The annual celebration of our Lord’s Resurrection comes and goes each year along with so many other important events and activities. Inherent in our busy lives is the risk that this day, Pascha, may become a little too much like every other holiday or celebration. In time, life itself can become a rather flat...
More »
By the end of this month we will enter into the period of the year known as Great Lent. The season culminates with the celebration of the Lord’s Resurrection at the Vigil on Saturday night. The journey itself is an arduous one full of many opportunities to increase our practice of a Christian way...
More »
For those of you who know me well you are aware that I love warm and sunny days. This time of year I am always surprised by how short the days become. Of course the days will continue to grow shorter until we reach the end of December. With this turn of the seasons...
More »
Most of us have heard about Christmas in July and the annual sales many stores host six months before Christmas. Yet it is unlikely you have heard of New Year’s Day in September. Well believe it or not that is when the Church celebrates the New Year, on September 1. So what is going...
More »
Each year during the first fifteen days of August our Church honors the Mother of God in a special way. The time period is known as the Dormition Fast. It begins on August 1 and concludes on August 15 with the celebration of the Divine Liturgy. During these two weeks the Church observes a...
More »
Summertime comes as a welcome break for millions of children the world over. Adults also look forward to summer, when schedules relax and long summer days give us more time to enjoy the outdoors and one another. With summer, as with the changing of every season, our mindset often changes and the particulars of...
More »
From the Orthodox Study Bible… One of the tragic aberrations of so-called modern religion is the presence of “Churchless Christianity.” The assertion is that it is Christ who saves us, not the Church, so “all you need is Jesus.” Few who claim to be Christians would argue against the statement that it...
More »
From the Orthodox Study Bible… Virtually all students of the Bible realize there was liturgical worship in Israel. Immediately after the giving of the Ten Commandments (Ex. 20:1-17), instructions for building the altar were set forth (Ex. 20:24-26). Then comes instruction concerning keeping the Sabbath (Ex. 23:10-13), the annual feasts (Ex. 23:14-19) and...
More »
In the first article in this series I examined the ultimate challenge each community faces, that of becoming a community of love. The second article in this series, looked at what it means to love, and the preconditions needed for love to exist. In this last article, we will examine the Ultimate model of...
More »
Not too long ago, a friend of mine who is not Orthodox challenged me with the following question: he wondered why Orthodox Christians couldn’t just get back to the Bible and use it as a means, like other Christian denominations had, for agreeing over what Christianity truly is. This same friend was concerned that...
More »
