“Someone asked Abba Anthony, ‘What must one do in order to please God?’ The old man replied, ‘Pay attention to what I tell you: whoever you may be, always have God before your eyes; whatever you do, do it according to the testimony of the holy Scriptures; in whatever place you live, do not easily leave it. Keep these three precepts and you will be saved.’” (Sayings of the Desert Fathers)
An important (but lesser-known) quality necessary for spiritual healing and growth is geographic stability. God calls un to be his disciples in specific places.
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The Two Great Commandments are not: Agree to this set precepts about God; and agree to that set precepts about your neighbor. Faith is not about intellectual assent; faith is about love. Faith is our loving, trusting response to the love of God for us. And in our loving response to God’s love a life-giving relationship is forged. My sermon at St. Nicholas Orthodox Cathedral in Fort Wayne, Indiana, on Sunday, July 9, 2023.
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Interested in helping keep my ministry going and growing? → https:// http://www.buymeacoffee.com/frajarmus ☕️ Many thanks for your support! Prayers and blessings 🙏 ☦️
In June 2022, I was invited to speak on Eastern Orthodox Christianity at Zootown Church in Missoula, Montana. I talked with with my bishop, and he agreed that it was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up. It was a wonderful visit. I met some very devout and kind hearted believers, and I made some new friends. The theme of my message was how the ancient Christian Church understands the story of our salvation.
An Akathist Prayer is sacred poetry, consisting of thirteen segments. The word “akathist” means “without sitting,” indicating that these prayers are meant to be recited standing up.
The earliest and best known Akathist is to the Mother of God. A contemporary Akathist that has captured the hearts of Orthodox faithful throughout the world is the Akathist of Thanksgiving, also known as “Glory to God for All Things” (St. John Chrysostom’s final words.
The Akathist of Thanksgiving is the 20th-century composition of a Russian Orthodox bishop, Metropolitan Tryphon (Turkestanov) who died in 1934. A copy of the text was found on the body of Father Gregory Petrov after his death in a Soviet prison camp. In the midst of that man-made hell, Fr. Gregory found solace in the words of this hymn.
I was recently asked to provide offer a quick overview of the beliefs and practices that make Eastern Orthodox Christianity different from the Western Christian confessions. This is no easy task; to get it done you need to paint with a pretty wide brush. With that said (and for what it’s worth) here’s my response…
To start off, it needs to be stressed that these are generalizations only. There are many different Western Christian confessions and Orthodoxy overlaps here and there with a lot of them. But the differences are significant and some of the big ones are as follows.
First, we understand salvation as being healed from a life-threatening wound, not getting a reprieve from a death sentence. The Church is a hospital, not a courtroom.
Second, becoming a Christian is not about making an intellectual agreement to a specific set of principles; it is about entering into a living relationship with Jesus Christ, through his Body on earth – the Church.
Third, there is more to reality than what we can see. The unseen world is real, it has an impact on us and we can impact it. And we connect with the unseen world through symbols, icons, and liturgy (ritual).
Finally (and I’ve saved the big one for last), we believe that heaven and hell are the same place. Actually, they are not places at all but reactions to, or experiences of, God’s Presence. At the end of this age everyone will be in the presence of God, some will like it and others won’t – that’s heaven and hell.
Again, these are only generalizations, but if they’ve piqued your curiosity at all, feel free to reach out and I’ll be happy to delve into them a little deeper with you.
In his teaching on prayer in Matthew 6, is Jesus really condemning repetition in prayer? If so, why do we see multiple examples of repetitive prayer in the scriptures? Visions of heaven, in fact, show that around God’s heavenly throne all you hear is repetitive prayer: “Holy! Holy! Holy!”
The Orthodox Church teaches that we are created with, not five, but six senses. Our sixth sense is the least developed and yet the most important, because through it we are able to perceive reality in its fullness.
Q: I want to draw closer to Eastern Orthodoxy but my spouse wants no part of it. What do I do?
A: These situations are more common than you might think. In fact, they are more the rule than the exception. Because this is an issue that touches directly on someone’s core values, you cannot push your spouse into a decision. Take your time and do your best to be a good witness to the Orthodox Faith, answering questions with kindness and accepting their resistance with patience. It’s a longer road, but one with much more fruitful possibilities for your family’s faith journey. And, of course, pray without ceasing that the Lord warms your spouse’s heart to the beauty and truth of Eastern Orthodoxy.
Eastern Orthodoxy 