In English

The Feast of the Annunciation lends a pre-Paschal feeling to Great Lent, during which it always falls. The atmosphere of compunction recedes and gives way to the joy of the great feast. This is why we have a dispensation to eat fish. The hymns, the celebrations and all the other things associated with a Feast of the Mother of God dispel the spirit of mourning of Lent and offer us the opportunity to enjoy the Annunciation (which means ‘announcement’ or ‘message’), the news of the forthcoming advent and birth of Him Who would release humankind from the bonds of death, of corruption and of sin. In Greece it coincides with the national holiday commemorating the outbreak of the revolution against Turkish ...

At the third part of his interview to Pemptousia, Nobuyuki-Gheoghe Nukina, Japanese karate fighter, shares his experience from his pilgrimage to Mount Athos.

Third miracle It was said of one man that his stomach gradually expanded on a daily basis, and if he ate and drank a lot he felt even more hungry and thirsty. His face was pallid and unpleasant to look at and he was in terrible pain, day and night. While he was in this terrible state, he went to the relics of the saint, weeping fervent tears and begging to be given a cure and not to leave empty-handed. Since the grave was well-sealed and never opened, the by-standers laid him lengthwise, on his back, on the grave, placed the icon-light on his stomach and rubbed oil from it onto him. The man fell asleep for a short time, during ...

Divine Grace is sweet, peaceful, humble, quiet, cathartic, illuminating and joyful, and there’s no room for doubt that it’s divine Grace. >Blessed Joseph the Hesychast

My Christian friends, if you want to make spiritual progress- as I’m sure you do- then I recommend that you embrace prayer and read the lives of the saints and the teachings of the Fathers of our Church. In these you’ll see the magnificence of our Orthodox faith and also how we are to live it on an everyday basis. One great Father of our Church, who, for a long time was hardly known at all because preachers never mentioned him in their sermons and catechisms, was Saint Gregory Palamas, Archbishop of Thessaloniki. I’ll just say a few words about him here and you, who have a thirst for knowledge, can investigate further. Saint Gregory Palamas, my beloved friends, was born ...

Don’t allow the seeds of doubt or disbelief to enter your soul. It will be bad for you, if at the time of prayer, your heart is hovering between faith and disbelief, if your faith isn’t firm. Don’t expect the Lord to grant you what you ask if your faith isn’t firm. » Saint John of Kronstadt

The mourning atmosphere of Great Lent is unquestionably lightened by the service of the Salutations. These ‘Hails’ which we address to the ‘Birth-Giver and Mother of the Light’, in gratitude for her great loving-kindness towards us, are returned to us by her. In a mystical way, she responds to our greeting. It seems that there’s something very special and necessary happening in our life, when the churches are full every Friday evening in Lent. Of course, there’s the honour we pay to her, who became the bridge who brought God to dwell among us, but she’s also our own bridge, raising ‘those on earth to the heavens’. This is a personal relationship, full of gratitude and generous love for her presence in ...

Any prayer spoken with humility and pain of the heart is always heard by God. » Venerable Païsios the Athonite

Second miracle At some point, late at night, Saint Diomidis appeared to the iconographer and said to him: ‘Look, painter, at the man you say you don’t know and, once you’ve been convinced by the monk who’s entreating you, record in colours him whom you see’. Having said this, he disappeared. The painter leapt out of bed, utterly astonished at the manifestation of the saint. He sought forgiveness from the saint for his earlier refusal and began confidently to paint him. With great skill, he painted an icon of the saint as he’d seen him and placed it in a space among many others. Afterwards, the same monk returned and begged him, as before, for an icon. The iconographer said: ‘Go ...

The second Sunday in Lent is devoted to Saint Gregory Palamas (14th century), a hesychast from the Holy Mountain and later Archbishop of Thessaloniki. Saint Gregory Palamas defended the hesychasts of the Holy Mountain who were being mocked and attacked by the person who expressed the spirit of the Western Church, the monk Barlaam, from Calabria in Southern Italy. When Saint Gregory defended these monks, he set out the Orthodox faith regarding God, the way we can approach Him and what it is that constitutes the salvation of humankind. If the faith is altered, every in the slightest way, then our life ‘in  Christ’ is modified and the salvation of humankind is aborted. The West Among those who altered the true faith of ...

Temptations teach us the experience of spiritual warfare, they toughen us up in life and help us progress spiritually. They also humble us and show us our weakness and incapacity when we’re alone, without divine assistance. They also reinforce our patience, prayer, tears, humility and faith. » Elder Cleopa Ilie

Fr Jonah from Taiwan speaks on the feast of the restitution of the holy icons on Sunday of Orthodoxy.

Angelos Theoharoudis, the son of Dimitrios and Anastasia, was born in 1876 in Gomati, Halkidiki. In 1892, he entered the beautiful, old Kelli of the Great Martyr Prokopios, belonging to the Holy and Great Monastery of Vatopaidi, where the saint’s hand is kept. He was tonsured in 1899 by Elder Neofytos I. In 1907 he was ordained deacon and in 1909 he became a priest. He was a wonderful, discerning and well-known Spiritual Father. He was often called out into Halkidiki to confess the faithful. People flocked to him for confession as to no other Spiritual Father. Elder Gavriil, of the Holy Monastery of Dionysiou writes in his splendid Lavsaïko: ‘Outstanding as an Elder was the kindly and devout Spiritual Father, ...

The saintliness of the parents saves the children. For this to happen, Divine Grace has to act upon the souls of the parents. People don’t become saints on their own. The same Divine Grace will then enlighten, warm and give life to the souls of the children. » Venerable Porphyrios of Kavsokalyvia

We can’t accept that God is the ‘maker’ of the wrongs we see all around us. It’s not possible that God created corruption, pain, sickness and, finally, death. But then, how do they exist? There are a variety of explanations and, of course, the Church has expressed its own theological view on the issue. This is a view which is ‘embodied’ when there’s faith and not so much in rationality, arguments and proofs. In chapter 3 of Genesis, the tragic moments of what we call the Fall are described. People ‘rebelled’ and sought to become gods themselves, ‘an illusion of autonomy’. Instead they achieved rupture, division, separation and solitude. They ruptured their relationship with God, other people and the rest of ...

Trust in God is a continuous mystical prayer which quietly draws the powers of God, where and when they’re required. » Venerable Païsios the Athonite

When his enemies became aware of his presence, they followed him, because they wanted to find out who it was who’d come to Trifyllios, where he’d come from and where he was staying. Five hundred Hagarenes were on his heels. The first miracle The young child ran to escape. They pursued him, like rabid dogs closing in on their prey. But the Lord knows how to deliver people from a tight spot. A voice from heaven was heard, saying: ‘Diomidis, turn round and make the sign of the cross over your pursuers’. No sooner had he quickly done so than they were inundated with divine wrath. Their bellies and hidden members swelled with fluid to such an extent that they were ...

Nobuyuki-Gheoghe Nukina, Japanese karate fighter, at the second part of his interview to Pemtousia talks about the relationship between Orthodoxy and karate.

Repentance without a complete turnaround is nothing more than a travesty before God and the soul. It doesn’t do to play with God. He shows mercy to those who repent, but chastises harshly those who don’t repent at all or who do so only partially and insincerely. And when God strikes, the wound is very deep and no-one can heal it except God Himself. » Saint Nicholas Velimirovich

Emeritus Professor of Theology Georgios Mantzaridis speaks on extremist positions in Life as well as in Theology.