I have sometimes said (in a light-hearted manner) that God gave us the Church to keep us honest. The truth is, that God gave us the Church that we might be saved. The failure to see why and how the Church is the ark of salvation is a failure to understand some of the most fundamental parts of our Christian faith – and often a failure which transforms Christianity into an ersatz religion that knows nothing of the Church.
An issue of national importance which has been capturing the attention of the whole country for decades as well as the various Greek ministries and the Greek national security authorities, has become a matter of internal political squabbling, of investigative committees and of unrestrained chit-chat because of ‘additional external factors’. The consequences of such furor will possibly be felt by the entire nation for years to come. read more… Διαβάστε τη συνέχεια του άρθρου »
The first and most important thing to remember is that we do not bring anyone into the Church – its not our job. We do not attract people to the faith, we do not convince people of the Truth, we don’t do any of that. God is the One Who attracts people, Who brings them in the door, Who convicts their hearts, Who brings them to repentance, Who convinces them of the Truth!
We do none of this.
Too often the individual person is made responsible for doing God’s task, but in attempting to do God’s work, he neglects his own!! What is our task? Our task is the acquisition of the Holy Spirit (St. Seraphim), our task is the working out of our salvation, our task is to repent and weep for our sins, our task is to enter the Kingdom of God. This more than anything else is what we must do. This is an evangelistic task – indeed the primary evangelistic task.
There are other «tasks», however, which derive from this one which are a bit more specific to «evangelism». It is God who brings people to the door of the Church and who convinces them that they should enter – however, we must keep the door to the Church open and visible!!! Διαβάστε τη συνέχεια του άρθρου »
God will judge The Prince of evil on the last day - The Day of Judgment
«Satan can only deceive he cannot pluck us out of the hand of God»
Deceive – to mislead by a false appearance or statement
By Fr. Timothy Evangelinidis
When I was much younger and attending university in my home-town of Sydney (in those days a much smaller and less busy place), I was allocated a particular lecturer who prided himself on being an atheist. «Religion is something for weak people, those who cannot think or live for themselves». Arriving at his first lecture this man proudly announced that with a few premises, sub-conclusions and a watertight conclusion, he would prove beyond any doubt that God did not exist. It went something like this: Διαβάστε τη συνέχεια του άρθρου »
All too often do we as creatures of the Almighty forget that in each of us, no matter how spiritually depraved or perverted, is the ever present image of God. In some of us its very brilliance overshadows everything that we come in contact with and thus brings admiration and greater glory for God. On the other hand, there are those of us who live as though our existence depended only on our own initiative void of any spiritual power and thus denying the deity within us. Nevertheless, whether we recognize the fact or not. God’s image pervades our natures from the very moment of our conception. Διαβάστε τη συνέχεια του άρθρου »
…One of the things which is so difficult to come to terms with is the reality that when we bear anger and resentment and bitterness in our hearts, we erect barriers to God’s grace within ourselves. It’s not that God stops giving us His grace. It’s that we say, “No. I don’t want it.” What is His grace? It is His love, His mercy, His compassion, His activity in our lives. The holy Fathers tell us that each and every human person who has ever been born on this earth bears the image of God undistorted within themselves. In our Tradition there is no such thing as fallen nature. There are fallen persons, but not fallen nature. The implication of this truth is that we have no excuses for our sins. We are responsible for our sins, for the choices we make. We are responsible for our actions, and our reactions. “The devil made me do it” is no excuse, because the devil has no more power over us than we give him. This is hard to accept, because it is really convenient to blame the devil. It is also really convenient to blame the other person, or our past. But, it is also a lie. Our choices are our own. Διαβάστε τη συνέχεια του άρθρου »
Dearly Beloved Brethren,
Nοbody knows the time or even the place that our Lord is coming again to judge the living and the dead. For this reason, the Fathers of our Church do not tell us to try and outsmart God, by predicting the time that He will appear. On the contrary the Fathers concentrate on teaching us to be constantly ready and watchful, by praying, fasting and doing works of love and faith. We are instructed to expect a sudden if not instant entry of our Lord.
In the final chapter of the Book of Revelations, the Apocalypse of Saint John we are informed that we must fully accept the imminent coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Furthermore we are told that our world will suffer terribly before the DEUTERA PAROUSIA (SECOND COMING) of our Lord and that this world will be destroyed. Nevertheless so let it be, in obedience we should pray «Even so come, Lord Jesus [Christ]» (Rev 22:20) and come quickly. Διαβάστε τη συνέχεια του άρθρου »
If we consult a Bible concordance for the words «belief» and «faith», we find many pages of Biblical references. So very much has been said in the Scriptures and by the Fathers, yet these words are still misused and misunderstood. In the Western Churches, debates on «faith alone», or «faith and works», have caused division and strife. Today, in our consumer-oriented society, as we look at the Scriptures, we tend to want to know what is promised, what we deserve, and what we can get from our faith and belief. Certainly, «all things are possible to him who believes»; but only from searching the whole of the Scriptures and the mind of the Church, can we come to understand what is revealed to us by God. Our understanding of faith cannot be limited to a belief in the existence of God. Satan knows that God is God, the demons recognized and knew Jesus Christ, and many devil-worshippers recognize, yet wish to deny, what God reveals to us. Διαβάστε τη συνέχεια του άρθρου »
«We are fools for Christ’s sake» (1 Corinthians 4:10).
Thus speaks the great Apostle Paul who in the beginning was guided by worldly wisdom, which is against Christ, until he recognizes the falsehood and decay of the wisdom of the world and the light and stability of the wisdom of Christ. Then, the holy apostle did not become angry with the world because they called him «a fool for Christ’s sake» neither did he, in defiance of the world, hesitate to be called by this name.
It is not of any value to us how the world is going to regard or call us. Διαβάστε τη συνέχεια του άρθρου »
“Search for me,
A needle in a haystack,
Find where I lie,
Pain hidden by a rag,
Here I hide – from you? –
Blood wounds, undried and shining,
I hide, fearing
Your loving hands hold salt”.
(from a Belarusian poem)
Monk Alexander
Source: Orthodox Research Institute
The Beginning of Love
True love starts when we let others be the way they are, rather than adjusting our impression of them to our own liking. Otherwise, we will love only our own fixed perception of them. It is necessary to understand ourselves and everyone else as God’s creatures, to see God’s image and dignity in ourselves and in others. He granted it to everyone of us, and if we hurt this dignity in others, we actually hurt ourselves.
We have no power to change another person, and we should not waste our time analysing why he behaves this way or that. Let him follow his own path. We should accept people as they are, otherwise our intrusion can prove to be destructive. A person might know what we expect of him and behave the opposite way.
Monk Alexander
Source: Orthodox Research Institute
We have no power to change another person, and we should not waste our time analysing why he behaves this way or that. Let him follow his own path. We should accept people as they are, otherwise our intrusion can prove to be destructive.
The Moral Schism
The faith and love of every man is put to the test by something – misfortunes, psychological difficulties, moral perplexities, even by our happiness. Διαβάστε τη συνέχεια του άρθρου »
Part 1. The contemporary situation.
The present contribution describes a miracle that, as far as we know, is almost unheard of in the entire history of Christianity. A dead person (Elder Joseph of Vatopaidi) smiled. Impressive is the fact, that this smile occurred 45 minutes after his death. This is photographically documented. There have been reported a lot of miracles with dead persons (prophets, saints, e.t.c.). But almost never before did occur a miracle like the one that happened on July 1, 2009 in the Holy Great Monastery of Vatopaidi (Mount Athos, Greece)
Since many months, the spiritual family of Elder Joseph (namely the Brotherhood of the Holy Great Monastery of Vatopaidi and especially Abbot Ephraim) suffers a unique, for our days, persecution. The latter consists of all kinds of lies and slander. Every father is sad, when his children are acused. But he is much more sad, when the acusations are faulty. Elder Joseph, being the spiritual father of this family, suffered from this persecution as well. But where sin abounded (in this case the unjust and systematic persecution of the Vatopaidi Brotherhood and of Abbot Ephraim by the pathetic watchdogs of the New World Order), grace did much more aboud (in this case the smile from eternity) (Apostle Paul, Letter to Romans, chapter 5, vers 20). Διαβάστε τη συνέχεια του άρθρου »
by Archimandrite Justin Popovich
All the truths of Orthodoxy emerge from one truth and converge on one truth, infinite and eternal. That truth is the God-man Christ. If you experience any truth of Orthodoxy to its limit, you will inevitably discover that its kernel is the God-man Christ. In fact, all the truths of Orthodoxy are nothing other than different aspects of the one Truth–the God-man Christ. Διαβάστε τη συνέχεια του άρθρου »
ΣΥΝΑΞΑΡΙ
Απόψεις για τη Μονή Βατοπαιδίου (και όχι μόνο) 