A few years ago I was challenged by a critique of Orthodox Christianity leveled by a close friend who was in the process of leaving the Church. “When you face facts,” he said, “you realize that if you really want to live the Orthodox life in its fullness, you have to become a monk.” As much as I wished to offer a counter- point, I found myself unable. In fact, I even grudgingly agreed with
The cell is a battleground where the monk is confronted with the desires and passions that deface his or her inmost self. It can be a terrifyingly vulnerable venue for naming the ego as the self-imposed ruler of the mind. The ego sets itself apart from God and the world in order to maintain its control over its self-created identity, desires, and needs. The ego knows it is limited by time and space, and this
But life can teach us that although the events of the day are out of our hands, they should never be out of our hearts, that instead of becoming bitter our lives can yield to the wisdom that only from the heart a creative response can come forth. When the answer to our world remains hanging between our minds and our hands, it remains weak and superficial. When our protests against war, segregation and social
It is out of respect for our freedom that God allows evil to exist; it has already been conquered, but secretly, because the Holy Spirit wishes to regenerate us from within, by a free and faithful response, without compulsion. What matters in the history of the Church is her holiness, her awareness, in a world that is utterly free, that Christ has conquered death once and for all, and that his victory is always present
As I shared earlier this year, the Bible is “a text in travail.” Sometimes the biblical writers catch a glimpse of God’s true character–love, mercy, and justice–and sometimes they lose sight of it. Old Testament scholar and theologian Walter Brueggemann traces the evolution of human consciousness through three sections of Hebrew Scriptures: the Torah (the five books of the Pentateuch), the Prophets, and the Wisdom literature (including Job, the Psalms, Song of Songs, and Ecclesiastes).
Saint Luke came from the city of Antioch, probably of a pagan family. From his youth he applied himself to seek after wisdom and to study the arts and sciences. He traveled all over the world to quench his thirst for knowledge, and had particular skill as a physician and in painting. The Gospel he wrote shows his excellent command of Greek; he also knew Hebrew and Aramaic. There is a tradition that Luke was
Nowadays the monastic fathers could show us a way out of the superficial debates about the structure of the church or the exhaustion of spirituality. They invite us onto the path of longing. The longing for God sends us off through all obstacles on the chase for the hare, for oneness with God, for the coming of Jesus Christ, “who will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body” (Phil. 3:21). The striving
When we think about the people who have given us hope and have increased the strength of our soul, we might discover that they were not the advice givers, warners or moralists, but the few who were able to articulate in words and actions the human condition in which we participate and who encouraged us to face the realities of life. Preachers who reduce mysteries to problems and offer Band-Aid-type solutions are depressing because they
The Cell “The anchorite leaves the world and travels toward the desert. There he builds the cell of his repentance, the place of his rebirth, where he settles.” [6] The Physical Environment of the Cell As we have seen, the cells of the desert monks, both male and female, were often caves or built onto caves, portions of abandoned forts or villages, tombs carved into rock cliffs, natural rock formations, simple hand-built dwellings within or
Symeon the New Theologian (949-1022) was a Byzantine Christian monk and mystic revered to this day by Eastern Christians. Symeon believed humans had the capacity to experience God’s presence directly. He visualized this union happening within the “force field” of the Body of Christ. This cosmic embodiment is created both by God’s grace and our response. Symeon’s Hymn 15 in his Hymns of Divine Love beautifully names the divine union that God is forever inviting
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