set, all talk of Mary got packed up along with it.  And my proof that Bible-believing Christians should not talk about Mary?  The New Testament never did. …

This is an extraordinary personal appeal, one which I do not make lightly. St. Herman of Alaska Church in Langley, B.C., Canada (of which I have been pastor since 1987) is in the process of building a new church temple on our property, and are about half completed.  Our church community has already raised thousands of dollars from within our membership to complete this project.  We were under the impression from our…

In 1956 an American game show debuted called “To Tell the Truth”.  Each round of the game introduced three people all claiming to be the same person, and a team of panelists would ask them questions.  Those pretending to be the real (usually famous) person would make up answers, while the real person would answer truthfully.  The inquiring panelists would then guess which was the real person.  The host of the show…