Simplicty of Being Loved

"When we begin to discover and to drop the barriers and fears which prevent us from being ourselves and which prevent the life of the Holy Spirit from flowing through us, we become more simple. Simplicity is no more and no less than being ourselves, knowing that we are loved. It is knowing that we are accepted, with our qualities, our flaws and as we are in the depths of our being. Simplicity is letting the love and the light of God flow and shine through us."

+ Jean Vanier, Community and Growth

The Deeper Message of Forgiveness

"We think always of forgiveness as a way in which we would say to a person who has offended, hurt, humiliated us, that the past is past and that we do not any more hold a grudge against this person. But what forgiveness means more deeply than this is that if we can say to a person: let us no longer make the past into a destructive present, let me trust you, make an act of faith in you, if I forgive you it means in my eyes you are not lost, in my eyes there is a future of beauty and truth in you."

+ Metropolitan Anthony Bloom

Religous Feelings

"Religious feeling, on the contrary, easily accepts a rupture between religion and life and gets along happily with ideas, convictions, sometimes entire worldviews that are not only alien to Christianity but frequently openly contradictory to it."

+ Fr Alexander Schmemann. "The Eucharist." Translated by Paul Kachur. (New York: St Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1987) 144.

"We should not depend on sentiment in our relationship with God. Instead, we should be fortified by a faith that goes beyond our feelings."

+ Fr Mattew the Poor, Guidelines on Prayer.

Remembering the Cross

Happy Feast of the Cross (in the Old Calendar)

"The power of our Christianity is closely and deeply tied to our faith and our relationship with the Holy Cross, and its apparition in our lives is a powerful force against the devil, materialism and worldly desires. The Cross is a power that transforms envy to love, revenge to forgiveness and flaunting to simplicity. The Cross then fills you with joy, so we pray with St Paul: “ But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” (Galatians 6:14)

Therefore, the Cross must be clearly seen in the Church, so our church also becomes bearing the Cross of our Lord; the Cross of service and missionary; the Cross of partaking of our Lord’s passions and glory; the Cross of loving EVERYONE and abhorring the world, a cross from which the aroma of love, blessing and peace spreads to the ends of the earth.

May the blessings of the Holy Cross be with us all. Amen."

+ Hegumen Bishoy Kamel, Alexandria, Egypt

Fr Stephen Freeman on Evangelism and the Ego

A very humbling and important blog post by Fr Stephen Freeman. His observations on the ego are very profound. I also have started to read Dr Jean-Claude Larchet's "Therapy of Spiritual Illnesses" recently translated by Alexander Press ( you can buy a copy here: http://alexanderpress.com/ ) which appears to address the similar issue of "fallen passions."

Perhaps evangelism if not understood in the correct restorative context can also be a 'fallen passion.' I think of the focus on subduing creation instead of restoring and offering it. Of conquering and crusading (and the implication of opposition that has to be overcome) instead of drawing, inviting, encountering and raising people and places back to the fullness of Truth that is encountered and witnessed in the Liturgical Life and Lived Theology of the Orthodox Church.

Lot's to think about and pray about. Je Nai Nan. Lord Have Mercy.

Orthodoxy is Orthodoxy.

Imparting Peace

Imparting Peace and Words of Comfort 

One Friday they were out harvesting and it was Simeon’s turn to cook the midday meal. Forgetting that it was Friday, he prepared a dish of pork for their lunch, and they all ate of it. Six months later, on a feast-day in winter, Simeon’s father turned to him with a gentle smile and said,

St Silouan the Athonite

‘Son, do you remember how you gave us pork to eat that day in the fields? It was a Friday. I ate it but, you know, it tasted like carrion.’

‘Why ever didn’t you tell me at the time?’

‘I didn’t want to upset you, son.’

Recalling such incidents from his life at home, the Staretz would add, ‘That is the sort of staretz I would like to have. He never got angry, was always even-tempered and humble. Just think - he waited six months for the right moment to correct me without upsetting me!’

+ Archmandrite Sophrony, "Part 1: The Staretz' Life and Teaching," in "Saint Silouan the Athonite." Translated by Rosemary Edmonds. (New York: St Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1999) 12-13.

Words Appropriate

"Theology, whose essence lies in the search for “words appropriate to God”, is called to be such a salvation of words through the power of God. But it fulfils its mission not with the help of definitions, not through “words about words,” but by referring words to that reality and to that experience of it that is more primary than the word itself and in relation to which the word is a symbol, manifestation, gift, partaking, possession. For it is precisely as a symbol—i.e., not as a definition of reality, which in the end is undefinable, but as its manifestation and gift, as partaking in it and as possession of it—that the word was created. Through the symbol the word frees itself from its fall and rises to that encounter with reality and that reception of it that we call faith."

+ Fr Alexander Schmemann. "The Eucharist." Translated by Paul Kachur. (New York: St Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1987) 149.

Asomen (Let us Praise)

Asomen (Let us Praise)

Orthodox Hymn for the Feast of Pentecost (Coptic Rite)

Let us praise the Lord , for with glory He was glorified. He ascended into the heavens and sent to us the Paraclete , Spirit of truth , [the Comforter]. Amen. Alleluia.

He made the two into one, that is, heaven and the earth. He ascended...

O come, all your peoples, let us bow down and worship Jesus Christ He ascended...

This is God our Saviour, and the Lord of all flesh. He ascended...

Three in unity and unity of three; the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Spirit of Truth, [the Comforter]. Amen. Alleluia.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZftp9IfwPw

What is Peace?

"Do not rail against anyone, but rather say, 'God knows each one.' Do not agree with him who slanders, do not rejoice at his slander and do not hate him who slanders his neighbor. This is what it means not to judge. Do not have hostile feelings towards anyone and do not let dislike dominate your heart; do not hate him who hates his neighbor. This is what peace is: Encourage yourself with this thought, 'Affliction lasts but a short time, while peace is for ever, by the grace of God the Word.'"

+ St. Moses the Ethiopian.

Prayer for the Departed in the Coptic Rite

It is truly wonderful to see how much the Orthodox funeral prayers are focused on healing, union and restoration into the divine life of Chist which is the Orthodox concept of salvation. Here are some excerpts from the prayers of the departed in the Coptic Rite:

...You have created man for life and not death....

...You have not created humans for curses but for blessings. ...
...Clothe him/her with them the pure garment and unending joy in the sovereignty of light that You have prepared for those who please You...

...For there is no death to Your servant but a departure from death to life, and no death will overcome us because of the death of Your Only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord....

...all are alive with You, those who are worthy for Your greatness....

...You are our helper and our protector and our savior and our hope and our healing and our resurrection and our eternal life altogether....

...And we ask You, O our Master to number us with them, and give us rest with Your holy flock, who have attained to stand at Your right hand....

Orthodox funeral prayers (in all the different rites of the many local Churches) actually say alot about life and the journey of the Church.

Let us pray to embrace liturgical theology, our lived theology, and encounter the deeper mysteries of the Person of Christ within the life, word, deeds and being of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.

May the following excerpt from the Coptic Rite of the Orthodox Church encourage your prayer and deepen your encounter of Christ in the Liturgy after the Liturgy.


+ + +

Prayers for the departed

Priest: Again,let us ask God the Pantocrator, the Father of our Lord, God and Savior, Jesus Christ. We ask and entreat Your goodness, O lover of mankind, remember, O Lord, the souls of Your servants who have fallen asleep, our fathers and our brethren.