Daily Meditations Archives - Page 113 of 333

Image and Likeness: We Were Made by Love to Love

06/23/2020

God said, “Let us make humans in our image, according to our likeness.” —Genesis 1:26 My dear people, we are already children of God; what we will be in the future has not yet been fully revealed, and all I do know is that we shall be like God. —1 John 3:2 The Judeo-Christian creation story says that we were created in the very “image and likeness” of God—who is Infinite Love flowing between Three, making unity out of clear diversity. (Picture

Begotten of the Father

06/22/2020

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, July 27, 2015 No revelation is more central to the Christian faith than God as Father. Some might immediately respond that the Trinity should be seen as the central revelation. But, in Orthodox understanding, the Trinity has its source (πηγή) in the Father. We should understand this not only as a matter of Trinitarian thought, but as the proper grounding of the spiritual life as well. To be a Christian in the proper sense, to

No One Is Saved Alone

06/19/2020

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, July 16, 2015 “If anyone falls, he falls alone. But no one is saved alone.” – Alexei Khomiakov Roughly 25 years ago I quit smoking. I never think about it now – it has become a thing of the distant past. But I can remember a period of about 10 years in which I struggled to quit. I would make up my mind, throw things away, make a clean sweep, and

Christ and Nothing (Part III)

06/18/2020

By David Bentley Hart, October 2003 We are still at war, of course, but the situation of the Church has materially altered, and I suspect that, by comparison to the burden the First Commandment lays upon us today, the defeat of the ancient pantheon, and the elemental spirits, and the demons lurking behind them will prove to have been sublimely easy. For, as I say, we moderns believe in nothing: the nothingness of the will

Focusing On One’s Own Sins. The Corporate Life of the Church.

06/17/2020

By Abbot Tryphon, October 10, 2019 If you are to win the battle, focus only on your own sins When we take our eyes off our own sins we focus only on the sins of the other. As we allow their sins get our attention, we fail to struggle with the passions that keep us from the wholeness that God intended, and we move ever closer to the abyss of our own fall. Ignoring our

Image and Likeness: In the Beginning and the End

06/16/2020

God said, “Let us make humans in our image, according to our likeness.” —Genesis 1:26 Let the one who is thirsty come; and let the one who wishes take the free gift of the water of life. —Revelation 22:17 Centuries of Christian theology confirm that the “image” described in Genesis refers to our eternal essence in God which cannot be increased or decreased. It is the soul’s objective union with God. You (and every other created thing) begin with

Rational Sheep and the Word of God

06/15/2020

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, July 13, 2015 I’m in a bit of a hiatus point in my summer. I am traveling and working, and even a little distracted. I will be posting a selection of articles reflecting on the nature of our humanity (in keeping with recent articles). For the doctrine of what it means to be human (anthropology) is as central to the Orthodox faith as the doctrine of God (theology). It is doubtless

The Voice of the Natural Will

06/12/2020

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, July 10, 2015 Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. (2Co 3:17) Though many speak of the “free will” of human beings, this is largely a misnomer, or misapplication of the phrase. The choosing that we experience is not the same thing as the will. It is the product of a fracturing of the will and a manifestation of a fundamental

Christ and Nothing (Part II)

06/11/2020

By David Bentley Hart, October 2003 Even our ethics are achievements of will. And the same is true of those custom-fitted spiritualities — “New Age,” occult, pantheist, “Wiccan,” or what have you—by which many of us now divert ourselves from the quotidien dreariness of our lives. These gods of the boutique can come from anywhere—native North American religion, the Indian subcontinent, some Pre-Raphaelite grove shrouded in Celtic twilight, cunning purveyors of otherwise worthless quartz, pages

Becoming a Philanthropist

06/10/2020

By Abbot Tryphon, October 7, 2019 The act of giving can change everyone’s life for the better As any history buff knows, these times we are living in can sometimes seem like reruns. News reports are filled with stories of wars, disasters, dictators, attacks on the innocent, increased crime, and the ever present persecution of Christians in various parts of the world. We’ve witnessed increased attacks against Coptic Christians in Egypt, as well as the