John Henry Newman is not among my favourite authors. I read his Apologia many years ago when I was an Anglican priest, and contrived not to be too shaken by it (mostly by closing the book and not thinking about it too much). As...
The call of Isaiah to the prophetic office is narrated in Isaiah 6. Isaiah was in the Temple when he had a vision of Yahweh of hosts, King of the heavenly armies, in all His glory. As Yahweh sat on His high throne, the lower skirt of...
There is, hidden away in the Book of Revelation, a very tiny but precious verse. In each of the highly-stylized and structured messages to the seven churches of Asia that Christ passes along to John, Christ makes promises to those who...
Despite the fact that many people in the past have predicted that the works of the late C. S. Lewis would fade into obscurity and be forgotten (one social commentator once described enthusiasm for his works as a “fad”), his books on...
As far as Joshua was concerned, Moses died too young. Admittedly Moses died at the age of 120, a ripe old age, whether the figure is mathematics or poetry. But doubtless Joshua looked forward to Moses entering the Promised Land and...
I am informed that Sr. Vassa recently presented an in-person lecture and spiritual reflection at the seminar “Women and Lived Orthodoxy” at the New Valaam monastery in Heinavesi, Finland on September 15-17, 2023. Presumably this is the...
If you were to ask me the most significant characteristic of modern life as compared to all previous ages I would point to the fact that we hardly ever sing. Or, to state the matter differently, that all modern life is secretly...
An old proverb informs us “History repeats itself”—or, as one wag paraphrased it, “If there is one thing we learn from history is that no one learns anything from history.” Sadly, this is especially true in religious matters.The bit of...
I just learned the day before yesterday through the grapevine that Ancient Faith will be discontinuing its blogs (such as this one) on October 1. The late date of this discovery has not allowed me time to create another blog format for...
Psalm 82, though brief, has attracted much contemporary attention and functions as a kind of lynch pin for a larger narrative about the role of angels. We have looked at the psalm before, but the puzzles and complications of many...
The practice of baptism is a complicated one, with questions being asked about the legitimacy of infant baptism, about what is accomplished in baptism, and about how converts to Orthodoxy should be received—i.e. must all be received by...
The difficulty in understanding the words and life of Moses is that we have a literary embarrassment of riches. There is almost too much material to absorb—or varying the image, the mountain is almost too big to bring within focus. How...
Authentic Orthodox Christianity is opposed to anti-Semitism. That said, the Orthodox Church throughout the world is a far-flung family, not a centrally-controlled cult, so that it cannot police or control every utterance made by its...
Eventually every pastor will be faced with the question of what to do about the theological issue of suicide, either because he will be asked to preside at the funeral of someone who has taken his or her own life, or because he will be...
Our society is not accustomed to hear a word from God; we are unfamiliar with oracles. Instead, we are awash with the words of men—usually fairly worthless words—coming at us from all sides, like incoming missiles in a war zone: texts...
