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Stop Saying “Glory to God for All Things!”
A testimony offered by Hieromonk Synesios. “A few years ago, I was the parish priest of St. Vasileios church (Piraeus) and was called to hear the confession of a young man, Xenophon, 42 years old. When I arrived, his days were numbered. Cancer with rapid metastases had affected his brain too. He was all alone at the ward, the bed next to him was empty, so we were all alone. This is what he told me about how he came to Faith, since he was a “hardened atheist” in his own words: ‘I arrived here about 35 days ago, in this ward of two beds. Next to me was another…
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Suffering with Christ in Orahovac
by Josef Candelario If there is one thing I’ll never forget about Kosovo, it’s Orahovac. There was a time when Muslim Albanians and Serbian Christians lived there together in peace. There was a time when three thousand Serbs called Orahovac home. And then came the war, the Unrest of 2004, and the systematic persecution of Christians in Kosovo. The shrinking population of Serbs who refused to leave their homeland gathered together around the village church on the hill for protection, on the one remaining street which has become a Serbian ghetto. We were there to visit one of these families, friends of Nikola and Ivan. To say that…
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When Fr Benedict Resurrected His Dead Benefactor
Archimandrite Benedict Petrakis (+ September 8, 1961) developed a magnificent pastoral activity in the Metropolis of Aitoloakarnania and especially in Agrinio. Many spiritual branches of this region bore fruit through his systematic work and his exceeding love for God and neighbor. When he was young and wanted to study theology, he was helped financially by a pious woman from Patras, Melpomeni Bulbasakos. And when he became a mature preacher in Aitoloakarnania, he received a phone call informing him that his benefactor was near death and he was requested to go and give her final communion. Immediately Benedict got into a taxi and hurried for Melpomeni’s home in Patras. When he…
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The Tower of Skulls
By Josef Candelario “I saw a large tower rising in the midst of the plain, as white as Parisian marble… [R]aising my eyes to the monument, I discovered that the walls, which I supposed to be built of marble or white stone, were composed of regular rows of human skulls; these skulls bleached by the rain and sun, and cemented by a little sand and lime, formed entirely the triumphal arch which now sheltered me from the heat of the sun. In some places portions of hair were still hanging and waved, like lichen or moss, with every breath of wind. The mountain breeze, which was then blowing fresh, penetrated…
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The Great River: Christianity and Paganism
From Death to the World #XXVI By Deacon Joseph Magnus Frangipani By the time I arrive in New Delhi, leaping pockets of green slime lining the bus terminals, sailing through smoke of burning bodies, backpacking dog-infested cobblestone streets of Tibetan refugee camps; before happening upon remote caves at the source of the Ganges, and discovering the wonders of the Prayer of the Heart; long before studying black magic in ashrams through Rishikesh and forking roasted vegetables smeared with butter and rose petal; before shooting back and forth across sage deserts of Idaho by astral projection and offering fruit, fire and rice before Krishna, Shiva and the goddess of death I…
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Attend to Thyself: Attentiveness and Digital Culture
«Πρόσεχε σεαυτῷ»: Attentiveness and Digital Culture Fr. Maximos Constas Senior Research Scholar Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology International Conference on Digital Media and Orthodox Pastoral Care Athens, 7-9 May, 2015 The Distracted Life Having promised us a technological utopia, our ubiquitous and intrusive cyberculture has instead precipitated a spiritual crisis in which human experience has been systematically fragmented and the coherence of the self increasingly threatened. Living in a culture of organized distractions, our thoughts are isolated and disconnected, preventing us from seeing and experiencing the wholeness of life. Distraction and fragmentation have negative consequences for the organization of knowledge; they prevent us from engaging our spiritual depth,…
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José Muñoz-Cortez: Chosen of the Mother of God
The Russian Orthodox Church Abroad was making preparations to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the Myrrh-streaming Iveron Icon of the Mother of God, when it was shaken by the news of the tragic death of the icon’s guardian, Brother Joseph (José) Muñoz- Cortes. He was brutally murdered on the night of October 31 in a hotel room in Athens. Brother Joseph was born in Chile in 1950, into a pious Roman Catholic family of Spanish descent. He was a boy of twelve or thirteen when, passing by the Russian Orthodox church in Santiago, he was attracted by the sound of singing and went in. There he became acquainted with Archbishop…
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Orthodox Spirituality and The Technological Revolution
From “The Authentic Seal: Spiritual Instruction and Discourses,” by Archimandrite Aimilianos, Former Abbot of the Holy Monastery of Simonos Petras, Mount Athos. Introduction A great deal is made nowadays of “the technological revolution,” as seen from both sides, those in favour and those who are very much against. In the realm of Orthodox theology, however, is there really any essential difference between the age-old problem of technology and today’s reality? We could, of course, talk about the last century with the industrial revolution and all its consequences: social, political, moral, religious and so on. When people speak of a new era in the history of mankind, of the third, technological…
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OUR ORIGIN
Youth of the Apocalypse. Part I. Chapter I. CHILDREN OF WAR IN the beginning when there was peace, mankind was given the fearful and noble gift of free will. This perfect gift of life was quickly subverted and brought about mankind’s death. Within this gift of freedom there were two paths, two choices: good and evil. Mankind chose evil. As an angel falling from heaven, like lightning the whole of mankind fell into the abyss of corruption and death As children of war, this is our origin. We have come from thousands of years of sorrows–in hunger, in thirst, in nakedness, in imprisonment, and in death. With every step on…
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Seven Homilies to the Youth: Part III
By Fr George Calciu Continued from Part II. Below is the third recorded homily given in opposition to the law, in a series of “seven homilies to the youth” delivered as lenten meditations by Fr George Calciu to the youth in Romania. Under communist rule in Romania, Fr George was taken prisoner by the authorities for refusing to become a puppet of the government. He preached the truth openly to a society that was being contorted into a materialistic one, being stripped of all spiritual life. In the face of cruel imprisonment and unimaginable torture for which he suffered for many years, Fr George delivered to the youth a series of…
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Seven Homilies to the Youth: Part II
By Fr George Calciu. Continued from Part I. Below is the second recorded homily given in opposition to the law, in a series of “seven homilies to the youth” delivered as lenten meditations by Fr George Calciu to the youth in Romania. Under communist rule in Romania, Fr George was taken prisoner by the authorities for refusing to become a puppet of the government. He preached the truth openly to a society that was being contorted into a materialistic one, being stripped of all spiritual life. In the face of cruel imprisonment and unimaginable torture for which he suffered for many years, Fr George delivered to the youth a series of…
