The Orthodox Christian Network Blog

Click here to listen to this week's episode of Jason's Get Wisdom podcast, and click here to download the free study guide for this episode.

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Imagine that your world is falling apart around you: you are receiving failing grades at school; you are about to lose your after-school job; you learn that someone you do not like has been spreading lies about you. As you look at

It was on Miodrag's account that he and Drazen visited our church on this sad day.  Miodrag's brother, Aleksandar, a long-time resident of Mt. Pleasant, had died-alone-and Miodrag had just arrived from his home in Europe to tend to the affairs of his departed brother.

I had not known Aleksandar in this life.  Still, it is our custom to care for the dead and their survivors, the weeping and the

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I think my favorite service, as a priest, to serve, is the baptism of an infant. It's one of the most magnificent events in all of the life of our Church. To add another member to the Body of Christ; to call on the Holy Spirit to lead and guide this new person through their whole life and eventually into the Kingdom of Heaven. Every time we're present for a baptism, in thinking about the

Click here to listen to this week's episode of Jason's Get Wisdom podcast, and click here to download the free study guide for this episode.

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Overcoming the passions is one of the central foci of the Orthodox life. St. Maximos the Confessor defines passion as “an impulse of the soul contrary to nature, as in the case of mindless love or mindless hatred for someone or for

Click here to listen to the latest episode of Jason's Get Wisdom podcast, and click here to download the free study guide for this episode.

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 In Romans chapter six, St. Paul presents the issue of being either dead to sin or alive in Christ. He is very clear that Christians should no longer be slaves to sin (Romans 6:6). At the same time, however, he tells us to “reckon

Click here to listen to this week's episode of Jason's Get Wisdom podcast, and click here to download a free study guide for this episode.

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In Romans 5:13, the Holy Apostle Paul abruptly stops discussing the entrance of sin and death into the world; in fact, he stops in the middle of a sentence and leaves the thought uncompleted. He then discusses how sin was

My family members are Evangelicals of the Pentecostal variety. I was raised in that faith, but being Orthodox for almost 10 years has distanced me quite a bit from the world of megachurches and televangelists. Still, visiting home frequently means coming face-to-face with it, as my retired dad usually watches several hours of televangelism a day. He's good about keeping the TV off when my kids are awake, but after they are in bed, he often turns on programs he's recorded during the day.

St. Paul begins this morning's Epistle reading, a letter to the Christians of Corinth, with a plea-"We then as workers together with Him (Christ), beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain" (2 Cor. 6:1). The Corinthian Christians are workers together with Paul and the Apostles with Christ; all sent out (which is the meaning of the word ‘apostle') into the world to gather the

 

Riot shields.  A ray of light beaming from the dome of the Church of the Resurrection down into the nave.  A Berlin-ish Wall running over the hillside, dividing families.  The Great Walls of the Old City.  Women bearing machine guns in the streets.  The angelic voices of the nuns at the Russian monastery at En Kerem.  A late night talk with an Orthodox Rabbi who has a well-known radio program