Fathers Archives - Page 8 of 12

The Philokalia

02/28/2019

Virtually every spiritual tradition has an authoritative scripture or scriptures that serve as a foundational text for its beliefs, practices, and spirituality. For Christians, that collection of texts is the Holy Bible. But the fracturing of the Christian Church in the fifth century (following the Council of Chalcedon in 451), the eleventh century (the break between what came to be known as the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches), and the sixteenth century (the Protestant

The Three Hierarchs

01/30/2019

During the reign of the Emperor Alexius Comnenus (1081-1118), a controversy arose in Constantinople among men learned in the Faith and zealous for virtue about the three holy Hierarchs and Fathers of the Church, Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian and John Chrysostom. Some argued for Saint Basil [known as Basilians] above the other two because he was able, as none other, to explain the mysteries of the Faith, and rose to angelic rank by

Man’s Place in the Universe

10/09/2018

The ancient philosophers loved to stress the central place of Man in the universe. They said that Man is the only animal which stands upright, and so symbolizes the dimensions of space, first the high, or heavenly, and the low, or earthly. Other animals walk on all fours or crawl. Their space is purely earthly; it is only by Man that they are connected to the heavens. True, trees and rocks stand upright, symbolizing the

The Dormition of the Ever-Virgin Mother of God

08/15/2018

In the Communion of Saints, which is the true Church Universal and Catholic, the mystery of the New Humanity is disclosed as a new existential situation. And in this perspective and living context of the Mystical Body of Christ the person of the Blessed Virgin Mother appears in full light and full glory. The Church now contemplates her in the state of perfection. She is now seen as inseparably united with her Son, who “sitteth

The Fast of the Dormition of the Blessed Virgin (Part I)

08/08/2018

By Father Leonidas Contos There are in the Orthodox tradition three principal periods of fasting during the ecclesiastical year; they are also the ones that are the least neglected. One is the forty-day period of Advent; the second is the forty-day period of Lent; the third is the fifteen-day fast which begins the first of August, and will end on the fifteenth with the commemoration of the Falling Asleep of the Theotokos. Among the three

Saved in Weakness

07/06/2018

By Father Stephen Freeman, January 21, 2015 We are not saved by our talents and gifts nor by our excellence – we are saved by our weakness and our failure. I have made this point in several ways in several articles over the recent past – and the question comes up – but what does that look like? How do I live like that? The question can be somewhat urgent for some because the message

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!

07/04/2018

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY! Godly Meditations from America’s Founding Fathers: “No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible hand which conducts the affairs of men more than the people of the United States. Every step, by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency.” –George Washington “I have so much faith in the general government of the world by

So-Called “Fathers” of the Modern World

06/28/2018

Just as there are Fathers of the Church, there are also what we might call Fathers of the modern world, revered and studied by the intelligentsia, who hope to combine them in a sort of grand synopsis of atheism. We may never have read Feuerbach, Marx, Nietzche or Freud, but our outlook, the spirit of the age, is formed by their ideas. The Marxist theory of social alienation and the reification of humanity the creator

Our Aim in Life

06/20/2018

In St. Panteleimon’s Monastery, it happened that once I had up to fourteen functions at the same time. I spoke about it to my spiritual father. I told him: ‘I don’t manage to carry out my work; I have fourteen jobs!’ He answered me: ‘You are wrong; you’ve only got one job’. ‘But no, Father’, I replied, ‘I have fourteen!’ Again he said, ‘No, you are only doing one thing at a time. So, do

What the Fathers Sought

06/12/2018

What the Fathers sought most of all was their own true self, in Christ. And in order to do this, they had to reject completely the false, formal self, fabricated under social compulsion in “the world.” They sought a way to God that was uncharted and freely chosen, not inherited from others who had mapped it out beforehand. They sought a God whom they alone could find, not one who was “given” in a set,

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The Philokalia

The Three Hierarchs

Man’s Place in the Universe

The Dormition of the Ever-Virgin Mother of God

The Fast of the Dormition of the Blessed Virgin (Part I)

Saved in Weakness

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!

So-Called “Fathers” of the Modern World

Our Aim in Life

What the Fathers Sought

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