Treasures of the Fathers: Fourth Sunday of Tubah
Does God Listen to Sinners? The Lord Jesus…opened the eyes of a man who was born blind. Brethren, if we consider our hereditary punishment, the whole world is blind. And therefore came Christ the Enlightener, because the devil had been the Blinder. He made all men to be born blind, who seduced the first man. Let them run to the Enlightener, let them run, believe, receive the clay made of the spittle. The Word is – …
The Honor Due to a Priest
Whoever honors the priest will honor God, and he who has learned to despise the priest will gradually proceed in time to insult God also. ‘He who receives you receives Me.’ [Mt. 10:40]. And it is written, ‘But hold His priests in honor.’ [Sir. 7:31]. Hence, the Jews learned to despise God because they despised Moses and would have stoned him [cf. 17:4]. And when someone acts reverently towards a priest, he will be much – …
Treasures of the Fathers on the Holy Nativity
+ Today the Lord is born, the life and salvation of mankind; today a reconciliation is made of Divinity to humanity, and of humanity to Divinity; today all creation has leapt for joy; those above sent toward those below; and those below towards those above; today occurred the death of darkness and the life of humanity; today a way was made toward God for man and a way for God into the soul. – Saint – …
The Essence of A Christian Marriage
This article presents the Christian understanding of marriage, based on St. John Chrysostom’s homilies. Although he lived in the 4th and early 5th centuries, yet his teachings are pertinent to every generation and present the best understanding of what a Christian marriage should be like. The general Orthodox Christian view is that God created humanity in His own image and likeness as male and female with the intent that they should live together in harmony. – …
Patient Love
In the thirteenth chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians, known as the "Chapter of Love," Saint Paul the Apostle presents to us the attributes of love or the virtues that a loving person should adorn himself with. Amongst these virtues is patience or longsuffering, "Love suffers long" (I Cor.13:4). What it the meaning of longsuffering? Longsuffering means having a spirit that is patient and slow to anger. A person who loves another should – …
Collection for the Saints
Ministering to the needy requires raising money, and collecting money in church is a sensitive issue that stirs numerous opinions, which can be controversial. The Church has its spiritual message – which is witnessing for Jesus Christ before the whole world and preparing its children for the Kingdom of God. When the Church cares about collecting money, there is skepticism about the basic mission of the Church; this matter is not new in the life – …
The Star
This star was not a common one–it was not even a star at all, as it seems at least to me. But some invisible power transformed into this appearance, is in the first place evident from its very course. For no star moves like this. For, we see the sun, moon, and all the other stars travel from east to west; but this was drifted from north to south–for so is Palestine situated with respect – …
The Monastery of Saint Antony the Great
Born in the Upper Egypt town of Coma near Heracleopolis in the year 251 A.D, St. Antony the Great, when orphaned at the age of 18, became a hermit and thus lived to 105 years old. He lived as an Anchorite, as still exists in Egypt, and it is said that he was tormented his entire life by flatteries and temptations of the devil. He, along with St. Pachomius, were two of the first exponents – …
Contemplations on the Feast of Ascension
We celebrate two great feasts on Thursday. The first great feast of the Lord is Great Thursday of the Holy Pascha, on which the Lord gave us the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. The second is the Feast of the Ascension of our Lord into Heaven, after He spent forty days with His disciples. This Thursday is also a Feast of the Lord called the Feast of Ascension. By the Ascension of the Lord, we – …
Passing on Peace in the Family
The words of St. Paul to his disciple, Timothy, were very strange, when he told him, “ I call to remembrance the genuine faith that is in you, which dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am persuaded is in you also” (2Tim.1:5). Is faith inherited? The very genuine faith in the heart of Timothy, the son, was the very same faith as that living in the heart of his – …
Christ the Teacher
It pleases me on this blessed day to congratulate all of you on the occasion of the Nativity of the Lord Christ. I felicitate my Muslim brothers on this occasion as I felicitate my Christian brothers because the Lord Christ is for everyone and everyone believe in His miraculous virginal birth. I would like to talk to you about a single characteristic of His many characteristics and it is His characteristic as a teacher. They – …
Treasures of the Fathers: Third Sunday of the Holy Fifty Days (Samaritan Woman)
God Tires for Us In the Gospel lesson the holy evangelist has shown us most abundantly that our Lord Jesus Christ assumed the weakness of the human race…Our Lord Jesus Christ came to the field which holy Jacob had left to his son, Joseph. I do not think that this field was left to Joseph as much as to Christ, whom holy Joseph the patriarch prefigured, for truly the sun and moon adore Him, while – …