Author: Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick

The Very Rev. Archpriest Andrew Stephen Damick is Chief Content Officer of Ancient Faith Ministries, former pastor (2009-2020) of St. Paul Antiochian Orthodox Church of Emmaus, Pennsylvania, and author of The Lord of Spirits, Arise, O God, Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy, Bearing God and An Introduction to God. He is co-host of the following podcasts: The Lord of Spirits (with Fr. Stephen De Young), The Areopagus (with Michael Landsman), and Amon Sûl (with Richard Rohlin). He is also host of The Orthodox Pilgrim, Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy, Orthodox Engagement, and Roads from Emmaus. With Richard Rohlin he is collaborating on the major documentary series The Wolf and the Cross. You can follow him on YouTube, Facebook, Telegram and Instagram.

Same-Sex Pair Uses Orthodox Wedding Service

· Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick
[HuffPo] Manhattan saw many couples married that day, but one wedding was different, not only because it was two men being married in a Christian church, nor because they were joined by 80 supportive family members, nor even because it was a fully legal marriage of a same-sex couple, but also because two thinly handcrafted silver metal hoops, seven inches in diameter,…

Dancing Bishops Greet the Pope (and Other Such Nonsense)

· Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick
Even if I were somehow able to be convinced of Rome’s unique dogmas, stuff like the above is one of the main reasons I could never become a Roman Catholic. I have been told by Rome’s apologists that these kinds of things are really just “abuses” and that the “true” culture and worship of Rome shouldn’t be like this. But if a…

“Aren’t You Supposed to Hate Me?”: Calvinism and the Politics of the Damned

· Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick
The following article was originally published on the Roads from Emmaus weblog in May of 2012, just after the passage of a constitutional amendment defining marriage by the state of North Carolina. Given recent national-level discussions about marriage in the United States and what they mean for the theology of man, and especially given that the Supreme Court opined that legal support…

“A Premodern Sacramental Eclectic”?: Evangelicals Reaching for Tradition

· Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick
An Evangelical friend who is interested in Orthodoxy sent this link to me: Ten years ago I was a poverty-stricken Christian…and I didn’t even know it. My poverty was theological and it was the sad consequence of my arrogant sectarianism. By restricting my Christianity to the narrow confines of modern charismatic evangelicalism I suffered from a self-inflicted theological poverty. I needed the…

Medical Study “Proves” Speaking in Tongues has Divine Origin

· Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick
The video above is from several years ago, but I came across it and thought it was worth commenting on briefly. This is interesting in a number of ways. One major drawback in the reporting is that the Pentecostal practice of speaking in tongues (glossolalia) is not presented as what it is — the practice of only one sector of Protestantism. Rather,…

Did Pope Francis say everyone will be saved by doing good?

· Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick
Enormous theological ignorance and bad reading exploded onto the scene this week: Pope Francis Says Atheists Who Do Good Are Redeemed, Not Just Catholics (An earlier version had this headline: “Pope Francis Says All Who Do Good Are Redeemed – Atheists included.”) (Huffington Post) Pope Francis rocked some religious and atheist minds today when he declared that everyone was redeemed through Jesus,…

Is Jesus coming back in the next 40 years?

· Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick
It seems that nearly half of Christians in America think that Jesus is coming back by the time we could be swearing in an occupant for the 67th term for a President of the United States: (Pew Forum) According to a 2010 Pew Research Center survey, roughly half (48%) of Christians in the U.S. say they believe that Christ will definitely (27%)…

Should I want everyone to become Orthodox?

· Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick
I recently ran across on Facebook a group named “Catholic & Orthodox: Steps Towards a Reunited Church,” which naturally interested me since I am, among other things, keen to understand how Orthodoxy compares and relates with Rome and vice versa. It’s always hard to figure out exactly what the character of these groups is at first blush, even from reading their official…

Pope Francis: One Patriarch Among Many?

· Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick
(RealClearReligion: Reading the Franciscan Tea Leaves) In his inaugural address from the loggia, he never once used the words “pope” or “pontiff” or their cognates. (There is nothing wrong with either term: pope comes from the Greek for “father” and “pontiff” in Latin means bridge-builder.) Instead he consistently referred to Rome now having a bishop again. This is extremely significant because of…

Two Chairs of Peter: Reform, Orthodoxy and the Papacy

· Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick
Update: At the request of Ancient Faith Radio, this post has been recorded for your listening edification. In the anticipation preceding yesterday’s election of the new Roman pontiff, especially what with the American media’s constant chatter about reform for the Roman Catholic Church, I could not help but be reminded of a somewhat less-anticipated primatial election that is still fresh in the…