FEASTDAYS IN THE ORTHODOX YEAR

INTRODUCTION Catechesis 60 contains a number of interesting details. Who, for example, if the ‘holy father and teacher’ referred to in the opening sentence? If the Short Catecheses were given during St Theodore’s exile to the Propontis in 820, it cannot be St Platon, who had died in 812. The most likely person is St Nikephoros, the Patriarch. The latter, …

By Blessed Theophylact, Archbishop of Ochrid and Bulgaria From The Explanation of the Gospel of St. Mark 34-37. And when He had called the people unto Him with His disciples also, He said unto them, Whosoever desireth to follow after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whosoever desireth to save his life, …

On guarding the soul from destructive passions. Brethren and fathers, now that we have fasted for the first week we appear to each other somewhat different to what we were, leaner and paler. But even if our outward nature is wasting away, as the Apostle says, the inner is being renewed day by day. For what it is to see …

The Holy Church calls the second Sunday of Great Lent the Sunday of the Light-Creating Fasts. In its Divine services, in line with the destruction of the sinful condition of man, it is descriptively and touchingly represented in the church hymns, which explains the Gospel parable about the Prodigal son, and praises the fast as a means to the beneficial …

The following vision was recorded by Patriarch Philotheos Kokkinos, the biographer of Saint Gregory Palamas, and was also later repeated by Hieromonk Athanasios of Paros in his biography of Saint Gregory Palamas. At the Great Lavra of St. Athanasios on the Holy Mountain there dwelt a perfected anchorite. Spending his time in solitude and prayer, the hesychast was neither seen …

By Nikephoros Kallistos Xanthopoulos SECOND SUNDAY of LENT On the same day, the Second Sunday of the Fast, we celebrate the memory of our Father among the Saints, Gregory Palamas, Archbishop of Thessalonica. Verses The Fountain of light leadeth unto the unwaning light The radiant herald of the light and the truly great mind. The relics of Saint Gregory Palamas …

By Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos, from his book Saint Gregory Palamas as a Hagiorite Every Saint loves the Panaghia. Sainthood is not understood without this Theotokophilia. It occurs because the Saints, after tasting the Love of God, communing of the Body and Blood of Christ, and experiencing the gifts of the incarnation of Christ, feel the need to give thanks …

On fasting and dispassion; spoken at the beginning of the fast. Brethren and fathers, the season of Lent, when compared to the whole year, may be likened to a storm-free harbour, in which all who are sailing together enjoy a spiritual calm. For the present season is one of salvation not for monks and nuns only, but also for lay …

On this Sunday the Holy Church focuses on the memory of the exile of our ancestral parents from paradise for disobedience and intemperance in order that through misfortune it more evidently emphasizes the importance of the presented ascetical effort for all, and in the loss of the blessedness of paradise it specifies a subject, worthy of repentance and tears. The …

By Metropolitan Athanasios of Limassol On the first Sunday of Lent, we celebrate the Sunday of Orthodoxy, that is to say the feast of the restitution of the holy icons, as the Church once again, by the grace of God, vanquished the heresy of the iconoclasts and preserved with exactitude the faith and the tradition of the Holy Fathers of …