The futile search for a “happiness” that is found only in the material world leads in the long run to unhappiness. Even at current the frenzied rush to purportedly “keep people safe and healthy” reveals the tragedy of fallen existence. All we have, all of humanity's “well-being” and “happiness” is found in that which is …
Continue reading It is Better to be Outside of Heaven with God than to be in Heaven without Him
“But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves” (James 1:22). True faith is both in word - theology, faith – and in deed - work, practice, application. Thus, there is no right faith devoid of right practice. St. Paul also echos this spiritual reality when he teaches “Not …
Continue reading Right Theology Without Right Praxis is Dead
The Reconstruction. Перестройка. Gray high-rise apartment buildings loomed in the gray overcast sky. Through the dust-covered window of the charter van, I watched as we passed an overcrowded electric trolley bus which was leaning heavily to one side. I wondered how the trolley was even driving … at the time it seemed more like a …
Continue reading Uniformity of Behavior, Reconstruction, and Such Musings
“If anyone is to be taken captive, to captivity he goes; if anyone is to be slain by the sword, with the sword he must be slain” (Rev. 13:10). True Christianity calls a person to total faith in God. A Christian must believe wholeheartedly that his life and his bodily death are in God's hands. …
Continue reading The Masters of Death Are Now the Ministers of Life?
The ongoing chaotic situation surrounding the Coronavirus to which, it seems, the general response is panic, revels to a degree certain spiritual realities. Obviously, people should strive to maintain good hygiene as it is continuously being pointed out to us. Such a virus has possible grave physical implications. My point, once again, is not to …
Continue reading What is More Deadly, a Physical or Spiritual Virus?
“Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the LORD thy God, He it is that doth go with thee; He will not fail thee, nor forsake thee” Deut. 31:6. Fear and panic are tools of the devil to manipulate humanity. When humanity “materializes,” that is lives for …
Continue reading The Coronavirus, Fear as Control, and Fearlessness
“To the angel of the Church in Ephesus write: 'These things says the One Who holds the seven stars in His right hand, the One Who walks about in the midst of the seven golden lampstands” (Rev. 2:1). According to the Patristic understanding, the seven stars represent bishops and the lampstands the churches. Christ the …
If you love Me, you will keep My commandments,” John 14:15. A true Christian is one who is striving to abide in the commandments of our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ. For the one tasting of the goodness of God, even just a little bit, the commandments become “good and light” (cf. Matt. 11:30). …
“We must speak with children about the dangers of temptation. Toward the end of the 1950s a new epoch dawned in Europe, and two misfortunes came quickly upon us: the post-Christian era and globalism, along with the erosion of faith and the crumbling of morality. Now that I have reached old age I have begun …
Continue reading The New Epoch and the Loss of Personhood and Self-knowledge
"The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers gathered together, against the Lord, and against His Christ" (Ps. 2:2). The whole of earthly history is in the hands of God. Even those who strove to wrest history from God's governance, such as the Communists in Russia as a radical example, have ultimately only …
