Orthodox Mission to Sierra Leone: The Wounded Lion

Please support the Orthodox Mission to Sierra Leone.





Τhe video that we are presenting here is a shocking documentary about the horrors of the civil war that has plagued the African country of Sierra Leone for 12 years, making it the poorest country in the entire world.

Within this turmoil, the Orthodox Mission has embarked on its own activities, with Archmandrite Fr. Themistocles Adamopoulos in charge, opening up a brighter horizon of faith, hope and love. With his sacrificial love, this Missionary is offering everything possible by way of material needs, and at the same time offers everything he can from a spiritual aspect - in other words: Christ!

It is our duty as Christians to support this significant endeavor, in every possible manner - both material and spiritual.

Support this ministry here.

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Recent Miracles of St. Gerasimos of Jordan

Saint Gerasimos of Jordan (Feast Day - March 4)

St. Gerasimos of Jordan worked many miracles while alive and continues to the present day to work many miracles for Orthodox Christians. While alive he lived a strict ascetic life with little food and drink, he was able to read people's thoughts, foretell the future, pray unceasingly, raise the dead, and as is well known his purity was like that of Adam in Paradise and so walked with wild beasts as if they were his best friends. So speedy does his aid come from beyond the grave that over the centuries he has taken on the nickname of "Saint Express".

Archimandrite Chrysostomos, the abbot of St. Gerasimos Monastery in Jordan, relates the following three recent miracles of St. Gerasimos:

1. The Twelve Year Old Boy With A High Fever

About twenty years ago Deacon Eirinaios of the monastery at Sinai came here from Jerusalem. He had with him a twelve year old boy from Crete that was a student at the Zion school. It was Saturday evening, I was very tired, and I was kneading, because I didn't have prosphoro for the Sunday Liturgy. Suddenly the boy began to get a very high fever, he had a terrible headache and was in unbearable pain. I didn't know what to do. I didn't have a vehicle, except a moped, so I could not take him to the doctor and I was thus in a hopeless situation. I prayed to the Saint to make the child well. Around 11:00PM the deacon and the child fell asleep. I was beyond tired, had the breads in the oven, I was thinking about the Liturgy the next morning, and I pleaded fervently to the Saint to make the sick child well. At one point the deacon heard a knock at the door. He got up, looked around, but nobody was there. He came and found me and we went together to their room. I told him it must have been the Saint. I didn't have time to finish what I was saying when the child awoke and said: "Elder, I'm all wet! An old man spilled a bucket of water on me!" We took off his t-shirt and dried him off with the towel. In five minutes he fell asleep peacefully, without a fever, and in the morning he was perfectly well.

2. The Saint Brings Fruit To Those Who Came To Venerate Him

One time there was a group from Greece, in the region of Macedonia, that came to the Holy Land with a bishop who was named Dionysios. He had come with students from the Theological School. They notified us from Jericho that they were coming and asked if I could prepare them fava (because I normally make fava for visitors).

When they entered the monastery I told the bishop: "My Master, please forgive me but I do not have fruit to eat after your fava." Not long after that a soldier came in with a case of oranges and says: "Abba, take these oranges." I wondered who it was, because he left immediately and I went to see from what regiment he was from. I went outside, I looked over there, I looked over here, nothing. The soldier was out of sight. I called over a laborer and asked him where the soldier went. Confused he said that no soldier had entered the monastery. "How didn't he enter?" I told him. "Here are the oranges." The laborer was scared stiff and said: "No one entered. I was right here, at the door. No one came, I did not even see a jeep." I came back in and told the bishop that the Arab had told me that he saw no one enter. Everyone was confused because they all saw him with their eyes. They all went outside, a minute passed, and they saw no one. Even if he had come in a car, it still would not have had time to be beyond our sight. The Saint came to our aid and brought us fruit.

3. The Miraculous Discovery of Water for the Monastery

The well in the court of the monastery had very little water. And still it was not enough for the needs of the monastery. So I decided to dig in a nearby area where I had heard there was water in the old days. Three of us were digging - Samir, an Arab that I have had here since he was a child, a temporary worker, and myself. Though we dug twenty-three meters deep, we did not find even a drop of water. I remember it was afternoon. I was very tired and disappointed and sat down under a wild tree, to rest a bit. Then I said: "My Saint Gerasimos, it appears you do not want us to find water. If we do not find it today I will close up the well." We were working in the traditional manner. We would dig with the hoe and the pickaxe and we would clear it out with the shovel to go down. At that time the two workers were digging down and I was emptying the buckets. They yelled for me: "Abba, come down because we have found gravel." They had only found sand rocks. I got up right away. I went down the well, took the pickaxe, and began to dig myself. I dug and I dug and I dug until I went down half a meter and noticed the gravel was wet. At one and a half meters we found water. I absolutely believe this was a miracle of the Saint. If I did not pray to him and continue the shoveling, I would have absolutely closed the hole up the next day. The Jews forbid a person to dig a well or build anything without a license, which is why I always have problems. A greater miracle of the Saint was that the water was clean and sweet. In our region, because of our close proximity to the Dead Sea, not only are the waters bitter, but salty as well because of the sulphur, and it smells like eggs.

4. The Appearance of the Saint in His Church

About twelve years ago the abbot went to Greece. At the monastery there was a Romanian nun named Maria, an Arab named Asam who was then a young child, and next door in a cave the Abbess Christodouli. Every night they would hear the door of the Church of Saint Gerasimos open and close. Maria would go to see who it was, but saw no one. The same with Asam, who would then return to the monastery, because he would see no one.

When Fr. Chrysostomos returned to the monastery, they asked him: "Elder, who opens and closes the door to the church every night?"

He responded: "It is Saint Gerasimos, who else could it be?"

Saint Gerasimos is the protector of his monastery, especially when its protector is not present. It should also be noted that many smell a peculiar beautiful aroma in the church that cannot be described.

5. The Healing of a Young Student in Cyprus

D.S. from Larnaka, Cyprus relates the following:

My son George, fifteen years old, had a severe health problem. For five or six months continuously, every day, he would faint. We went to many doctors and spent a lot of money, and suffered a lot, until we heard about Saint Gerasimos from Abbot Chrysostomos. We spoke together, and after a Supplication to the Saint, my child was healed. He is functioning normally now. And even though from young childhood I had a heart problem, the next test showed that I was in absolutely perfect health, to the last detail.

6. Saint Gerasimos Confesses a Couple

A couple related the following story:

A few years ago we came to the monastery of the Saint and stayed there for a few days. One evening we asked the abbot if we could confess to him, if he had time. The abbot said that he could not because he had a lot of work to do. After a little while we climbed the stairs and entered the Church of Saint Gerasimos. We saw the abbot there again. When he saw us, he told us with much love: "Come my children, so I could confess you."

When the confession was over, we went down to the courtyard. After a bit the abbot passed near us and we thanked him, because he set aside his errands and was tired and still did us the favor and took on the burden of confessing us.

Then he, with confusion, said: "What are you talking about, my children? I confessed you? I haven't confessed anyone today. I had told you I didn't have time and I was tired."

We were speechless. We understood that the person who confessed us was none other than Saint Gerasimos. He appeared in the form of the abbot, in order to not suspect anything. We glorify God and thank Him! We further thank His great Saint, Saint Gerasimos, who gave us the great honor to confess us.

7. Saint Gerasimos Blesses A Priest

A clergyman related the following:

One day I was at the Monastery of Saint Gerasimos and was sitting in the outer court. At one point the abbot walked in front of me and blessed me. A little while later he again passed and I thanked him for giving me a blessing a little while before when he walked in front of me.

The abbot then told me: "Father, a little while ago I was not here, nor did I pass in front of you."

Then I responded saying that it must have been another clergyman that was staying at the monastery. He then told me that the only people wearing a rason (cassock) in the monastery were the two of us. We then understood that it was Saint Gerasimos that took the form of the abbot and walked around his monastery.

Source

See also the following miracles of St. Gerasimos (in Greek) here and here.


Apolytikion in the First Tone
Thou didst prove to be a citizen of the desert, an angel in the flesh, and a wonderworker, O Gerasimos, our God-bearing Father. By fasting, vigil, and prayer thou didst obtain heavenly gifts, and thou healest the sick and the souls of them that have recourse to thee with faith. Glory to Him that hath given thee strength. Glory to Him that hath crowned thee. Glory to Him that worketh healings for all through thee.

Kontakion in the Fourth Tone
As a star resplendent with the light of virtues, thou didst make the wilderness of Jordan radiantly shine with beams of sacred celestial light, O righteous Father, God-bearing Gerasimos.

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St. Gerasimos of Jordan Monastery (Documentary)

See also here.

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The Philosophy of Men Does Not Satisfy

If the philosophies of men were able to satisfy man, why did the philosophers Justin and Origen become Christians? Why did Basil, Chrysostom and Gregory, who in Athens studying all the philosophy of the Greeks, receive baptism? And why did Blessed Augustine, who knew the wisdom of both the Greeks and the Romans, throw away all and seek salvation and illumination in the Faith of Christ? And St. Clement of Rome, who was very wealthy and very learned? And St. Catherine, who was from the royal house and knew all the worldly wisdom of the Egyptians? And the young Crown Prince Joasaph in India, to whom was known all the Indian philosophies? And many, many more who primarily sought explanations to the puzzles of the world and illumination for their souls in philosophy and, after that, entered the Church and worshipped the Lord Christ?

- St. Nikolai Velimirovich, Prologue

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Serb Film Director Regrets Humanity's Lost Spirituality

Modern Day World Lost Spiritual Orientation and Sank in "High-Tech Paganism," Kusturica Believes

Moscow, 3 March 2010, Interfax – Renowned film director Emir Kusturica regrets modern-day humanity has lost spirituality.

"High-tech pagans have invaded the world today. This paganism doesn't do any good to a human-being. A person today lives under permanent technological control… However, the main difference of modern people is that they lost spiritual orientation. Uniqueness of a human being as God's image is leveled down in the world today," the film director said in his interview published by the NG-Religii paper in association with the Spas TV channel.

According to him, "Today a high-tech person is more disposed to biological life rather than spiritual. He is interested only in material values and is a pagan of technologies. And today this pagan opposes a man of God as Feodor Dostoevsky so often told about.

"Today a high-tech pagan is a consumer who doesn't ask eternal existential questions. He is losing his identity and becomes a part of controlled crowd. He doesn’t' have a soul, he is ready only to consume. Unfortunately, today I often see that majority of Serbs and Russians are turned into such pagans. They live with all their technologies in a spiritual vacuum," Kusturica said.

Atheism "destroys a soul and turns us into biological mechanisms consuming products imposed by ad industry," the film director believes. According to him, it leads to imitation of western culture samples and "not the best of them. You know, there's a lot of high quality cultural events in the West too, but youth chooses only the worst – paganism of technologies."

On Đurđevdan (St. George's Day) in 2005 Emir was baptized into the Serbian Orthodox Church as Nemanja Kusturica (Немања Кустурица) in Savina monastery near Herceg Novi, Montenegro. To his critics who considered this the final betrayal of his Bosnian Muslim roots, he replied that: "My father was an atheist and he always described himself as a Serb. OK, maybe we were Muslim for 250 years, but we were Orthodox before that and deep down we were always Serbs, religion cannot change that. We only became Muslims to survive the Turks."

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Atheism, Not God, is Odd

Where Do Atheists Come From?
03 March 2010
by Lois Lee and Stephen Bullivant
New Scientist

Editorial: Time to accept that atheism, not God, is odd.

HERE's a fact to flatter the unbelievers among you: the bright young things at the University of Oxford are among the most godless groups ever studied in the UK. Of 728 students surveyed in 2007, 48.9 per cent claimed not to believe in any god, with 49.6 per cent claiming no religious affiliation. And while a very small number of Britons typically label themselves as "atheist" or "agnostic" (most surveys put it at about 5 per cent), an astonishing 57.3 per cent of the Oxford sample did.

This may come as no surprise. After all, atheism is the natural stance of the educated and the informed, is it not? It is only to be expected that Oxford students should be wise to what their own professor Richard Dawkins calls "self-indulgent, thought-denying skyhookery" - and others call "faith". The old Enlightenment caricature, it seems, is true after all: where Reason reigns, God retires.

Of course, things are never quite that simple. Within the sample, for instance, the postgraduates (that is, the even-better educated) were notably more religious than the undergraduates, in terms of both belief in God and self-description. Although the greater number of non-Europeans in the postgraduate population is almost certainly a significant factor here, evidence from elsewhere backs the idea that there is no straightforward relationship between atheism and education.

Let's look at some results from the World Values Survey, an international attempt to assess the global state of socio-cultural, moral, religious and political values. The 2005 results show that while there is a clear positive correlation between education and lack of belief in God, the effect is slightly weaker, not stronger, among those with a university education (14.8 per cent were non-believers) compared with those whose highest attainment was secondary level (17.2 per cent).

What is more, the survey shows a far stronger correlation between education and certain "irrational" beliefs: for example, only 29.6 per cent of those without even an elementary education believe in telepathy, compared with 51.8 per cent of people with degree-level education.

Closer to home, an analysis of the 2008 British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey by David Voas of the University of Manchester reveals that the historical correlation between being educated and being "non-religious" has not only weakened but reversed. Looking at white British people, for example, the findings show that only around 25 per cent of men aged between 25 and 34 claiming "no religion" have degrees, compared with around 40 per cent of those describing themselves as religious. For women in the same age group, the difference is less marked but the trend is the same. The picture is more complicated across different ethnic groups, although the overall trend remains the same.

It appears that Enlightenment assumptions about the decline of religion as the population becomes more educated will no longer do - at least, not without considerable qualification. Why is it that, despite the long history of the study of religion, the picture seems to be getting more and not less confused about what it means to believe in God? We, and the scholars who gathered in December last year for a conference at Wolfson College, University of Oxford, think we may have the answer. The problems stem from a long-term, collective blind spot in research: atheism itself.

This oversight might seem remarkable (or remarkably obtuse on the part of the social scientists) but it is one with deep historical roots. Many of social science's 19th-century founders, including Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx, Émile Durkheim, Auguste Comte and Max Weber, were unbelievers, or "religiously unmusical", as Weber memorably put it. For them, religion was the great explicandum: how, they wondered, could so many people believe in something so absurd? What they failed to recognise was that their own, taken-for-granted, "lack" of belief might itself be amenable to inquiry.

Ironically, sociologists, psychologists, economists and, particularly, cognitive anthropologists have become so skilled at explaining why humans seem to have such a widespread bias towards theistic beliefs that a new question readily presents itself: if religion comes so naturally to us, why are so many people, especially in western Europe, apparently resistant to it? In the UK, for example, a sizeable 43 per cent said they had "no religion" in the 2008 BSA survey.

Moreover, social scientists themselves consistently rank as the most atheistic of all academics: see a recent study by Neil Gross at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, and Solon Simmons of the Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution at George Mason University, Arlington, Virginia (Sociology of Religion, in press).

What we need now is a scientific study not of the theistic, but the atheistic mind. We need to discover why some people do not "get" the supernatural agency many cognitive scientists argue comes automatically to our brains. Is this capacity non-existent in the non-religious, or is it rerouted, undermined or overwritten - and under what conditions?

Psychologically, we need to know how the self functions without theistic belief, and how our emotional resources might be altered by its absence. Anthropologically, we need to understand how people without religion make sense of their lives, how they find meaning, and how non-theistic systems of thought are embedded in, and shape, the different cultures in which they are present. Sociologically, we need to know how these alternative meaning-making systems are shared between societies, how they unite or divide us, and whether non-religious groups contain pro-social elements commonly associated with religion itself.

For all these reasons and more - not to mention the sheer thrill of entering uncharted waters - we set up the international and interdisciplinary Non-religion and Secularity Research Network in late 2008. The Wolfson meeting was the NSRN's inaugural conference, only the second event on this topic ever to be held in Europe. (The first was convened by the Vatican in 1969: make of that what you will.)

The conference presented the first fruits of research in this area - and discussed how much still needs to be done. One of the first tasks is to develop a common academic vocabulary. In this article, for instance, we have danced between "atheistic", "non-theistic", "non-religious", "unbelieving" and "godless" as if they were synonyms. They're not.

Interesting findings have, however, begun to emerge; some providing insight into the relationship between education and atheism. Voas, also a keynote speaker at the Wolfson conference, says one reason why a greater number of religious people are degree-holders may be that "better educated people have typically reflected on religion and have the self-confidence to come down decisively, on one side or the other". The issue is not which idea - atheism or theism - is more stupid than the other, but that education helps us either to work out or simply to communicate our beliefs, no matter what they are.

He also notes the observation by another keynote presenter, Colin Campbell of the University of York, whose 1971 book Toward a Sociology of Irreligion had until very recently been a lone voice in the wilderness. Campbell argues that though the educated are often the first to articulate a new cultural perspective, if that perspective becomes popular, it will spread across the population. As a result, the education levels associated with that perspective naturally average out. So it is that the relationship between intelligence or education and cultural shifts may not be as significant as they first appear.

Everybody stands to benefit from wider and more systematic research of the atheistic or non-religious. The believers may take heart from the fact that the most comprehensive studies no longer suggest the unreligious are cleverer or more lettered than them. But the non-believers might also comfort themselves that they are no longer outside the mainstream. They have become a "normal" and significant part of many societies. And researchers ignore them at their peril.

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Metropolis of Boston Responds to Plastic Spoon Controversy

PRESS RELEASE

On October 8, 2009, The Metropolis of Boston issued the following statement:

"The Center of Disease Control (CDC), fearing an H1N1 Pandemic, strongly discourages participation in group activities, recommending individuals, (especially children) with colds or the flu remain at home and follow the instructions of their medical doctors. Many faithful have approached our Parish Priests expressing concern about their participation in worship services, especially in the sacramental life of the Church. While the warnings of the medical community should be heeded by persons with colds and flu-like symptoms, people, in general, should not panic but carry on with their usual activities, including going to church and receiving Holy Communion.

"It should be noted, that the Church has always been clear in its belief that diseases are not transmitted from the Holy Chalice which we believe contains the very Body and Blood of our Savior. Hence, the distribution of Holy Communion was never a question even when various diseases ravaged the world. As is well known, Priests consume what remains in the Chalice at the end of the Divine Liturgy, regardless whether it was celebrated in a parish church, a hospital or hospice chapel.

"Orthodox faithful have always acted responsibly. As we face the reality of the present flu pandemic fears, Orthodox Christians are urged to use discretion as they follow the directives of the medical community."


Regrettably, a priest serving in New England - surely pressured by well meaning parishioners concerned with the outbreak of the H1N1 flu pandemic - utilized plastic spoons to distribute Holy Communion. This unacceptable violation of Church order was addressed in accordance with Ecclesiastical procedure.

The Metropolis expresses its regret that this lapse of judgment resulted in widespread controversy, and is appalled that some individuals questioned whether this practice was authorized. It expresses its fervent prayer that those who arrive at rash judgments - hurtling paranoid condemnations in the press and on the internet - will rather invest their time in prayer and self examination during Great Lent. They should reflect on the countless passages in the New Testament which urge the followers of the Crucified Lord to avoid gossip and the sin of judging others. Let us all etch in our hearts and souls the prayer of St. Ephraim,

O Lord and Master of my life,
Give me not the spirit of laziness,
curiosity, lust for power, and idle talk.
But give to me your servant a
spirit of prudence, humility,
patience, and love.
Yes, Lord and King grant me to see
my own faults and not to
judge my brother.
For You are blessed unto the ages of ages. Amen.

Source

[The post I made about this controversy is here. - J.S.]

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Ida Not a Human Ancestor

“Many lines of evidence indicate that Darwinius has nothing at all to do with human evolution,” said Chris Kirk (U of Texas) in an article on Science Daily. Researchers publishing their analysis in the Journal of Human Evolution accused the presentation of ignoring decades of research and an enormous body of literature on the evolution of strepsirrhines, a primate group that includes lemurs and lorises. Ida’s discoverer claimed it had characteristics suggesting a linkage to haplorhines.

The announcement about Ida included a book, a History Channel documentary, and an exhibit at the American Museum of Natural History. Mayor Michael Bloomberg unveiled the specimen at a news conference in New York city. The lead author of the new paper remarked, “Just because it’s a complete and well-preserved fossil doesn’t mean it’s going to overthrow all our ideas.”

The truth may not get you a book or History Channel documentary, but it has one major benefit over the alternative: it’s true.

For more, see also here and here.

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Russian President Venerates Crown of Thorns

Russian President venerates the Saviour’s Crown of Thorns

On March 2, 2010, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Ms. Medvedev venerated the Saviour’s Crown of Thorns, the piece of the Lord’s Cross and the Nail from the Lord’s Cross kept in the Notre Dame Cathedral. These shrines were brought from Constantinople to Parish by Louis IX, the King of France, in 1239. The piece of the Cross happened to come to the French capital from Rome.

For the first time in the history of modern Russia, a head of the state prayed at this common Christian shrine. Emperor Nicholas II and his wife prayed at it in 1895. Like nearly a hundred years ago, the head of the Russian State was welcomed by the ringing of all the bells and a solemn procession of the cathedral’s clergy. The main gates of the church were opened for the occasion.

Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate’s department for external church relations, said a prayer at the Crown of Thorns. Praying together with him and the high guests were Archbishop Innokenty of Korsun, Hegumen Philip Riabykh, DECR vice-chairman, Hegumen Philaret Bulekov, Moscow Patriarchate representative to the Council of Europe, Archpriest Antony Ilyin, acting representative of the Moscow Patriarchate to European international organizations, Hegumen Nestor Sirotenko, rector of the Church Representation of the Three Hierarchs, Hieromonk Alexander Sinyakov, rector of Paris Orthodox Seminary, and clergy of the Korsun diocese. The singing was performed by the choir of Paris Orthodox Seminary.

The Catholic Church was represented by the Right Rev. Jérôme Beau, auxiliary bishop of Paris, Msgr. Patrick Jacquin, rector of the cathedral, local clergy and knights of the Order of Holy Sepulcher.

After the prayer and veneration of the Crown of Thorns, Mr. Medvedev thanked the congregation, saying, ‘I would like to express sincere gratitude for the opportunity to visit the Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris and venerate the shrines found here. For me as President of the Russian Federation, it is a great honour. For me as a man of Christian faith, it is an opportunity to touch some specially venerated shrines. I very much hope that the meetings of this kind will help us strengthen peace and mutual understanding and contribute to better relations between our countries and to contacts between Churches’.

Then the Russian President and his wife proceeded to the Icon of Our Lady of Vladimir. In 2007 this icon was given to the Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris by the late Patriarch Alexy II during his historic visit to France.

In memory of his visit to the cathedral, Mr. Medvedev presented it with an ancient icon bearing an image of the Saviour in a crown of thorns.

On his way from the church the president came up to the Parisians who assembled in the cathedral square to greet him.





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Metropolitan Hilarion Shouted Down as ‘Heretic’

Metropolitan Hilarion (Alfeyev) shouted down as ‘heretic’ by members of the Patriarchate of Moscow

On the evening of Saturday 13 February, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk was greeted by shouts of ‘heretic’, as he came out at the polyeleios at matins. The disturbance took place in the Church of the Icon of the Mother of God of All those who Sorrow, which is on the Ordynka in Moscow. Metropolitan Hilarion serves regularly in this church.

The young Metropolitan Hilarion, who possesses a doctorate from the University of Oxford, has shocked many members of the Patriarchate (and other Local Orthodox Churches) in recent weeks with various of his private opinions. These all appear to challenge Russian Orthodox values, for example concerning traditional Orthodox dress in church, preparation before communion and relations with Roman Catholicism.

The situation has not been helped by the leaking of a discussion document which resulted from ecumenical talks about papal primacy. These talks were held last year in Crete among academics from the Orthodox Church and from the Vatican. The discussion document has been dubbed the ‘Cretan Unia’ by its opponents. The situation thus resembles that in Greece in the 60s and 70s, where Greek ecumenists of that generation were also regularly shouted down during services as heretics.

All this serves to show just how broad a spectrum of opinion is represented within the Patriarchate of Moscow. These are far broader than within the Tradition of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, where views are much more consistent. Presumably, this must result from the fact that there are so many recently baptised in the Patriarchate, who do not always know or understand the Tradition.

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Sermon for the Third Wednesday of Great Lent

CATECHESIS 60: On Our Sudden Departure From Here and Teaching About Keeping Safe Watch Over our Senses and our Mind from Unseemly Desires.

By St. Theodore the Studite

Given on Wednesday of the 3rd Week.

Brethren and fathers, in the presence of our holy father and teacher we have no need to discourse; but nevertheless because of our custom let us say just a little. Day by day our life, as you see, is passing and we are getting nearer to death, and we must be removed hence and be joined to our brothers and fathers; so  there is need of much vigilance and attention and preparation of heart. We hear the story of the Flood being read, and the Lord in the Gospels saying: "As in the days of Noah they were eating, drinking, marrying, buying, selling and suddenly the flood came, so too it will be at the coming of the Son of Man" [Cf. Mt. 24:37-39; Lk. 17:26]. And perhaps we wonder in this case how insensibly they were disposed, and were not rather trembling and terrified. Let us be on the watch then lest we find ourselves without realizing it in the same state of which we accuse them. Already it is not the ark which is being got ready, which was being filled up during one hundred years, but every day the tomb is seen filled, into which we are about to crawl. Already each day death is at work [Cf. 2 Cor. 4:12], when each one of our brothers departs. Things here are more fearful than those there; and so we should be on our guard. I don’t say: we shouldn’t eat, drink, or clothe ourselves. I don’t say that; "but whether we eat, or drink, or whatever we do, let us do everything to the glory of God" [1 Cor. 10:31-32], giving no offence to Jews or Greeks or to the Church of God, as the Apostle teaches.

Yes, I exhort, yes, I implore, my brothers, "make my joy complete", as the Apostle again says, "be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or vainglory; but in humility think of others as better than yourselves" [Phil. 2:2-3]. Let us secure our senses, sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch, for through them death enters. Let us bridle our mind to not be carried off to things it should not, not to step into the pitfall of unseemly things, not to picture to ourselves evil images nor to conceive sinful desires, from which we gain no profit or pleasure; on the contrary we are pained and crushed accomplishing nothing useful. There is one repose then and one pleasure, to cleanse the soul and to look towards dispassion. And let us not grow despondent [akedia] when called to repose and the joy of dispassion, but let us hasten and press forward intently with diligence to right every defect; and God is our helper; for the Lord is near those who wait for him. And by living thus may we reach the kingdom of heaven in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory and might with the Father and the Holy Spirit, now and ever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

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Dr. George Bebis Interviewed About the Greek Archdiocese

The Metropolis' Brought "Fragmentation", says Professor George Bebis

Theodore Kalmoukos
January 10, 2010
Romfea.gr

"The creation of Metropolis' has brought much fragmentation to the Church of America," remarked the professor of Patristic Theology at Holy Cross Theological School, Dr. George Bebis, in an interview with the National Herald, adding that "it is impermissible to not hear the commemoration of the name of Archbishop Demetrios."

Almost ten years after his official retirement, the professor of Patristic Theology of the Theological School in Boston, Dr. George Bebis, not only teaches two courses a year, but he insists on teaching in the Greek language.

He is the only professor who teaches courses in Patristics in Greek, and furthermore receives a minimum nominal tip for one course and the other he teaches totally free. For the past six months he was teaching a class on the Lives and Sayings of the Fathers. Speaking with the National Herald, he said, "Of course I taught it in the Greek language, and occasionally I say and write certain things on the board in English."

Dr. Bebis graduated from the Holy Cross Theological School as well as from Harvard University, and in Athens he received his doctoral degree. With particular satisfaction he mentioned how "this year I didn't see many older aged students, but young students, and that is a good sign. I would like young students to continue coming from Greece. In fact, I have one student in my class from Greece named Konstantinos Vasilakis."

He went on to say, that "it is also good for Greece that students come from there to our School, and it is good for our School and our Church if they stay here and get ordained or take a path towards Theology." Professor George Bebis came to the Theological School in 1950 as a poor orphaned boy from Crete and he succeeded and distinguished himself on his own. To the question on how different and how similar the Theological School is from back then to today, he answered how "it was very much different; we spoke only Greek." He went on to say: "I remember I had a Greek typewriter and I wrote all my academic work in Greek."

When the National Herald pointed out how in half a century we found ourselves where we are today, Professor Bebis agreed, saying, "Yes, unfortunately." He further said: "Last year the Chief Secretary of the Patriarchate, Fr. Elpidophoros Lambrianidis, addressed this problem of opposition to the Greek language, because young students from the Antiochian Archdiocese and many of our own protested that his speech was too Greek. And Fr. Elpidophoros, to his honor, said 'What is this here, is it not a Greek Orthodox Theological School?'"

Speaking of the chanting in the chapel, Dr. Bebis said: "I haven't seen Mr. Ketzetsis (chanter and professor of Ecclesiastical Music) at the School since September. They invite him elsewhere and he goes and chants, and even during Holy Week he is absent even though he should be present to give an example at the chapel." He said: "Of course there is always room for improvement to make things better, but the Greekness is missing; I would like more Greekness. I emphasize that the chapel is the only place where they will learn to chant in Greek, but we gather the converts, the married, etc. instead and they begin to chant in English."

He also made the point how "since the Gospels were written in Greek, and the Fathers were written in Greek, the School is the only center where the future priests will learn Greek. If they don't learn it at the School, where will they learn it?" Furthermore he said: "And I do not emphasize this out of fanaticism or carelessness, but I believe it is the only place where the Greek language should be taught, the tradition of course." He insisted: "The School must remain Greek."

Speaking about Hellenic College, Dr. Bebis revealed: "When Archbishop Demetrios came to the first meeting some professors of the School stood up and asked for the elimination of Hellenic College, and it was the first time I saw Demetrios get angry and say, 'Hellenic College will remain.'" Mr. Bebis believes that "it must remain; we must support Hellenic College and make it a Center of Hellenic Studies." When asked if it was a failure of Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, who recently visited America, to not visit the Theological School, to do a Memorial at the tomb of Iakovos, he said, "I sent him a gift and a letter in which I asked "are you not going to come to beautiful Boston?'"

To the question if in the end it was wrong for the Archdiocese to be split into Metropolis', Professor Bebis believes that "it is impermissible to not hear the commemoration of the name of Archbishop Demetrios."

He elaborated saying: "The creation of Metropolis' has brought much fragmentation to the Church of America." He explained how "the way the system is today, it is not right because there is only one Archbishop. Furthermore, the Metropolitans are in communion through the Archbishop with the Patriarch, and this is another proof that the chief shepherd is the Archbishop of America." When asked if today's hierarchs are something like helper bishops or Titular Metropolitans, he said: "Obviously, but they don't want this and there was a mess, and Bartholomew said 'ok, ok, I don't want a mess.'" Today the greatest fear of Mr. Bebis is "a split".

[For another interesting read, I recommend you read this piece about how Dr. Bebis and Fr. George Dragas, the two Holy Cross Patristic's professors, were excluded from being a part of the Pappas Patristic Institute and a Jesuit was chosen as it's chairman instead, though it should be an Orthodox Institute. - J.S.]

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The Unknown Maiden

The Unknown Maiden (Feast Day - March 3)

by St. Nikolai Velimirovich

Coming from a wealthy home in Alexandria, she had a good father who suffered much and came to an evil end, and an evil mother who lived well, died peacefully and was buried with honors. Perplexed as to whether she should live according to the example of her father or her mother, this maiden had a vision which revealed to her the conditions of her mother and her father in the other world. She saw her father in the Kingdom of God and her mother in darkness and in torment. This vision helped the maiden to decide that she would dedicate her whole life to God and, like her father, would adhere to the commandments of God, without considering all the adversities and the misfortunes which she would have to endure. She was faithful to the will of God to the end and, with the help of God, was made worthy of the Kingdom of Heaven where she was reunited with her God-loving father.

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Science Behind 'Holier-Than-Thou'

Scientists Break Down the Superiority Complex

By Lee Dye
ABC News
March 2010

Be honest about it. Deep down inside, you really do see yourself as morally superior to the average Joe.

It turns out that you've got a lot of company. Most of us think we are above average in a lot of things, especially when it comes to morality, says David Dunning, professor of psychology at Cornell University.

People see themselves as being fairer, more altruistic, more self-sacrificing, more moral than most others, according to numerous studies, Dunning says.

In short, most of us think we really are "holier than thou," although we may not be willing to admit it. Most of us know we wouldn't do the awful things that set us apart from those ordinary people who stumble along the way — all those folks who are just average.

There's just one problem. Most of us can't be above average. By its definition, average is the mathematical median, so the majority can't be either above or below average.

So if most people see themselves as better than the average person, they have to be making one of two mistakes: Either they think they're a lot better than they really are, or those other folks out there aren't as bad as they seem.

Dunning and a graduate psychology student, Nick Epley, set out to find out which error we are making. Are we really as good as we think we are?

Misjudging Ourselves

In a word, no. That's according to their evidence, published in a recent issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. The two set up a series of studies on the Cornell campus and got very "robust" results, according to Epley, who designed the experiments.

The participants were asked to predict what they and others would do in certain circumstances. In most cases, the participants predicted they would do the right thing a lot more often than their peers.

However, when the participants found themselves confronting those circumstances in the real world, they didn't do nearly as well as they had predicted. But they were right on the mark when it came to predicting what others would do.

So the error appears to be in how we perceive ourselves, not how we see others, the researchers conclude.

For example, each year the Cornell campus has a charity drive, called Daffodil Day, when students sell daffodils to raise money for the American Cancer Society. About a month before the drive, Epley asked about 250 students in a classroom if they would buy a daffodil during the drive.

"Over 80 percent said they would buy a daffodil," Dunning says. But they predicted that only about half of the other students in the room would be generous enough to buy one.

A couple of days after the drive, the researchers returned to the same classroom and asked the students how many had bought a daffodil.

"It turned out that only 43 percent of the people had," Dunning says. "That's close to what people had said about others, but its way off from what they had said about themselves."

In another experiment, conducted prior to the November national election, 84 percent of the participants said they would vote, but they expected only about 67 percent of their peers to vote.

"The actual rate of voting was 68 percent," Dunning says. Again, they had their peers down pat, but overestimated their own sense of civic responsibility.

We Are What We Hear

One can argue over whether voting has anything to do with morality, or whether buying a plastic daffodil is really an expression of personal ethics. Who's to say what's right or wrong?

The definition of morality is highly "idiosyncratic," Dunning says. We tend to see things as moral if they are the kind of things we do. If we give to charity, then giving is a moral obligation. Likewise if we consider ourselves honest, or loyal, or altruistic, or religious.

Our sense of morality, then, becomes an expression of ourselves.

But that doesn't explain why we seem to think we're so much better, so much "holier," than we really are.

Dunning says one reason our egos are inflated is we get a lot of positive feedback from our peers. Even if some people think you're "a jerk," he says, they aren't likely to say that to your face.

Instead, we're often told how neat we are, at least by our friends, so we tend to believe we are doing the right things. We're nice people, after all.

So our moral judgments become a self-fulfilling prophecy. If it's the kind of thing we do, it must be moral, or we wouldn't be doing it.

"We define morality by looking at our own behavior," Epley says.

But does believing that we are moral really have any effect on how we live?

Dunning thinks it probably does.

Living Up to Standards

"Once you say you are a moral, wonderful, generous person, you have to live up to those standards," Dunning says. "So even if you have overestimated yourself, you are constrained" by your self image, he adds.

Living in a world with people like that is preferable to living "in a world where people basically say they are selfish jerks," Dunning says, "because then they would be constrained to act like selfish jerks."

But there is a down side to all this self anointed sense of morality, he adds.

"If people think they are morally superior to others, they are going to be too harsh in judging other people," he says.

"They don't realize that in the same situation, they are going to act the same way."

Lee Dye’s column appears weekly on ABCNEWS.com. A former science writer for the Los Angeles Times, he now lives in Juneau, Alaska.

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Moral Dilemmas of Globalization

by Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew

Speech given at the Annual Davos meeting of the World Economic Forum in 1999.

We should first like to express our joy that this meeting of distinguished and dynamic economists, political figures, and other eminent dignitaries has included on the agenda of its discussions the human dimension of globalization of the economy, as well as non-economic values. There is no doubt that when ranking values the human person occupies a place higher than economic activity. Neither is there any doubt that economic progress, which is present when there is growth in economic activity, becomes useful when and only when it serves to enhance the non-economic values that make up human culture. This is the reason that justifies our Modesty’s presence among this luminous gathering of eminent economic activists although we bear no relation to matters of economy.

The advance of humanity towards globalisation is a fact arising primarily out of the private sector, in particular they are the desires of multinational economic giants. This fact finds support in the incredible development of communications. Already the role of states is being constantly downgraded, with few exceptions; whereas the role of the economically powerful is growing in magnitude, even among the larger states.

As the Primate of the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the first bishop of the Orthodox Church throughout the world, we assure you that the Orthodox Church has experienced and cultivated the idea of spiritual ecumenicity. This is a form of globalization that proclaims that bonds of love, brotherhood and cooperation should unite all human beings of every race and language and of all cultures. It is true that the Church invites all to one faith, but it does not make brotherhood, love, and its concern for people contingent upon their joining this faith. Because the Church loves everyone, it also experiences the unity of humankind to its fullest. From this point of view, Christian ecumenicity differs substantially from globalization. The former is based on love for one’s brother and sister and respects the human person whom it also seeks to serve. The latter is primarily motivated by the desire to enlarge the market and to merge different cultures into a new one, in accordance with the convictions of those who are in a position to influence the worldwide public.

Unfortunately, globalization tends to evolve from a means of bringing the peoples of the world together as brothers and sisters, to a means of expanding economic dominance of the financial giants even over peoples to whom access was denied because of national borders and cultural barriers.

It is not our intention or responsibility to suggest ways and means by which this danger can be contained or eliminated. We do, however, have a duty to point out and proclaim that the highest pursuit of humanity is not economic enrichment or economic expansion.

The Gospel saying, “Man shall not live by bread alone” (Matt.4:4), should be more broadly understood. We cannot live by economic development alone, but we must seek the “word that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Matt.4:4), that is, the values and principles that transcend economic concerns. Once we accept these, the economy becomes a servant of humanity, not its master.

We believe that it can be understood by all, independently of religious conviction, that economic development in itself and the globalization that serves it lose their value when they cause privation among the many and an excessive concentration of wealth into the hands of the few. Moreover, evolution toward this direction is not without limitation, because beyond a certain limit the person dealing with financial matters receives a response well known since ancient times: “You can not take from one who has not”.

Solon the legislator declared that Athenian society was not functioning properly because of the excessive indebtedness of the majority of its citizens to the few and had instituted what was known as “seisachtheia”, that is, the writing-off of all debts. Although this seemed at first to be to the disadvantage of the rich, in the end it benefited the entire Athenian community because it allowed its members to act as free, creative and self-motivated citizens and not as each other’s slaves.

Also well-known is the decision of that pioneering American industrialist, the inventor of the assembly line, who raised the wages of his workers to make them capable of purchasing his products. (We are, of course, referring to the automobile manufacturer Henry Ford, who based his ideas on Taylor’s views on the rationalisation of labour.) These examples and many others show that economic progress is morally justifiable and successful only when all the members of the global community participate in it.

This situation sets before us new dimensions of economic morality of a global magnitude. However, although we are speaking of new challenges, we are dealing essentially with an aggravated form of ancient problems. The ancient Athenians excelled “not by bestowing any advantage on the rich, but by the poor sharing equally with the rich” (Euripides, Suppliants 407). When Athens fell into an anarchic democracy controlled by demagogues, its former glory was eclipsed, just as it was and still is in those societies which Aristotle called “oligarchies,” the presupposition of which is the possession of wealth (Politics IV, 8, 1294a).

It is a fact that as soon as respect for the human person is abandoned as an inviolable presupposition of our ethos and the principle of economy, power, and the ability to influence the masses are made into idols and worshipped as such. There arises an insatiable cupidity that inevitably leads the “haves” to increase what they possess, whether it is wealth, or political or military power, or the power to shape ideas or generally the power to influence the whole world.

We ought, however, to preserve all the remaining cultural values that pertain to humanity without, of course, putting up unnecessary barriers to useful economic development. Nevertheless, we also ought to be aware that the globalisation of abilities is only morally justified when accompanied by the global distribution of the benefits that flow from it.

Globalization thus proves to be a new vision for some and a new threat for others; a vision which promises much to a few and very little to many; a vision impressive to some extent in its conception and in its realisation. At the same time, however, it is also frightening to the degree that the dynamic of globalization exceeds the limits acceptable to the moral conscience and accessible to our regulatory rules and mechanisms. What is impressive, for example, is the almost automatic globalization of information, yet, at the same time, the potentiality for intentional misinformation is alarming. What is impressive is the globalization of knowledge and the participation of many in the farthest reaches of the macrocosm and the innermost depths of the microcosm. However, what is also fearful is the threat posed by the possible misuse of this accumulated knowledge.

The visions, the dangers, the threats, the dilemmas rise before us. The achievements of international cooperation in the sectors of economy, commerce, telecommunications and trade in general, to which the phenomenon of globalization is primarily attributed, are wonderful.

What, however, is the true gain for humanity as a whole if the economy, in succumbing to the sickness of elephantiasis, devours the other sectors of culture; namely, thought, the artistic will, and the contemplative side of human life? What is the true gain for humanity if it causes its creative powers to whither and enfeebles the fundamental principles of coexistence and survival, such as justice, reciprocity, solidarity between individuals and peoples, respect for the human person, that truly unshakeable bedrock of our existence and coexistence?

As a representative of the Orthodox Church, we are not opposed to the economic progress that serves humanity, nor are we bigoted or timorous in the presence of other faiths and ideologies. Our desire, however, is to safeguard the possibility for the members of every religious or cultural minority to maintain their distinctiveness and the particularity of their culture. We are in absolute agreement and are prepared to move ahead when Globalization opens doors for the cooperation of peoples.

The Ecumenical Patriarchate and we personally have already frequently invited adherents of divided faiths and ideologies and interests to put aside their differences, and reconcile and work together on a practical level. Globalization, however, as a means of making humanity homogeneous, of influencing the masses and causing a single, unified and unique mode of thought to prevail, will find us opposed. We also regard the use of globalisation exclusively for the enrichment of the few to the detriment of the many as something impermissible and to be avoided. And we invite all, rich and poor, to cooperate for the improvement of the standard of living of all people, for this is also in the interest of the “haves”, more than the one-sided increase in their economic worth is.

May God enlighten us all to be able to understand this truth.

2 February 1999

BARTHOLOMEW of Constantinople

Your fervent supplicant before God

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Victims of Radical Islam: Christianity’s Modern-Day Martyrs

The rise of Islamic extremism is putting increasing pressure on Christians in Muslim countries, who are the victims of murder, violence and discrimination. Christians are now considered the most persecuted religious group around the world. Paradoxically, their greatest hope could come from moderate political Islam.

February 26, 2010
Spiegel

Kevin Ang is cautious these days. He glances around, taking a look to the left down the long row of stores, then to the right toward the square, to check that no one is nearby. Only then does the church caretaker dig out his key, unlock the gate, and enter the Metro Tabernacle Church in a suburb of Kuala Lumpur.

The draft of air stirs charred Bible pages. The walls are sooty and the building smells of scorched plastic. Metro Tabernacle Church was the first of 11 churches set on fire by angry Muslims — all because of one word. “Allah,” Kevin Ang whispers.

It began with a question — should Christians here, like Muslims, be allowed to call their god “Allah,” since they don’t have any other word or language at their disposal? The Muslims claim Allah for themselves, both the word and the god, and fear that if Christians are allowed to use the same word for their own god, it could lead pious Muslims astray.

For three years there was a ban in place and the government confiscated Bibles that mentioned “Allah.” Then on Dec. 31 last year, Malaysia’s highest court reached a decision: The Christian God could also be called Allah.

Imams protested and disgruntled citizens threw Molotov cocktails at churches. Then, on top of everything, Prime Minister Najib Razak stated that he couldn’t stop people who might protest against specific developments in the country — and some took that as an invitation to violent action. First churches burned, then the other side retaliated with pigs’ heads placed in front of two mosques. Sixty percent of Malaysians are Muslims and 9 percent Christians, with the rest made up by Hindus, Buddhists, and Sikhs. They managed to live together well, until now.

It’s a battle over a single word, but it’s also about much more than that. The conflict has to do with the question of what rights the Christian minority in Malaysia is entitled to. Even more than that, it’s a question of politics. The ruling United Malays National Organization is losing supporters to Islamist hardliners — and wants to win them back with religious policies.

Those policies are receiving a receptive welcome. Some of Malaysia’s states interpret Sharia, the Islamic system of law and order, particularly strictly. The once liberal country is on the way to giving up freedom of religion — and what constitutes order is being defined ever more rigidly. If a Muslim woman drinks beer, she can be punished with six cane strokes. Some regions similarly forbid such things as brightly colored lipstick, thick make-up, or shoes with clattering high heels.


Expelled, Abducted and Murdered

Not only in Malaysia, but in many countries through the Muslim world, religion has gained influence over governmental policy in the last two decades. The militant Islamist group Hamas controls the Gaza Strip, while Islamist militias are fighting the governments of Nigeria and the Philippines. Somalia, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen have fallen to a large extent into the hands of Islamists. And where Islamists are not yet in power, secular governing parties are trying to outstrip the more religious groups in a rush to the right.
This can be seen in Egypt, Algeria, Sudan, Indonesia to some extent, and also Malaysia.

Even though this Islamization often has more to do with politics than with religion, and even though it doesn’t necessarily lead to the persecution of Christians, it can still be said that where Islam gains importance, freedoms for members of other faiths shrink.

There are 2.2 billion Christians around the world. The Christian non-governmental organization Open Doors calculates that 100 million of them are being threatened or persecuted. They aren’t allowed to build churches, buy Bibles or obtain jobs. That’s the more harmless form of discrimination and it affects the majority of these 100 million Christians. The more brutal version sees them blackmailed, robbed, expelled, abducted or even murdered.

Bishop Margot Kässmann, who was head of the Protestant Church in Germany before stepping down on Feb. 24, believes Christians are “the most frequently persecuted religious group globally.” Germany’s 22 regional churches have proclaimed this coming Sunday to be the first commemoration day for persecuted Christians. Kässmann said she wanted to show solidarity with fellow Christians who “have great difficulty living out their beliefs freely in countries such as Indonesia, India, Iraq or Turkey.”

There are counterexamples as well, of course. In Lebanon and Syria, Christians are not discriminated against, and in fact play an important role in politics and society. And the persecution of Christian is by no means the domain of fanatical Muslims alone — Christians are also imprisoned, abused and murdered in countries such as Laos, Vietnam, China and Eritrea.


‘Creeping Genocide’ against Christians

Open Doors compiles a global “persecution index.” North Korea, where tens of thousands of Christians are serving time in work camps, has topped the list for many years. North Korea is followed, though, by Iran, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, the Maldives and Afghanistan. Of the first 10 countries on the list, eight are Islamic, and almost all have Islam as their state religion.

The systematic persecution of Christians in the 20th century — by Communists in the Soviet Union and China, but also by Nazis — claimed far more lives than anything that has happened so far in the 21st century. Now, however, it is not only totalitarian regimes persecuting Christians, but also residents of Islamic states, fanatical fundamentalists, and religious sects — and often simply supposedly pious citizens.

Gone is the era of tolerance, when Christians enjoyed a large degree of religious freedom under the protection of Muslim sultans as so-called “People of the Book” while at the same time medieval Europe was banishing its Jews and Muslims from the continent or even burning them at the stake. Also gone is the heyday of Arab secularism following World War II, when Christian Arabs advanced through the ranks of politics.

As political Islam grew stronger, devout believers’ aggression focused not only on corrupt local regimes, but also more and more on the ostensibly corrupting influence of Western Christians, for which local Christian minorities were held accountable. A new trend began, this time with Christians as the victims.

In Iraq, for example, Sunni terrorist groups prey specifically on people of other religions. The last Iraqi census in 1987 showed 1.4 million Christians living in the country. At the start of the American invasion in 2003, it was 550,000, and at present it is just under 400,000. Experts speak of a “creeping genocide.”


‘People Are Scared Out of Their Minds’

The situation in the region around the city of Mosul in northern Iraq is especially dramatic. The town of Alqosh lies high in the mountains above Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city. Bassam Bashir, 41, can see his old hometown when he looks out his window there. Mosul is only 40 kilometers (25 miles) away, but inaccessible. The city is more dangerous than Baghdad, especially for men like Bassam Bashir, a Chaldean Catholic, teacher and fugitive within his own country.

Since the day in August 2008 when a militia abducted his father from his shop, Bashir has had to fear for his and his family’s lives. Police found his father’s corpse two days later in the Sinaa neighborhood on the Tigris River, the body perforated with bullet holes. There was no demand for ransom. Bashir’s father died for the simple reason that he was Christian.

And no one claims to have seen anything. “Of course they saw something,” Bashir says. “But people in Mosul are scared out of their minds.”

One week later, militiamen slit the throat of Bashir’s brother Tarik like a sacrificial lamb. “I buried my brother myself,” Bashir explains. Together with his wife Nafa and their two daughters, he fled to Alqosh the same day. The city is surrounded by vineyards and an armed Christian militia guards the entrance.


Tacit State Approval

Bashir’s family members aren’t the only ones who came to Alqosh as the series of murders in Mosul continued. Sixteen Christians were killed the next week, and bombs exploded in front of churches. Men in passing cars shouted at Christians that they had a choice — leave Mosul or convert to Islam. Out of over 1,500 Christian families in the city, only 50 stayed. Bassam Bashir says he won’t return until he can mourn for his father and brother in peace. Others who gave up hope entirely fled to neighboring countries like Jordan and even more to Syria.

In many Islamic countries, Christians are persecuted less brutally than in Iraq, but often no less effectively. In many cases, the persecution has the tacit approval of the government. In Algeria, for example, it takes the form of newspapers reporting that a priest tried to convert Muslims or insulted the Prophet Mohammed — and publishing the cleric’s address, in a clear call to vigilante justice. Or a public television station might broadcast programs with titles like “In the Clutches of Ignorance,” which describe Christians as Satanists who convert Muslims with the help of drugs. This happened in Uzbekistan, which ranks tenth on Open Doors’ “persecution index.”

Blasphemy is another frequently used allegation. Insulting the core values of Islam is a punishable offense in many Islamic countries. The allegation is often used against the opposition, whether that means journalists, dissidents or Christians. Imran Masih, for example, a Christian shopkeeper in Faisalabad, Pakistan, was given a life sentence on Jan. 11, according to sections 295 A and B of Pakistan’s legal code, which covers the crime of outraging religious feelings by desecrating the Koran. A neighboring shopkeeper had accused him of burning pages from the Koran. Masih says that he only burned old business records.

It’s a typical case for Pakistan, where the law against blasphemy seems to invite abuse — it’s an easy way for anyone to get rid of an enemy. Last year, 125 Christians were charged with blasphemy in Pakistan. Dozens of those already sentenced are on death row.


‘We Don’t Feel Safe Here’

Government-tolerated persecution occurs even in Turkey, the most secular and modern country in the Muslim world, where around 110,000 Christians make up less than a quarter of 1 percent of the population — but are discriminated against nonetheless. The persecution is not as open or as brutal as what happens in neighboring Iraq, but the consequences are similar. Christians in Turkey, who numbered well over 2 million people in the 19th century, are fighting for their continued existence.

It’s happening in the southeast of the country, for example, in Tur Abdin, whose name means “mountain of God’s servants.” It’s a hilly region full of fields, chalk cliffs, and centuries-old monasteries many. It’s home to the Syrian Orthodox Assyrians, or Aramaeans as they call themselves, members of one of the oldest Christian groups in the world. According to legend, the Three Wise Men brought the Christian belief system here from Bethlehem. The inhabitants of Tur Abdin still speak Aramaic, the language used by Jesus of Nazareth.

The world is much more familiar with the genocide committed against the Armenians by Ottoman troops in 1915 and 1916, but tens of thousands of Assyrians were also murdered during World War I. Half a million Assyrians are said to have lived in Tur Abdin at the beginning of the 20th century. Today there are barely 3,000. A Turkish district court threatened last year to appropriate the Assyrians’ spiritual center, the 1,600-year-old Mor Gabriel monastery, because the monks were believed to have acquired land unlawfully.

Three neighboring Muslim villages had complained they felt discriminated against by the monastery, which houses four monks, 14 nuns, and 40 students behind its walls.

“Even if it doesn’t want to admit it, Turkey has a problem with people of other faiths,” says Ishok Demir, a young Swiss man with Aramaean roots, who lives with his parents near Mor Gabriel. “We don’t feel safe here.”

More than anything, that has to do with the permanent place Armenians, Assyrians, Greeks, Catholics and Protestants have in the country’s nationalistic conspiracy theories. Those groups have always been seen as traitors, nonbelievers, spies and people who insult the Turkish nation. According to a survey carried out by the US-based Pew Research Center, 46 percent of Turks see Christianity as a violent religion. In a more recent Turkish study, 42 percent of those surveyed wouldn’t accept Christians as neighbors.

The repeated murders of Christians come, then, as no surprise. In 2006, for example, a Catholic priest was shot in Trabzon on the Black Sea coast. In 2007, three Christian missionaries were murdered in Malatya, a city in eastern Turkey. The perpetrators were radical nationalists, whose ideology was a mixture of exaggerated patriotism, racism and Islam.


Converts in Grave Danger

In even graver danger than traditional Christians, however, are Muslims who have converted to Christianity. Apostasy, or the renunciation of Islam, is punishable by death according to Islamic law — and the death penalty still applies in Iran, Yemen, Afghanistan, Somalia, Mauritania, Pakistan, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

Even in Egypt, a secular country, converts draw the government’s wrath. The religion minister defended the legality of the death penalty for converts — although Egypt doesn’t even have such a law — with the argument that renunciation of Islam amounts to high treason. Such sentiments drove Mohammed Hegazy, 27, a convert to the Coptic Orthodox Church, into hiding two years ago. He was the first convert in Egypt to try to have his new religion entered officially onto his state-issued identity card. When he was refused, he went public. Numerous clerics called for his death in response.

Copts make up the largest Christian community in the Arab world and around 8 million Egyptians belong to the Coptic Church. They’re barred from high government positions, diplomatic service and the military, as well as from many state benefits. Universities have quotas for Coptic students considerably lower than their actual percentage within the population.

Building new churches isn’t allowed, and the old ones are falling into disrepair thanks to a lack both of money and authorization to renovate. When girls are kidnapped and forcibly converted, the police don’t intervene. Thousands of pigs were also slaughtered under the pretense of confining swine flu. Naturally all were owned by Christians.


The Christian Virus

Six Copts were massacred on Jan. 6 — when Coptic celebrate Christmas Eve — in Nag Hammadi, a small city 80 kilometers (50 miles) north of the Valley of the Kings. Predictably, the speaker of the People’s Assembly, the lower house of the Egyptian parliament, called it an “individual criminal act.” When he added that the perpetrators wanted to revenge the rape of a Muslim girl by a Copt, it almost sounded like an excuse.

The government seems ready to admit to crime in Egypt, but not to religious tension.

Whenever clashes between religious groups occur, the government finds very secular causes behind them, such as arguments over land, revenge for crimes or personal disputes.

Nag Hammadi, with 30,000 residents, is a dusty trading town on the Nile. Even before the murders, it was a place where Christians and Muslims mistrusted one another. The two groups work together and have houses near each other, but they live, marry and die separately. Superstition is widespread and the Muslims, for example, fear they could catch the “Christian virus” by eating together with a Copt. It comes as no surprise that these murders occurred in Nag Hammadi, nor that they were followed by the country’s worst religious riots in years. Christian shops and Muslim houses were set on fire, and 28 Christians and 14 Muslims were arrested.

Nag Hammadi is now sealed off, with armed security forces in black uniforms guarding roads in and out of the city. They make sure no residents leave the city and no journalists enter it.

Three presumed perpetrators have since been arrested. All of them have prior criminal records. One admitted to the crime, but then recanted, saying he had been coerced by the intelligence service. The government seems to want the affair to disappear as quickly as possible. The alleged murderers will likely be set free again as soon as the furor has blown over.

More Rights for Christians?

But there are also a few small indications that the situation of embattled Christians in Islamic countries could improve — depending on the extent that nationalism and the radicalization of political Islam subsides again.

One of the contradictions of the Islamic world is that the best chances for Christians seem to crop up precisely where a major player actually comes from the political Islam camp. In Turkey it is Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a former Islamist and now the country’s prime minister, who has promised Turkey’s few remaining Christians more rights. He points to the history of the Ottoman Empire, in which Christians and Jews long had to pay a special tax, but in exchange, were granted freedom of religion and lived as respected fellow citizens.

A more relaxed attitude to its minorities would certainly signify progress for Turkey.

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Another Patriarch Gives A Koran As A Gift!

"Muhammad wrote many ridiculous books." - St. John of Damascus

The official website of the Patriarchate of Alexandria has reported that Patriarch Theodoros II of Alexandria and All Africa met with the President of Sudan, Omar Hassan Ahmad Al-Bashir, on February 28, 2010 on a visit he made to Sudan. The Patriarch thanked the President for his love for Greece and the Greeks, while at the same time thanks was given by the President to the Patriarch for his love for the Sudanese people. The Patriarch also bestowed upon the President his prayer and blessing for his continued service towards Sudan and its future success.

So far so good. But...

As a gesture of good will the Patriarch gave the President a Koran with the official seal of the Patriarchate of Alexandria.

It seems it has become fashionable for our Patriarchs to give Koran's as gifts to Muslim leaders. As I have mentioned before, it is one thing to make a gesture of good will, and a totally different thing for an Orthodox Christian leader to give to a Muslim the gift of a book that at its core blasphemes what Orthodox Christians believe. And the President isn't even a religious leader, but a political leader. There is absolutely no excuse for such a scandalous and blasphemous action.

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Radovan Karadzic: Muslim Slaughter a Myth

3 March 2010
Belfast Telegraph

The slaughter of 8,000 Muslims at Srebrenica during the Bosnian war was a myth staged to vilify the Serbs accused of their murder, former leader Radovan Karadzic claimed yesterday.

On the second day of his defence at the UN war crimes trial, he said genocide charges against him were riddled with false evidence. Prosecutors say Karadzic was the “supreme commander” of a campaign to kill or expel Muslims and Croats from eastern Bosnia and create an ethnically pure Serbian state.

He is charged with two counts of genocide and nine counts of murder, extermination, persecution, forced deportation and the seizing of 200 UN hostages. During seven hours stretched over two days, Karadzic gave a uniquely Serb view of events.

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The Purpose of Man According to the Greek Fathers

By Rev. Dr. John Romanides

If man was created according to the image of God for the purpose of being perfected and becoming like Him, he can attain it only by spiritual exercise of the will because only through true freedom is it possible for man, in his love, to become like God. True freedom is the love that distinguishes God as free of all necessity and selfishness. "Be ye therefore perfect as your Father who is in heaven is perfect"[1] does not mean that man must become perfect as the self-loving, self-contented God of philosophy and of certain Scholastics of the West, but perfect as the God of Holy Scripture and the Greek Fathers, who is free of all necessity and selfishness. The destiny of man, as imagined by Augustine, Aquinas, Calvin, Ritschl, and others of the West, is self-centred eudaemonia[2] attained by supposedly identifying the mind with the reality in the essence of God.[3] This is supposed to cause a cessation of all movement of the mind and will toward any other person or thing since there is nothing more desirable for the human intellect than the divine essence. For the Greek Fathers, however, the idea of a vision of the divine essence is blasphemous. Such theories of eudaemonia simply project and elevate to a divine level the force that rules in the world, the force of necessity and self-interest called "fate" by the ancients.[4] But man was not made for the purpose of finding satisfaction of the supposedly natural, self-centered longings within himself and, thus, of becoming unmoved and dispassionate. On the contrary, he was specifically made so he can love God and his fellow man with the same love that God has for the world. Love that arises out of self-interest is alien to the nature of God just as it is alien to the original destiny of man. Before the coming of the Lord, the devil appears standing before God, accusing the righteous of selfishness. Replying to the things that God said about the faith of Job, the "devil said before the Lord, 'Does Job worship the Lord for nothing? Hast Thou not made a hedge about him, and about his household, and all his possessions round about?'"[5]

Notes

1. Mt. 5:48

2. According to Romanides, eudaemonia is the self-centered quest for happiness. F. Copleston says that the system of ethics of Aquinas is a combination of Aristotelian eudaemonism and the Christian West's teaching of the beatific vision of the divine essence (Aquinas, p. 133).

3. He is speaking of the Platonic forms or ideas.

4. Tatian maintains that demons "introduced fate" to mankind.

5. Job 1:9-10

John S. Romanides, The Ancestral Sin, Zephyr Publishing, pp. 106, 107.

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Papoulakis: A Pictorial of St. Joachim of Ithaka

"Papoulakis", Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi and Ithaka (Feast Day - March 2 and May 23)

For the Life and Miracles of St. Joachim with more pictures, refer to the links below:

Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (1)
Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (2)
Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (3)
Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (4)
Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (5)
Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (6)
Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (7)
Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (8)
Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (9)
Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (10)
Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (11)
Papoulakis: Saint Joachim of Vatopaidi (12)
Prophecies of St. Joachim "Papoulakis" of Ithaka (13)

Kalyvia, the birthplace of Saint Joachim.

The basement where Saint Joachim's step mother would often confine him as a child and abused him.

Saint Barbara Church, built by Papoulakos in the village of Stavros.

The skoufi of Papoulakos, treasured by the family of K. Ravtopoulos in Avogi, Ithaka.

A tryptich icon Papoulakis gave as a gift and now in possession by the family of Mr. Spyridon Pavlatos.

A letter written by Saint Joachim.

Papoulakis' holy relics upon their discovery.

The washing of Papulakis' relics after their transfer.

From the first celebration of Saint Joachim's feast day.

The venerable skull of Papoulakis.

The tomb of St. Joachim, behind the Holy Altar of the Holy Church of Saint Barbara. It is shadowed by a tree he planted with his own hands.

The authorization of Saint Joachim's canonization.

Ἀπολυτίκιον. Ἦχος γ´. Θείας πίστεως.
Θεία χάριτι λελαμπρυσμένος κατεφώτισας τοὺς ἐν σκοτείᾳ ἀγνωσίας καὶ δουλώσεως πέλοντας ταῖς διδαχῶν καὶ θαυμάτων ἀκτῖσί σου, Ἰωακείμ, ἀσκητὰ ἐνθεώτατε· γόνε πάντιμε Ἰθάκης, Χριστὸν ἱκέτευε δωρήσασθαι ἡμῖν τὸ μέγα ἔλεος.

Apolytikion of St. Joachim in the Third Tone
Shining with divine grace, you illumined those caught in the darkness of ignorance and apostasy by your teachings and radiant wonders, Joachim, most-divine ascetic, all-precious offspring of Ithaki, entreat Christ to grant us great mercy.

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