In English

This change in basic ethical reasoning can be seen in the routine screening of older women by a procedure called amniocentisis. This is done in order to "identify" Down’s Syndrome and other afflicted children in utero so that they might be destroyed before birth (there is a popular misconception that older women are more likely to give birth to Down’s Syndrome children, however recent studies done have refuted that belief). Large numbers of tests are being developed to screen children in the womb, the sole object being a wholesale "search and destroy" mission against any unborn child who proves to be less than "perfect." What parents are not told is that, most of these tests increase the danger of spontaneous ...

Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, during his opening address at the Holy and Great Council of the Orthodox Church, quoted the preacher with the golden mouth, St. John Chrysostom: “For the term ‘church’ is defined as a system and synod.” Both the term ‘church’ and the system of synod have generated a great deal of discussion recently and regrettably some division as well. Archbishop Anastasios of Albania remarked in his opening statement that the “Heresy of our time is egocentrism.” Following the Inaugural Session, I spoke with a well-known delegate about the Archbishop’s statement, and on the self-centredness of many monomaniacal critics of the Council. One of his comments was especially insightful. He compared them to the pope, and argued that unlike the Roman pontiff who ...

People who don’t have love within themselves have been cut off and isolated from all that is best and spiritual.

This saint lived in the time of Emperor Antoninus, in the year 140, and came from a village of Old Rome. She was the daughter of Christians called Agathon and Politeia, who observed the commandments of the Lord scrupulously. They were childless and constantly besought the Lord to send them one. God, who fulfills the wishes of those who venerate Him, granted them a daughter, whom, at her Holy Baptism, they named Paraskevi, because she was born on Friday, the day of preparation. The child devoted herself to God from the time she was still in her mother’s arms. She was taught by her mother and encouraged by her. Once she had learned to read, she constantly studied the Scriptures and ...

His discourse was also theological. He never ignored dogma, never indulged in moralizing, empty verbiage or flights of fancy. He spoke well, was comprehensible, and used theology, not as a system of knowledge, but as the essence of life, which imbues the whole of human existence. The centre of his theology was the Bible, which he knew in depth. His sermons were, at bottom, Biblical and he recommended that his ‘children’ read the Scriptures, and, indeed, he set a chapter of the New Testament to be read every day, by all of them. He immersed himself in the Scriptures, engaging with the text and enjoying the interpretational footnotes, both Patristic and modern. We would often speak at length on the telephone ...

The life of a monk should be such that he should gradually become an angel on earth and a man in heaven.

Monastery of Grigoriou Spouts and water from the mountain, occasional springs here and there. Faucets and water at the entrance to the monasteries, cooling passers-by and visitors alike. Streams with refreshing, crystalline water, their sources in the ravines and, higher up, in the untrodden gorges or at the root of some oak tree seen only by God. Water that flows down to the sea, water that kisses Athos. Holy water in the forests of pine on the way to Saint Ann’s. A spiritual spring of holy water. Every corner has a spring, overshadowed by a broad-leafed plane tree or crisscrossed with ivy. Refreshing moments when you quench your thirst, bodily and spiritually.  Under the dense foliage the weather takes a ...

Sleep. It’s enough that you’re vigilant. Some people are vigilant for a few, others are vigilant for everybody

People are born with a dual nature: they are both material and spiritual. With the dust of the earth, God made our body and He gave life to this body by breathing into it the soul. The soul and body are indissolubly united. Neither is superior to the other; neither is opposed to the other. To the body has been assigned the precious role of being the temple of the soul, not its place of confinement, as in non-Christian philosophy. The soul has been given to us as being bodiless, rational and immortal. Body and soul have been fashioned by the Creator to co-exist and collaborate in absolute harmony. In this way, the aim of human existence will be fulfilled, ...

In the year 1628 the holy martyr Athanasios, a Greek by birth, the son of a çavuş who had converted to Islam, was martyred for his faith in Christ, with the collaboration of his father, who had urged him to convert from faith in Christ. From an early age, when he was twelve years old, this holy and blessed man abandoned his parents and the Mohammedan faith and fled to the Holy Mountain, where he became a monk in the monastery of Iviron. When he’d been in the monastery for eight years, he went to the khan to ask him if there could be a return to the Christian faith for his mother and father, who was a harsh, ...

Don’t accept bad ideas and you won’t be forced to sink into evil and its works. Because if you don’t sin in your mind then you won’t sin in deeds either. When you fall into various temptations, think of it as a great joy.

All those who are glorified in this world are lost with it. But those who are glorified by Christ are glorified through Him. The glory of the world is death, whereas the glory of Christ is life - life eternal and immortal.

This has led, in the West, at least, to humanists/secularists pushing their own agenda, which is a ‘logical’ (humanist) approach to social issues. A man and a woman love each other and want to marry. No problem. But if a man and a man or a woman and a woman love each other they must also be allowed to marry. It’s only ‘fair’. Men can become priests; women are also people, so they should be able to become priests, too. It may be (though it is highly unlikely) that the Church will adopt these positions, but if it were to do so, it should be on theological and ecclesiological grounds not because of secular or sociological demands. If this were ...

It’s estimated that more than 1,000 monks hand nuns have sprung directly from the ‘root’ of Elder Iosif the Hesychast. Because he had foreknowledge of this, the Elder didn’t allow his disciples to continue to live together after his death, but separated them, in an unusual step for the order of things on Athos. He knew in advance that they’d become Abbots and Elders of large coenobitic monasteries. When he was in the caves at Little Saint Ann’s, he was visited by Ioannis Bitsios, from Oranoupoli. This was at a time when he’d acquired three disciples: Elders Iosif Vatopaidinos, Efraim Filotheïtis, and Haralambos Dionysiatis. Mr Bitsios asked the Elder if these three young monks were part of his brotherhood and ...