Glory to God For All Things

April 19, 2019

This Time Is That Time – Holy Week Thoughts

At the very heart of traditional Christian worship is an understanding of time. “This time is that time.” When the Jews gathered for Passover and recited the words given to them, they said, “We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt.” Passover was not (and is not) a historical re-enactment, nor a simple memorial in which […]
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Holy Week, Modernity, Reflections, Time
April 15, 2019

With Envy and Justice for All

We use many words and concepts in our daily lives without bothering to consider their true content. In my experience, few words are less examined than “justice.” It is a word that is foundational in the modern world with deep roots in religious tradition. Most people would agree that the desire for justice is virtually […]
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Enemies, Heart, Morality, Reflections
April 9, 2019

As Lent Moves On – The Greatest Fast Awaits

As Great Lent has passed its mid-point, attention begins to move towards Holy Week itself and its very intense focus. It has been an unusual time for me, having traveled on two successive weekends to lead retreats. Travel is always disruptive, and absence from your own community creates a break in the normal continuity of […]
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Communion, Pascha, Reflections, Union with God
April 4, 2019

The Ladder of Divine Ascent and Moral Improvement

The Fourth Sunday of Great Lent in the Orthodox Church, is dedicated to St. John Climacus, the author of the ancient work, The Ladder of Divine Ascent. It is a classic work describing “steps” within the life of the struggling ascetic. There is an icon associated with this work, picturing monastics climbing the rungs of […]
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Modernity, Morality, Reflections
March 29, 2019

A Modern Lent

Few things are as difficult in the modern world as fasting. It is not simply the action of changing our eating habits that we find problematic – it’s the whole concept of fasting and what it truly entails. It comes from another world. We understand dieting – changing how we eat in order to improve […]
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Fasting, Modernity, Reflections
March 25, 2019

The Mystery, Upborne, Fulfilled

Orthodoxy has a number of “favorite” words – all of which fall outside the bounds of normal speech. Though we commonly use the word “mystery” (for example), popular speech never uses it in the manner of the Church. I cannot remember using the word “fullness,” or even “fulfilled,” in normal speech. More contemporary words have […]
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Liturgy, Mystical Theology, Reflections, The Sacraments
March 20, 2019

When Icons Became Windows

Some thirty years ago I was doing doctoral work at Duke University under Geoffrey Wainwright. I was drawn to Wainwright on account of his commitment to liturgical tradition and practice as the ground of theology. A course that became a turning point in my studies was on the nature of language in theology. Like all […]
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Icons, Knowledge of God, Orthodox Christianity, Reflections
March 16, 2019

Truth, Lies and Icons

As verbal beings, we live in a world of icons. We experience the world in an iconic fashion. A major difficulty for us is that we have lost the vocabulary of iconic reality. We have substituted the language of photography. The dissonance between reality and our photographic assumptions has led us to doubt both. Man […]
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Existence, Icons, Knowledge of God, Reflections
March 11, 2019

Facing Up to God

And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. 2 Cor. 3:18 Among the most striking of all images in St. Paul’s writing is his description of beholding the glory of God with an unveiled face. It’s […]
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Knowledge of God, Reflections, Salvation
March 9, 2019

Forgiveness and the Whole Adam

I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; (John17:20-21) The Elder Sophrony, together with St. Silouan, wrote about the “whole Adam.” By this, they meant all the human beings who have ever existed and those yet to come. For Silouan and Sophrony, this was […]
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Dostoevsky, Forgiveness

Thank you so much Byron!

Praying for you, Dee! May God hold you close.

Father, I so appreciate your words. I’ve been suffering a lot over the last night and today. It helps to…

Mark, I think “responsible for” does not quite get at his meaning. It’s not that he’s saying that I must…

Father Stephen, [quote]The character, Father Zossima, in The Brothers Karamazov, teaches that “each man is guilty of the sins of…