The Grave Robber and the Living Dead Girl

The Amazing Miracle of a Dead Girl Who Detained Her Despoiler and Would Not Let Him Go Until He Promised to Become a Monk.

When we were visiting Abba John, abbot of the Giants' Monastery at Theoupolis, he told us the following story:

Not long ago a young man came to me saying: "For God's sake, take me in, for I want to repent" - and he was weeping bitterly whilst he said this. I could see that he was deeply troubled and perplexed.

"Tell me how you have come to such compunction," I said.

He replied: "Abba, I most certainly am a sinner, sir."

Again I said to him: "Believe me child, just as there are many and different kinds of sin, so there are many cures. If you wish to be healed, tell me truthfully what deeds you have committed so that I can apply suitable penances. One does not apply the same treatment to a fornicator and to a murderer and to a sorcerer. Greed is treated one way; lying, anger, theft, adultery - each has its proper medication. But rather than go listing sins for you, let me say that just as we see various remedies applied to different physical infirmities, so too for the sins of the soul (which are many) a variety of medicines are available."

He heaved a great sigh and smote himself on the breast, breaking into tears and sobbing. So great was the disturbance in his heart that he was unable to speak clearly. When I saw that he was paralyzed and struck dumb by his grief and could therefore tell me nothing of his condition, I said to him: "Listen to me, my child; take a hold of yourself and tell me what has happened. Christ our God Himself will grant you His own aid. Of His unspeakable love for mankind and His immeasurable mercy He endured everything for our salvation. He consorted with publicans; He did not turn away the woman who was a sinner nor did He reject the thief; and, finally, He accepted death on the cross. When you repent and turn to Him, He will receive you with His own hands and in great joy, for "He desires not the death of a sinner but that he should turn to Him and live" (1 Tim. 2:4).

Then he made an effort to pull himself together. When his tears had abated somewhat, he said to me: "Abba, I who am full of sin, sir, and unworthy of heaven and earth. Two days ago, I heard of the death of the maiden daughter of somebody of first rank in this city; also that she had been buried in many clothes in a sepulchre outside the city. Now I was already in the habit of doing the forbidden deed [of grave robbing]. I went to the sepulchre by night and began stripping the corpse. I stripped her of all she wore, not even leaving the innermost little garment but taking that from her too and making her as naked as the day she was born. Just before I was about to leave the tomb, she sat up before me and stretched out her left hand. She took hold of my right hand and said: 'Oh, man, did you have to strip me naked? Have you no fear of God? Ought you not to have had pity on me in death? Should you not respect my sex? How can you, as a Christian, condemn me to presenting myself naked before Christ because you had so little respect for my sex? Is not mine the sex which gave you birth? Do you not outrage your own mother in so using me? Wretched man, what sort of a defense will you offer for this crime against me when you come to the terrifying judgment seat of Christ? As long as I lived, no strange man ever saw my face; and now, after death and burial, you have stripped me and looked upon my naked body. What is there to be said for humanity when it can stoop to such depths? What a heart, what hands you are going to have when you come to receive the all-holy Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ!'

"When I heard and saw this, I was seized by fear and dread. Quaking I said to her: 'Let me go - and never again will I do this,' but she said: 'You came in here when you wanted to; but you will not go out of here as you will. This tomb shall be shared by the two of us. And do not think you are going to die right away. Only after many days of torment will you - in evil circumstances - surrender your soul.' I begged her with tears in my eyes to let me go, making great oaths by almighty God that I would never again commit that forbidden and illegal deed [of grave robbing]. After I had implored her at great length and poured out many tears, she replied in these words: 'If you wish to live and be delivered from this anguish, give me your word that if I shall let you go, not only will you desist from your hateful and profane deeds, but also that you will, immediately and without delay, go renounce the world and become a monk - so that you can repent of your misdeeds and live in the service of Christ.' I swore to her, saying: 'Not only will I do all that you have said, but from this day forward I will not enter my house. Rather I will go from here immediately to a monastery.' Then the maiden said to me: 'Dress me as you found me.' I made her fit for burial again and then she lay back down and was dead. I, the unworthy, the sinner that I am, immediately went out of the sepulchre and came here."

When I heard all this from the young man, I comforted and refreshed him by talking to him about repentance and continence. Some time later I tonsured him, clothed him in the monastic habit and shut him up in a cave in the mountain within the city, he giving thanks to God and fighting a good fight for his own soul.

St. John Moschos, The Spiritual Meadow, #78.

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The "Trash" of Papa-Fotis

For forty years now Papa-Fotis from Mytiline gathers stones wherever he is and wherever he stands - broken and cut up floor tiles, roof tiles, marble, and bricks - which are thrown out from buildings, enclosures and stores. Later he goes to Pamphyla. He has completed a church which he built by himself with these remnants. It is a true masterpiece. It is as if it fell out of the heavens and is untouched by human hands.

He wanders around barefoot both winter and summer with a ripped rason. After a vigil in a church in Thessaloniki, a certain priest mistakenly took his ripped rason leaving on his seat his own which was new and made all of silk. When Papa-Fotis realized this he began to cry like a little child because the new one was too warm and he wanted his own which was lighter.

When after forty years of labor he completed the Church of Saint Luke, the first Liturgy was celebrated. Many people were there. A little before going out for the Small Entrance he realized he had forgotten to leave an opening for the left door of the Beautiful Gate to go through. Immediately he went and took the pickaxe and began to tear down the wall. The people went outside coughing because of the dust, and in danger of the stones launching out at them. But he, quietly, when his work was completed, continued doing the Liturgy in a correct manner....

I don't know if Papa-Fotis lives today. When I came to know him about five years ago he was already near ninety. May he be well wherever he is...I thank God that I responded to him on the road. May we have his prayers.

From the unpublished book "My Soul".

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See also:

Papa-Fotis the "Fool For Christ" Has Reposed

Interview With Papa-Foti Lavriotis

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And Why Do We Make Prostrations?

by the Very Rev. John Breck

Prostrations may seem a curious and dubious exercise for Christians to assume. They have a vital place, though, in the spiritual journey that leads through Lenten asceticism to Paschal joy.

A professor at Sarah Lawrence College long made it a practice to bring some of her students to St Vladimir’s Seminary, to introduce them to Orthodox worship. It was always a welcome sight to see her and the group of young men and women arrive as the community was gathering together in the seminary chapel. Interestingly, she chose to offer them this introduction on a Wednesday afternoon in Great Lent, during the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts. As could be expected, reactions on the part of the students were mixed. With the many prostrations made by members of the congregation during the service, those reactions included a measure of surprise, or amusement, or even scandal.

Physical gestures are looked on with a great deal of ambivalence by many Americans. In Western Europe no one is surprised or offended when teen-agers, for example, greet each other in the street by kissing each other on the cheek: two, three or four times (protocol limits it, nevertheless, to boy-girl or girl-girl). If I enter a restaurant and meet an Orthodox friend, instinctively we tend to greet each other by embracing in the same way. The look on the faces of other patrons, however, is usually one of shock or bewilderment: “We don’t do that in our society.” We Orthodox do, though.

We also make prostrations, both in our times of personal prayer and in our liturgical services, particularly during Great Lent. Why do we do that? Is it some odd carry-over from traditional monastic spirituality, with its emphasis on rigorous ascetic discipline? Or is it a practice that has special value for anyone who wishes to enter seriously, deeply, into the Life in Christ? Is it, in other words, a peculiar exercise, taken on perhaps for some health benefit, as a kind of Christian yoga? Or is it a practice that works an actual and positive transformation in our life, one that is both physical and spiritual?

Americans these days are thoroughly familiar with the prostrations made by Muslims during their ritual of daily prayer; we see images of it almost daily in the media. Most are not aware that Orthodox Christians practice the same discipline, kneeling in a place of worship and touching the head to the ground, before rising to stand in the usual attitude of prayer. They would be amazed to witness those monastics, for example, who make literally hundreds of prostrations during an ordinary Vespers service (a common sight at Holy Dormition Monastery in Michigan, as in many such communities). They would be equally surprised to see “ordinary” lay people prostrating themselves repeatedly throughout the Compline service of the first week of Great Lent, with the penitential Canon of St Andrew of Crete. But again, this is what we Orthodox do. Why?

A fine answer to the question appears in the writings of the great hesychast bishop Theoliptos of Phildelphia (+1322). “Do not neglect prostration,” he admonishes his spiritual children. “It provides an image of man’s fall into sin and expresses the confession of our sinfulness. Getting up, on the other hand, signifies repentance and the promise to lead a life of virtue. Let each prostration be accompanied by a noetic invocation of Christ, so that by falling before the Lord in soul and body you may gain the grace of the God of souls and bodies.” 1.

The importance of prostrations, from Theoliptos’ point of view, is far more spiritual than physical. In bending our knees we assume an attitude of humility before the God to whom we offer our prayer. Kneeling, then touching our forehead to the ground, we acknowledge our sinfulness; we create a living image of our fall into sin. Our very posture represents a confession of that state, a calling to mind of our spiritual poverty, of our susceptibility to passions of greed, lust, anger and malice. As we make our descent in body and in spirit, we confess as well the Name above every name, the Name that “upholds the universe,” as the Shepherd of Hermas expresses it, and upholds our personal world as well: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner!”

Then, as we rise to our feet, this confession both of Christ and of our sinfulness becomes a bodily symbol, a virtual promise, that change will occur in our life. We commit ourselves to repentance, to a turning from the old Adam to the new. The inner transformation signified by this gesture of course does not come about as a result of our prostrations, and not even as a result of our decision to repent. Like every aspect of our Christian life, this transformation – the power to act upon our commitment – is a gift of grace that comes down “from above, from the Father of lights.”

This passage from the Epistle of James (1:17), however, needs to be read in its context, expressed so well throughout the letter: “What does it profit, my brethren, if a man says he has faith but has not works? Can his faith [alone] save him?… Show me your faith apart from your works, and I by my works will show you my faith… For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so faith apart from works is dead.”

When we consider ascetic disciplines such as fasting and prostrations, it is essential that we remember words like these. Those disciplines can indeed work an inner transformation, by purifying and directing our mind and spirit toward “the one thing needful” (Lk 10:42). But they are never ends in themselves. As the Holy Fathers teach repeatedly, they exist for the sole purpose of leading us to Christ, who alone heals our brokenness, forgives our sin, and draws us into eternal communion with God and with one another.

The last word, when we make a determination to assume a serious Lenten discipline, is given to us by our Lord Himself. Inveighing against the hypocrisy of religious leaders who followed the letter of the Law yet ignored its spirit, he declared: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law, justice and mercy and faith; these you ought to have done, without neglecting the others” (Mt 23:23).

Ascetic practices, particularly during the Lenten periods, are good and even necessary, if we are to enter fully into the spirit of the feast, and allow the Spirit Himself to work His transforming grace and power in our life. But those practices can never stand alone. One of their most basic purposes, aside from the spiritual value they offer us, is to lead us into acts of justice and mercy toward those around us. These above all we ought to do, without neglecting the others.

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1. “On Inner Work in Christ,” The Philkalia vol. IV (London: Faber & Faber, 1995), p. 185.

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Saint Anastasia the Patrician of Alexandria

St. Anastasia the Patrician of Alexandria (Feast Day - March 10)

Saint Anastasia the Patrician of Alexandria lived in Constantinople and was descended from an aristocratic family. She was an image of virtue, and she enjoyed the great esteem of the emperor Justinian (527-565). Widowed at a young age, Anastasia decided to leave the world and save her soul far from the bustle of the capital. She secretly left Constantinople and went to Alexandria. She founded a small monastery not far from the city, and devoted herself entirely to God.

Several years later, the emperor Justinian was widowed and decided to search for Anastasia and marry her. As soon as she learned of this, St Anastasia journeyed to a remote skete to ask Abba Daniel (March 18) for help.

In order to safeguard Anastasia, the Elder dressed her in a man's monastic garb and called her the eunuch Anastasius. Having settled her in one of the very remote caves, the Elder gave her a Rule of prayer and ordered her never to leave the cave and to receive no one. Only one monk knew of this place. His obedience was to bring a small portion of bread and a pitcher of water to the cave once a week, leaving it at the entrance. The nun Anastasia dwelt in seclusion for twenty-eight years. Everyone believed that it was the eunuch Anastasius who lived in the cave.

The Lord revealed to her the day of her death. Having learned of her approaching death, she wrote several words for Abba Daniel on a potsherd and placed it at the entrance to the cave. The Elder came quickly and brought everything necessary for her burial. He found the holy ascetic still alive, and he confessed and communed her with the Holy Mysteries. At Abba Daniel's request, St Anastasia blessed him and the monk accompanying him. With the words: "Lord, into Thy hands I commend my spirit," the saint died in peace (ca. 567-568).

When the grave was prepared, the Elder gave his disciple his outer garment and ordered him to dress the deceased "brother" in it. As he was putting on the rassa, the monk noticed that she was a woman, but he did not dare to say anything. However, when they returned to the monastery after they buried the nun, the disciple asked Abba Daniel whether he knew the "brother" was a woman, and the Elder related to the young monk the life of St Anastasia. Later, the abba's narrative was written down and received wide acclaim.

The relics of St Anastasia were transferred to Constantinople in the year 1200, and put not far from the church of Hagia Sophia.

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HYMN OF PRAISE: SAINT ANASTASIA THE PATRICIAN

by St. Nikolai Velimirovich

One time, a glorious patrician, Venerable Anastasia,
Money, flattery, abandoned she all,
To Christ, her entire life she directed;
Christ, her bread; Christ, her water;
Christ, her joy and freedom,
Christ, the restorer of her soul,
Christ, the bridge over death.
Anastasia became shriveled,
The spirit through her withered face shines;
The spirit raises her higher to God,
With the Spirit of God, she breathes,
Until illuminated, she became,
By Grace enlightened,
By the power of God strengthened
And among the Living inscribed.
All she forgave, all she loved,
And for the entire world, she prays,
Like an angel, she was indeed,
Wholly fixed on Christ;
By the power of God, more powerful was she
And by riches, more wealthy
Than the Empress Theodora
Amidst the opulence of the imperial court.

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No Charges in Priest's Beating

09 Mar 2010
MyFoxTampaBay.com

TAMPA - The Hillsborough County State Attorney's office has decided not to file charges against a Marine reservist accused of attacking an Greek Orthodox priest.

The incident happened in November in the parking garage of the Seaport Channelside Apartments on Twiggs Street.

Police said Jasen Bruce, 28, beat Father Alexios Marakis with a tire iron, then chased him on foot for three blocks.

The State Attorney's Office put out the following statement:

"After considering the law, the evidence and the information, and arguments provided by defense counsel, it is evident that we cannot prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Mr. Bruce committed a crime and acted without legal justification."

Bruce and his attorney spoke to the media Tuesday afternoon, saying Bruce was acting in self-defense after the priest grabbed his genitals.

"As you know, the state attorney's office said there was no legal justification to charge Jasen in the case, and what they're saying obviously is that Jasen acted in self defense," attorney Jeff Brown said.

"I defended myself that night from being sexually grabbed and attacked," Bruce said. "Many people refused to believe me simply because the attacker was a priest."

Brown played a surveillance tape of the priest's car following another car into the garage, saying it proved the priest was not lost.

Brown also said the entrance of that garage is a "known gay trolling area." He played an excerpt from a 911 call he said was Bruce telling the dispatcher a man had just grabbed his testicles. He says to the dispatcher, "If I follow him, it's gonna get bad. Get someone over here."

But Marakis' attorney said his investigation showed the attack was unprovoked.

"I firmly believe, and I'll stand by it based on my investigation and my information i've obtained, this is roid rage at its worst," said Jerry Theophilopoulos. "To have somebody beat another person with a tire iron, it is a travesty of justice to have him on the streets with you or I."

Bruce and his attorney say they are now looking at a potential civil lawsuit.

See more here and here.

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Psychic Failures

Missing Persons and Abductions Reveal Psychics' Failures

By Benjamin Radford
Mar 5, 2010
Discovery

Several high-profile former missing persons have been in the news lately, including Elizabeth Smart and Jaycee Dugard.

Earlier this week, Elizabeth Smart’s abductor, Brian David Mitchell, was found competent to stand trial in a Utah court. His trial is expected to begin March 26, eight years after Mitchell and his wife allegedly kidnapped Smart from her Salt Lake City home and held her captive for nine months. Also in the past month, the family of Jaycee Dugard (who was kidnapped and held for eighteen years before being discovered in a virtual prison in the back yard of a couple’s home) announced that they have filed a lawsuit against the California Department of Corrections for failing to find her sooner.

The cases are similar, but Smart and Dugard have something else in common (and with other missing persons including Natalee Holloway, Laci Peterson, Chandra Levy, and many others): Hundreds of psychics gave information about their location while they were missing—and every single psychic turned out to be completely wrong.

Over 1,000 psychics (some of them with national profiles, including Allison DuBois, inspiration for the hit NBC TV show Medium) gave information they claimed would locate Elizabeth Smart. Tragically, none of it led to her rescue; she was recovered because a couple recognized her on a city street and called police.

There are thousands of self-proclaimed psychics and psychic detectives in the world who claim to be able to find missing persons. Some are rich and famous, such as Sylvia Browne, DuBois, Noreen Renier, and Carla Baron. If they truly have the powers that they claim, why do we see horrific cases like those of Smart and Dugard? Why aren’t psychics leading police to rescue these innocent young victims within hours or days of their abductions? Why did Jaycee Dugard have to wait nearly two decades for her rescue—-by suspicious neighbors, not psychics-—while being subjected to continual sexual and physical abuse, if a psychic had the power to find her?

Despite claims to the contrary, there is not a single documented case of a missing person being found or recovered due to psychic information. The fact that any well-known abducted or missing person you can name is either still missing or was not found by a psychic should tell you something. Here’s a hint: the next time you see a news story about a missing person, check the follow-up and see if a psychic’s information led to the person’s recovery.

If psychics can find missing persons, why hasn’t Natalee Holloway been found? Or Osama bin Laden, or any other terrorist leaders whose capture could make America safer? As I write this, there are dozens of missing persons who, if psychic detectives can do what they claim, could be safely located and recovered. Laura Vogel who disappeared in Hawaii on February 21. Cherice Maria Ragins disappeared from Baltimore on the same day. Olivia Aguirre of Contra Costa, California, missing since March 1. And so on. Do a quick Internet search and ask yourself why psychics aren’t helping these people and their desperate families. Either psychics cannot help these people, or they refuse to. I’m not sure which is worse.

If psychics can do what they claim, maybe Jaycee Dugard and her family should be suing not only the police, but also the psychics who gave false or useless “information” about her and wasting police time and effort. If people are going to earn fame and fortune from claiming to be psychic, they should be held accountable for their failures.

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Sermon for the Fourth Wednesday of Great Lent

Catechesis 66: That This Pascha Is a Type of the Future and Eternal Pascha; and About Endurance and Courage.

by St. Theodore the Studite

Given on the Fourth Wednesday of the Great Fast

Brethren and fathers, Lent is already galloping past and the soul rejoices at the imminence of Pascha, because by it it finds rest and is relieved of many toils. Why did this thought sound for me in advance? Because it is as if our whole life directs its reason contemplating the eternal Pascha. For this present Pascha, even though it is great and revered, is nevertheless, as our fathers explain, only a type of that Pascha to come. For this Pascha is for one day and it passes, while that Pascha has no successor. From it "pain, grief and sighing have fled away"[1]; there everlasting joy, gladness and rejoicing; there the sound of those who feast[2], a choir of those who keep festival and contemplation of eternal light; where there is the blessed breakfast[3] of Christ and the new[4] drink of which Christ spoke, "I shall not drink of the fruit of this vine, until I drink it with you new in the kingdom of my Father".[5] Of this He spoke to his disciples when He was about to ascend to heaven, "I am going to prepare a place for you and, if I go, I will prepare a place for you. I am coming again and I will take you to myself, so that where I am you maybe also. And where I am going you know, and the way you know."[6] And a little further on, "On that day you will know that I am in the Father, and you are in Me, and I am in you."[7] And elsewhere, "Father, I wish that where I am they may be with Me also, so that they may see My glory, which You gave Me, because You loved from before the foundation of the world."[8] But because this concerns not only the Apostles, but also ourselves, He also said, "I do not ask this only for them, but also for those who through their word believe in Me, so that all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me and I am in You, that they may also be one in Us."[9] What could be more comforting than these words? What could be more appealing? What soul can they not soften? What heart not prick with compunction, even should someone say that the human heart is a nature of stone? With thoughts like these the saints bore all that they bore, considering afflictions as joys, constraints as freedoms[10], struggles as delights, harsh training as relaxation, deaths as lives.

I beseech you, my brother, should not we also, since we have the same aim and seek the same Pascha, bravely and courageously bear our present condition, not falling, not succumbing to despondency, but rather roused with greater fervour watching for the wicked serpent who works to deceive us by the passions, transforming himself into an angel of light,[11]and altering things from what they are; show dark as light, bitter as sweet. This was how he ensnared our forefather, bewitching his sight and depicting as beautiful what was not, and as a result through food casting him out of Paradise. But let us, who have learned by experience what a deceiver he is, not leave the paradise of God’s commandments, nor, when he indicates to us that the fruit is beautiful, let the eye of soul or body be directed there, otherwise we are being caught in the snare. But let us flee by every means from looking. What is the fruit which seems beautiful? The love of the flesh, the evil lust of every one of the destructive passions. If we avoid experiencing them, my brothers, we shall be saved and easter[12] to age on age, with all the Saints in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory and might with the Father and the Holy Spirit, now and for ever, and to the ages of ages. Amen.

Notes:

[1] Isaiah 35:10. The phrase is familiar from the prayer for the departed.

[2] Cf. Psa. 42:4, where the Greek has a singular. The same phrase is found, but with the plural, in the prayers after Communion.

[3] Cf. John 21:12.

[4] The Greek has koinon, ‘common’, but the word should be kainon, ‘new’, as the following citation makes clear. There is also an echo of the Paschal canon, ‘Come, let us drink a new drink’ (poma kainon).

[5] Matthew 26:29.

[6] John 14:2-4.

[7] John 14:20.

[8] John 17:24.

[9] John 17:20-21.

[10] It is difficult to reproduce the play in Greek on stenochoria and evrychoria.

[11] 2 Corinthians 11:14.

[12] St Theodore uses a very rare verb paschazein, and temptation to follow G. M. Hopkins and use ‘easter’ as a verb is irresistible. The only reference in Lampe is to St Theodore’s contemporary Theophanes, who uses it of the Quartodecimans, who ‘easter’ with the Jews.

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Sermon for the Feast of the Forty Holy Martyrs

CATECHESIS 62: On Our Imitating the Lord’s Sufferings

by St. Theodore the Studite

[Migne adds: On the Forty Martyrs [March 9th]. But it seems to have been given after the day itself.]

Brethren and fathers, how good it has become for us the separation from the monastery here! "For why should our liberty be subject to the judgement of another’s conscience?" [1 Cor. 10:29]. And why do we maltreat ourselves still for what is of no use? We managed as far as it was possible and the moment allowed; but now, because when the moment summoned they did not choose persecution on behalf of Christ, as certain others, it is necessary to listen to the Prophet when he says, "Come out from among them and be separated," [Isa. 52:11] says the Lord. If others act otherwise over these matters, they will render an account to the Lord on the day of judgement; for it seems to me that to be brought under their power is equivalent of being indifferent towards the heretics. You see that the same distinction withdraws us from the world and drives us to trouble, to distress, to hunger, to persecution, to prison, to death; "but in all these we must be supremely victorious through the God who loved us," [Rom. 8:37] when, whenever he sees a soul thirsting for Him, gives it force to be able to endure sufferings on His behalf. And to this the Forty Martyrs, whose memorial we have just celebrated, bear witness with the others; for we cannot say that they possessed a different nature to the one we have. But since they loved God with a true heart, they were empowered in their weakness to throw down the invisible enemy by the flesh, and to accomplish a struggle of such a quality and greatness that all Christians praise it in song. And blessed is one who has been granted to share in the sufferings of Christ,[ Cf. 1 Pet. 4:13] even to some extent at least: the persecuted, because He too was persecuted; the arrested, because He too was arrested; the reviled, because He too was reviled; the scourged, because He too was scourged; the imprisoned, because He too was imprisoned; see too why it is written, "If we have died with Him, we shall also live with Him; if we endure, we shall also reign with Him; if we deny, He too will deny us; if we are faithless, He remains faithful; He is not able to deny Himself" [2 Tim. 2:11-13]. Do you see the promises and the threats, of what sort and how great they are? For the rest then, brethren, let us strive, let us struggle by the grace of Christ not to shame those things that have been previously mentioned: the banishments, the imprisonments, the scourgings. We may not all have been imprisoned, nor all scourged; but nevertheless the fellowship of life itself becomes a fellowship of sufferings, "for if one limb suffers, all the limbs suffer with it; if one limb is glorified, all the limbs rejoice with it" [1 Cor. 12:26]. And would that we were even "more one body and one spirit, as we have been called in one hope of our calling," [Eph. 4:4] having Christ as the head, to become well-pleasing to God, to gain the kingdom of heaven, in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory and might with the Father and the Holy Spirit, now and always and to the ages of ages. Amen.

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A Tour of Panagoulakis Hermitage in Kalamata

Many thanks to my sister Vaso and my mother for taking this rare video footage of the Hermitage of Panagoulakis in Kalamata, Greece. My mother is from Kalamata and was baptized in this monastery in 1955. In these videos pilgrims tell the story of Elder Elias Panagoulakis (+1917) and how he founded this monastery, and my sister is able to descend into the cave of Elder Elias, where he lived his life in strict asceticism, and venerate his holy skull. Stories are also told of Haralambi the Fool for Christ, whom my mother knew and was a regular visitor to the monastery. More will be said on these two holy personalities in future posts. It should be kept in mind, if anyone happens to visit, that this monastery is currently Old Calendarist and not in communion with the Church.

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Xeropotamou Monastery and the Forty Holy Martyrs

Xeropotamou Monastery on Mount Athos is dedicated to the Forty Holy Martyrs of Sebaste. Oral tradition makes the founder of the Monastery the Empress Pulcheria, who lived in the fifth century, while another version regards the founders as the tenth century Emperors Constantine VI Porphyrogenetus and Romanus I Lecapenus. Saint Paul of Xeropotamou is said to have become an ascetic in a cell near an old monastery where Xeropotamou now stands. This old monastery is the one said to have been built by Empress Pulcheria and dedicated to the Forty Holy Martyrs after the discovery of their holy relics in her time. St. Paul of Xeropotamou also wrote the Canon to the Forty Martyrs. The katholikon today is dedicated to the Forty Holy Martyrs and was built in between 1761-1763 on the site of an earlier church; the iconography was done in 1783. It celebrates its main feast on March 9. Among the treasures of Xeropotamou are the paten of Pulcheria, made of steatite, relics of many saints including those of the Forty Holy Martyrs, gold embroidered vestments, and priceless episcopal staffs, but its greatest treasure consists of two pieces of the True Cross, the largest anywhere in the world, which have a hole made by one of the nails of the Crucifixion. According to St. Nikodemos the Hagiorite, the library contains manuscripts detailing the lives of the Forty Holy Martyrs.

(For the history of the icons and manuscripts at Xeropotamou pertaining to the Forty Martyrs, see here. There is an english summary on page 8 which is followed by some icons of the Forty Martyrs from Xeropotamou.)

Two Miracles of the Forty Martyrs at Xeropotamou Monastery


A. The Forty Martyrs and Sultan Selim I (d. 1519):

Xeropotamou Monastery has survived many earthquakes and fires, having been rebuilt many times over by several rulers. One of these rulers was Sultan Selim I. Pirates had burned down the monastery in 1507, and one day the Forty Holy Martyrs appeared to Selim in a vision to restore it. In return for this restoration, the Forty Martyrs promised him that they would help him in his battle against the Arabs. Long after the sultan's death in 1519, his successors continued to provide oil for the lamps before the icon and relics of the Forty Holy Martyrs in the katholikon of Xeropotamou. Today the monastery has in its archives a Hatt Shariff from 1517 documenting the large donations Selim made to the monastery and its facilities.

Here is the official record of Selim's vision:

"During his residence in Egypt, Sultan Selim saw forty large-bodied lads with golden chariots, which appeared to be running like angels, and they said: "We are, O King, helpers of the Ottomans and co-workers in the victory against your enemy. As a reward for the good we have done for you, when tomorrow comes, if you will, some spiritual (Ρουχμπάνιδες) hermits will come asking of you a will of your kingdom to restore our house, in which is found our relics. If you have love and want to have us as friends on other occasions, you must not only grant them a will to build our house, but to give them some of your imperial friendly treasures as well."

The 10 Articles of the Hatt Shariff defined the following:

1. Restore Xeropotamou after a recent fire.
2. Give permission to the monks to restore the Monastery as necessary.
3. 40 oil lamps are to burn before the relics of the saints.
4. For the Monastery to be able to see the four parts of the horizon.
5. The monks are to be granted immunity.
6. 10 of the best workers are to be brought to draw up the borders of the Monastery and the Metochion, with the caretaker of the Monastery being Ibrahim Agha.
7. Confirms the Hatt Shariff of Sultan Murad Yao.
8. If a monk leaves the Monastery for another, he is to be punished with a fine of 100 piastres, having received this Monastery from the Agha's land, and for Xeropotamou to be notified.
9. No one should inherit all of Mount Athos, but only the Monastery to which they belong.
10. The present Hatt Shariff should be kept in the Monastery, and only a copy is to be used when exported by the fathers for use in courts, etc. Mentioned also here are aphorisms against the violators of this document.


B. From the life of Elder Ambrose Lazaris (+2006):

The blessed elder told me [Abbot Ephraim of Vatopaidi] in a conversation that after his military duty was completed (he was a Tsolia for the Palace Guard), he wanted to go to the Holy Mountain. However, he did not know where nor how to go. Suddenly there appeared to him a young man around 25 years of age and said to him: "I know those lands. Come with me." And this is how it happened.

They embarked together, went to the sea and boarded the ship. "He also gave me," he said, "bread which we ate together all the days we were together. His name however he did not tell me, though I also never asked him. This is how we arrived in Daphne and from there we walked into the Holy Mountain.

"As long as he was with me, I felt greatly protected. Moving on he showed me the Monastery of Xeropotamou where the Holy Forty Martyrs are honored. He asked me if I wanted us to go venerate and I approved. We entered the church (the katholikon of the Monastery) and as I was venerating the icon, forty young men encircled us. Then the young man told me that 'it is the Forty Holy Martyrs and they are rejoicing because you are becoming a monk'.

"From there we continued along the road and arrived at Karyes and from their the Holy Monastery of Koutloumousiou. Here the young man stopped, he showed me the Holy Monastery, and said: 'Here you will live Spyro. You will become a monk, you will be patient and be obedient to the elder' ... and he disappeared."

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Discovery of the Relics of the Forty Holy Martyrs

A woman by the name Eusebia, who was a deaconess of the Macedonian sect, had a house and garden outside the walls of Constantinople, in which she kept the holy remains of forty soldiers, who had suffered martyrdom under Licinius at Sebaste in Armenia.

When she felt death approaching, she bequeathed the aforesaid place to some Orthodox monks, and bound them by oath to bury her there, and to hew out separately a place above her head at the top of her coffin, and to deposit the relics of the martyrs with her, and to inform no one. The monks did so; but in order to render due honor to the martyrs secretly, according to the agreement with Eusebia, they formed a subterranean house of prayer near her tomb. But open to view, an edifice was erected above the foundation, enclosed with baked bricks, and a secret descent from it to the martyrs.

Soon after, Caesar, a man among those in power, who had formerly been advanced to the dignity of consul and prefect, lost his wife, and caused her to be interred near the tomb of Eusebia; for the two ladies had been knit together by the most tender friendship, and had been of one mind on all doctrinal and religious subjects. Caesar was hence induced to purchase this place so that he might be entombed near his wife. The aforesaid monks settled elsewhere, and without divulging anything about the martyrs.

After this, when the building was demolished, and when the earth and refuse were scattered about, the whole place was smoothed off. For Caesar himself erected there a magnificent temple to God to the honor of Thyrsus, the martyr. It appears probable that God designedly willed the aforesaid place to disappear, and so long a time to elapse in order that the discovery of the martyrs might be regarded as more marvelous and a more conspicuous event, and as a proof of the Divine favor towards the discoverer.

The discoverer was, in fact, no other than the Empress Pulcheria, the sister of the emperor. The admirable Thyrsus appeared to her three times, and revealed to her those concealed beneath the earth; and commanded that they should be deposited near his tomb, in order that they might share in the same position and honor. The forty martyrs themselves also appeared to her, arrayed in shining robes. But the occurrence seemed too marvelous to be credible, and altogether impossible; for the aged of clergy of that region, after having frequently prosecuted inquiries, had not been able to indicate the position of the martyrs, nor indeed had any one else.

At length, when everything was hopeless, Polychronius, a certain presbyter, who had formerly been a servant in the household of Caesar, was reminded by God that the locality in question had once been inhabited by monks. He therefore went to the clergy of the Macedonian sect to inquire concerning them. All the monks were dead, with the exception of one, who seemed to have been preserved in life for the express purpose of pointing out the spot where the relics of the holy martyrs were concealed. Polychronius questioned him closely on the subject, and finding that, on account of the agreement made with Eusebia, his answers were somewhat undecided, he made known to him the Divine revelation and the anxiety of the empress, as well as the failure of her recourses. The monk then confessed that God had declared the truth to the empress; for at the time when he was an overgrown boy, and was taught the monastic life by its aged leaders, he remembered exactly that the relics of the martyrs had been deposited near the tomb of Eusebia; but that the subsequent lapse of time, and the changes which had been carried on in that locality, deprived him of the power of recalling to his recollection whether the relics had been deposited beneath the church or in any other spot. And further said Polychronius, "I have not suffered a like lapse of memory, for I remember that I was present at the interment of the wife of Caesar, and, as well as I can judge from the relative situation of the high road, I infer that she must have been buried beneath the ambo; this is the platform for the readers. Therefore," subjoined the monk, "it must be near the remains of Caesar's wife that the tomb of Eusebia must be sought; for the two ladies lived on terms of the closest friendship and intimacy, and mutually agreed to be interred beside each other."

When it was necessary to dig, according to the aforesaid intimations, and to track out the sacred relics, and the empress had learned the facts, she commanded them to begin the work. On digging up the earth by the ambo, the coffin of Caesar's wife was discovered according to the conjecture of Polychronius. At a short distance on the side they found the pavement of baked bricks, and a marble tablet of equal dimensions, each the measure of the bricks, under which the coffin of Eusebia was disclosed; and close by was an oratory, elegantly enclosed with white and purple marble. The cover of the tomb was in the form of a holy table, and at the summit, where the relics were deposited, a small orifice was visible. A man attached to the palace, who happened to be standing by, thrust a cane which he held in his hand into the orifice; and on withdrawing the cane he held it to his nose, and inhaled a sweet odor of myrrh, which inspired the workmen and bystanders with fresh confidence.

When they had eagerly opened the coffin, the remains of Eusebia were found, and near her head was the prominent part of the tomb fashioned exactly in the form of a chest, and was concealed within by its own cover; and the iron which enclosed it on each side at the edges was firmly held together by lead. In the middle, the same orifice again appeared, and still more clearly revealed the fact of the relics being concealed within. As soon as the discovery was announced, they ran to the church of the martyr, and sent for smiths to unfasten the iron bars, and easily drew off the lid. A great many perfumes were found thereunder, and among the perfumes two silver caskets were found in which lay the holy relics.

Then the princess returned giving thanks to God for having accounted her worthy of so great a manifestation and for attaining the discovery of the holy relics. After this she honored the martyrs with the costliest casket; and on the conclusion of a public festival which was celebrated with befitting honor and with a procession to the accompaniment of psalms, and at which I was present, the relics were placed alongside of the godlike Thyrsus. And others who were present can also bear testimony that these things were done in the way described, for almost all of them still survive. And the event occurred much later, when Proclus governed the church of Constantinople.

Sozomen, Ecclesiastical History, Book IX, Ch. 2

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Gender Equality and Priestly Celibacy in the Catholic Church

Two interesting articles below:

"Gender Equality" Seen to Be Hindering Women

Is Priestly Celibacy Psychologically Dangerous?

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St. Luke of Crimea: Science and Religion

"When we examine contemporary science as developed by scientists such as Lamark and Darwin, we see the antithesis and I would say the complete disagreement that exists between science and religion, on topics that concern the more basic problems of existence and knowledge. For this, an enlightened mind cannot accept at the same time both one and the other and must chose between religion and science."

A well known German Zoologist, Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919), who was a good follower of Darwin, wrote these words some 65 years ago, in his book, "The Riddle of the Universe" that was very successful and as it seemed, had proved that faith is absurd. So says Haeckel that every enlightened man must choose between science and religion and should follow either one or the other. He considered it necessary that such men should deny religion because a logical man cannot deny science.

Truly, is this necessary? No, not at all, for we know that many and great scientists were at the same time great believers. For example, such was the Polish astronomer Copernicus who laid the foundation of all contemporary astronomy. Copernicus was not only a believer but was also a cleric. Another great scientist, Newton, whenever he mentioned the word God, he removed his hat. He was a great believer. A great bacteriologist of our time and almost a contemporary, Pasteur, who laid the basis of contemporary bacteriology, he would start every scientific work with a prayer to God. Some ten years ago a great scientist passed away, who was our countryman, physiologist Pavlov, who was the creator of the new physiology of the brain. He too was a great believer. Would Haeckel therefore dare say that these men did not have enlightened minds because they believed in God?

So what happens now? Why even today there are some scientists, professors at Universities whom I personally know and are great believers. Why don't all the scientists deny religion but only those who think the same as Haeckel? Because these people believe only in materialism and deny the spiritual world, they do not believe in life after death, they do not accept the immortality of the soul, and of course they do not accept the resurrection of the dead. They say that science is capable of everything, that there is no secret in nature that science cannot discover. What can we answer to these?

We shall respond to them this way. You are totally right. We cannot limit the human mind that searches nature. We know that today, science knows only a part of the things we have of nature. We also understand that the possibilities of science are great. In this they are right and we don't doubt it. What then do we doubt? Why don't we deny religion like them and consider it contrary to scientific knowledge?

It is because we believe wholeheartedly that there is a spiritual world. We are certain that apart from the material world there is an infinite and incomparably superior spiritual world. We believe in the existence of spiritual beings that have higher intellect than us humans. We believe wholeheartedly that above this spiritual and material world there is the Great and Almighty God.

What we doubt is the right of science to research with its methods the spiritual world. Because the spiritual world cannot be researched with the methods used to research the material world. Such methods are totally inappropriate to research the spiritual world.

How do we know that there is a spiritual world? Who told us that it exists? If we are asked by people who do not believe in Divine Revelation, we shall answer them thus: "Our heart told us". For there are two ways for one to know something, the first is that which is spoken by Haeckel, which is used by science to learn of the material world. There is however another way that is unknown to science, and does not wish to know it. It is the knowledge through the heart. Our heart is not only the central organ of the circulation system, it is an organ with which we know the other world and receive the highest knowledge. It is the organ that gives us the capability to communicate with God and the world above. Only in this we disagree with science.

Praising the great successes and achievements of science, we do not doubt at all its great importance and we do not confine scientific knowledge. We only tell the scientists "You do not have the capability with your methods to research the spiritual world, we however can with our heart."

There are many unexplainable phenomena which concern the spiritual world that are real (as are some type of material phenomena). There are therefore phenomena that science will never be able to explain because it does not use the appropriate methods.

Let science explain how the prophecies were made regarding the coming of the Messiah, which were all fulfilled. Could science tell us how the great prophet Isaiah, some 700 years before the birth of Christ, foretold the most important events in His life and for which he was named the evangelist of the Old Testament? Could it explain the far-sighted grace possessed by the saints and to tell us with which physical methods the saints inherited this grace and how they could understand the heart and read the thoughts of a person they had just met for the first time? They would see a person for the first time and they will call him by his name. Without waiting for the visitor to ask, they would answer on what troubled him.

If they can, let them explain it to us. Let them explain with what method the saints foretold the great historical events which were accurately fulfilled as they were prophesied. Let them explain the visitation from the other world and the appearance of the dead to the living.

They shall never explain it to us because they are too far from the basis of religion - from faith. If you read the books of the scientists who try to reconstruct religion, you will see how superficially they look at things. They do not understand the essence of religion yet they criticize it. Their criticism does not touch the essence of faith, since they are unable to understand the types, the expressions of religious feeling. The essence of religion they do not understand. Why not? Because the Lord Jesus Christ says "No one can come to me unless My Father who sent Me draws him to Me"(John 6:44).

So it is necessary that we be drawn by the Heavenly Father, and it is necessary that the grace of the Holy Spirit enlighten our heart and our mind. To dwell in our heart and mind through this enlightenment, the Holy Spirit and the ones who were found worthy to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, those in whose heart lives Christ and His Father, know the essence of faith. The others, outside the faith cannot understand anything.

Let us hear the criticism against Haeckel from a French philosopher Emile Boutroux (1845-1921). So says Boutroux" "The criticisms of Haeckel concern much more the ways, than the essence, which (the ways) he observes with such a materialistic and narrow view, that they cannot be accepted by religious people. Thus the criticism of religion by Haeckel is not referred to, not even in one of the principles that constitutes religion."

This is therefore our opinion regarding Haeckel's book "The Riddle of the Universe" which up to day is considered the "Bible" for all those who criticize religion, which they deny and find it contrary to science. Do you see how poor and tasteless arguments they use? Don't become scandalized when you hear what they say about religion, since they themselves cannot understand its essence. You people, who may not have much of a relationship with science and do not know much about philosophy, remember always the most basic beginning, which was well known by the early Christians. They considered poor, the person who knew all the sciences yet he knew not God. On the other hand, they considered blessed the person who knew God, even if he knew absolutely nothing about the worldly things.

Guard this truth like the best treasure of the heart, walk straight without looking right or left. Let us not bother with what we hear against religion, losing our bearings. Let us hold on to our faith which is the eternal indisputable truth. Amen.

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A Tour of St. Irene Chrysovalantou Monastery in Lykovrisi

Many thanks to my sister Vaso, my mother, and my niece Christiana (you can see my nephews Pano and Demetri as well) for taking this rare video footage of the Holy Monastery of Saint Irene Chrysovalantou in Lykovrisi, Athens. This was filmed in the summer of 2009.

To read more about Saint Irene Chrysovalantou and her Monastery in Lykovrisi, see here, here and here.

If videos don't work, just click on them and they will take you to the originals on Youtube.

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Adam's Lament

Outside the empty Paradise, Adam folds his hands,
Banished and alienated he throbbed from pain;
The angels of heaven, until then his companions,
As beautiful dreams, flew hurriedly away,
Before the banished one, before the cursed one,
Until yesterday, the mighty proprietor of Paradise!
And Adam sobbed on the cold boulder:
"Woe to my descendants! Woe to me a sinner!
For one moment, my Creator I despised
To be despised by all that was created
Throughout the days and nights,
Throughout the centuries long,
Instead of God, a serpent to have for a companion!
Instead of me, over all created things to rule,
Over me, now, everything will rule:
The winds and the heat, the elements of nature,
The beasts and scorpions, repulsive things and serpents.
Instead of freedom, behold, fear grips me,
And confuses my thoughts and chills me to the bone.
There is only One Who is able to help:
The One that I offended--Have mercy O God!"

- St. Nikolai Velimirovich

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Why Galileo Was Wrong, Even Though He Was Right

March 7, 2010
by Cornelius Hunter
Darwin's God

In the early seventeenth century a courageous and brilliant scientist, Galileo Galileo, confirmed heliocentrism, the idea first proposed a century earlier by Nicolaus Copernicus that the sun was at the center of the universe. Heliocentrism challenged geocentrism, the religiously motivated idea that a stationary earth was at the center of the universe. Galileo explained why heliocentrism was true and not surprisingly the church strongly opposed and persecuted the scientist. Ultimately, however, the truth could not be denied and church was forced to, once again, reluctantly give in to the objective truths of science.

That was the false history of the Galileo Affair according to later revisionists who promoted the view that science and religion were in conflict. In fact while Galileo indeed was brilliant, he also made it difficult for friendly voices to support him. Furthermore he did not confirm heliocentrism, and heliocentrism was not the only viable alternative to geocentrism. And geocentrism was hardly religiously motivated. The church had little objection to heliocentrism when Copernicus wrote of the model in the sixteenth century, and Copernicus was not the first to consider the idea.

The Galileo Affair is far more complex than the simple-minded warfare thesis supposes. Yes Pope John Paul II issued a declaration in 1992 acknowledging the church's errors. And the church was no doubt mistaken. But the church's action in the Galileo Affair was far more complex than simply opposing a scientific finding out of religious conviction (Galileo's trial focused on his insubordination, not heliocentrism). In fact, there were at least four reasons why the church opposed Galileo's heliocentrism which confound the naive warfare thesis.

First, in Galileo's day internal church politics had made it less receptive to new ideas such as heliocentrism. Second, Galileo's disobedience and style--such as satirizing his friend Pope Urban VIII who had been a supporter--fomented opposition. Third, it was understood that science could devise models that, on the one hand fit the data but on the other hand were not true or approximately so. In fact, geocentrism modeled the celestial motions quite accurately. And finally, in some cases where geocentrism did fail, another alternative--Tycho Brahe's hybrid model--succeeded.

An important failure of geocentrism were the phases of Venus which indicated it circled the sun, not Earth. Galileo expounded upon this point, but what he failed to mention was that the Tychonic system, in which the sun circles the earth and the inner planets in turn circle the sun, handled the phases of Venus just fine.

In fact new research reported on this week indicates another problem with Galileo's firmly held views. When observing stars through a telescope, as Galileo did, they do not appear as points of light, as they should, but as a small extended area, or disk, as did the planets. This disk appearance is due to the diffraction of light which was unknown at the time.

Of course the stars were assumed to be like the sun, and therefore much larger than the planets. Given their larger size the observed small disk meant they must have been much farther away than the planets. But the calculated distances to the stars were thousands of times less than what we now calculate. Yes the stars were far away, but those small disks were misleading. The diffracting light made the stars appear closer than they actually are.

Galileo was therefore assuming the stars were much closer than they actually are. Why is this important? Consider objects you observe out the window as you sit in a moving train. A nearby tree may be behind a closer tree, but as the train moves you will see the farther tree emerge as your angle changes. Two stars in the sky, on the other hand, do not move in relation to each other as you move along, because they are so far away.

Because Galileo calculated the stars to be much closer than they actually are, he would necessarily expect to see some change in their relative positions as the earth circled the sun in his heliocentric model. But no such relative change was observed. It was an important failure of Galileo's model which, again, he did not mention. And again, it was an observation that the Tychonic system handled just fine.

What the new research points out is that a contemporary of Galileo, the German astronomer Simon Marius, famous for naming the moons of Jupiter, was aware of these implications and followed them to their logical conclusion.

While Galileo was making high claims for heliocentrism, Marius had made clear in his 1614 book Mundus Iovialis (The Jovian World), that the observations confirmed the earth-centered Tychonic system.

The new paper, aptly entitled "How Marius Was Right and Galileo Was Wrong Even Though Galileo Was Right and Marius Was Wrong," is another example of how not just science, but the history of science, is more complicated than self-serving black-white renditions would have it.

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The Desperation of the Multiverse Theory

Multiverse Mavens Hoisted on Own Petard

6 March 2010
Barry Arrington
UncommonDescent

Several factors are combining to increase belief (of the “faith” variety, not the “demonstrated fact” variety) in the multiverse among materialists. Two of these factors are relevant to ID at the biological and cosmological levels. At the biological level materialists are beginning to understand that the probability that life arose by random material processes is so low (estimated in this article written by materialists to be 10 raised to -1018) that infinite universes are required for it to have occurred, the implication being that we just happen to live in the ever-so-lucky universe where it all came together.

At the cosmological level, the probability that the fine tuning of the universe necessary for the existence of life arose by sheer coincidence is so low that again the multiverse is invoked to provide infinite “probabilistic resources” to do the job (see here).

Of course, there is another possible explanation for both the emergence of life and the fine tuning of the universe. These phenomena may be the results of acts of a super powerful being whom we might call God.

Obviously, the whole reason materialists have invoked the multiverse in the first place is to avoid resorting to agency to explain the emergence of life and cosmological fine tuning. But isn’t it obvious that given the very premises invoked by materialists in the multiverse scenarios that we can just as easily conclude that God exists.

Here is how the logic runs: The materialists says, “Yes, the probability that life emerged through random material processes is vanishingly small, but in an infinite multiverse everything that is not logically impossible is in fact instantiated, and we just happen to live in the lucky universe where life was instantiated. Similarly, we happen to live in the Goldilocks universe (which, again, is one of infinite universes) where the physical constants are just right for the existence of life.”

But the theist can play this game too. “The existence of God is not logically impossible. In an infinite number of universes everything that is not logically impossible is in fact instantiated, and we just happen to live in one of those universes in which God is instantiated.”

I do not believe in the multiverse. The entire concept is a desperation “Hail Mary” pass in which logical positivists and their materialist fellow travelers are attempting to save a philosophical construct on the brink of destruction. The point is that materialists’ own multiverse premise leads to the conclusion that God exists more readily than the opposite conclusion. Ironically, far from excluding the existence of God, if the multiverse exists, God must also exist.

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'Mystical' Stone Puts Plumber On New Path

March 2010
Ananova

A Polish plumber has become a faith healer after finding a 'mystical' stone while digging up drains under his house.

Jacek Slominski has been swamped by demands from hundreds of patients since he pulled the stone from the earth where it had lain undisturbed for hundreds of years.

"It has a huge Z carved into it and as soon as I touched it I felt this tremendous energy coming from it," he said.

"I've had a bad back for years but all of a sudden all the pain left me and never returned," he added at his home in Bialystok.

Now Mr Slominski has become a full time healer and claims that patients travel hundreds of miles just to touch his healing stone. "I don't understand it but it works and it's better than fixing broken toilets," he said.

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Icon of Virgin Mary Weeps In France

Virgin Mary Icon 'Crying Tears of Oil' in France

An image of the Virgin Mary has been crying tears of oil, its owner has claimed, in a story that has drawn hundreds of visitors to the man's home in France.

08 Mar 2010
Telegraph UK

Esat Altindagoglu has been inundated with more than 50 visitors a day hoping to see the "miracle" at his house near Paris.

The one-foot high painting was given to his wife Sevin by a Lebanese priest on her birthday in 2006, the Turkish-born salesman said.

It began weeping oil on February 12 this year, and had been "crying" every day since, he claimed.

He said: "As word spread, people started arriving from France, then from all over Europe.

"I've been having between 50 and 60 people a day turning up for more than three weeks now."

An Orthodox priest had now agreed to say mass at his home in Garges-les-Gonesse this week to thank the Virgin Mary, Mr Altindagoglu said.

He added: "Apparently the next step is to have the weeping witnessed by a bishop so the miracle can be officially recognised by the church."

Over the centuries there have been hundreds of incidents of statues said to have wept blood, oil or water.

But the only one ever approved as a miracle by the Pope was Our Lady of Akita in Japan, in 1973, with all the others ruled out as hoaxes.

See more here.

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Idle Chit Chat Can Make You Unhappy

06 Mar 2010
Telegraph UK

Having a profound conversation can boost happiness levels, but trivial chatter can be depressing, scientists say.

Psychologists investigated whether happy and unhappy people differed because of the types of conversations they engaged in.

Volunteers wore an unobtrusive recording device to monitor conversations with friends and colleagues for four days.

Researchers then listened to the recordings and identified them as trivial small talk or substantive discussions.

In addition, the volunteers completed personality and wellbeing assessments.

Reporting the findings in the journal Psychological Science, the researchers said the recordings revealed some startling findings.

Greater wellbeing was related to spending less time alone and more time talking to others. The happiest participants spent 25 per cent less time alone and 70 per cent more time talking than the unhappiest.

But the researchers were surprised to discover that the type of conversations people took part in also affected their happiness levels.

The happiest participants had twice as many deep and meaningful conversations and one third as much small talk as the unhappiest.

Matthias Mehl, an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Arizona, said: "These findings suggest that the happy life is social and conversationally deep rather than solitary and superficial."

The researchers conclude that profound conversations may have the potential to make people happier.

They said: "Just as self-disclosure can instill a sense of intimacy in a relationship, deep conversations may instill a sense of meaning in interaction with partners."

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Lost Jewish Tribe 'Found in Zimbabwe'

By Steve Vickers
BBC News
Harare

The Lemba people of Zimbabwe and South Africa may look like their compatriots, but they follow a very different set of customs and traditions.

They do not eat pork, they practise male circumcision, they ritually slaughter their animals, some of their men wear skull caps and they put the Star of David on their gravestones.

Their oral traditions claim that their ancestors were Jews who fled the Holy Land about 2,500 years ago.

It may sound like another myth of a lost tribe of Israel, but British scientists have carried out DNA tests which have confirmed their Semitic origin.

These tests back up the group's belief that a group of perhaps seven men married African women and settled on the continent. The Lemba, who number perhaps 80,000, live in central Zimbabwe and the north of South Africa.

And they also have a prized religious artefact that they say connects them to their Jewish ancestry - a replica of the Biblical Ark of the Covenant known as the ngoma lungundu, meaning "the drum that thunders".

The object went on display recently at a Harare museum to much fanfare, and instilled pride in many of the Lemba.

"For me it's the starting point," says religious singer Fungisai Zvakavapano-Mashavave.

"Very few people knew about us and this is the time to come out. I'm very proud to realise that we have a rich culture and I'm proud to be a Lemba.

"We have been a very secretive people, because we believe we are a special people."

Religion vs culture

The Lemba have many customs and regulations that tally with Jewish tradition.

They wear skull caps, practise circumcision, which is not a tradition for most Zimbabweans, avoid eating pork and food with animal blood, and have 12 tribes.

They slaughter animals in the same way as Jewish people, and they put the Jewish Star of David on their tombstones.

Members of the priestly clan of the Lemba, known as the Buba, were even discovered to have a genetic element also found among the Jewish priestly line.

"This was amazing," said Prof Tudor Parfitt, from the University of London.

"It looks as if the Jewish priesthood continued in the West by people called Cohen, and in same way it was continued by the priestly clan of the Lemba.

"They have a common ancestor who geneticists say lived about 3,000 years ago somewhere in north Arabia, which is the time of Moses and Aaron when the Jewish priesthood started."

Prof Parfitt is a world-renowned expert, having spent 20 years researching the Lemba, and living with them for six months.

The Lemba have a sacred prayer language which is a mixture of Hebrew and Arabic, pointing to their roots in Israel and Yemen.

Despite their ties to Judaism, many of the Lemba in Zimbabwe are Christians, while some are Muslims.

"Christianity is my religion, and Judaism is my culture," explains Perez Hamandishe, a pastor and member of parliament from the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

Despite their centuries-old traditions, some younger Lemba are taking a more liberal view.

"In the old days you didn't marry a non-Lemba, but these days we interact with others," says Alex Makotore, son of the late Chief Mposi from the Lemba "headquarters" in Mberengwa.

"I feel special in my heart but not in front of others such that I'm separated from them. Culture is dynamic."

Crowds

The oral traditions of the Lemba say that the ngoma lungundu is the Biblical wooden Ark made by Moses, and that centuries ago a small group of men began a long journey carrying it from Yemen to southern Africa.

The object went missing during the 1970s and was eventually rediscovered in Harare in 2007 by Prof Parfitt.

"Many people say that the story is far-fetched, but the oral traditions of the Lemba have been backed up by science," he says.

Carbon dating shows the ngoma to be nearly 700 years old - pretty ancient, if not as old as Bible stories would suggest.

But Prof Parfitt says this is because the ngoma was used in battles, and would explode and be rebuilt.

The ngoma now on display was a replica, he says, possibly built from the remains of the original.

"So it's the closest descendant of the Ark that we know of," Prof Parfitt says.

Large crowds came to see the unveiling of the ngoma and to attend lectures on the identity of the Lemba.

For David Maramwidze, an elder in his village, the discovery of the ngoma has been a defining moment.

"Hearing from those professors in Harare and seeing the ngoma makes it clear that we are a great people and I'm very proud," he says.

"I heard about it all my life and it was hard for me to believe, because I had no idea of what it really is.

"I'm still seeing the picture of the ngoma in my mind and it will never come out from my brain. Now we want it to be given back to the Lemba people."

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Sermon for the Third Sunday of Great Lent

CATECHESIS 63: Historical, Concerning the Christians Who Were Massacred in Bulgaria During the Holy Lent, On Account of Meat-eating.

by St. Theodore the Studite

Given On the 3rd Sunday.

Brethren and fathers, in the present instruction I want to urge you to consolation from a certain story. The story is this: In Bulgaria, as those who were accurately informed have reported, an evil decree went out from the ruler there that the Christians in captivity and our brothers were to eat meat during the period of the holy Forty Days; those who obeyed would live, those who disobeyed would be killed. The word of the godless was exceedingly strong and the people assembled and there was weeping and groans and much lamentation with women and children, on the one side of those clinging to the Christian law, on the other of those quailing before the death of the flesh. Finally — ah, the pitiable announcement — they were defeated and submitted to the godless order. Fourteen of them though broke away and stood apart saying it was not possible either to obey or to eat meat in violation of the Christian law. At this, appeals and exhortations by the people were made: 'Let them yield to constraint, not die foolishly, and through repentance they can be restored again.' But nothing could persuade them or weaken them from keeping their gaze fixed on God and on the blessedness that was laid up in his promises. The Scythian then, when he saw the implacable determination of the men, thought to subdue the rest by means of one, and having slain him he at once distributed his children and his wife among the Scythians as slaves, so that the others weakened by this would be brought over. But they rather remained unbowed and shouted out, ‘We are Christians, and our lot is that of our dead brother’. At this confession they were crucified on planks and died in the Lord.

You see, therefore, brethren, that even now too the Gospel of the kingdom of God is active. 'One who loves father or mother,' it says, 'more than me is not worthy of me; and one who loves son or daughter or wife more than me is not worthy of me; and one who does not take up his cross and follow after me, is not worthy of me' [Matt. 10:37-38]. And again, 'Do not fear those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul; rather fear one who can destroy both soul and body in Gehenna' [Matt. 10:28]. They were obedient then to the commands of the Gospel, they obeyed the authority of the Lord and were wreathed with the crown of martyrdom, imitating the holy Maccabees and doubling their number, for the Maccabees were seven, but they were fourteen; the former so as not to taste swine’s meat in violation of the law, the latter so as not to partake of any meat in violation of the Christian rule; this latter seems stricter, because for the Maccabees partaking of pork was utterly forbidden, but for these men it was permissible to partake of any meat under necessity, as St Basil says. But since the order from the Scythians was aimed at the rejection of the faith, they refused; but they considered all things as secondary for the love of Christ. O blessed men! O blessed action! in a single instant to have received in exchange eternal rest! What will they say to this, those who deny that heretical communion is a breach of faith? For if there there was a breach of faith by the people over eating meat, how much more here over the heretically sacrificed communion. Where too are those who say that there is no ground for martyrdom in the image of Christ? For if there there was ground for martyrdom for those who did not eat meat, how much more here is the ground for martyrdom resplendent for those who have not denied. But the heretics, because they are dark themselves, also speak things that are dark as they try to embroil others in their own falls.

But let us, brethren, glorify our good God, who glorifies those who have glorified Him, who reveals martyrs in this generation too, as we reflect on the fact that if men who were apparently lowly, uneducated, married and with children gave everything up for the love of Christ, how much more should we, who are unmarried and outside the world, when the moment calls, become as zealous as the saints. But this is for a day when Christ calls us; now though, let us stand firm for the uninterrupted martyrdom according to the conscience. Let us not bow the knee to Baal, brethren, and let us not give in when struck by thoughts [logismoi], but let us rather quench the fiery arrows of the evil one with tears, with supplications, with compunction, with the other batterings of the body, so that we too may be able to say with the Apostle, 'Every day I die, that is as certain as the boast in you, which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord' [1 Cor. 15:31]; and with the holy David, 'Because for You we die all the day, we were reckoned as sheep for the slaughter' [Ps. 43:23]. With them may we be found worthy to become heirs of the kingdom of heaven, in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory and might, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, now and for ever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

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