SACRAMENTAL LIVING

“In a culture where materialism is not seen as unusual, it’s fascinating how immaterial the spiritual life is for many…When one’s material needs consume all one’s attention, nothing more will be sought after; the demands of physical life can totally colonize the mind.” (Father Stephen Freeman, Matthew the Poor) “This is important to bear in mind as we go through a world that boasts of its objectivity and commitment to what’s “really there.” To the average modern person, objec

“Struggle is inescapable, for if we are not struggling in the service of Jesus, we will be struggling in the service of sin…In Christ, by contrast, we have a relationship with the living God. He loves us, illumines us, stands with us, and forgives us as we struggle to have Him and His being formed within our hearts and souls.” (Robin Phillips, Dynamis 9/7/2018) “There is an ascetic imperative, an utter necessity to enter into the struggle that is Christ’s own struggle. We fas

“…God Himself takes on human form to reveal man’s vocation and meaning as divine. From this moment onward man is free. Nothing stands over him, for the very world is his as a gift from God to fulfill his divine destiny….Tragically, too many people do not hear this voice of Jesus as the voice of Love Incarnate calling us to repent, to sacrifice, to have sacrificial love in order to have the greatest joy, to have our deepest desires fulfilled, to find our true selves, to fulfil

“Why was the entire dispensation of history and work of Christ necessary? Could not God simply have saved humankind by fiat?...The solution God has provided is to heal our nature from the inside out. By joining His divine, eternal life to human flesh, Jesus Christ has overcome the power of death; hence mortality will be abandoned in the grave when the universal resurrection dawns. If this explanation is not sufficient for the inquirer, ‘Say something like this to reasonable p

“God is an obvious reality, but man is a paradoxical being—God’s beloved creation, fallen away from real life and caught in some fiction,...

“Christ then appears through shut doors in the midst of them and tells them one thing: ‘Peace be with you.’ For these to be the first...

“…Chrysostom understands original sin not in terms of inherited or personal guilt but in terms of an inherited mortality that causes...

“…sin lies in the direction of the will…A person sins when he looks upon his life as if it belonged only to him…It is necessary for...

“…by entering into His created order by means of the Incarnation, God intimately unites Himself to our nature, thereby infusing it with...

“Every human being who comes into this world is unique, and all are given the opportunity to know God.” (Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnica) “We...