SACRAMENTAL LIVING

“…let us never indulge in idle questioning. Speculation only opens the door to evil and leads us into moral and spiritual confusion. Only the Lord Jesus conversed successfully with Satan, since He alone is sinless…let us strive to live pure and godly lives, even if it requires painful struggle at times. Christ has promised to help us and save us. May we grow “in holy conduct and godliness” (1 Peter 3:11)…The renowned theologian Dumitru Staniloae equated “doing theology” with

“We look forward to the time when our family can be reunited, and we can settle into a new, balanced routine. Regardless, there is still a need that must be met. Matushka still has patients, the physically suffering, that must be cared for. I have my own spiritual patients, both in the parish and at my base, who likewise find themselves in need of care. Throughout all of this, it is our hope that our children can learn from this experience, understanding that the needs of oth

“Man was created to know God; not only to believe in Him and to hope in Him, but to know Him and so to love Him and to serve Him. Knowledge of God is the aim and goal of man’s life, the purpose of his creation by God.” (Father Thomas Hopko) “…only those who love God are known by Him (1 Cor 8:3). Such “knowledge” does not refer to God’s ability to see a man’s heart. Rather, it describes God’s disclosure of Himself to a man, when He invests that person with divine energies…tang

“All the power possessed by the Lord is bestowed upon the apostles! [Matthew 10:5-8]. Those who were prefigured in the image and likeness of God in Adam have now received the perfect image and likeness of Christ. They have been given powers in no way different from those of the Lord. Those once earthbound now become heaven-centered.” (St. Hilary of Poitiers) “…the degenerative power of pride, or egocentrism, blinds us to the goodness, truth, and beauty of the cosmos of which

“In the Lord Jesus’ Sermon on the Plain (Lk 6:17-49), He commands all who come to Him (vs. 47) to love their enemies, do good to those who hate them (vs. 27), bless those who curse them, and pray for those who abuse them (vs. 28). Next, He even more stringently requires the disciple to endure physical assaults against person and property (vs. 29), give and lend freely (vs. 30), be merciful to all (vs. 36), refrain from judging or condemning, and forgive others (vs. 37). His e

“God and His Word are one. To trust in God is to trust in what He has spoken. Faith is based on God's word. Christ dwells in the heart of the believer to the extent His word indwells in him. The apostle Paul exhorts the believer to seek God's word as the possession of the heart. "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly" (Col. 3: 16). Christ abides in us when His word indwells the heart, because the word releases the presence of Christ. The spoken word is the extension of t

“Everyone who lives in this body knows that he must be committed to that special task or ministry to which he has given himself in this life as a participant and a laborer, and he ought not to doubt that in that everlasting age he will also be the partner of him whose servant and companion he now wishes to be, according to what the Lord says, “If anyone serves me, let him follow me, and where I am, there also will my servant be.” (St. John Cassian) “To minister is to serve so

“Start each day anew with a deep sense of wonder and awe…When awe and wonder depart from our awareness, depression sets in, and after its blanket has lain smotheringly upon us for a while, despair may ensue, or the quest for kicks begin. The loss of wonder, of awe, of the sense of the sublime, is a condition leading to the death of the soul. There is no more withering state than that which takes all for granted, whether with respect to human beings or the rest of the natural