Daily Meditations Archives - Page 228 of 348

Gentleness as a Sign of the Spiritual Person (Part I)

09/19/2016

Gentleness as a Sign of the Spiritual Person The goal of the spiritual path is not the great ascetic, not the indefatigable faster, not the consistent person, but the meek and gentle one. Evagrius continually mentions gentleness as a sign of spirituality. He challenges us to be like Moses, of whom Scripture says: “Now the man Moses was very meek, more than all the men that were on the face of the earth” (Num. 12:3).

SUNRISE IN THE HEART (Part I)

09/16/2016

Saint Teresa of Avila goes to great lengths to remind us that there is such a thing as inner light, “We are conditioned,” she says, “to perceive only external light. We forget that there is such a thing as inner light, illuminating our soul, and we mistake that radiance for darkness.” Saint Hesychios says our practice will dawn with yet a new brilliance, a “continuous seeing into the heart’s depths, stillness of mind unbroken even

REAL PEACE (Part IX)

09/15/2016

“How is this joy of God born within the heart of a person?” Michael asked. “According to the teaching of the elders, it starts when a person begins to strive spiritually and tirelessly to implement the commandments of God. He will encounter fatigue and many difficulties along the way. But there will also be a gradual emergence in his heart of the first rays of God’s joy, which will offer him further inducement to continue

Before Thy Cross, we bow down in worship!

09/14/2016

By Father Steven Kostoff “Then will appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven….“ [Matthew 24:30]. Contemporary scholars debate the meaning of the word “sign” in the words of Christ found in the above passage that describes, in highly symbolic terms, His parousia or return in glory. This sign, whatever it may be, will be impossible to miss or misinterpret. It will overwhelm those who are present to observe it and stand in its shadow,

The Four Loves

09/13/2016

There are many different kinds of love. Ancient Greeks had multiple distinct words for what we try to cover with our single word “love”; these include philia (friendship), eros (passion), storge (familial love), and agape (infinite or divine love). I sometimes fear that our paucity of words reveals an actual narrowness of experience. For Paul, agape love is the Great Love that is larger than you. It is the Great Self, the God Self. It’s

Contemplation as a Path of Healing (Part II)

09/12/2016

The spiritual path of the early monks is, then, not a moral way, but a mystical, a mystagogical way, that leads us into God. That is why the writings of Evagrius breathe, not some sort of dour severity, but love, attentiveness, and joy over our calling, to be allowed to be one with God in prayer. One senses in his words the longing for God. To be able to pray undisturbed, without distraction, is the

Molding Interruptions

09/09/2016

While visiting the University of Notre Dame, where I had been a teacher for a few years, I met an older experienced professor who had spent most of his life there. And while we strolled over the beautiful campus, he said with a certain melancholy in his voice, “You know … my whole life I have been complaining that my work was constantly interrupted, until I discovered that my interruptions were my work.” Don’t we

Nativity of the Theotokos

09/08/2016

Theotokos In addition to the celebration of the Annunciation, there are three major feasts in the Church honoring Mary, the Theotokos. The first of these is the feast of her nativity which is kept on the eighth of September. The record of the birth of Mary is not found in the Bible. The traditional account of the event is taken from the apocryphal writings which are not part of the New Testament scriptures. The traditional

Meditation and Worship (Part X)

09/07/2016

One can pray everywhere and anywhere, yet there are places where prayer ends its natural climate; those places are churches, fulfilling the promise; ‘I will make them joyful in my house of prayer’ (Is 56: 7). A church, once consecrated, once set part, becomes the dwelling-place of God. He is present there in another way than in the rest of the world. In the world he is present as a stranger, as a pilgrim, as

Everything That Rises Will Converge

09/06/2016

In Romans 8:22, Paul says, “From the beginning until now, the entire creation as we know it has been groaning in one great act of giving birth.” Just this one line from Paul should be enough to justify a Christian belief in evolution. Yet to this day, the issue of evolution still divides some Christians, questioning what is rather obvious: that God creates things that create themselves. Wouldn’t this be the greatest way that God