The Church has the same task in whatever land it takes root and finds itself, namely that of making disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Trinity, and of teaching them to observe all that Christ commanded.  How it goes about fulfilling this task, however, varies with time and place. For example, in Russia and Ukraine, where the Orthodox faith was planted over a thousand years ago and…
Quiet confession just between us: nostalgic freak that I am, I still like listening to old songs from the Christian folk group “Children of the Day”. The group was one of the earliest Jesus People music groups, and consisted of four young people, headed by Marsha Carter. They were most famous for the song “For Those Tears I Died” (also known as “Come to the Waters”) written by Marsha shortly after her…
I have been reading liberal theology since my college days—i.e. theologies which deny many, most, or all of the major tenets of the traditional Christian Faith. The theologies are as many and as varied as their authors, but they all share a conviction that Jesus of Nazareth didn’t say and do all the things which the New Testament recorded that He said and did, that the Gospels are not to be trusted…
The earliest Church, from the days of the apostles and into the first centuries, had an abundant share of guts and what everyone else regarded as perversity. Its claims were so outrageous that it was hard for the average Jew or Greek or Roman to take them seriously. Those claims began immediately after the crucifixion of Jesus. A small group of His followers—about 120 in number, hardly enough to show up in…
I sometimes tell inquirers at St. Herman’s when they ask that I began my Christian life in earnest as a Jesus People—which usually results in blank stares, since most of them are too young to have heard of the cultural phenomenon known as the Jesus People Movement. The movement has recently come up again for notice in a film called “Jesus Revolution”, based on the true events of the founding of Calvary…
I cannot be the only one who has had the experience of visiting a non-Orthodox church service and finding it stunningly empty and plain. After long familiarity with Orthodox worship with its icons, incense, candles, vestments, Gospel books, and crosses, attending such services produces a kind of sensory deprivation, rather like sensory overload in reverse. Entering those churches and experiencing their services left me looking around almost madly for something focus and…
