Daily Meditations Archives - Page 78 of 347

The Holy and Great Monday: The Bridegroom and Judgment

04/18/2022

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, April 9, 2017 Behold, the Bridegroom comes at midnight, and blessed is the servant whom He shall find watching; and again, unworthy is the servant whom He shall find heedless. Beware, therefore, O my soul, do not be weighed down with sleep, lest you be given up to death and lest you be shut out of the Kingdom. But rouse yourself crying: Holy, holy, holy, art Thou, O our God. Through the Theotokos, have

On Palm Sunday

04/17/2022

Sermon Preached by Fr. Antony Hughes on Sunday, April 1, 2007 In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God. Amen. Glory to Jesus Christ! The crowd in Jerusalem on Palm Sunday long ago was mistaken. Jesus was not the Messiah they had hoped for. He did not come to overthrow Rome or to establish an earthly kingdom. They would have known that if they had listened

Lazarus Saturday

04/16/2022

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, April 24, 2021 Largely ignored by much of Christendom, the Orthodox mark the day before Palm Sunday as “Lazarus Saturday” in something of a prequel to the following weekend’s Pascha. It is, indeed a little Pascha just before the greater one. And this, of course, was arranged by Christ Himself, who raised His friend Lazarus from the dead as something of a last action before entering Jerusalem and beginning His slow

The Sixth Friday of Great Lent: An Atonement of Shame – Orthodoxy and the Cross

04/15/2022

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, March 6, 2017 Some decades ago in my early (Anglican) priesthood, a parishioner brought a crucifix back from South America. The question for me as a priest was whether I would accept the crucifix as a gift and place it in the Church. I like crucifixes, my taste was always towards the Catholic direction. But, you have to bear in mind that Spanish/Latin crucifixes have a tendency to be, well, rather

The Sixth Thursday of Great Lent: God Is Always with You, Part 3

04/14/2022

Published by Pemptousia Partnership, June 16, 2015 Ms. Jessica Precop traveled to the Dormition of the Mother of God Monastery in Rives Junction, Michigan to interview Father Roman Braga, who grew up and served in Romania under a communist regime. We are very thankful to Ms. Precop, Father Roman, and the Sisterhood at the Monastery for making this interview possible. The interview was commissioned for the OCA Wonder blog, on which it originally appeared. Why

The Sixth Wednesday of Great Lent: God Is Always with You, Part 2

04/13/2022

The Sixth Tuesday of Great Lent: God Is Always with You, Part 1

04/12/2022

The Sixth Monday of Great Lent: The Healthy Shame at the Heart’s Core

04/11/2022

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, April 20, 2017 Imagine: A large crowd has assembled and you know that something special has been planned. Unknown to you, however, is the fact that the something special is for and about you. At a given moment, you are called forward. A short speech detailing some extraordinary thing you have done is given. You had not thought anyone would notice, and you did not expect them to. However, you are being

The Fifth Friday of Great Lent: The Danger and Shame of Forgiveness

04/08/2022

By Fr. Stephen Freeman, February 27, 2017 Forgiveness is so terribly hard. On a psychological level, it feels dangerous. The shame engendered by any insult or injury is our experience of vulnerability, and we instinctively react to protect ourselves. That, we must understand, is not a sin, it is an instinct that is a gift from God. The example of Christ, who did not “turn His face from the spitting and the shame,” is also

The Fifth Thursday of Great Lent. The Monastic Life: The Way of Perfection, Part III

04/07/2022

Published by Pemptousia Partnership, June 16, 2015 By Prof. Georgios Mantzaridis The monastic profession rite, with its shearing of hair, is called a second baptism”19. Baptism, however, is one and the same for all members of the Church. It is participation in the death and resurrection of Christ. The rite of profession does not repeat, but renews and activates the one baptism. The vows taken during the rite are in essence no different from those taken