Saint John Chrysostom: Second Instruction to Catechumens
I have come to ask first of all for some fruit in return for the words lately said out of brotherly love to you. For we do not speak in order that you should hear simply, but in order that you should remember what has been said, and may afford us evidence of this, by your works. Yea, rather, not us, but, God, who knows the secrets of the heart. On this account indeed instruction is so called, in order that even when we are absent, our discourse may instruct your hearts. And be not surprised if, after an interval of ten days only, we have come asking for fruit from the seed sown. For in one day it is possible at once to let the seed fall, and to accomplish the harvest.
Why Go To Church When I Can Just Pray At Home?
St. John Chrysostom answers this question briefly when he writes: They say: ‘We can pray at home.’ Thou art deceiving thyself, O man! Of course, one can pray at home. But it is impossible to pray there as in church, where such a multitude of hearts are uplifted to God, merging into one unanimous cry. […]
A Recent Appearance of the Theotokos in Bethlehem
This is the story of the miraculous appearance of the Panagia to a Muslim in Bethlehem on the first day of Holy Week 2012. The Orthodox monastic community of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem related this story to Mr. Lycourgos Markoudes who writes here as he heard it. The story begins on Holy […]
Theology in a Scientific World
First of all I would like to thank you for inviting me to speak this evening about Theology and Science, and for being here with us, not simply in this historic University and City of Oxford, where Theology and Science, and, we may hope, Wisdom are cultivated by so many eminent people, but also in […]
Christ in the Old Testament
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”. [John 1:1] It is no coincidence that St John begins his gospel in the same way as begins the first book of the Old Testament: “In the beginning…” (Gen. 1:1). Orthodox Christianity rests on the belief in “one […]
The challenge of contemporary homosexual culture to the Orthodox Church
Contemporary homosexual culture? How can we talk of such a thing? What do we mean? It is to these questions that we must turn at the beginning and then consider where the challenge to the Orthodox Church lies. I am sufficiently old – the ‘wrong’ side of 60, to be able to remember quite well […]
Original Sin: Orthodox Doctrine or Heresy?
How easily we Orthodox indiscriminately adopt the language of Western theology! It is always a great temptation for those who have converted to Orthodoxy from Western Christian denominations to bring the baggage of their former allegiances with them rather than embrace Orthodoxy as something which is entirely different from the Christianity they left behind. While […]
The Twelve Great Feasts
The Twelve Great Feasts 1. The Great Feast of Theophany. Read online Theophany View as PDF