After I read the post again this morning it is a habit of mine to re-read good writing on spiritual matters several times over a period of days or even weeks to allow my thoughts a chance to dwell there , I came across the following passage from Pseudo-Macarius that furthered my understanding:. He will never recover from the intoxication of materialism. But on the other hand, whoever has received the grace of the Spirit and does not in any way change his mind, or through negligence or wrongdoing resist grace, if he for some time strives not to grieve the Spirit, he will be able to become a participator of eternal life.
Just as one is aware of the operations of evil from the very passions, I mean, by anger and concupiscence, envy and heaviness, by evil thoughts and absurdities, so also ought one to perceive grace and the power of God by the virtues, I mean, by love, kindness, goodness, joy, simplicity, and divine gladness so as to become like to and mingled with the good and divine nature, with the kind and holy efficacy of grace.
He gradually comes to be totally one with the Spirit and thus is rendered holy and pure by the Spirit, made fit for the kingdom. There is so much wisdom in this small passage! By it, we are encouraged to: This morning I was thinking about what a gift it is to fill our homes with light, joy, kindness, and peace, and to dispel heaviness, negativity, complaining, and gloom.
The truth is that God is with us always. I had to open my hands and my heart and let go of everything else in order to cling to God. My children and I prayed to St. Prior to the surgery there had been many scans and imaging that clearly showed the tumor, right up to the morning of the operation when an ultrasound was done to mark the tumor.
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The surgeon had never expereienced anything like it in her career. In a season of difficulties and losses, we were given amazing grace—Alleluia! In that miracle, all of my earthly concerns and doubts were utterly transformed. What followed has been three years of hardship and more joy and peace than I have ever known. And also more sorrow than I have ever known.
Strange That Our Money Says: In God We Trust - Glory to God for All Things
What I have learned about worldly goods—and money —is that they are meaningless. Their worth comes only from their distribution and use. In other words, money comes and goes. At least it should. Father, thank you so much for sharing one the canons from one of the councils. I have read much about the councils, but I have never before read anything that was written by a council. Can you recommend a good resource for further investigation of councilar documents? I hesitate to approach the documents themselves without the assistance of some learned commentary.
Your post leaves me perplexed for at least three reasons that I would like to share for discussion and feed back. If you are born an aristocrat, your family and associates are aristocratic and you stay were you are. Likewise if are born a baker, you stay a baker. When the baker and the aristocrat meet, everybody knows where they stand and the aristocrat has some responsibility for the welfare of the baker. Not so in America where money not birth is the determinant of position in society. So the baker could become richer than the aristocrat and their positions can flip.
An neither has any responsibility for the financial welfare of the other. Money in monarchist France or monarchist England during the industrial revolution had a different meaning to money in America and a different meaning to money in communist countries. To take an example from geometry, in Euclidian geometry a triangle has a sum of angles of degrees whereas in Lobachevskian geometry there are also triangles but their angles do not sum up to So triangles have different meaning depending on the geometry they reside in.
Perhaps money is still a disease but the way we catch this disease is different in our time in America. For one thing, we are in America, the time of Lazarus is different. There are no Lazaruses in America. In America there is electricity, automobiles, telephones and food banks. If somebody is down and out an ambulance is minutes away to drive them to a hightech hospital and after they are sent to a food bank to eat and sleep and subsequently recieve welfare checks and government housing. A different reason is Hagia Sofia in Istambul Constantinople.
This awe-inspiring structure was not built by the poor. It was built by two mathematicians who came from prominent wealthy families. The poor could never build such a structure well they can be directed where to lay the bricks. But maybe the poor are more spiritual, more sane. Maybe such structures show the excess and decadence of wealth and it is better if everybody lives in huts and as the Taliban believes tear down and destroy Hagia Sofia? Electricity for use by the common man , automobiles, computers, the internet, the largest middle class in the world all came to life in America.
The Middle Class probably got its first large boost in England and Scotland — it was exported to the colonies. The Middle Class largely financed the enterprise through markets such as tobacco. Spiritual realities do not change with time and culture — the soul of human beings is a universal phenomenon. That said, our context is certainly different. Clement considered a dangerous disease. It is, essentially, the false understanding that we, in fact, are in charge of the world and manage it. That the outcome of history is ours to command. It is difficult in the modern American Middle Class not to think this — just as it might have been for the wealthy in the time of St.
To invoke the Taliban is cheap rhetoric. I live and have always lived somewhere within the Middle Class. I look after Middle Class souls for the large part. I see the disease described by St. Clement at work within us. I observe and make suggestions. Hagia Sophia was not built by two men. They need not have been wealthy — only trained.
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Many care more about the building than the spiritual content that may once have filled it. I have not suggested the abolition of the Middle Class or the destruction of science, technology, etc. But all of those things also come with their warnings. Our wealthy, Middle Class culture is sick to its very core. It will collapse in an ugly manner if the sickness is not attended to. But that part of history is in the hands of God. I pray for His mercy. The greatness of a culture and its people cannot be measured in their wealth or skill, much less their empire.
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It is a greatness of soul. I would measure that by the commandments of Christ. There are many, many Lazaruses in America. Mother Theresa thought we were in far, far worse danger than the poor of Calcutta. His translation has done a great service to English speakers: I too am so moved. However I also think as contemporary North Americans, we really miss the impact of the gospel vis. The truth is that I am the rich , even though my family lives technically below the poverty line. The absolute tragedy of sexual and gender confusion seems to me just a recent symptom of long established societal unrepentence.
We are members of the eternal Kingdom, not citizens of this world. I have been on government disability since There is a year waiting list for a Section 8 voucher for government housing assistance. I am only 3 years into that wait. I have lived in a vehicle twice for 2 years each time because I cannot afford housing. I was graciously given refuge at an Orthodox Monastery for a year. I have received help from my local parish as needed.
The small city where I live has thousands of homeless people, many of whom are mentally ill and unable to function normally in this world. Two-thirds of all calls in my city come from the homeless. The homeless fill our city parks during the daylight hours. Mark Basil and Esmee, Thank you both for your recent contributions via your comments.
Both have given me pause to reflect deeper into what truly is poverty and what truly are riches. God bless both of you as you attempt to live out the truth of the gospel in your own particular context. I do not know Christopher Columbus but I imagine he must have had determination that there will be land if the boat keeps on going through the endless ocean. I have not heard any accounts of an Angel coming to Columbus and directing his path. My understanding is that by all acounts Columbus believed that there is land and he took it upon himself to reach it.
He must have know he is doing something unprecedented that could alter history and he did it. But I suppose each of us alters history every day by our actions and interactions with others and the environment around us yet our impact is on the micro level. When God willing I wake up in the morning and plan my day, there is no Angel that comes to me maye for other, although I have never heard of this from people I know and tells me what to do, where to go, to whom and how to speak. I do this with the determination that I will earn enough money to buy a car.
After a year my goal is achieved. If I just sat in my appartment and waited for and Angel to come and tell me what to do, I doubt I would have bought a car. As a matter of fact I have tried just that but after a week, there is no sign, the food is gone and I am very hungry, so I go out on my own to manage my world without any signs or instructions. Another aspect of Columbus is that he was sponsored by the Spanish crown and the land that he discovered did not belong to him.
Whereas Joel Myers has sole possesion of a modern oracle, namely the algorithms that run accuweather https: Money in America not in China or Russia or India allows a person to be like Joel Myers, the possesor of the fruit of ones own labour and not like Columbus even if he had money unlikely without Royal connection he would most likely not be allowed to sail and posses land in America and then still have support from the Spanish government.
The feces covered drugged up people in places like downtown San Francisco are no Lazarus and I although I had a good job and wore an expensive suite am not the rich man as I was passing by them I was afraid of being attacked by them. In my view there are many, many sick, poor people in America that need help but their sickness in not the same as the poor in India or as in Lazarus and to characterize them as such is missdiagnosis and being out of touch.
As a mathematician, I am used to using reductio ad absurdum and directness in writing. Please excuse me, my sole intention is to get a point across in a clear manner. Ted, Your comment was directed to Fr Stephen and there is no reason, I suppose, to respond to my comment here. Out of curiosity, did you miss what Esme wrote? Also your derogatory description of the poor in the US you mentioned your context in San Francisco was more than facetious, it seems contemptuous.
Am I misreading your comment? I will say a prayer for you and your illness. If I may, in my understanding Lazarus had no telephone to call and no Church to assist him. Lazarus was completely on his own, the State and the Church were not there to help him. Lazarus was not mentally ill. In my view base on human physiology to be on ones own in Lazaruses situation is to be in mortal danger every minute of the day.
The fact that there are mentally ill people lying on the streets is in my view failure of Government. A government that has trilions of dollars in its pockets. In my view, your situation is different. Ted, When I say that the outcome of history is in the hands of God, I do not mean that our actions are order by angels or some such thing. Modernity, and its Enlightenment secularism — holds that there is no providence, and that the world is only what we make of it. It embraces various versions of Utilitarianism, and believes that it is the task of human beings to make the world a better place.
Its various measurements seem to do a good job of self-justification, and do a wonderful job of ignoring much else. I believe that modernity is inherently violent — in that the only way to make history behave the way we want it to is to force it. The US has only had 17 years in its entire history in which it was not at war, all of which we do in the name of some self-defined good.
For a Christian, Christ is the very definition and incarnation of the Good. His commandments direct us towards that same good. I am not here discussing how to make a better America, how to rearrange the economy, etc. It is the wrong set of questions. The right questions are found in the commandments of Christ: Economies and such are not a proper tool of measurement — they are not the proper goals of life.
That the government should do something different is, no doubt, true. But, even if it is so, it does not absolve me of anything. The Orthodox faith has, for most of its life, suffered under persecutions and governments that were fairly wicked in their own way. None of that changes who we are or what we should do.
Also forgive me for misspelling your name, Esmee! I want to write the accent too. Is there a way in this textbox? What are the key strokes? As a result, the parable scares the hell out of me. Another result is that I now talk to Lazarus, in his many incarnations, and share a shamefully small portion of my wealth with him. I cannot begin to describe what a joy this has been for me. I have gotten to know many wonderful people.
The experience has also brought me closer to Jesus, just as He said it would. I pray the He will give you the same joy that He has given me. Regarding the homeless, walking by them I have felt a range of emotions. Initially I have tried to help only to be met with bizzare reactions they were mentally ill and or under the influence and the possibility of violence, police presence and false accusations. They were people, my fellow human beings but they were agresive beligerent and decieving liars.
Also they were not hungry the government fed them. This is not derogatory, these are facts I observed. Ted, Lazarus and the Rich Man are a parable, not an historical case history. Lazarus can be found in many forms and situations. If the homeless is not where you find him, then pray that Christ will help you see him somewhere — or even to find where he lives in you. And then do for the Lazarus He gives you what you can. And may God bless it. Ted, A word of wisdom from my mother who was a dancer trained by Martha Graham. The question is whether you fall and just fall, or fall and pick dasies.
All the talent, training and practice will fail. We each have different gifts and talents and we use them well or use them ill, but in and of themselves they end up in the dust as we do. That only comes by embracing the Cross. We do not need to change anything, the victory has been won. We just need to learn to participate in it. What ever small fruits we produce will rot and become poisonous if we do not learn to offer all in thanksgiving.
History is not linear nor dialectical nor controllable. History is Providential, a gift and a miracle story of death and Ressurection. Indeed I know I do have an impoverished heart. May God help us. His concern for what is healthy dialogue is legitimate. I have learned much from the people here in terms of who I am, what I am willing to believe, and what I am willing to share with my son. Fr Stephen once told me that baptizing my son while my wife and I were still very divided religiously over how to raise him would be unwise.
He described a strongly religiously divided home as schizophenic. I began to see that. I began to see how that vast difference could actually make my son schizophrenic with respect to religion. So I quit taking Micah to worship. Im glad he isnt baptized. Then I quit coming to worship. Now I feel like I am waking up from a dream. I have been watching from afar and I want to confess to everyone that I tried.
I really gave my heart to this. But in the end there is nothing here that has filled the void, there has been no healing. No voice has been heard. As always…I am alone. Simon, The wounds which you carry, I think, stand between you and a lot of what you desire, and those wounds do not respond very easily to what might seem a desired solution: My prayers are with you daily, weak as they are.
My door and the door of the Church remain open — always. I encourage you to read Fr. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. Most people quote the second part of that without the preface.
The Church at a Crossroads
The way reveals the way. I dont need therapy. Not everyone needs to fit within the first standard deviation of the mean. I like the feel of being consumed by purpose. The healing I seek is not from childhood trauma. What difference does anything at all make without life? The disease for which I once sought a cure is the same disease for which I first began seeking a cure back —disconnection. But my first articulation of something like that was when I was eight or nine years old. For most of my life I have been aware of how alone we are inside our minds.
I remember the first time existence itself felt miraculous—we are alive and we aware.
For over thirty years I have sought connection. I have sought for wisdom and understanding. I have sought for truth. I have sought for God. As a child I thought that my heart had been gouged by God and that the gouge was getting deeper. But there is no God for that gouge. The desire for God even the desire for salvation and enlightenment is the desire for the deepest imaginable connection.
Orthodoxy is beautiful in so many ways. But, so is a sunset and sunsets dont exist, not really. They are an experience of EM perceived from a certain point of view. Orthodoxy is like our sunsets: Beautiful, but there is no one who is dwelling in the setting of the sun. Simon, Reading what you wrote made my heart ache. You remind me of a couple of verses in Psalm My prayers are for you, Simon, your little son and for your wife.
I still see you as a brother. Simon, I think I might have some experience of what you mention. This very demand, is the best footing for the serpent to be heeded by a poor soul, and the Fall to follow. So, in prayer terms, once seeking and not finding, accept that God might not give in to you, maybe not even until after your death, for reasons that only He knows are to your benefit.
Keep this utter trust of acceptance, and put all effort into this strand of humility. In fact, have this demand instead: These are the sort of words I had received from holy men on this. I hope you find some use for them brother. Simon, Did you ever get round to reading this? Dino, you have revealed more of myself to me than perhaps anyone else on the blog.
I do not love God. And the corollary to that is I do not know God. And the corollary to that is God is not present to me. And there is probably a very good reason why all of that is true. I thought in the beginning that perhaps what was missing was baptism and the sacraments. We do things for reasons we barely understand. Looking in the phone book…or go to the nearest clinic? Not in my world.
This is the crux of the matter. While others not talking clergy here lovingly give advice, what it really is, is them affirming their own convictions, hoping with all sincerity that it will help you. But when alone, all you want affirmation of yourself…not to hear what someone thinks you need. Sometimes best is silence. I also understand where Father says we are not alone. But something has to happen in the soul where you know you are not alone.
Perhaps the same with you. And it was to be that I realized this through the Church. Really there is no final chapter in life, like an ending of a book. You will carry that Cross to the end of your days. If not before, it will be then when you will see The Lord. I am a Christian, but the part of me that is not yet converted is positively an existential nihilist.
Have you ever read about the work of Kazimierz Dabrowski? He was a brilliant Polish psychologist who developed a theory of personality development called the Theory of Positive Disintegration. In it, he posits that what we experience as psychoneuroses depression, anxiety, unhappiness, distress, etc. Unlike many psychological theories which end up viewing intrapersonal religious conflict as just another psychoneurosis to be cured from, TPD validates everything you are experiencing as an essential part of your growth that need not frighten or dismay you.
Learning about the work of Dabrowski gave me an extremely useful model that has reaped enormous benefits for my mental life and my spiritual life. The model of TPD allows me to exist within the tension of nihilism and Christ with patience, and even sometimes joy and thanksgiving. I have been challenged by and learned much from your contributions.
Paula, and that is why you are the coolest of the cool beans, sister. Thanks for your understanding. There are actually others that do too! You do get it. Dabrowski…never heard of him. Simon I would dare say that none of us loves God. And the more aware we are of that, the closer we are to becoming the kind of vessels that will be filled with the Grace that alone can bestow the power of loving God as our God, instead of the default position of fallen man loving our ego as our god.
Yes, Simon, I remembered from your previous comments. I wish I knew what to do or say that would truly offer you relief and resolution. Paula, I do hope you can get your hands on some good material, and that you benefit from it! There are more free resources on the web today than there were ten years ago, but there are also a few books published by his students that pop up when you search for him.
Dino, Is it not right to say that none of us loves God completely or perfectly?
- You Can Minister in Gods Power: A Guide for Spirit-filled Disciples.
- Fr Stephen Wang.
- En los antípodas del día (Narrativa (baile Del Sol)) (Spanish Edition).
I certainly do not. John in his 1st. Dear All, I see that the previous conversation was replaced by a much more beautiful one. Thank God and Father Stephen for moderating — although many things you said Father, trying to calm things down, were very beautiful and worthy of remaining, especially the part about asking our own heart to direct us — I wish I saved that one! This is how Mother Melania commented recently, I found that reflection helpful and beautiful. May we all be granted generosity towards those we can help.
When I have implemented it, it has changed my life for the better every time. I am finding it very encouraging. You mentioned some books written by his students. Would you give me a recommendation or two? My background in Psychology and Nursing may be of help with the meatiness you made note of!
Simon, My heart aches regarding your circumstances. In many respects my life is similar. I can only surmise it must be additionally more difficult. This too has been my life since I have joined the Church. There is indeed a kind of schizophrenia of the heart. I love my husband very much, and my child is now grown and there too with both is also a heart ache of not being able to share my life experience in the Church.
I share and talk about it but there is a gulf present in the conversation. It was most difficult in the beginning when I first joined the Church. Slowly my husband has become accustomed to the icons and morning prayers. The tides apparently do change, but ever slowly. My hope is that you stay with us here.
Serafina Aldea, linked by Mark Basil. It was so good—excellent in every way. I plan to share it with my family. Thank you so much for linking it, Mark. Also, I have really appreciated the conversation between Simon, Fr. Stephen, Paula, and everyone else. I am grateful to Fr. Stephen for providing a safe, welcoming, space for us to discuss matters of faith, share our individual experiences, and ask hard questions. Stephen, you are a very gracious host and moderator.
Thank you, too, for linking Fr. Simon, I have been thinking of you and what you wrote all day. I hope so much that you will continue to comment here. Your perspective has shone a light into some of the dark areas of my heart. I remember feeling as a young child that no one really knew me and understood me—or could know me.
Those feelings grew to a crescendo when I was in my mid-thirties. By then I had spent a lot of time searching for God and trying to connect through Bible study, various churches, etc. It is natural to being human. My desire to feel closeness connection with God is really the same as any of my other self-desires. I may think it is different because it has to do with God, but it is still something I want in order to feel better—more comfortable in myself and in the world.
In letting go of my attachment to this desire a long, ongoing process! I, ironically, begin to feel my alienation less. While I know that Christian tradition focuses on the metephor of disease and healing, sometimes it gets in the way for me. Especially since, all of us still get physically sick and die. So what changes when one becomes a Christian?
Christ is the difference between standing in a room in the middle of the night and standing in it in the morning. And, so everything has changed, because now you see. It just means that we see—begin to see—how things really are. We need everyone in order to see more and more clearly.
I may think it is different because it has to do with God, but it is still something I want in order to feel better —more comfortable in myself and in the world. Well now Sue…that got my attention. I assume you speak of an unhealthy attachment. What did you begin to do?
I was attached to a false idea of how God should be. Full rather than empty. Connected rather than alienated. Anything we place above God is an idol or heart attachment. Jesus tells us over and over that God will provide everything we need in this life and the next—that we are not to worry about anything, but rather trust in our Father.
Perhaps our biggest attachments in life are our own plans for how things should be for us and for our loved ones. It is a hard thing to accept, but this can even be the case in spiritual matters. You asked me how I began to let go of my attachment. Letting go was and continues to be a process. For me it began with consciously simplifying my faith: Praying the Psalms and other scriptures has slowly become more important to me than praying from my own faulty voice and selfish concerns.
Therese of Lisieux wrote: Then everything seems clear: It is not the feeling that you are close to God that makes you close to God; it is your prayers and your actions which truly show your love for God, and where the deepest connection to Him can be found. Adam is walking in the Garden of Eden at the very dawn of creation. It is a world of infinite possibility; […]. Thoughts for Catholic students as they begin the academic year: I spent the bank holiday weekend at Walsingham for the annual Youth Summer Festival.
There was a very nice piece about the group in the Catholic Herald just a few days before by Joanna […]. It feels as if we are part of an epic biblical scene: Two great tribes have gathered together from the four corners of the continent, at the place where the plain meets the mountains, to […]. It started life as a series of short articles about the Catholic faith, and gradually morphed into a more systematic presentation within a traditional catechetical structure. Lord Patten outlined the recommendations his committee has made to a Vatican commission about the reform of the Vatican […].
I saw the RSC play Oppenheimer this week. For me, the overriding one was how it […]. Archbishop Oscar Romero is beatified today in El Salvador. What is more important: A reflection on character and the fears that hold us back, by Fr Stephen Wang. How to overcome the stress and sheer existential terror of exams and assignment deadlines.
A homily by Fr Stephen Wang to encourage students during these last few weeks of the academic year. How to enter the reality of suffering without losing faith in God. Have you ever been in a situation where, to everyone outside, it looked like everything had fallen to pieces? A failed plan, a project or job fallen through, a serious illness, a financial loss, some […]. Catholics and Our Common Home: Caring for the Planet We Share. At last we are in fashion!
It had seemed obvious to me for a long time that any sane person would want […]. World Mental Health Day: The world is icon and sacrament pointing towards its Creator as well as being that place where we have communion with Him. All of Creation rejoices in you, O full of grace: He made your body into a throne, and your womb more spacious than the heavens.
All of creation rejoices in you, O full of grace: In the proclamation of the Kingdom of God, Christ makes known to us what is hidden. He reveals the truth of our existence and the true nature of all things. It is worth noting that the New Testament takes great care to tell us that what it says has first been hidden. It makes no apologies:. To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ; to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places, according to the eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord Eph 3: Glory to God for All Things.
Reading Beneath the Words Fr. Through her is established a connection to the World on High, and mystical contact with eternity. In her is defeated death, which becomes a rest from labors and a portal to "the best and most useful. Allegorical Interpretations of Scripture? John Whiteford Allegorical Interpretations of Scripture? John Whiteford Clearly, if the Apostles could interpret the Old Testament in allegorical and typological terms, no one who claims to be a Christian should object to the Church Fathers doing likewise.
Why the Orthodox Honor Mary Fr.