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God cannot be forced by anyone; neither does He impose His will on His creatures endowed with reasoning. Likewise the man with the gift of God does not want to impose power over any mortal, neither that his spirit be under the power of another. He imitates Christ Who overcame the world through His humble love and drew unto Him all who freely desire to follow Him. The freedom that the man born of the Spirit seeks is neither political nor social but spiritual and of the heart. The more he becomes sanctified, the more he becomes free. Holiness is not an ethical principle but is purely spiritual and ontological. The holy person is not someone who manages to have perfect ...

(c) 2016 || www.studiomathewes.com You never figure it out completely. You have to be purposeful every day. A difficult season may not leave fast enough, or require a tough lesson. A happy season may leave too soon, and make you cling to the past. You can prepare for it, like the seasons of the earth, through prayer, reading, and asking for others’ wisdom. …but most of all, through prayer. Source: familylifeministry.atlanta.goarch.org

The phenomenon of heresies has been present from the first steps of the Church towards preaching the Gospel to the world. It’s a phenomenon which, from as early as the Apostolic Age, has been considered an expression of the mystery of lawlessness (II Thess. 2, 7). In the New Testament and in the works of the Holy Fathers of the Church the basic parameters, as well as the severe soteriological consequences of this phenomenon are described (I Tim. 1, 9; II Peter, 2. 1). Hereafter, we shall attempt to note some of the characteristics of the phenomenon, which have appeared in a variety of heresies over time. a) It’s well-known that the Church, as the body of Christ, is a mystery which ...

The Church has always respected the efforts of science and has shared the concern of all people for the extension of life. But the extension of life should aim at increasing the time for repentance and spiritual progress, because however long we extend life for, at some point it will end, since biological life• is a one-way street. Christian theology sees people holistically and, apart from their bodily health is also interested in the health of their souls, which is why it supports the contribution of medical science in this matter. Besides, for Christian theology, support for patients such as those with incurable illnesses is as important as the cure. This view is in sharp contrast with utilitarianism, which modern society ...

Death is a bridge that brings us to Christ. As soon as we close our eyes, we’ll open them in eternity. We’ll be brought before Christ. In the next life we’ll experience the Grace of God more intensely.

Sharing, Silence, Suffering If the Mother of God at the moment of the Annunciation is a true icon of human freedom, of authentic liberty and liberation, then her actions and reactions in the events that follow shortly afterwards in St. Luke’s Gospel illustrate three basic consequences of what it means to be free. Freedom involves sharing, silence, and suffering. Freedom involves sharing. Mary’s first action after the Annunciation is to share the good news with someone else: she goes with haste to the hill country, to the house of Zechariah, and greets her cousin Elizabeth.8 Here is an essential element in freedom: you cannot be free alone. Freedom is not solitary but social. It implies relationship, a “thou” as well as an ...

Icon of Jesus Pontius Pilate’s cry has been echoed down the ages and it seems that it has a particular resonance today when, intellectually speaking; only science seems to offer the kind of objective truth once claimed by theology itself.  In some ways this shift has been accelerated by our shrinking world and the challenge of meeting those of other faiths.  Of course, Christians knew of the existence of other religions in times past, but they were rarely encountered on home soil and could be just as easily be dismissed by the collective description “heathen” or perhaps “pagan.” Today when your next door neighbour is likely to be a Muslim – at least inEurope- it is less easy for many ...

The Orthodox Patristic tradition and modern pastoral psychology consider self-absorption to be a source of many psychological and spiritual problems. Elder Sophrony, at Essex, called the internal and event he external state of egocentric people demonized spirituality which engenders all the passions and sins. The same saintly Elder, who lived in our own times, considered pride to be the root of all evil, as did the ancient Church Fathers. This ontological truth has practical consequences in our everyday lives, if we think that we’re the centre of other people’s attention. Saint Païsios the Athonite was asked: ‘Elder, if you have the feeling that everybody’s interested in you and your doings, how can you get rid of it?’ He answered: ‘That’s from the temptation ...

“UNBIND HIM” John was coming home after being away for the past five years.  You might think the family would be planning a great party and feast to celebrate the return of their son.  Instead the family was in turmoil about how to handle his return.  You see John had been branded with a capital “F” on his forehead for he had become a Felon.  This wasn’t a literal “F” but the family knew that everyone would see it.  These past five years of his life had been spent in the deep darkness of prison.  Some of the family wished he were moving to another town so they wouldn’t be embarrassed by him.  Other family members wanted him home, but didn’t ...

In continuation of the article by Professor Ilias Voulgarakis on Sin and Love, it might be worth looking at what the English mystic and recluse “Julian atte Norwich” (ca. 8 November 1342 - ca. 1416) had to say on much the same subject in the Revelations of Divine Love: “A constantly recurring feature of all the revelations which filled my soul with wonder as I diligently observed it, was that our Lord God, as far as he himself is concerned, does not have to forgive, because it is impossible for him to be angry. It was shown that the whole of life is grounded and rooted in love, and that without love we cannot live. So to the soul, privileged by ...

It’s an interesting point that, just as the Hydra of the Ancient Greeks had seven heads, so sin can be described in terms of the seven deadly ones: pride, avarice, gluttony, lust, sloth, wrath and envy. All of them poison people’s souls. But the most destructive of all is envy. Because the sole aim of envious people is to harm their neighbor.

I recall my first classes in Moral Theology some 35 or so years ago. The subject is an essential part of Western thought (particularly in the Catholic and Anglican traditions). In many ways the topic was like a journey into Law School. We learned various methods and principles on whose basis moral questions – questions of right and wrong – could be discussed and decided. These classes were also the introduction of certain strains of doubt for me. The great problem with most moral thinking – is found in its fundamental questions: What does it mean to act morally? Why is moral better than immoral? Why is right better than wrong? Such questions have classically had some form of law to undergird ...

As Christ descended first to the nethermost parts of the earth and then ascended above the heavens, so humble love raises up a ladder in the heart of man. The same ladder which Christ used to descend to man, man uses to ascend to God, for ‘in his heart he has purposed to go up.’ Man then led by the Spirit of God, curtails sinful practices, eradicates desires and evil thoughts which are enmity against God. He is healed from the pestilence of sin, cultivating the longing for heavenly goods, performing God-pleasing works, entering into the heavenly enlargement of holy love of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit. He proceeds ‘from strength to strength’ becoming the son ...

Am I not free? (1 Corinthians 9:1) God persuades, He does not compel; for violence is foreign to Him. (Epistle to Diognetus VII, 4) What Shall We Offer? In an Orthodox hymn used at Vespers on Christmas Eve, the Virgin Mary is seen as the highest and fullest offering that our humanity can make to the Creator: What shall we offer You, O Christ, Who for our sakes have appeared on earth as human? Every creature made by You offers You thanks: The angels offer You a hymn, The heavens a star, The Magi gifts, The shepherds their wonder, The earth its cave, The wilderness the manger; And we offer You a Virgin Mother. As our supreme human offering, the Mother of God is a model — next to Christ Himself, and through God’s grace — of what ...

She finished her story here and invited to me to eat some of the beans she had in her basket, because she’d been told “from the outside”, that I was very hungry. We ate and drank until I was full. But I saw that both the basket and the pitcher were still full, so I gave glory to God. When it was time for me to go, I wanted to leave her my outer raso , but she wouldn’t take it and said: “Bring me new clothes when you next come”. I was filled with joy when she said this and begged her to wait for me and to welcome me again. We prayed again, I bade her farewell and left, imprinting ...

Far from discouraging the faithful from seeking the aid of medical science, the Fathers of the Church actually encourage us to visit specialists for whatever ails us. It is true, however, that Basil the Great rejects excessive respect for the art of medicine and points out the spiritual danger involved in ‘officiously keeping alive’. Let us examine medical science from the point of view of Christian Patristic Ethics. In his work Όροι κατά Πλάτος (The Greater Rule) Basil the Great a Father and Doctor of the Church sets out the relationship which we have with medical science, which is the anthropological principle that ‘God made us to be all of a piece’. He believes that the restoration of the health ...

If a doctor puts us on a diet for the sake of our health, we follow it religiously. What’s a diet? It’s fasting and, in fact, abstention from many forms of food. But we don’t follow the fasting imposed by God. We listen to the doctor but don’t listen to Christ. For us, the doctor’s word is more important than Christ’s.

Rev. Patrick H. Reardon The universal claims of the Christian revelation rest on the assumption that the God revealed in his Son and his Holy Spirit is the only true God. There is only one God, the Father with his Son and Holy Spirit. Therefore, we Christians are deeply persuaded that God has no relations with this world except through his Son and in his Holy Spirit. In the creation of the world and in all his dealings with it, God has never once acted except through his Son and in his Holy Spirit. The created order and the order of history are related to God only through his Son and in his Holy Spirit. Man has no other access to ...

Brueghel’s Landscape with the Fall of Icarus Believers are often challenged with this question: How can you believe that God cares more for human beings than for other creatures, or any other part of creation? We have answered too confidently sometimes, almost as if we could know the mind of God. We know that God does love human beings, and the Cross and Resurrection show the extent and depth of that love. But we do not know that God does not love the rest of creation in ways we cannot fathom. I remember a poem by Jorge Luis Borges in which the Word becomes flesh for every part of creation-a tiger for the sake of tigers, and so forth. While the ...