Glory to God For All Things

Vast numbers of people with no experience of the beneficial action of prayer do not know that a world of indescribably magnitude is disclosed to the spirit of man through prayer. Prayer unfolds both the dark depths of hell and the luminous heavenly spheres. Without faith in the resurrection almost all suffering is without meaning, […]

An earlier form of this article appeared in 2007. Our first child was born over 27 years ago. I remember feeling completely overwhelmed by the event – staggered at the seriousness of what had happened in my life. Evey aspect of her coming into our life was new – and I felt completely unprepared. On her […]

A Hermit said, “We fail to make progress because we do not comprehend our capacity. We weary of the work we have started. We want to be good without making any effort.” From the Sayings of the Desert Fathers There is a popular cultural statement, “I’m only human,” that serves to make excuse for our […]

Khouria Frederica Mathewes-Green, a long-time friend and well-known Orthodox writer, has an excellent piece in First Things that I had not seen (it’s almost a year old). A friend sent me a link and I deeply enjoyed the read. It is a creative use of sources that I really appreciate in a writer – someone […]

Having just posted “ten books of influence,” (by request) –  I’ve been reflecting on the role of books in the Orthodox life. I’ll start with the story of a brief encounter: During my years as an Anglican priest, I continued to read Orthodox writings, a practice that had begun in college. I worked on “digesting” […]

And Christ said unto them, “It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power” (Acts 1:7) We live in difficult times, and for some of us the times are more difficult than others. We also live in a culture of apocalypticism, in which […]