Saving Communion

Saving Communion
by Fr Stephen Freeman
http://glory2godforallthings.com/2013/03/07/saving-communion/

Few things are as fundamental to the New Testament as the reality of communion (koinonia). It means a commonality, a sharing and participation in the same thing. It is this commonality or sharing that lies at the very heart of our salvation. This communion is described in Christ’s “high priestly prayer”:

The Mystery and the Process of Death

"The last moments of death are perhaps one of the most profound moments in a person's life...we should do everything we can to ensure we with do not deprive someone of their last, perhaps prayerful encounter of this mystery of their death...and their life."

+ An Orthodox Priest

The Mystery and the Process of Death

http://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2012/07/the-mystery-and-process-of-death.html

An interview with Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos and St. Vlassios by Pavel Chirila, Professor and Doctor at St Irene’s Hospital in Bucharest (Romania).

May Be One

Fr Stephen mentions that the prayer of our Lord Christ that "we may be one" is particularly Eucharistic and Ecclesial and not ecumenical. (http://glory2godforallthings.com/2013/02/11/america-and-the-perversion-of-christianity/)

At first I wonder if my current concerns are also affected by the American Evangelical ideas of ecumenism. I think that yes there is a sort of fallen ecumenism which is focused on reductions. However I think when we say Oneness in terms of Orthodoxy being Orthodoxy we must keep in mind that this is not a label or an appeal to denominationalism.

Metropolitan Anthony Bloom On The Prodigal Son

On The Prodigal Son
by Metropolitan Anthony Bloom

In the Name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost.

How simple and how restrained are the words in which the Gospel describes his cruel rejection of his father, and prepares his departure into the far, the strange country! “Father - give me my part of thy inheritance!” Do these words not mean: “Father - I can't wait until your death! You are still strong, and I am young; it is now that I want to reap the fruits of thy life, of thy labours; later they will be stale. Let us come to an agreement: for me you are dead; give me what belongs to me or what would belong to me after your actual death, and I will go, and I will live the life I have chosen”.

On Orthodox Worship

"I suppose some people have zeal, but the point is actually not to have a bunch of emotional ecstasy. Worship, like all of Orthodox life, is to be sober – absolutely not dour or down-in-the-mouth, but primarily connecting with God in the innermost center of our being – which in Orthodox Theology is the heart, but please do not understand this as having to do with emotionalism.

The Ethiopian Liturgy: A Bird's Eye View

The Ethiopian Liturgy: A Birds Eye View
by Rev. Dr. Mebratu Kiros Gebru

Fr Mebratu's PhD Dissertation: "Liturgical Cosmology: The Theological and Sacramental Dimensions of Creation in the Ethiopian Liturgy", from St Michael's College, Toronto, 2012

http://youtu.be/wU3RQieF55Q

Transcriber's Note: Fr Mebratu mentions a lot of very very good points, however there are some categories in this particular presentation which appeal to "Western Scholastic Methods" or maybe Roman Catholic Systematic Theology which divides Liturgy into identifiable parts and compartments. Ie. the danger being of course that one kills the frog when one dissects it to study it. 

Father does briefly reference interdependence in the Divine Liturgy but his lecture doesn't emphasize that the Sacrament of Communion cannot be isolated from Sacrament of the Assembly, Sacrament of the Kingdom, Sacrament of Entrance, Sacrament of the Word, Sacrament of Unity, Sacrament of Anaphora, etc. 

The other issue is that Fr Mebratu mentions modern absence of Catechumens which suggests that either the catechumenate is not in use as a missiological apparatus or that the Ethiopian Orthodox Church does not have Catechumens. One would hope that the existence of the rite of Dismissial of Catechumens would encourage the Church (this includes all Orthodox Rites) to have active work in Catechizing those we 'mission' too, and encouraging the use of the Catechumenate as the Traditional method of evangelism and mission instead of appealing to heterodox methodologies and presuppositions. If Orthodox missiology is Liturgical, Trinitarian and focused on Theosis, then the Official use of the office of the Catechumenate is an integral sacramental work of the Church, for the synergistic cooperation of man's union with God. 

Still, this lecture does give a fascinating insight into the Traditions of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. Glory to the Holy Trinity. 

Transcript:

Blurred Lines

Blurred Lines: Priestly Pastoral Care & the Responsibility of the Laity
A lecture by Archpriest Steven Ritter

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzSKUOWB7zo

Transcript:

On Worship

"It’s not “limiting” God nor “legalistic” to be faithful to what He gave us. The worship “in spirit and in truth” is precisely the vast tradition of Orthodox liturgical worship given by Christ and then elaborated within the Church. To worship in spirit and in truth does not mean that that deposit from Christ is abandoned in favor of the whims of modern taste and secular culture. Christ Himself kept the Jewish calendar and participated in synagogue and temple liturgy, so interpreting His words in such a way as to draw condemnation of His own actions doesn’t really make much sense"

+ Fr Andrew Stephen Damick

A recent post by Fr Andrew Stephen Damick discusses the appeal of the "Rock Band and Sermon" package that has become the tradition of American Evangelical Mega-church approaches. 

Sometimes these trends also have appeal among Orthodox living in the Lands of Immigration. One might hear that there is 'worship' music and then there is Liturgy or Liturgical music, but such dichotomies and categories feed into the secular presuppositions and also imply that Liturgy is not worship but something else.

On Freedom and Choice

“We live in an age whose chief moral value has been determined, by overwhelming consensus, to be the absolute liberty of personal volition, the power of each of us to choose what he or she believes, wants, needs or must possess …." 

+ David Bentley Hart, In the Aftermath: Provocations and Laments.

 “unconstrained personal license might actually serve to make society as a whole less free by making others powerless against the consequences of the ‘rights’ we choose to exercise…" 

+ David Bentley Hart, In the Aftermath: Provocations and Laments.

“We are free not merely because we can choose, but only when we choose well. For to choose poorly, through folly or malice, in a way that thwarts our nature and distorts our proper form, is to enslave ourselves to the transitory, the irrational, the purposeless, the subhuman”

+ David Bentley Hart, Atheist Delusions.

The Place or the Person

The following post by Joel Miller asks the question if place or person is required for change?

"Ever feel like a change in circumstances would make life easier? You’re not alone.