Today we celebrate the Sunday of all Saints and the synaxis or gathering of the twelve Apostles. Our Church honors the memory of the Holy Apostles in order to show us visible examples of holiness, which we can follow, so that we can also enter like them into the Kingdom of Heaven, to be partakers of Beauty. The saints were …
Read More »Tag Archives: Christianity
DIATRIBE: HOLY WEEK
“For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures; and that He was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve; after that, He was seen of above five …
Read More »ICONOGRAPHY – A STATEMENT OF IMAGE
Introduction In recent times, there has been a subtle but noticeable trend of Byzantine iconography manifesting itself within the decor of Roman Catholic and Protestant churches all around the world. To the discerning Orthodox Christian observer, initially there is joy at the fact that other fellow Christians are adopting and using iconography as an expression of faith, and thus serve …
Read More »THE GREATNESS OF PAN ORTHODOXY
Here in New Zealand, and in places where the other Orthodox Christians (the Antiochians, Russians, Serbs, Romanians, etc) do not have churches and priests of their own as (well as) in the Fiji Islands, we the Greek Orthodox cover their devotional needs. So well-pleasing and very beautiful are our shared feelings every time and whenever all we Orthodox attend the …
Read More »5th Sunday of Matthew (Mat 8:28-9:1)
This Gospel reminds us more or less of our own troubled time where people who by following their own imagination and individual notions of life, create huge problems in the peaceful course of humanity. It would be no exaggeration to state that Church life in today’s world has become irrelevant. This is why as mature and serious Christians, Christ’s presence …
Read More »SOME THOUGHTS ON FASTING
Introduction The role played by the discipline of fasting has figured prominently within the spiritual life of Christianity, and has remained integral to the Orthodox Church. Its purpose and meaning is multifaceted, to which entire treatises have been written on the subject. For this reason, we will not labour the point by providing an exhaustive exposition on the subject, since …
Read More »LOVE FOR ONE ANOTHER (Lk 6:31-36; 2Cor 6:1-10)
“The Lord said: as you would want others to do to you, you also do unto others” Sometimes, dear brothers and sisters, we believe that the standard Christ gives us in today’s Gospel passage is not very different to what was stated in the Old Testament, which was very much in accordance with human logic. The Old Testament stated: “whatever …
Read More »EVERYTHING IN LOVE: THE MAKING OF A MISSIONARY
For over a decade, Fr. Luke and Presbytera Faith Veronis served as Orthodox missionaries in Albania under the spiritual leadership of Archbishop Anastasios (Yannoulatos), with Fr. Luke directing the Holy Resurrection Theological Seminary in Durres. The Veronis family has now returned to the U.S., where Fr. Luke pastors Sts. Constantine and Helen Greek Orthodox Church in Webster, Massachusetts, and is …
Read More »Saint Kosmas Aitolos (1714-1779) Feast Day on the 24th August
SAINT KOSMAS AITOLOS Seventeen centuries after St. Paul journeyed across Greece, a solitary man of God travelled the same country from border to border, sea to sea, and island to island in a magnificent religious spirit, which strengthened the fires of Christianity and the flickering hopes of a nation, that was straining under the yoke of Turkish occupation after nearly …
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ModeOfLife Become love as God exhorts us, for this is the true starting point for changing your life and the world. For it is love that will bring respect, justice and equity into the world, not our personal opinion of what justice or equity is.