SACRAMENTAL LIVING

“Every day of your life is a battle and the field of battle is the human heart and mind. This is where the battle takes place on a daily basis. Whether you pay attention or ignore it, whether you apply yourself or you are negligent, you are already at war.” (Fr. James Guirguis) “Choosing a side means not only standing with the army to which you pledge your allegiance but also actively participating in that side’s combat. Civilians in human war may try to stay out of harm’s wa

“God calls us to faithfulness in whatever situation He places us…Faithfulness to God is never forgotten by the Lord, even if it appears to go unnoticed (Heb 6:10). The true reward is glorification, not in this life, but in the Kingdom to come (Heb 11:39, 40).” (Orthodox Study Bible, Esther 2:20, 23) “People often perceive faith as confidence in the existence of God. But this is the first step of faith, from which you can gradually rise to something higher. For example, faith

“One of my daily prayers is for God to open the doors He wants me to walk through and close the doors He doesn’t. Life becomes very simple when we surrender to God’s will.” (Jackie Morfesis) “I firmly believe that God will not only open the right doors in our lives, as I often say, He will close the wrong doors on our lives. Not only the doors, but people also who are no longer beneficial to our souls will seamlessly fade away. I realize given that we are to love our neighbor

“And truly, we ourselves are not at all strangers to the roaring winds and crashing waves of the storm of this temporal life. We live in what many now term “the attention economy.” We are surrounded on all sides by the most powerful corporations and the most advanced technology in the history of the world, all cleverly preying on our psyches to keep our attention constantly fixed on the desires and cares of this world. From morning till night, we are assaulted by advertisemen

“…we often lightly pronounce sentence and form an idea about someone based upon… not even the knowledge of different facts of his biography, but much more often upon hearsay, conjecture, and our own opinions supported by nothing, yet influencing us so powerfully that we consider our opinions the sole and precise truth about one or another person. But this is not at all correct—not in 99 cases out of 100, but in all 100 cases. Therefore, if we speak about a negative, disagreea

“If we look inside ourselves and try to see our tendencies, we will easily notice that we already have a developed habit of condemning...

“I know well from a history of panic attacks that shallow, quickened breath is a symptom of deep distress. I also know well the wild...

“…we cannot see ourselves accurately simply by looking at ourselves. The soul does not serve as a private mirror. Who and what we are is...

“We all have the experience of falling into our familiar sins again and again. Instead of being disheartened to the point that we no...

“The Apostle Peter exhorts us Christians to be “of one mind” which will require us to have compassion for one another and to forgive...