In Spirit and in Truth, by Father John Breck The account of Jesus and the Samaritan woman, which we read on the fifth Sunday after Pascha, brought to mind something I often forget, and maybe others do as well. It’s the fact that authentic prayer is not really a human endeavor. We can probably say it is not even a human possibility. In Romans 8, the apostle Paul declares, “We do not know how to
The Christian Concept of Death, by Father Alexander Schmemann (Part III) But again, in order not so much to understand, but rather to sense, to feel this Christian interpretation of death, we must begin by saying at least a few words about this design of God’s, as much as has been disclosed to us in the Holy Scriptures and revealed to its fullness in Christ, in His teaching, in his death and in His Resurrection.
By Sergei V. Bulgakov On Wednesday of the fourth week we celebrate the Mid-Feast of Pentecost, i.e. half of the period from Pascha to Pentecost. This day we commemorate that event from the life of the Savior, when He on the Midfeast of the Tabernacles taught in the temple about His Own Divine ministry and the mystery of water, under which we understand the beneficial teaching of Christ and the beneficial gifts of the Holy
The Christian Concept of Death, by Father Alexander Schmemann (Part II) Those who turn to Christianity turn not to ideas or principles, but they accept this belief in the Resurrection, this experience, this knowledge of the risen Teacher. They accept faith in the universal resurrection, which means the overcoming, the destruction, the annihilation of death as the ultimate goal of the world. “The last enemy to be destroyed is death!” exclaims the Apostle Paul in
The Christian Concept of Death, by Father Alexander Schmemann (Part I) Indeed “if Christ is not risen, then your faith is in vain.” These are the words of the Apostle Paul, and they remain fundamental for Christianity to this day. “He suffered and was buried. And He rose again…” After the Cross, after the descent into death there is the Resurrection from the dead — that principal, fundamental and decisive confirmation of the Symbol of
Sermon on the Sunday of the Paralytic, by Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh His Eminence Metropolitan Anthony Bloom (1914 – August 4, 2003) was bishop of the Diocese of Sourozh, the Russian Orthodox Church in Great Britain and Ireland. He wrote masterfully about Christian prayer, and many Orthodox Christians in Great Britain and throughout the world consider him to be a saint. In the Name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. How tragic
A Paschal Homily, by Blessed Justin Popovich Sentenced to Immortality (Part III) One need not be surprised that Christians also die bodily. This is because the death of the body is sowing. The mortal body is sown, says the Apostle Paul, and it grows, and is raised in an immortal body (I Corinthians 15:42-44). The body dissolves, like a sown seed, that the Holy Spirit may quicken and perfect it. If the Lord Christ had
In Adam our nature was split or dissected into two through sin. Yet in Christ this split is healed completely. This then is the abolition of death, or rather of mortality. In other words, it is the potential and dynamic restoration of the fullness and wholeness of human existence. It is a recreation of the whole human race, a “new creation” (ή καινή κτίσις),a new revelation of Divine love and Divine power, the consummation of
Oration on the Pascha of Christ, by St. Constantine the Great Emperor and Equal to the Apostles, St. Constantine the Great (early 4th century) was the first Roman emperor to convert to Christianity, establishing a policy of religious toleration that paved the way for the freer expansion of the Church. This text is taken from his great oration ‘To the Assembly of the Saints’ – an extensive examination of several Christian topics. That presented here
A Paschal Homily, by Blessed Justin Popovich Sentenced to Immortality (Part II) The entire history of Christianity is nothing other than the history of a unique miracle, namely, the Resurrection of Christ, which is unbrokenly threaded through the hearts of Christians form one day to the next, from year to year, across the centuries, until the Dread Judgment. Man is born, in fact, not when his mother bring him into the world, but when he
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