Contemporary Greece and Westernization

[An interesting article written in 1997 that is proving itself to be rather prophetic the way things are progressing in present-day Greece. - J.S.]

by Chrestos Yannaras

A rather "incidental" item appeared in the magazine Economicos Tachidromos of 14 August 1997. It referred to a speech Henry Kissinger gave some three years prior, during which he said the following:

"The Greek people are a difficult if not impossible people to tame, and for this reason we must strike deep into their cultural roots. Perhaps then we can force them to conform. I mean, of course, to strike at their language, their religion, their cultural and historical reserves, so that we can neutralize their ability to develop, to distinguish themselves, or to prevail; thereby removing them as an obstacle to our strategically vital plans in the Balkans, the Mediterranean, and the Middle East."

Were such a condemnatory speech to appear in the Greek press today, regarding -- let us say -- Greece's inability to organize the 2004 Olympic Games (even if it were a reprint of something said years ago), there would be a storm of protest and much anger. It would make the front pages of the papers, and would no doubt be the lead story on all of the televised newscasts. The party in power would "strongly condemn" such a statement, and all of the opposition parties would issue their own caustic rejoinders. There would be a veritable "fiesta" of outrage; but, unfortunately, such a reaction would never occur over issues having to do with things that seriously impact the lives of contemporary Hellenes: such things as our language, our ecclesiastical tradition, our history, or the continuation of our culture.

By some strange coincidence, one week before the article in the E.T., the exceedingly "progressive" periodical, Samizdat, published ( 6 August 1997 ) an incognito article that predicted the inevitable and desirable Latinization of our Greek alphabet. It was declared, moreover, that such a development would have a "liberating" affect on contemporary Greek thought. It would seem that the author -- writing under a nom de plume -- has been mobilized to advance the political agenda that Kissinger so blatantly expounded. Are such people paid operatives of some dark conspiratorial power that is seeking to destroy Hellenism? Not really. Quite simply, these individuals are just our run-of-the-mill "progressive" Greek intellectuals, and nothing more.

The almost total indifference in Greece to the insulting and startlingly revealing declaration by Kissinger is something -- I must confess -- that I am beginning to understand. It is proof positive that the strategy outlined by "Henry the Great" [Kissinger] has been deployed and is already showing impressive results. I understand and await the Latinization of our alphabet as an example of things to come; This Latinization will be the result of the strategy that is working against Hellenism. But I was once young and have grown old, and have yet to understand just what kind of Hellas our native-born "progressives" have in mind. What kind of a country do they think will emerge as a result of their agitations on behalf of the Kissingers of the world?

What is it that they are pursuing and what is it that they fear? For years now I've been following the methodical war they've been waging -- virtually unchallenged -- in the Sunday pages of our "progressive" newspapers: the disdainful formality of their writing, the fanatical ironies and sarcasms, the jeering and the mockery concerning anything having to do with the continuance of our language or the ecclesiastical traditions of our people. We are dealing here -- it would seem to me -- with the psychological hang-ups of a backward peasantry burdened by a naked indifference as to whether our race continues, the quality of our lives, and the future of the native culture of our country. Do these people have an exemplary model, perhaps, of some "advanced" western nation, where the progressive mindset they espouse has worked to bring down the existing establishment? Maybe they have the same faulty vision of the West that [Adamantios] Korais had two centuries ago. Or they may even be anticipating the initial successes Marxism enjoyed in 19th century European thought.

Our "progressive" intellectualism, together with the political agitations of its adherents, are promoted by many who've been educated for years in the West; individuals who've taught in the universities of the West, and who've maintained continuous working relations and social contacts with the scientific and academic communities there. How is it that these people continue to ignore the growing threats against such vital and essential components of our civilization? Such things as our language, religion, and culture. I will contribute my personal observations concerning these questions. I have met, in western countries, Greek scientists and academicians with decades-long experience as professors and researchers, who are permanently afflicted with the inferiority complex of the backward peasant; the complex they carried with them when they left Greece to go to the West. Their main objective being to persuade the inhabitants of their new environment that "yes I had the misfortune of being born a Greek and an Orthodox Christian, but look at what a good westerner I've become." And because they've been taught that "western" means anticlerical, that it is synonymous with having a disdainful view of the falsely characterized "medieval Byzantium," that it requires that one display a sarcastic mockery of any metaphysical speculation, and that one be an ardent proponent of utilitarian rationalism, our "progressive" immigrants strive to embody all of these putative western concepts. This is how they have imperceptibly imprisoned themselves inside of their inbred peasant inferiority complex. They are perfectly capable practitioners of their particular disciplines, but totally incapable of correctly perceiving the spiritual ethos being promulgated all around them.

This particular malady -- the psychological complex afflicting our neo-Hellene "progressives" -- is a very difficult if not impossible illness to combat. It can't be cured by mere argument against it, no matter how compelling. I have only one suggestion to make to our political leadership (or to some enterprising private firm): let some responsible international polling company take a survey of European public opinion. How many agree or disagree with Kissinger's statement? How do our European partners envision our country in the future? Do they prefer us without our unique language? Without our religious traditions? Do they want us to be a colorless culture of consumer-drones, devoid of distinctive characteristics? Maybe from such a study our "progressive" political agitators will learn something new and useful.

Article by author, professor, and columnist, Chrestos Yiannaras, in Kathimerini, 24 August 1997.

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Obama's Favorite Theologian: Reinhold Niebuhr

How Obama's Favorite Theologian Shaped His First Year in Office

By John Blake
CNN
February 5, 2010

Obama called Reinhold Niebuhr his favorite philosopher, but few know about the controversial pastor today.

In the summer of 1943, when Adolf Hitler's armies marched unchecked across Europe, a pastor in a remote New England village decided to write a prayer.

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change," he began, "the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference."

It is now known as the Serenity Prayer. It's been adopted by 12-step recovery programs and cited in numerous self-help books. Yet few people know who wrote it. His name is Reinhold Niebuhr, and he was a Protestant pastor in the mid-20th century whose words tended to unsettle people, not offer comfort.

Niebuhr is getting attention again because he has a fan in the Oval Office.

In a widely cited New York Times column, President Obama called Niebuhr his "favorite philosopher." But how precisely has Niebuhr's philosophy influenced Obama and his handling of everything from health care reform to fighting terrorists?

The answer may be seen by looking at Obama's first year in office, several scholars, and a relative of Niebuhr's, suggest.

Who was Niebuhr?

At first, there seems to be little resemblance between the cool, cerebral Obama and the pugnacious Niebuhr.

Niebuhr was a blunt critic of morally complacent Christians. He thought the church was full of idealists who believed that progress was inevitable and that love alone would ultimately conquer injustice, some Niebuhr scholars say.

"He said there was a difference between being a 'fool for Christ' and a plain damn fool," says Richard Crouter, author of the upcoming book "Reinhold Niebuhr: On Politics, Religion and Christian Faith."

Niebuhr lived during an age of global calamities. He was born in Missouri in 1892, the son of a German-born minister. He preached and taught theology during the Great Depression and World War II. He saw the suffering of workers at Henry Ford's auto plant -- lack of pensions, dismissals for sickness -- when he became a pastor in Detroit, Michigan, Crouter says.

"The greed of capitalism and the business class was huge in his mind," Crouter says. "It had to be combated."

So would other forms of evil. Niebuhr wrote movingly about the power of nonviolence. But when Hitler rose to power in the 1930s, Niebuhr drew criticism from Christian pacifists and others for urging the U.S. to enter the war, says Jordan Copeland, an assistant professor of religion at La Salle University in Pennsylvania.

Niebuhr would attract more criticism after the war for supporting "containment," the U.S. Cold War policy of using military, economic and diplomatic force to counter the influence of the Soviet Union, Copeland says.

"He criticized Christian idealists who thought force was never justified and who believed that the law of love was a simple solution to social and political problems," Copeland said. "At times, power must be challenged by power."

Niebuhr distilled his view of human nature in his monumental book, "Moral Man and Immoral Society." The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. cited the book in his "Letter from Birmingham City Jail." Former President Carter is also an admirer of Niebuhr's.

People are capable of doing good, but groups are driven by "predatory self-interest," Niebuhr wrote.

"As individuals, men believe that they ought to love and serve each other and establish justice between each other," Niebuhr wrote. "As racial, economic and national groups, they take for themselves, whatever their power can command."

How is Obama shaped by Niebuhr?

Tough talk, but how does it give us insight into Obama?

The president's political rhetoric reflects some of Niebuhr's world view, says great-nephew Gustav Niebuhr. He says Obama, like his great-uncle, avoids moral absolutes in his speeches: The U.S. is not always right, and its enemies are not always evil.

Niebuhr says he saw this attitude embedded in Obama's speech to the Arab world in Cairo, Egypt, last year. Obama acknowledged U.S. involvement in helping overthrow a democratically elected government in Iran during the 1950s and avoided "clash of civilizations" rhetoric that implied that the U.S. is free of moral taint.

"We can't see ourselves as the ultimate arbiter for what's good and moral," says Gustav Niebuhr, director of the Religion and Society Program at Syracuse University. "Reinhold would say to do that is to claim a perfectionism that doesn't belong to human beings."

When Niebuhr died in 1971, Gustav had just turned 16. But he still remembers the letters and toys his great-uncle sent him.

Gustav Niebuhr says he's gratified but not surprised that Obama would gravitate to his great-uncle.

"Obama is a very deep-thinking person, from what I can tell," Niebuhr said. "He is very attuned to nuance. I think he's found a philosopher that suits his temperament."

Crouter says he can see Niebuhr's pragmatism and moral complexity in Obama's governing style.

Some Americans became disenchanted by the apparent backstage tradeoffs Obama was accused of making in health care negotiations.

Niebuhr thought, however, that well-meaning people often couldn't get anything done because they preferred to appeal to people's altruism, not their self-interest, Crouter says.

"He thought that sometimes getting your hands dirty with self-interested folks is the only way to make progress," Crouter says. "If you don't believe the Kingdom of God is just around the corner, the best you can sometimes do is take baby steps toward justice."

What Obama said about Niebuhr

In a 2007 interview, Obama explained to David Brooks, a New York Times columnist, what he learns from Niebuhr.

He called Niebuhr his "favorite philosopher," Brooks wrote.

"I take away," Brooks quoted Obama as saying, "the compelling idea that there's serious evil in the world and hardship and pain. And we should be humble and modest in our belief that we can eliminate those things. But we shouldn't use that as an excuse for cynicism and inaction. I take away ... the sense that we have to make these efforts knowing they are hard, and not swinging from naive idealism to bitter realism."

Obama's efforts to balance idealism with realism can be seen in his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech in Oslo, Norway, in December, other scholars say.

Obama, a student of the civil rights movement, declared that he was a "living testimony to the moral force of nonviolence." Yet force is necessary at times, he said.

"A nonviolent movement could not have halted Hitler's armies," Obama said. "Negotiations cannot convince al Qaeda's leaders to lay down their arms."

"Niebuhr would have loved that [Oslo] speech," says John Danforth, an Episcopal priest and a former Republican senator who also admires Niebuhr.

"I was very impressed with that speech," Danforth says. "He said you need to deal with terrorists in a very hard-nosed, pragmatic way but hold to American standards."

Yet Danforth says there are critical differences between Obama and Niebuhr.

"I see in Obama's approach to politics, which is surprisingly partisan and ideological, a hubris that is not Niebuhrian," says Danforth, who is also a partner at the Bryan Cave law firm in St. Louis, Missouri.

Niebuhr may still have some lessons to teach Obama.

As the president pivots to his second year in office, there are reports that he is trying to connect better with ordinary Americans. Niebuhr's Serenity Prayer has been doing that for 60 years, says BJ Gallagher, author "It's Never Too Late to Be What You Might Have Been" and an admirer of the Serenity Prayer.

"He saw that religion and theology were real-word issues," Gallagher says. "Theology isn't just for people in church or academe. Theology is for people in their homes, their businesses, their government and their communities. It helps you live your life well."

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The Conundrum of the Parthenon Marbles

A Lost Civilization?

By Christos Yiannaras
November 19, 2002
Kathimerini

That is the logic behind the demand that the Parthenon Marbles, currently on display at the British Museum, be returned to Greece?

The spontaneous answer of most Greeks would be: “Those sculptures belong to us. They are the work of our ancestors, they are the expression of our history, the British stole them from our country.” And I imagine the automatic response from the British side (not the studied, polite version) would be: “Civilizations do not have natural heirs, heirs are those who prove themselves capable of developing this legacy.”

The Parthenon Marbles belong to those peoples sufficiently cultivated to appreciate their timeless value and significance for the whole of humanity — they belong to the peoples who proved themselves as heirs of classical civilization. According to the British, this has been Western European civilizations. It was they who cultivated the classics, who studied ancient Greek art, who interpreted ancient Greek literary texts, who used neoclassicism to transfer the rhythm and aesthetics of ancient Greece to the far corners of the earth. I could even imagine the British using the arguments of our own great thinker Adamantios Korais, who conceded that we modern Greeks have nothing in common with our ancient predecessors, and who maintained that only through “Westernization” could we become Greeks once again...

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The Great Martyr Theodore Stratelates

Great Martyr Theodore Stratelates (Feast Day - February 8)

The Great Martyr Theodore Stratelates came from the city of Euchaita in Asia Minor. He was endowed with many talents, and was handsome in appearance. For his charity God enlightened him with the knowledge of Christian truth.

For his bravery St Theodore was appointed military commander [stratelatos] in the city of Heraclea, where he combined his military service with preaching the Gospel among the pagans subject to him. His gift of persuasion, reinforced by his personal example of Christian life, turned many from their false gods. Soon, nearly all of Heraclea had accepted Christianity.

During this time Emperor Licinius (311-324) began a fierce persecution against Christians. In an effort to stamp out the new faith, he persecuted the enlightened adherents of Christianity, who were perceived as a threat to paganism. Among these was St Theodore. Licinius tried to force St Theodore to offer sacrifice to the pagan gods. The saint invited Licinius to come to him with his idols so both of them could offer sacrifice before the people.

Blinded by his hatred for Christianity, Licinius trusted the words of the saint, but he was disappointed. St Theodore smashed the gold and silver statues into pieces, which he then distributed to the poor. Thus he demonstrated the vain faith in soulless idols, and also displayed Christian charity.

St Theodore was arrested and subjected to fierce and refined torture. He was dragged on the ground, beaten with iron rods, had his body pierced with sharp spikes, was burned with fire, and his eyes were plucked out. Finally, he was crucified. Varus, the servant of St Theodore, barely had the strength to write down the incredible torments of his master.

God, however, in His great mercy, willed that the death of St Theodore should be as fruitful for those near him as his life was. An angel healed the saint's wounded body and took him down from the cross. In the morning, the imperial soldiers found him alive and unharmed. Seeing with their own eyes the infinite might of the Christian God, they were baptized not far from the place of the unsuccessful execution.

Thus St Theodore became "like a day of splendor" for those pagans dwelling in the darkness of idolatary, and he enlightened their souls "with the bright rays of his suffering." Unwilling to escape martyrdom for Christ, St Theodore voluntarily surrendered himself to Licinius, and discouraged the Christians from rising up against the torturer, saying, "Beloved, halt! My Lord Jesus Christ, hanging upon the Cross, restrained the angels and did not permit them to take revenge on the race of man."

Going to execution, the holy martyr opened up the prison doors with just a word and freed the prisoners from their bonds. People who touched his robe were healed instantly from sicknesses, and freed from demonic possession. By order of the emperor, St Theodore was beheaded by the sword. Before his death he told Varus, " Do not fail to record the day of my death, and bury my body in Euchaita." He also asked to be remembered each year on this date. Then he bent his neck beneath the sword, and received the crown of martyrdom which he had sought. This occurred on February 8, 319, on a Saturday, at the ninth hour of the day.

The Saint's holy relics were returned to his ancestral home on June 8, which is also a feast of the Great Martyr Theodore.

St Theodore is regarded as the patron saint of soldiers.

Source

Short Life of St. Theodore

by St. Nikolai Velimirovich

There are martyrdoms more precious than precious. The preciousness of martyrdom depends upon the greatness of the good which a Christian abandons and in lieu of that, accepts suffering; and still, it depends upon the greatness of the suffering which he endures for Christ's sake.

St. Theodore, a Roman commander in the army of Emperor Licinius and mayor of the town of Heraclea, scorned his youth, handsome appearance, military rank and the good graces of the emperor. In place of all that, he accepted horrible tortures for the sake of Christ.

At first, Theodore was flogged and received six-hundred lashes on his stomach. After this, he was raised on a cross and was completely pierced with lances. Finally, Theodore was beheaded.

Why all of this? Because, St. Theodore loved Christ the Lord above all else in the world. He abhorred the stupid idolatry of the superstitious Emperor Licinius.

He smashed the idols of silver and gold and distributed pieces of them to the poor. He converted many to the Faith of Christ and called upon Emperor Licinius himself to reject idolatry and to believe in the One Living God. During the entire time of his tortures, St. Theodore said repeatedly: "Glory to You my God, glory to You!"

St. Theodore suffered on February 8, 319 A.D., at 3:00 p.m., and entered into the kingdom of Christ. St. Theodore is considered the Protector of Soldiers who call upon him for assistance. His miracle-working relics were translated from Euchaita to Constantinople and interred in the church of Balchernae.

Apolytikion in the Fourth Tone
In truth enlisted with the King of the Heavens, thou didst become for Him a noble commander, O trophy-bearer and Great Martyr Theodore. With the weaponry of faith didst thou arm thyself wisely and didst utterly destroy all the hordes of the demons, as a triumphant athlete of the Lord; wherefore we ever do faithfully call thee blest.

Kontakion in the Second Tone
In courage of soul, and furnished with the arms of faith, thou tookest in hand the word of God as though a spear and didst put thy foe to flight, thou great boast of martyrs, O Theodore; now together with them, O Saint, cease not to entreat Christ our God for all of us.

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Prophet Zechariah the Sickle-Seer

Prophet Zachariah the Sickle-Seer (Feast Day - February 8)

The Prophet Zachariah the Sickle-Seer is the eleventh of the twelve Minor Prophets. He was descended from the tribe of Levi, and seems to have been a priest (Nehemiah 12:4, 16). He was called to prophetic service at a young age and became, in the wondrous expression of church hymnology, "a spectator of supra-worldly visions."

The Book of the Prophet Zachariah contains inspired details about the coming of the Messiah (Zach 6:12); about the last days of the Savior's earthly life with the Entry of the Lord into Jerusalem on a young donkey (Zach 9:9); about the betrayal of the Lord for thirty pieces of silver and the purchase of the potter's field with them (Zach 11:12-13); about the piercing of the Savior's side (Zach 12:10); about the scattering of the apostles from the Garden of Gethsemane (Zach 13:7); about the eclipse of the sun at the time of the Crucifixion (Zach 14:6-7).

"Enlightened by dawnings all above," the Prophet Zachariah, "saw the future as it were the present." According to Tradition, this "most true God-proclaimer" lived to old age and was buried near Jerusalem, beside his illustrious contemporary and companion, the Prophet Haggai (December 16). The title "Sickle-Seer" given Zachariah comes from a vision in which he saw a sickle flying in the air, destroying thieves and perjurors (Zach 5:1-3).

The holy Prophet Zachariah died around 520 B.C. His tomb was discovered in 415 under the Emperor Honorius in a village near Eleutheropolis (Sozomen, Hist. Eccles. VI:32, IX:17). The Prophet appeared in a dream to a certain Calemerus, telling him where he would find his tomb. His body was found to be incorrupt (Eccl. Hist., Book IX, 17). At the prophet's feet was the body of a child dressed in royal accoutrements. His holy relics were transferred to the church of St James the Brother of the Lord (October 23) in Constantinople.

Source

Apolytikion in the Second Tone
As we celebrate the memory of Thy Prophet Zachariah, O Lord, through him we beseech Thee to save our souls.

Kontakion in the Fourth Tone
As a brightly-shining lamp that was illumined with the Spirit's fiery beams, O Zachariah most renowned, thou didst prefigure with clarity the Savior's great and untold condescension toward us.

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Saint Seraphim of Sarov: On Despair

Just as the Lord is concerned about our salvation, so does the devil, the slayer of men, concern himself about bringing the soul of man to despair.

Judas the betrayer was faint-hearted and inexperienced in struggle, which is why the devil, seeing him in a state of despair, attacked and persuaded him to hang himself.

Peter, the formidable rock, falling into great sin and experienced in struggle, did not despair and did not lose the presence of the Spirit, rather he shed bitter tears from a warm heart and, seeing that, the devil fled from him as though burned by fire.

Thus, brethren, the Venerable Antiochus teaches that when despair befalls us, we should not succumb to it but, strengthened and enveloped by Holy Faith, say with great bravery to the cunning spirit [the devil]: "What have you to do with us, O apostate from God, fugitive from heaven and a slave of evil! You are unable to inspire us to do anything; for Christ, the Son of God, has authority over us and over all. And you, O murderer, depart from us! Strengthened by His Honorable Cross, we trample upon your serpent's head."

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Elder Ephraim of Philotheou: On Temptations

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The Childhood Fasting of Hosios Loukas

St. Luke the Righteous of Mount Steirion (Feast Day - February 7)

Saint Luke, as a child, cannot be compared to other youngsters. While other boys love to play, laugh, and run hither and thither, Luke was quiet and well-behaved, and showed himself in every activity as one with the gravity of an old man. The child also manifested sober habits and a strong love for continence and self-control.

From his earliest years he rejected rich dishes. He refrained from eating not only meat, but also cheese and eggs. Any pleasing or fattening foods were refused by him. He even gave up eating fruits. He lived only on barley bread, and vegetables and legumes with water. On Wednesday and Friday, he abstained from everything until the setting of the sun. What was most marvelous about his diet and ascesis was that he learned such strictness from no one, but was moved from within himself to avoid fatty foods and sweets which please the palate. Of his own volition, he chose those labors that mortified his flesh. Though he often went hungry, he loved the fire of abstinence which reduced to ashes the fuel of the passions.

Now on one occasion, as the divine Luke was sitting at table with his parents, they did not perceive that his shunning of foods was done by him for the sake of God and bringing his mind and body under subjection. They imagined that he did it out of childish levity and ignorance. Nevertheless, they decided to put their son to the test in the following manner. They placed meat and fish together in one pot and prepared it. The pot was then placed on the table. Luke, meanwhile, was unaware of his parents' experiment. When the father put the fish on his son's plate, the lad partook of it. Luke then began sensing in the fish the presence of meat, which heaviness had been imparted when the foods were cooked together. Luke then perceived the artifice that his parents wrought upon him. He was so saddened and grieved by the ruse that he started vomiting that which he ate. As further proof of his long-suffering and patience, he remained fasting for three days. He wept all that time, as though he had willingly committed the act. His parents, thereupon, finally understood their son's intention and aim, which they did not deem human but divine. As a result, they left him to tread his own path as God enlightened him. And despite his exacting life, Luke did not neglect showing his parents proper respect and love and obedience in his daily chores.

Saint Luke continued and increased his strict mode of abstinence and fasting throughout his life.

Kontakion in the Plagal of the Fourth Tone
God, Who by judgments known to Him chose thee from when thou wast formed,
that thou, O Luke, mightest be right well-pleasing unto Him; from the womb made thee His own and He sanctified thee; as His own true faithful servant hath He shown thee forth and hath set aright thy footsteps, ever guiding thee as the Friend of man; thou rejoicest before Him now.

From The Great Synaxaristes of the Orthodox Church - February 7.

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Hosios Loukas and His Monastery

Lecture (in Greek) by Metropolitan George of Thebes at the Church of St. Nicholas in Patras. He is the current abbot of the Holy Monastery of Hosios Loukas.

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G. K. Chesterton on Religion and Darwinism

IN the days when Huxley and Herbert Spencer and the Victorian agnostics were trumpeting as a final truth the famous hypothesis of Darwin, it seemed to thousands of simple people almost impossible that religion should survive. It is all the more ironic that it has not only survived them all, but it is a perfect example (perhaps the only real example) of what they called the Survival of the Fittest. It so happens that it does really and truly fit in with the theory offered by Darwin; which was something totally different from most of the theories accepted by Darwinians. This real original theory of Darwin has since very largely broken down in the general field of biology and botany; but it does actually apply to this particular argument in the field of religious history.

The recent re-emergence of our religion is a survival of the fittest as Darwin meant it, and not as popular Darwinism meant it; so far as it meant anything. Among the innumerable muddles, which mere materialistic fashion made out of the famous theory, there was in many quarters a queer idea that the Struggle for Existence was of necessity an actual struggle between the candidates for survival; literally a cut-throat competition. There was a vague idea that the strongest creature violently crushed the others. And the notion that this was the one method of improvement came everywhere as good news to bad men; to bad rulers, to bad employers, to swindlers and sweaters and the rest. The brisk owner of a bucket-shop compared himself modestly to a mammoth, trampling down other mammoths in the primeval jungle. The business man destroyed other business men, under the extraordinary delusion that the eohippic horse had devoured other eohippic horses. The rich man suddenly discovered that it was not only convenient but cosmic to starve or pillage the poor, because pterodactyls may have used their little hands to tear each other’s eyes. Science, that nameless being, declared that the weakest must go to the wall; especially in Wall Street. There was a rapid decline and degradation in the sense of responsibility in the rich, from the merely rationalistic eighteenth century to the purely scientific nineteenth. The great Jefferson, when he reluctantly legalised slavery, said he trembled for his country, knowing that God is just. The profiteer of later times, when he legalised usury or financial trickery, was satisfied with himself; knowing that Nature is unjust.

But, however that may be (and of course the moral malady has survived scientific mistake) the people who talked thus of cannibal horses and competitive oysters, did not understand what Darwin’s thesis was. If later biologists have condemned it, it should not be condemned without being understood, widely as it has been accepted without being understood. The point of Darwinism was not that a bird with a longer beak (let us say) thrust it into other birds, and had the advantage of a duelist with a longer sword. The point of Darwinism was that the bird with the longer beak could reach worms (let us say) at the bottom of a deeper hole; that the birds who could not do so would die; and he alone would remain to found a race of long-beaked birds. Darwinism suggested that if this happened a vast number of times, in a vast series of ages, it might account for the difference between the beaks of a sparrow and a stork. But the point was that the fittest did not need to struggle against the unfit. The survivor had nothing to do except to survive, when the others could not survive. He survived because he alone had the features and organs necessary for survival. And, whatever be the truth about mammoths or monkeys, that is the exact truth about the present survival of religion. It is surviving because nothing else can survive.

Religion has returned; because all the various forms of scepticism that tried to take its place, and do its work, have by this time tied themselves into such knots that they cannot do anything. That chain of causation of which they were fond of talking seems really to have served them after the fashion of the proverbial rope; and when modern discussion gave them rope enough, they quite rapidly hanged themselves. For there is not a single one of the fashionable forms of scientific scepticism, or determinism, that does not end in stark paralysis, touching the practical conduct of human life. Take any three of the normal and necessary ideas on which civilisation and even society depend. First, let us say, a scientific man of the old normal nineteenth-century sort would remark, “We can at least have common sense, in its proper meaning of a sense of reality common to all; we can have common morals, for without them we cannot even have a community; a man must in the ordinary sense obey the law; and especially the moral law.” Then the newer sceptic, who is progressive and has gone further and fared worse, will immediately say, “Why should you worship the taboo of your particular tribe? Why should you accept prejudices that are the product of a blind herd instinct? Why is there any authority in the unanimity of a flock of frightened sheep?” Suppose the normal man falls back on the deeper argument: “I am not terrorised by the tribe; I do keep my independent judgment; I have a conscience and a light of justice within, which judges the world.” And the stronger sceptic will answer: “If the light in your body be darkness–and it is darkness because it is only in your body–what are your judgments but the incurable twist and bias of your particular heredity and accidental environment? What can we know about judgments, except that they must all be equally unjust? For they are all equally conditioned by defects and individual ignorances, all of them different and none of them distinguishable; for there exists no single man so sane and separate as to be able to distinguish them justly. Why should your conscience be any more reliable than your rotting teeth or your quite special defect of eyesight? God bless us all, one would think you believed in God!” Then perhaps the normal person will get annoyed and say rather snappishly, “At least I suppose we are men of science; there is science to appeal to and she will always answer; the evidential and experimental discovery of real things.” And the other sceptic will answer, if he has any sense of humour: “Why certainly. Sir Arthur Eddington is Science; and he will tell you that science cannot destroy religion, or even defend the multiplication table. Sir Bertram Windle was Science; and he would tell you that the scientific mind is completely satisfied in the Roman Catholic Church. For that matter. Sir Oliver Lodge was Science; and he reached by purely experimental and evidential methods to a solid belief in ghosts. But I admit that there are men of science who cannot get to a solid belief in anything; even in science; even in themselves. There is the crystalographer of Cambridge who writes in the Spectator the lucid sentence: ‘ We know that most of what we know is probably untrue.’ Does that help you on a bit, in founding your sane and solid society?”

We have of course seen just lately the most dramatic exit of great material scientists from the camp of Materialism. It was Eddington I think, who used the phrase that the universe seems to be more like a great thought than a great machine: and Dr. Whitney as reported, has declared that there is no rational description of the ultimate cosmic motion except the Will of God. But it is the perishing of the other things, at least as much as the persistence of the one thing, that has left us at last face to face with the ancient religion of our fathers. The thing once called free thought has come finally to threaten everything that is free. It denies personal freedom in denying free will and the human power of choice. It threatens civic freedom with a plague of hygienic and psychological quackeries; spreading over the land such a network of pseudo-scientific nonsense as free citizens have never yet endured in history. It is quite likely to reverse religious freedom, in the name of some barbarous nostrum or other, such as constitutes the crude and ill-cultured creed of Russia. It is perfectly capable of imposing silence and impotence from without. But there is no doubt whatever that it imposes silence and impotence from within. The whole trend of it, which began as a drive and has ended in a drift, is towards some form of the theory that a man cannot help himself; that a man cannot mend himself; above all, that a man cannot free himself. In all its novels and most of its newspaper articles it takes for granted that men are stamped and fixed in certain types of abnormality of anarchical weakness; that they are pinned and labeled in a museum of morality or immorality; or of that sort of unmorality which is more priggish than the one and more hoggish than the other. We are practically told that we might as well ask a fossil to reform itself. We are told that we are asking a stuffed bird to repent. We are all dead, and the only comfort is that we are all classified. For by this philosophy, which is the same as that of the blackest of Puritan heresies, we all died before we were born. But as it is Kismet without Allah, so also it is Calvinism without God.

The agnostics will be gratified to learn that it is entirely due to their own energy and enterprise, to their own activity in pursuing their own antics, that the world has at last tired of their antics and told them so. We have done very little against them; non nobis, Domine; the glory of their final overthrow is all their own. We have done far less than we should have done, to explain all that balance of subtlety and sanity which is meant by a Christian civilisation. Our thanks are due to those who have so generously helped us by giving a glimpse of what might be meant by a Pagan civilisation. And what is lost in that society is not so much religion as reason; the ordinary common daylight of intellectual instinct that has guided the children of men. A world in which men know that most of what they know is probably untrue cannot be dignified with the name of a sceptical world; it is simply an impotent and abject world, not attacking anything, but accepting everything while trusting nothing; accepting even its own incapacity to attack; accepting its own lack of authority to accept; doubting its very right to doubt. We are grateful for this public experiment and demonstration; it has taught us much. We did not believe that rationalists were so utterly mad until they made it quite clear to us. We did not ourselves think that the mere denial of our dogmas could end in such dehumanised and demented anarchy. It might have taken the world a long time to understand that what it had been taught to dismiss as mediaeval theology was often mere common sense; although the very term common sense, or communis sententia, was a mediaeval conception. But it took the world very little time to understand that the talk on the other side was most uncommon nonsense. It was nonsense that could not be made the basis of any common system, such as has been founded upon common sense.


“THE RETURN TO RELIGION” from THE WELL AND THE SHALLOWS, by G. K. Chesterton

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Angels Appear on Icon to Children in Ukraine

Kiev, 4 February 2010, Interfax – Depictions of angels appeared in the icon of St. Mitrophan of Voronezh in the Vitovka village not far from Poltava after the icon visited a children’s camp, Ukrainian edition of the Komsomolskaya Pravda daily reports.

This small icon with St. Mitrofan’s relics was found at the cemetery in 2003. Parishioners brought it to the church and soon the halo around the saint’s head started glaring.

However, strange events have not stopped occurring. After the icon was consecrated and parishioners started venerating it as the main church shrine, many residents of the region wanted to see the wonder. Last summer, the icon was taken to the children’s camp in the village of Golovach.

“The icon was there for several days, and just before the departure, children showed me that some new elements appeared in it – a small church and an angel above the cloud,” the priest told.

St. Mitrophan died on November 23, 1703 and was buried in the Protection Cathedral of Voronezh. People say that Emperor Peter I carried his coffin. His tomb was twice opened in 1831 and 1989. When his body was found uncorrupted, the saint was canonized.

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Meatfare Sunday: Sunday of the Last Judgment

The foregoing two parables -- especially that of the Prodigal Son -- have presented to us God's extreme goodness and love for man. But lest certain persons, putting their confidence in this alone, live carelessly, squandering upon sin the time given them to work out their salvation, and death suddenly snatch them away, the most divine Fathers have appointed this day's feast commemorating Christ's impartial Second Coming, through which we bring to mind that God is not only the Friend of man, but also the most righteous Judge, Who recompenses to each according to his deeds.

It is the aim of the holy Fathers, through bringing to mind that fearful day, to rouse us from the slumber of carelessness unto the work of virtue, and to move us to love and compassion for our brethren. Besides this, even as on the coming Sunday of Cheesefare we commemorate Adam's exile from the Paradise of delight -- which exile is the beginning of life as we know it now -- it is clear that today's is reckoned the last of all feasts, because on the last day of judgment, truly, everything of this world will come to an end.

All foods, except meat and meat products, are allowed during the week that follows this Sunday.


Sermon On The Last Judgment

by St. John Maximovitch

The day of the Last Judgement! That day no one knows — only God the Father knows — but its signs are given in the Gospel and in the Apocalypse of the holy Apostle John the Theologian. Revelation speaks of the events at the end of the world and of the Last Judgement primarily in images and in a veiled manner.

However, the Holy Fathers have explained these images, and there is an authentic Church tradition that speaks clearly concerning the signs of the approach of the end, and concerning the Last Judgement. Before the end of life on earth there will be agitation, wars, civil war, hunger, earthquakes… Men will suffer from fear, will die from expectation of calamity. There will be no life, no joy of life but a tormented state of falling away from life. Nevertheless there will be a falling away not only from life, but from faith also, and “when the Son of Man cometh, shall He find faith on the earth?” (St. Luke 18:8).

Men will become proud, ungrateful, rejecting Divine law. Together with the falling away from life will be a weakening of moral life. There will be an exhaustion of good and an increase of evil.

Of these times, the holy Apostle John the Theologian speaks in his God-inspired work, the Apocalypse. He says that he “was in the Spirit” when he wrote it; this means that the Holy Spirit Himself was in him, when under the form of various images, the fate of the Church and the world was opened to him, and so this is a Divine Revelation.

The Apocalypse represents the fate of the Church in the image of a woman who hides herself in the wilderness: she does not show herself in public life, as today in Russia. In public life, forces that prepare the possibility for the appearance of Antichrist will play the leading role.

Antichrist will be a man, and not the devil incarnate. “Anti” means “old,” and it also signifies “in place of” or “against.” Antichrist is a man who desires to be in place of Christ, to occupy His place and possess what Christ should possess. He desires to possess the attraction of Christ and authority over the whole world. Moreover, Antichrist will receive that authority before his destruction and the destruction of the world.

What is known of this man — Antichrist? His precise ancestry is unknown: his father is completely unknown, and his mother a foul pretended virgin. He will be a Jew of the tribe of Dan. He will be very intelligent and endowed with skill in handling people. He will be fascinating and kind. The philosopher Vladimir Soloviev worked a long time at presenting the advent and person of Antichrist. He carefully made use of all material on this question, not only Patristic, but also Muslim, and he worked out a brilliant picture.

Before the advent of Antichrist, there was a preparation in the world, the possibility of his appearance. "The mystery of iniquity doth already work" (II Thes. 2:7). The forces preparing for his appearance fight above all against the lawful Imperial authority.

The holy Apostle Paul says that Antichrist cannot be manifested until "what withholdest is taken away" (II Thes. 2:6-7). St. John Chrysostom explains that the “withholding one” is the lawful pious authority: such an authority fights with evil. For this reason the “mystery,” already at work in the world, fights with this authority; it desires a lawless authority. When the “mystery” decisively achieves that authority, nothing will hinder the appearance of Antichrist any longer.

Fascinating, intelligent, kind, he will be merciful — he will act with mercy and goodness; but not for the sake of mercy and goodness, but for the strengthening of his own authority. When he will have strengthened it to the point where the whole world acknowledges him, then he will reveal his face.

For his capital, he will choose Jerusalem, because it was here that the Savior revealed His Divine teaching and His person. It was here that the entire world was called to the blessedness of goodness and salvation. The world did not acknowledge Christ and crucified Him in Jerusalem; whereas, the whole world will acknowledge the Antichrist’s authority and Jerusalem will become the capital of the world.

Having attained the pinnacle of authority, Antichrist will demand the acknowledgement that he has attained what no earthly power had ever attained or could attain and then demand the worship of himself as a higher being, as a god.

V. Soloviev describes the character of his activity well, as “Supreme Ruler.” He will do what is pleasing to all — on the condition of being recognized as Supreme Authority. He will allow the Church to exist, permit her Divine services, promise to build magnificent churches…, on the condition that all recognize him as “Supreme Being” and worship him. Antichrist will have a personal hatred for Christ; he will see Him as a rival and look upon Him as a personal enemy. He will live by this hatred and rejoice in men’s apostasy from Christ.

Under Antichrist, there will be an immense falling away from the faith. Many bishops will change in faith and in justification will point to the brilliant situation of the Church. The search for compromise will be the characteristic disposition of men. Straight-forwardness of confession will disappear. Men will cleverly justify their fall, and gracious evil will support such a general disposition. There will be the habit of apostasy from truth and the sweetness of compromise and sin in men.

Antichrist will allow men everything, as long as they “fall down and worship him” and the whole world will submit to him. Then there will appear the two righteous men, who will fearlessly preach the faith and accuse Antichrist.

According to Church tradition, they are the two Prophets of the Old Testament, Elijah and Enoch, who did not taste of death, but will taste it now for three days, and in three days they must rise. Their death will call forth the great rejoicing of Antichrist and his servants. Their resurrection will plunge them into great confusion and terror. Then, the end of the world will come.

The Apostle Peter said that the first world was made out of water — an image of the primordial chaos, and perished by water — in the Flood. Now the world is reserved unto fire. The earth and the works that are therein shall be burned up (II Peter 3:5-7, 10). All the elements will ignite. This present world will perish in a single instant. In an instant all will be changed.

Moreover, the Sign of the Son of God, the Sign of the Cross, will appear. The whole world, having willingly submitted to Antichrist, will weep. Everything is finished forever: Antichrist killed, the end of his kingdom of warfare with Christ, the end, and one is held accountable; one must answer to the true God.

“The end of the world” signifies not the annihilation of the world, but its transformation. Everything will be transformed suddenly, in the twinkling of an eye. The dead will rise in new bodies: their own, but renewed, just as the Savior rose in His own body and traces of wounds from the nails and spear were on it, yet it possessed new faculties, and in this sense it was a new body. It is not clear whether this new body will be the same as Adam was made, or whether it will be an entirely new body.

Afterward, the Lord will appear in glory on the clouds. Trumpets will sound, loud, with power! They will sound in the soul and conscience! All will become clear to the human conscience.

The Prophet Daniel, speaking of the Last Judgement, relates how the Ancient of Days, the Judge sits on His throne, and before Him is a fiery stream (Daniel 7:9-10). Fire is a purifying element; it burns sin. Woe to a man if sin has become a part of his nature: then the fire will burn the man, himself.

This fire will be kindled within man: seeing the Cross, some will rejoice, but others will fall into confusion, terror and despair. Thus, men will be divided instantly. The very state of a man’s soul casts him to one side or the other, to right or to left.

The more consciously and persistently man strives toward God in his life, the greater will be his joy when he hears: “Come unto Me, ye blessed.”

Conversely: the same words will call the fire of horror and torture to those who did not desire Him, who fled and fought or blasphemed Him during their lifetime!

The Last Judgement knows of no witnesses or written protocols! Everything is inscribed in the souls of men and these records, these “books,” are opened at the Judgement. Everything becomes clear to all and to oneself.

Moreover, some will go to joy, while others — to horror.

When “the books are opened,” it will become clear that the roots of all vices lie in the human soul. Here is a drunkard or a lecher: when the body has died, some may think that sin is dead too. No! There was an inclination to sin in the soul, and that sin was sweet to the soul, and if the soul has not repented and has not freed itself of the sin, it will come to the Last Judgement with the same desire for sin. It will never satisfy that desire and in that soul there will be the suffering of hatred. It will accuse everyone and everything in its tortured condition; it will hate everyone and everything. “There will be gnashing of teeth” of powerless malice and the unquenchable fire of hatred.

A “fiery gehenna” — such is the inner fire.

“There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.”

Such is the state of hell.


Doxastikon of Matins in Tone One
Let us go before, O brethren, and cleanse ourselves for the Queen of virtues; for behold she hath come bringing to us fortune of good deeds, quenching the uprisings of passion and reconciling the wicked to the Master. Let us welcome her, therefore, shouting to Christ God, O thou who arose from the dead, keep us uncondemned, who glorify Thee, O Thou who alone art sinless.

Kontakion in Tone One
When Thou comest, O God, upon the earth with glory, the whole world will tremble. The river of fire will bring men before Thy judgment seat, the books will be opened and the secrets disclosed. Then deliver me from the unquenchable fire, and count me worthy to stand on Thy right hand, Judge most righteous.

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The Sacrifice of Christ as "Expiation"

Expiation, Blood and Atonement

by Fr. Patrick Henry Reardon

Among the biblical concepts supporting St. Paul’s theology of atonement, one of the most important, surely, is that of expiation. What does the Apostle mean when he writes,

“God set forth [Jesus Christ] as the expiatory in His blood” (Romans 3:25)?

Although this is the only time St. Paul uses the noun hilasterion, I believe that the full context of his epistles, along with the Old Testament substratum on which they depend, provides the correct and adequate meaning of that term.

If I seem to belabor an obvious point–that we should go to the Bible for enlightenment on the subject of expiation – let me say that I do so from a sense that some readers of Holy Scripture in recent centuries either have not done so, or have done so inconsistently. They have borrowed misleading ideas from elsewhere.

In classical and Hellenistic Greek, the verb “to propitiate” (hilaskomai), when used with a personal object, normally signified the placating of some irate god or hero. It is a curious fact that since the rediscovery of ancient Greek literature in the West, beginning from the Renaissance, there has grown a strong tendency to impose this pagan meaning of “expiation” on the teaching of the Bible.

Understood in this way, Paul is presumed to teach that Jesus, in His self-sacrifice on the Cross, placated God’s wrath against sinful humanity. That is to say, the purpose of the shedding of Christ’s blood was to propitiate, to assuage an angry Father.

Let me say that this interpretation of the Apostle Paul is very erroneous and should be rejected for three reasons.

First, this picture is difficult to reconcile with Paul’s conviction that God Himself is the One who made the sacrifice. How easily we forget that the Cross did cost God something. He is the One that gave up His only-begotten Son out of love for us. It was Jesus’ Father

“who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all” (Romans 8:32).

Sacrificial victims are expensive, and in this sacrifice the Father Himself bore the price. He gave up, unto death, that which was dearest and most precious to Him. In the death of Jesus, everything about God is love, more love, infinite love. There is not the faintest trace of divine anger in the death of Christ.

Second, in those places where Holy Scripture does speak of propitiating the anger of God, this propitiation is never linked to blood sacrifice. When biblical men are said to soften the divine wrath, it is done with prayer, as in the case of Moses on Mount Sinai, or by the offering of incense, which symbolizes prayer. Because blood sacrifice and the wrath of God are two things the Bible never joins together, I submit that authentic Christian theology should also endeavor to keep them apart.

Moreover, when the Apostle Paul does write of God’s anger, it is never in terms of appeasement but of deliverance. At the final judgment, when that divine anger, far from being placated, will consume the realm and servants of sin, Christ will deliver us from it, recognizing us as His faithful servants (1 Thessalonians 1:10; Romans 5:9). There will be not the slightest hint of appeasement at that point.

Third, the word hilasterion, which I have translated as the substantive “expiatory,” seems to have in Paul’s mind a more technical significance. In Hebrews 9:5, the only other place where the word appears in the New Testament, hilasterion designates the top, the cover, of the Ark of the Covenant, where the Almighty is said to throne between and above the Cherubim. In this context, the term is often translated as “mercy seat,” and it seems reasonable to think that this is the image that Paul too has in mind.

On Yom Kippur, the annual Atonement Day, the high priest sprinkled sacrificial blood on that hilasterion,

“because of the uncleanness of the children of Israel, and because of their transgressions of all their sins” (Leviticus 16:16).

Therefore, by saying that God “set forth” (proetheto) Jesus as the expiatory, or “instrument of expiation,” for our sins, Paul asserts that the shedding of Jesus’ blood on the Cross fulfilled the prophetic meaning and promise of that ancient liturgical institution of Israel, reconciling mankind by the removal of the uncleanness,

“their transgressions of all their sins.”

The Cross was the supreme altar, and Good Friday was preeminently the Day of the Atonement. The removal of sins was not accomplished by a juridical act, but a liturgical act performed in great love:

“Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma” (Ephesians 5:2).

Loving both the Father and ourselves, Jesus brought the Father and ourselves together by what

He accomplished in His own body, reconciling us through the blood of His Cross.

In the Bible,

“the life of the flesh is in the blood” (Leviticus 17:11).

The victim slain in sacrifice was not the vicarious recipient of a punishment, but the symbol of the loving dedication of the life of the person making the sacrifice.

This sacrificial dedication of life is the means by which the sinner is made “at one” with God.

Such is the biblical meaning of expiation and the proper context in which to interpret Paul’s teaching on the sacrifice of Christ.

Senior Editor of Touchstone Magazine, and archpriest of All Saints Orthodox Church in Chicago, IL, Fr. Patrick is, perhaps, the most erudite writer in the Orthodox Church in North America today. This article, one of his Pastoral Ponderings, was published by Orthodoxtoday.org.

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Roots of African Americans

[According to revisionist historians and their ilk, Islam was and is the great liberator of Africa, and Christianity was and is the great enslaver. In fact, quite the opposite is the Truth. - J.S.]

February is Black History Month. Many organizations celebrate the event, especially universities and other educational institutes. It is a good opportunity to evangelize. Some African Americans are converting from Christianity because of the waged war against Christianity. Some tell African Americans that Christianity is the white man religion who enslaved you. To make them hate Christ they told them that Christ was a European white man and Christianity is a product of the white man. We can tell the truth about these lies by telling the real history. Here is an article that you can use to share in Black History month that reveals some facts:

Roots of African Americans

By Victor Beshir

Everybody knows that African Americans came originally from Africa; however, not many people know what it means to be born and live in Africa at the time of the ancestors of African Americans. To fully understand those ancestors, we need to reveal some historical facts. Influence of the prophets who either stayed or lived in Egypt, Africa, touched the hearts and minds of Africans, such as Abraham, Israel, Jeremiah, Joseph and Moses.

Jesus and his family fled to Egypt, Africa, and lived there for four years. In fact, Jesus was born and raised in the Middle East and not Europe. In addition, all his disciples were from the Middle East, which includes many African countries. St. Mark, the writer of the second Gospel was born in Libya, Africa, and Simon the Cyrenian who bore the Cross for Jesus (Mark 15:21) was from Tunisia, Africa.

In fact, Christian churches started in Africa before a church started in Rome, Europe. In Egypt, the first theological school started in Alexandria, attracting students from all over the world. Theology, biblical studies, and Bible interpretations started in this school. Monasticism started in Egypt. The impact of Africa and Africans on Christianity is so evident.

This history left behind the names of thousands of great Africans theologians, martyrs, monks, saints, and teachers, such as Cyprian, St. Antony, Moses the hermit, Takla Haimanout, Origen, Tertullian the first of Latin theological writers, and Augustine the bishop of Hippo, North Africa.

The Christian faith mingled into every aspect of daily life of Africans. They absorbed the great pure Christian values of respect, love, peace, acceptance, forgiveness, service of the sick and the needy. It is needless to say that the first hospitals, orphanages, and homes for the needy in the world started by those African Christians. The Africans followed the Orthodox churches, enjoying a living faith and worship that were delivered by the apostles of Christ and were handed down from one generation to the next without a change.

Arriving to America, many of the ancestors of African Americans secretly met to pray their Orthodox Christian prayers in so-called “hush harbors”. Their masters prevented them from attending these meetings, fearing that the Christian teaching of equality and freedom of all men could start a revolt among the slaves against them. However, the ancestors continued to meet and to pray. As a result, many ancestors of African Americans were severely tortured, and even some died as martyrs. Silas Ezekiel and Charlotte Martin are among those who were martyred.

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Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew in Kalamata

On February 2, 2010 Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of New Rome celebrated a Panegyric Divine Liturgy in the Holy Cathedral of Ypapanti in Kalamata for the Feast of the Presentation of Christ into the Temple. Within this church is the miraculous icon of Ypapanti which on this feast is processed through the city with thousands in attendance.



See all 23 videos here.

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Counsels of Sts. Barsanuphius the Great and John the Prophet

Sts. Barsanuphios and John (Feast Day - February 6)

Saint Barsanuphius, an Egyptian by birth, lived in the 6th century during the reign of Emperor Justinian. He first lived in a monastery near the township of Gaza and then lived outside the monastery in a small cave, spending his time in prayer and silence. Nobody saw him for 50 years. For his great humility, God honored him with the gifts of wisdom, clairvoyance and prophecy. It has been told that, like the Apostle Paul, he ascended into Heaven and witnessed the indescribable blessings of God’s Kingdom. Being a miracle worker, he raised the dead, and like the Prophet Elijah could control the heavens. Such were the great gifts he obtained through unbelievably difficult temptations and sufferings. At the closing stages of his life — for the good of the Church — he was invited by the Patriarch of Jerusalem to visit the city, where he convinced the emperor to abandon his erroneous thinking and restore the concordant relationship with the Church of Jerusalem. He died in the year of 563.

Venerable John also practiced a life of silence and earned the gifts of prophecy and clairvoyance, for which he received the designation of prophet. His place of birth is unknown. During an 18 year period up to his death, he lived near the Elder Barsanuphius. Knowing the date of his demise and in response to Abba Elianus’ request, he postponed his death for two weeks in order to instruct him how to run the cloister.

Saints Barsanuphius’ and John’s instructions have been preserved in the form of questions and answers (over 800 +) posed by individuals of various callings — Archbishops, priests and laity.

Saint Barsanuphius instructed Abba Seridus to record all his answers without having any fear of making mistakes, as the Holy Spirit would direct him to chronicle everything correctly and in sequential order.

Once certain of the Fathers besought Saint Barsanuphius to pray that God stay His wrath and spare the world. Saint Barsanuphius wrote back that there were "three men perfect before God," whose prayers met at the throne of God and protected the whole world; to them it had been revealed that the wrath of God would not last long. These three, he said, were "John of Rome, Elias of Corinth, and another in the diocese of Jerusalem," concealing the name of the last, since it was himself.


On Prayer and Knowing the Will of God.

6. How can you be moved in prayer, reading and singing of Psalms? In prayer, the feeling comes from recollecting your sins. The praying person must bring to mind his deeds, how sinners that have committed similar sins will be judged, and the terrifying words of the Judge: "Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire" (Matt. 25:41).

During the uttering and singing of prayers, the feeling comes when the person compels his mind to be attentive to the words and grasp with all his soul the power that is enclosed in them. If despite this, that feeling is still absent within you, do not weaken but persevere patiently because merciful, generous and long-patient God will accept our endeavors. Always remember the Psalmist’s words: "I waited patiently for the Lord; and He inclined to me, and heard my cry" (Psalms 40:1). Act in this way and have trust that God’s mercy will visit you.

8. How many times does one pray in order to receive advisory thoughts as to what course of action to take? If you are unable to ask an experienced elder, you then have to utter your prayer on the given subject three times. After this, examine your heart and if it leans by even a hair’s breadth — act accordingly. This type of communication is noticeable and fully understood by the heart.

8. How do you pray three times: at different intervals or all at once? Sometimes you can’t defer them. If you have spare time, pray three times over three days. But if there are urgent circumstances like that with the betrayal of Christ — where He went away three times to pray and uttered the same words each time — then use that as your guide.

8. When you intend doing a God-pleasing deed and a contrary thought opposes it, this lets you know that the intended act is truly pleasing to God. Pray and observe, whether during prayer your heart corroborates the goodness and this goodness grows and does not lessen, and accordingly, whether the opposing thought increases or not. Know that every good deed definitely has bitter opposition from the devil’s jealousy, while a good deed through prayer gains ascendancy over it. If an ostensibly good deed is implanted by the devil and then be opposed by him, — then prayer will weaken this illusory good deed, together with its illusory opposition. In this instance, it is apparent that the reason why the devil opposes the thought he himself had implanted, is to beguile us into accepting his concept as good.

8. When in thinking about something, you see confusion in your thoughts, and after calling upon God this confusion remains — even slightly — then know that what you are thinking of doing has been motivated by the deceiver. Then, under no circumstances are you to do this — because nothing is pleasing to God that is done with confusion. In a situation where there are opposing thoughts to this type of confusion, then there is no need to immediately regard the matter as evil. Examine the subject, is it good or evil — if evil, then leave it and if it’s good, carry it out and reject the confusion.

On Repentance, Temperance, Meekness, and Sorrows

23. You ask how to lay the beginnings of repentance. If you wish to begin repentance, look at the woman sinner: she washed Christ’s feet with her tears (Luke 7:38). Tears wash away the sins of every person. But a person acquires tears by internal efforts, through the diligent study of the Holy Scripture, through patience, meditation on the Last Judgment and eternal shame, and through self-denial, just as the Lord said: "If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me" (Mat. 16:24). To deny one’s self and to take up the cross — means to sever your own will in everything and regard yourself as nothing.

24. Regarding temperance in food and drink, the fathers teach to partake of both in lesser quantities that is required, i.e., not to fill your stomach fully. Each individual has to determine his own measure in both food and wine. Moreover, the measure of restraint is not limited to food and drink, but extends to talking, sleep, clothing and to all the senses. There must be its own measure in all of this.

27. If upon starting a conversation you realize that it is sinful — terminate it by saying: "No, we won’t talk about this," or, having remained silent for a few moments, say: "I have forgotten what I wanted to say," — and switch the conversation to a different non-sinful topic.

28. Do you wish to free yourself of sorrows and not be burdened by them? Expect bigger ones — and you will calm down. Remember Job and other Saints — what sorrows they had endured! Acquire their patience and your spirit will be consoled.

On Humility, Vile Thoughts, and Discretion

30. Let us always have recourse to humility, for the humble lies on the ground, and where would one who lies fall? Whereas a person that has ascended to a great height, can easily fall. If we changed and reformed, it is not from us but is God’s gift, for: "The Lord lifts up the humble."

30. You must regard yourself as the greatest sinner among sinners, who has done nothing worthwhile before God, and reproach yourself at all times, everywhere for everything.

31. To the question on whether we should argue with thoughts that perturb us, I will answer: Don’t argue, because the enemies precisely want this to happen, and seeing our altercation will not cease their attack. It is better if you prayed to the Lord, opening your feebleness before Him, and He will not only drive out these thoughts but will eradicate them completely.

36. It is more beneficial to humbly pose questions than to persist with your own will, because the Lord Himself helps the asker what to say — for the sake of his humility and righteousness of heart.

On Love for Your Neighbor, Mercy, and Non-Condemnation

42. Do not grow despondant in sorrows and physical labors, which you have to perform within the society, because this also means that you have laid down your soul for your brothers (1 John 3:16) — and I hope the reward will be great for this labor. Just as the Lord placed Joseph to feed his brethren during the famine in Egypt (Psalm 32:19), He placed you to serve society. I am just repeating the words of the Apostle: "You therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Jesus Christ" (2 Tim. 2:1).

43. When you want to do a charitable act but a thought not to give creates doubt, test your thought, and if you find it being suggested through stinginess, then give — increasing the amount that you originally intended.

45. You are troubled by thoughts that incite confusion in others and find yourself confused. Know my brother, that if somebody offends you in word or deed, that person himself will be offended one hundred times worse sometime later. Be forbearing in everything and beware of ascribing your will to anything. Examine your thoughts attentively, so that they do not infect your heart with the murderous poison of anger, and that they do not tempt you into accepting a mosquito as a camel, or a pebble for a cliff. Because then you will be like a person who has a plank in his eye yet looks at the speck in another’s.

On Hypocrisy and Teaching

53. Sometimes, silence is better than any convincing and instructive conversations. Let us utilize words in moderation, remembering: "In the multitude of words there wanteth not transgression" (Prov. 10:19). So as not to fall into conceit and self-praise, let us remember that in not practicing what we preach, we preach toward our own condemnation.

Apolytikion in the First Tone
Divine and tuneful harps of the Holy Spirit's myst'ries, sounding forth sweet hymns of discernment which soothe all those in sorrows: ye moved men to cast off passion's yoke and trample upon Satan's loathsome head. Wherefore, Godlike Barsanuphius and wise John, deliver us who now cry out: Glory to Him that hath given you grace. Glory to Him that hath blessed you. Glory to Him that hath saved many through your sacred words of counsel.

Kontakion in the Third Tone
O Great Barsanuphius and John, thou marvellous Prophet, all the hidden secrets of men and God's dispensation brightly shone in the clear mirrors of your most pure hearts; and with beams of grace divine, ye cast out sin's shadows from the souls of men; O Fathers, lights of discernment, entreat the Lord for us all.

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Critique of Francis Dvornik's "The Photian Schism"

By Bishop John (Christodoulou) Kalogeraki of Amoriou

The work titled The Photian Schism of Fr. Francis Dvornik was welcomed with great enthusiasm by Byzantinists, because Photios had, by the judgments and opinions of fanatic heterodox theologians and historians, been erroneously discarded. Historians beforehand portrayed the Patriarch Photios as the cause of the schism of the Church between West and East. Thanks to this treatise, which was published in 1948, the outstanding personality and enormous worth of the great and wise Patriarch of the Orthodox Church was recognized.

That which characterizes the aforesaid work is the thorough knowledge and exhaustive examination of the sources and bibliography, as well as its methodological interpretation and the clarity of explaining its subject. It contains an index of abbreviations, anecdotes, manuscripts used by the author, three appendixes, a rich catalogue of manuscripts, an excellent bibliography, and at the end an index of names and subjects.

Having said this there are a few issues of secondary importance for which I have reservations and have another opinion on. I especially wanted to highlight the following:

1. The title of the work The Photian Schism is unfortunate and inaccurate, because the title gives the impression that in reality Patriarch Photios was the "Father of the Schism". It should be emphasized that contemporary scholarship has proven that Patriarch Photios was not the cause or motivator behind the schism of the Church. Rather Patriarch Photios is considered the Apostle of Unity for the Church. It would have been preferable for the book to have been titled either The Patriarch Photios or The Schism Between the Western and Eastern Churches.

2. The author observes that the trial of the Patriarch of Constantinople by the delegates of the Papal See of Rome proves by example the recognition of the Primacy of Authority of the Pope of Rome and the right of the Pope of Rome to judge an Ecumenical Patriarch.

3. On page 122 Fr. Dvornik writes that Patriarch Photios should not have brought up the issue of the Filioque against the Synod of 867 since the Pope of Rome found in 862 Photios' Confession that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father alone as Orthodox.

The above reservations or misgivings however are not meant to erase the fair spirit of the author, which is revealed throughout the entirety of the book. This should be much more honored when we consider that the same subjects, relating to the schism of the Western and Eastern Church, were often considered a slippery slope for Roman Catholic authors.

The honorable work of Fr. Dvornik is memorialized for this amazing wake-up call. I am empowered to say that it is the basis for anything regarding the study of Photios and the schism, because the sources which were used by Fr. Dvornik must be known. This work, The Photian Schism, is the result of many laborious years of work.

In conclusion, the present work of Fr. Dvornik is a work of toil and enthusiasm for which the author is worthy of praise by all.

From the book titled Analysis and Critique of the Work "The Photian Schism" Authored by Professor Francis Dvornik by Bishop John (Christodoulou) Kalogeraki of Amoriou.

Translated by John Sanidopoulos

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Saturday of Souls

Through the Apostolic Constitutions (Book VIII, ch. 42), the Church of Christ has received the custom to make commemorations for the departed on the third, ninth, and fortieth days after their repose. Since many throughout the ages, because of an untimely death in a faraway place, or other adverse circumstances, have died without being deemed worthy of the appointed memorial services, the divine Fathers, being so moved in their love for man, have decreed that a common memorial be made this day for all pious Orthodox Christians who have reposed from all ages past, so that those who did not have particular memorial services may be included in this common one for all. Also, the Church of Christ teaches us that alms should be given to the poor by the departed one's kinsmen as a memorial for them.

Besides this, since we make commemoration tomorrow of the Second Coming of Christ, and since the reposed have neither been judged, nor have received their complete recompense (Acts 17:31; II Peter 2:9; Heb. 11:39-40), the Church rightly commemorates the souls today, and trusting in the boundless mercy of God, she prays Him to have mercy on sinners. Furthermore, since the commemoration is for all the reposed together, it reminds each of us of his own death, and arouses us to repentance.

Apolytikion in the Plagal of the Fourth Tone
Only Creator who out of the depths of wisdom lovingly govern all things and upon all bestow what is accordingly best for them, give rest to the souls of Your servants, for they have placed their hope in You, our Author and Maker and God.

Kontakion in the Plagal of the Fourth Tone
Give rest, O Christ, among the Saints to the souls of Your servants, where there is no pain, no sorrow, no grieving, but life everlasting.

- Reading from Greek Orthodox Church of America website

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Preview of "A Pilgrim's Way" Orthodox Documentary

Short preview of a "A Pilgrim's Way", a documentary made about the Romanian Orthodox church. It begins with lay life in Bucharest and then travels to a monastery, and ends by meeting some of the great Romanian church fathers. It is 73 minutes long and will be released soon.

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Primordial Soup? Would You Believe...

David Klinghoffer
February 5, 2010
Evolution News and Views

Life arose without design or direction from any intelligent agent. Would you believe it did so in a sun-warmed ocean surface? No? Would you believe an earth-heated vent at the bottom of the same ocean? Would you believe an office microwave that hasn’t been cleaned since the Bush Administration?

The past week’s startling news of backpedaling from the “primordial soup” theory rang a bell, though I wasn’t instantly able to say whose comedy routine it put me in mind of. Hm, was it Monty Python? ScienceDaily carries the story:

"For 80 years it has been accepted that early life began in a “primordial soup” of organic molecules before evolving out of the oceans millions of years later. Today the “soup” theory has been overturned in a pioneering paper in BioEssays which claims it was the Earth's chemical energy, from hydrothermal vents on the ocean floor, which kick-started early life."

"Textbooks have it that life arose from organic soup and that the first cells grew by fermenting these organics to generate energy in the form of ATP. We provide a new perspective on why that old and familiar view won't work at all," said team leader Dr Nick lane from University College London. "We present the alternative that life arose from gases (H2, CO2, N2, and H2S) and that the energy for first life came from harnessing geochemical gradients created by mother Earth at a special kind of deep-sea hydrothermal vent -- one that is riddled with tiny interconnected compartments or pores."

So isn’t this interesting. A theory long held to be more or less bulletproof is suddenly rejected in favor of something rather different. I thought that kind of thing wasn’t supposed to happen? Of course, the story was familiar in part because intelligent-design advocates, and others, have long pointed out inadequacies in the soup concept.

In Signature in the Cell, Stephen Meyer writes about how back in 1985 he came across Thaxton, Bradley and Olson’s The Mystery of Life’s Origin, which “provided a comprehensive critique of the attempts that had been made to explain how the first life had arisen from the primordial ocean, the so-called pre-biotic soup.”

The soup-spilling team writing in BioEssays concentrates on the source of energy needed to power life into existence. Was it from UV radiation, as J.B.S. Haldane theorized in 1929? Or from a hydrothermal vent? This overlooks a much trickier problem: the source not of the relevant energy but the relevant biological information. As Meyer remarks in Signature, origin-of-life scenarios that “just transfer the information problem into the chemical soup itself” fit into a “clear pattern. Every attempt to explain the origin of biological information either failed because it transferred the problem elsewhere or ‘succeeded’ only by presupposing unexplained sources of information.”

Anyway, the lame retreat from a stance previously thumped with tremendous vigor sounds Pythonesque but no, a quick Internet search reveals it’s actually from Get Smart. Along with “Missed it by that much” and “Sorry about that, Chief,” “Would you believe…” was a repeated line from the classic 1960s TV show. It always introduced Agent Maxwell Smart’s attempt to climb down from an earlier, bolder claim in favor of increasingly pitiable ones: “I happen to be an expert in karate, Judo and tempura. Would you believe that I can break eight boards with one karate chop? No? Would you believe three boards? Would you believe a loaf of bread?”

But enough nostalgia. Read the ScienceDaily article here.

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Are Chimps and Humans Really All That Much Alike?

Jay Richards
February 5, 2010
Evolution News and Views

A popular Darwinian meme is that humans and chimp genomes are ninety-something percent identical. It varies a bit, but usually hovers close to 99%. The meme hides all sorts of assumptions, of course, but the take home lesson for the headline reader is plain enough: we’re almost exactly the same as chimps.

Though the 99% number has received some qualifiers, and has even been referred to as a “myth” in Science, the basic idea remains firmly entrenched in the media collective consciousness.

But evidence seems to be piling up that the similarities are not nearly what has been advertised. Geneticist Richard Buggs has reflected on this, and has even predicted “that when we have a reliable, complete chimpanzee genome, the overall similarity of the human genome will prove to be close to 70% (and very far from 99%).”

It will be interesting to see how Buggs' prediction holds up over time. If he’s right, this will be one more switch from “meme” to “myth” in the Darwinian ledger.

I should confess that I haven’t followed this debate closely, simply because I don’t think that the meme, even if true, really shows much. Here’s what I mean. Some years ago, a reporter called the Discovery Institute asking for a comment on a new study showing a 75% genetic similarity between human beings and a nematode (if I remember correctly). The reporter asked me what I thought about the discovery that we were 75% identical to a nematode. I suggested that there was a difference between our genomes being quite similar to the nematode’s, and human beings being quite similar to nematodes. That didn’t seem to connect, so I said: “Well, why doesn’t the story cause you to reassess the assumption that we’re basically identical with our DNA? If somebody told me we were 100% chemically identical with chimps, I would conclude that we must be a lot more than mere chemicals, since chimps and humans are quite different. Now since humans and nematodes are obviously quite different, while our genomes are similar, doesn’t that suggest that genetics tells us less about ourselves than we had assumed?” I'm pretty sure my comments didn’t make the story.

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