Saturday morning began with a thunderbolt: a dear fellow-priest from my diocese began his phone call to me early that morning with the words, “Did you hear about Fr. Alexander?” I had not heard about Fr. Alexander Pihach, but soon was...
The burning of books is objectionable on principle. Indeed, whenever I hear of books being burnt, I always think of the famous quote by Heinrich Heine, who was born a Jew but converted to Christianity, and who died 1856. He said, “Where...
On September 21, 2016, the Joint Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church met in Chieti and released an agreed statement with the long title, Synodality and Primacy during the first...
How much do you need to know to become a catechumen in the Orthodox Church? That was the question put to me by an inquirer at St. Herman’s one Sunday several months ago. The young lady in question was drawn to Orthodoxy and her heart...
If we read the New Testament through the lenses of our modern egalitarian culture we may miss some things in it which were shocking to the original readers and hearers, especially in the ministry of Jesus. We moderns in the West do not...
Time Magazine recently featured the story of a woman who decided to become a man and then decided to have a baby, which she eventually did. The story was provocatively entitled, “My Brother’s Pregnancy and the Making of a New American...
Missionary work no longer commands the cultural respect it once did. Indeed, missionary work is often grouped together with other forms of cultural and colonial imperialism, and derided as an insensitive imposition of foreign culture,...
It seems to me that self-described Christian Feminism is becoming increasingly shrill (I was struck by this when reading recently some feminist commentaries on the Song of Solomon). Orthodox Feminists, however, seems to offer a kinder,...
Sometimes I feel a little sorry for the Pope—he seems to have the unenviable task of changing Roman Catholic dogma and practice while all the time denying that he is doing any such thing. Take for example his apparent recent desire to...
Our Divine Liturgy here at my parish of St. Herman’s does not actually occur in Langley, B.C.—nor, if it comes to that, does the Eucharist you attend occur in the city in which you live. Rather, both of our Liturgies take place in the...
There are a number of people who are fairly certain that they can know—not guess, but know—who is lost and who is saved. Others on the opposite end of the omniscience scale assert emphatically that no one can know for sure if any...
There is a new product on the theological market, Universalism, which advertises a new and improved deity, one much better than the old deity offered by such men as John Calvin, Jonathan Edwards—and John Chrysostom. The old deity could...
Possibly no part of the Bible arouses more controversy and strong feeling than its opening two chapters on the creation of the world. In one corner of the cultural boxing ring we have those who regard those chapters as a literal...
A friend of mine just returned from back east where he had attended the funeral of a friend and was mightily impressed by it—but not in a good way. The deceased was an older woman who had died, leaving behind a grieving family who loved...
In the current cultural debate over Islam, we sometimes meet people who rush to defend Islam and assert that Muslims and Christians both worship the same God. Sometimes they give liturgical expression to this assertion, and participate...
