Almost all sicknesses come from lack of trust in God, which produces stress. Stress is responsible for the obliteration of the religious sense. Unless you really love Christ, unless you concern yourself with holy matters, you’ll certainly be filled with melancholy and wickedness.
Loneliness God is joy. Secular life is sorrow. For forty years, as though the presence of God were a toxin in our culture, schools and public square, many of America’s leaders have been zealously working to detoxify our land. Not surprisingly, the more secularized we have become the more sorrowful we have become. Now here is an amazing disconnect. Why is it that Americahas never been so Christian and yet so joyless? A greater percentage of our population identifies itself as Christian than at any time in our nation’s history, yet we are by all observable phenomena radically depressed. How are we to explain such an anomaly? The normal state of internal affairs for Christians is expressed by St. Peter, “Jesus ...
Sts. Cyril and Methodios, Enlighteners of the Slavs – Patron Saints of the Hellenic Home for the Aged in Toronto The Hellenic Home for the Aged in Toronto has two locations, one in west Toronto and the other in east end of the city. The parish in east Toronto, located inside the nursing home, is dedicated to Sts. Cyril and Methodios, Enlighteners of the Slavs. On May 10th, the eve of the feast of Sts. Cyril and Methodios, a Hierarchical Great Vespers was held there. Great Vespers was presided by His Eminence Metropolitan Sotirios, assisted by Fr. G. Nikiforakis (Parish Priest), Fr. C. Socosan (Parish Priest of the Holy Unmercenaries Church at the other Hellenic Home location), along with other clergymen. Since the ...
It is our pleasure to invite you to GRIBOI’s 27th annual conference, In Athens, Greece from 18-20 May 2017. For many years the GRIBOI association, under M. Bohner’ s successful presidency, has been bringing together the Basic Sciences in Chemistry, Bioengineering and Biocompatibility, in collaboration with Medical Doctors from Interventional Radiology, Neurosurgeons and Orthopedics, allowing us as a group to step into the future of new biocompatible devices and materials for percutaneous interventions. Our 2017 meeting will be held in partnership with the “Hellenic Society of Nanotechnology in Health Sciences” aiming to focus upon three major pillars: Interdisciplinary Collaboration, Image Guided Therapy and Injectable Materials. We want to enhance your experience in the world of existing solutions, but also explore potential future materials in ...
We will avoid the condemnation of our conscience, the pollution of our hearts and, above all the aversion of God when we make conscious use of our time and tread the path of this life in justice and wisdom, bearing with courage the burden and heat of the day all the days of our whole life.
In a homily on the Sunday of the Samaritan Woman, the shepherd of Thessaloniki, Saint Gregory Palamas, mentions that, from the moment that Jesus confessed that He is the Christ, the woman immediately became completely committed to spreading the Gospel, leaving everything behind and bringing many of the Samaritans to Jesus Christ. And so, the rest of her luminous life as Saint Foteini was stamped with her martyrdom and her love for Our Lord Jesus Christ. In the case of the Samaritan woman, Jesus first brought her to an awareness of her sinfulness, revealed to her that He knew the secrets of her heart, illumined the dark points of her life and then created an internal crisis of conscience within ...
Does being a Christian mean always having to say you’re sorry? When outsiders look at the Roman Catholic rite of confession (now more often termed "reconciliation"), they suspect it is driven by feelings of masochistic self-hatred, and sustained by claims of sacerdotal magic. Why should we have to spend this life groveling over sins, if Jesus already paid for them on the Cross? Why should we speak sins out loud to another person, when it could remain between us and the bedpost? And why should we believe that a priest stands between us and God, forgiving or retaining our debts as he chooses? Two new books from Roman Catholic authors attempt to make the case for regular sacramental confession. Scott Hahn, ...
The whole series can be read here: The Theology of Gender The examination and interpretation of the canons should be done in consideration of overall legislation. St. Basil and all the Fathers do not act as individuals in the name of their own will, but as persons that are in communion with God, therefore they express the consciousness of the Church. The experience of the Church on issues of spiritual guidance and assistance for Christians is compacted in the canonical tradition, which is part of the Holy Tradition. Still, according to Romanides, the way of interpreting and using the canons can be dangerous for the spiritual life of people, if he who applies the canons is not qualified for this demanding ...
Those who are treated unjustly by others but bear this gladly, with patience, are sheltered by God, so that they don’t sin. God also gives them comfort commensurate to their sorrow.
Cradle Orthodox You no doubt mean someone who is born into an Orthodox family and is baptized as an infant versus someone who converts to the Orthodox Faith from some other religion. As far as the Orthodox Church is concerned there is no difference. They are both members of the Holy Orthodox Faith and have the opportunity to grow toward Theosis and salvation through a Sacramental life of faith. Both of these individuals have positive and negative possibilities for their spiritual lives. On the positive side, a cradle Orthodox has the wonderful opportunity of growing in the Orthodox life and faith from their earliest years. They have the opportunity to partake in the Holy Eucharist, the Body and Blood of Christ ...
Christ has risen! The fifth Sunday after Easter and the Church presents us with the dialogue between the Lord and a Samaritan woman. This was a dialogue of real substance and a validity that will last throughout the ages, with a great deal to say to each of us. Christ goes to Samaria, to the town of Sychar, to the place where the patriarch Jacob had made a well: ‘And from the sons of Hamor, Shechem’s father, he bought for one hundred pieces of money the plot of land on which he had pitched his tent. There he erected an altar and called it El-Elohe-Israel ’. He later gave this piece of land to his son, Joseph. So when Jesus went and ...
Mother’s Day today and children all over the world take the opportunity to remember and honour their mother. There are also a good number of cynics who view the adoption of the ‘feast’ as a phenomenon of naked commercialization, while there are others who consider the sanctity of the role of the mother to be such that all the days of the year should be dedicated to them, rather than one being singled out specially. On its part, the Church presents Our Lady as the pre-eminent mother figure and discreetly suggests that the Feast of the Reception of Christ (Candlemas, February 2) might be the best day for the person of the mother to be honoured. In our tradition, we also come ...
Oh, how good God is. It’s right that my fellow-sinners should go to Hell for ignoring the infinite mercy of our heavenly Father. Although we err, as people, it’s difficult for us to say ‘I’ve sinned’. How can we do so when we -and I’m the worst at this- when we have a short memory, sloth, and pride as obstacles on the path to humility. Christ showed us, through the Cross, but, alas, we deliberately choose not to hear, much to our remorse.
The Church has classically been described by four adjectives: one, holy, catholic and apostolic. If I were looking for a more concise way to sum up these attributes, I would choose one word: alien. The on-line Oxforddictionary describes “alien” as, “belonging to a foreign country”, “unfamiliar and disturbing or distasteful” and “supposedly from another world, extraterrestrial” (I imagine this final definition is of more recent vintage, and presupposes the world of Science-Fiction, E.T., War of the Worlds and the mother-ship.) I am happy with all of these definitions, for they all describe, in one way or another, theChurch ofGod sojourning in this world. We do indeed belong to a foreign and heavenly country. The World ...
You have to work at virtue and not fail in your labors, because virtue doesn’t come without hard work.
Saint Paul We are powerless to change those bad habits that dominate our lives without help from God. However we may attempt to change behavior, we can not do battle with the passions unless we surrender ourselves in humility to God, for such change can only come about by God's grace. Struggle as we may, our flesh will resist until that moment we seek help from the Lord of Mercy, Who is quick to hear our plea for help. Many years ago, while teaching, I worked with another instructor who was arrogant, and condescending to anyone whom he felt was beneath him. There was a wonderful black woman who served as the head cook in the school's cafeteria, a woman of ...
The whole series can be read here: The Theology of Gender The return to the original state of humanity, as it was created from the beginning, is accomplished through the process of catharsis. Although some believe that catharsis is mainly to abstain from external physical sin, this view can lead to a mere moralistic or pietistic understanding of the Christian life. According to patristic theology, catharsis is the first stage of the process of spiritual life that finally leads to theosis, and refers to three essential elements: the turn of the powers of the soul towards God; the release from the captivity of pleasures and grief; and the cleansing of the heart from thoughts. The canons serve the purpose of keeping ...
Because without the eternal Father, people’s love and, indeed, they themselves are equivalent to time and therefore to death. Time makes death the content of desire (love) and thus, the content of us people, who are nourished only by it. It’s no coincidence that this truth regarding the organic relationship between love and death was felt more intensely in modern times, by a Jew, Sigmund Freud. It was only on the basis of the Jewish subconscious, shaped by the notion of dread Yahweh and a yearning for the forbidden fruit, which begets death (Gen. 2, 17; 3, 6) that it was possible for the Oedipus myth to assume such enormous dimensions in Freudianism. At bottom, Freudianism is, once again, a modern ...
With the gifts which we’ve received from God, we’re in a position to distinguish good from evil. And the most important thing is that, through this, we can choose good and avoid evil. Through this gift, we can understand that, although we sin and estrange ourselves from what is good, God calls us back to Him, having first freed us from our shameful enslavement to the devil, through the Blood of His Only-Begotten Son.
The Patriarchate of Romania recently separated their Archdiocese of America and Canada, creating the episcopal sees of the Archdiocese of Chicago and Metropolis of America, along with the Diocese of Canada. Archbishop Nicolae was elevated to Metropolitan, while Assistant Bishop Ioan Casian was elevated to Bishop of Canada. The enthronement of Archbishop of Chicago and Metropolitan of America Nicolae took place in Chicago on Sunday, April 31st, while the enthronement of His Grace Bishop Ioan Casian of the Romanian Orthodox Diocese of Canada occurred on Sunday, May 7th at the Cathedral of St. George in St. Hubert (Montreal), Quebec. As the representative of His Beatitude Patriarch Daniel of the Romanian Orthodox Church, His Eminence Metropolitan Nicolae celebrated the Divine Liturgy and ...
