Monkey Business

In an apocalyptic-sounding turn of events, the Governor of New York – the state in which I presently reside – declared a State Disaster Emergency (yes, all three words are capitalized) in response to the monkeypox outbreak. It is the same type of declaration as was issued when hurricane Ida struck NYC. In addition to the governor’s getting some political “street cred” for being proactively on top on things, local healthcare authorities will get reimbursements from the state’s budget for actually fighting the disease. And considering that our emergency medical services are not collapsing from an influx of monkeypox patients, it seems to me that most of my taxpayer’s share of the response will be spent on “raising awareness.” Therefore, preemptively and completely free of charge for the State, I decided to raise my own awareness of this ongoing Disaster Emergency.

First, I was quite happy to discover that the risk of my contracting this Disastrous Emergency of a disease is virtually non-existent. No, it is not because I have been vaccinated against smallpox as a child – although, I have been – or because I was lucky enough to become a recipient of the newly-released stockpile of the Jynneos vaccine – I was not, nor do I plan to be so lucky – but for a very different reason. This reason is not for the squeamish; so, if your sensibilities are easily offended, or you are of the age of innocence (and if you immediately thought of Joshua Reynolds, you probably are at heart), you may wish to read this post no further.

Monkeypox, we are told by the NYDOH, is “spread through close, intimate contact,” That is to say, if a parent cuddles a child for a bed-time story, the disease may spread, if either the parent or the child happens to be infected. Likewise, two Greco-Roman wrestlers may pass the disease to each other during a match. But surprisingly, it is not singlet-clad wrestlers or bed-time story lovers who are getting and spreading monkeypox. According to the New England Journal of Medicine, upwards of 95% of all cases have been transmitted during sex between men; or as Governor Hochul put it, in “certain at-risk groups”; while as of July 20 only 2 (yes, two – as in, “one, two”) infected individuals in all of the U.S. have self-identified as straight. (In any case, while our government seems to be incapable of defining a woman, it is refreshing that it knows what a man is, at least, when he has sex with other men.)

Some may immediately declare that God is punishing gays, but I think it is much more interesting to try to ask why a disease that is spread by “close, intimate contact” is not spreading among heterosexual people who routinely engage in such contact. Simply being a homosexual should not magically make one infected with monkeypox or HIV. In a true spirit of equality, both diseases are perfectly capable of infecting anyone without any regard for age, sex, sexual orientation, or gender identity. And yet, in the United States, both monkeypox and HIV have mostly affected “certain at-risk groups.” But why?

Commenting on this inexplicable health disparity, The Washington Post opined, “this is what disparities look like in accessing testing, vaccines and treatment for monkeypox.” Can this really be true? Can it be that everybody – parents, children, seniors in retirement homes, even Greco-Roman wrestlers – are getting tested, vaccinated, and treated for monkeypox as we speak, but men who have sex with men are not, especially in San Francisco and New York City, as if these were the two most intolerant places in all of the united States? I hope that the author of this opinion and his editor do not actually believe this nonsense and are instead engaged in propaganda. I can understand propaganda; but in this case, it is not helpful. Imagine that you have a gambling problem, and you spend so much money that you can no longer afford to pay your mortgage or your utilities or to buy food. And imaging saying to your wife: “This is what disparities look like in accessing housing, electricity, and groceries.” No, not helpful. If you refuse to name the real problem, you cannot hope to solve it. If instead of addressing your gambling addiction you decide to join a group called Gamblers for Equal Access to Housing, your bank is not likely to be impressed.

The real problem that makes “certain groups” at-risk is not their sexual orientation. Women who have sex with women, for example, do not appear to be driving the numbers of monkeypox infections, even though they are the L in LGBTQ; and presumably, neither do those women who happen to identify as men and are thus the T. In order to better understand what may be happening with monkeypox, it is instructive to take a look at the similar and in-many-ways-related HIV epidemic in Africa. In sub-Saharan Africa, some countries, such as Botswana, for example, report more than 40% of all adults – most of whom are heterosexual – infected with HIV; and in Fracistown, around 50% of pregnant women test positive for HIV – these are pregnant women who have sex with men who have sex with women. According to an article published in the Discover magazine (Feb. 2004), the reason for the HIV epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa is quite simple – at least, mathematically. As far back as the 1980s, “Australian demographer John Caldwell insisted that the virus was spreading rapidly in Africa simply because people there tended to have more sexual partners than people elsewhere.” Apparently, this was not self-evident enough to policy makers at the time, and a search for a more convoluted and implausible explanation continued for several decades. “Recently, though,” the article continues, “some experts, including epidemiologist James Chin of the University of California at Berkeley, have revisited the theory. Chin believes it’s the only possible explanation: ‘People tell me not to say it, but I strongly believe it.'” The key discovery is that, for cultural reasons, people in sub-Saharan Africa tend to have many sexual partners concurrently – sometimes, 10 or more. For example, “Ugandan men and women had sex many times over many years with each of their partners. If one of those partners was HIV-positive, the relationship would prove very risky over time.” Thus, the maths are quite simple: if a person has only five partners at one time, and each one of them has five others, then the person in question is in a “once-removed” relationship with twenty-five people simultaneously, in addition to a “twice-removed” relationship with 125 people and a “thrice-removed” relationship with another 625, for a total of 775 people all at the same time – and we are only half-way to the six degrees of Kevin Bacon! Before too long, thousands of people are exchanging diseases with each other and creating an epidemic. I do not write this as a judgment of African cultures or values – far from it! – but rather as a condemnation of the Western response to the problem. Ignoring the real problem and pretending that the HIV epidemic in Africa is caused by a lack of condoms or pills or by poverty, and that we need to send more of condoms or corn to the continent, is strangely unintelligent. Gay men in the U.S. have a much greater access to both condoms and corn – at least, compared to the pregnant women in Botswana – and yet they also experience an HIV epidemic. Conversely, severely impoverished people in Afghanistan lack access to both American condoms and American corn, and yet there is no HIV epidemic in Afghanistan. One need not be well-schooled in the scientific method in order to suspect that scientists and politicians who refuse to address the real causes of the HIV and monkeypox epidemics are mostly engaged in monkey business.

In a previous post on same-sex marriage, I mentioned that a “quick internet research reveals that 28% of gay men have over 1000 sexual partners in their lifetime” and many others are not too far behind. Many of these relationships are concurrent, rather than consecutive. Whatever the definition of “concurrent” may apply in this situation, WHO experts believe that the present monkeypox outbreak “appears to have been caused by sexual activity at two recent raves in Europe.” Compare this to an article in Scientific American from June of this year that proudly reported: “In Chicago last month, thousands of gay men gathered for the first time in three years for the annual International Mr. Leather conference, a four-day-long affair where men from all over the world gathered to strut their stuff in leather gear, have lots of sex, and compete to be named International Mr. Leather… Gay men socialize in intimate ways in large groups—at saunas, at raves and at conferences like International Mr. Leather.” (An attentive reader will undoubtedly notice the relevant parts in this description.) In other words, the epidemic is driven by a lifestyle, not sexual orientation of persuasion as such. (Full disclaimer: I am not a medical professional, and you may wish to consult with your healthcare provider before engaging in “close, intimate contact” with your spouse or cuddling your children.) Curiously, the CDC appears to be on to this. In one list of recommendations (most of which are not suitable for reproducing here), one finds the following statement:

Having multiple or anonymous sex partners may increase your chances of exposure to monkeypox. Limiting your number of sex partners may reduce the possibility of exposure.

Note that unlike other items on the list, such as “have virtual sex with no in-person contact,” the statement above is not in the imperative mood, not worded as a recommendation, but rather as a hedgy aside; and it is not helpful. Limiting from 1000 to 700 in a lifetime? Asking for a name before indulging? The mention of anonymity is especially puzzling, since it is impossible for me to ascertain precisely how anonymity contributes to the risk of infection, or how knowing someone’s name would mitigate that risk. Similarly, the WHO says that, “for men who have sex with men [it is recommended] for the moment, reducing your number of sexual partners, reconsidering sex with new partners, and exchanging contact details with any new partners…” Whatever precisely is meant by “reducing,” it is just “for the moment.” Oh, and don’t forget to get his number. I suppose, one cannot expect governments to be in the business of putting restrictions on people’s lifestyles, even if these lifestyles cause a Disaster Emergency… Oh, wait! Was it not in recent memory that our government shut down churches and prohibited people from visiting their elderly parents? Perhaps then, gay saunas and Mr. Leather events could also be re-considered. – Just a thought…

No, I do not think that God is punishing gay men with monkeypox any more than He punishes alcoholics with liver cancer or smokers with lung cancer. No one has died from monkeypox in the U.S., but almost 700 thousand people in the U.S. have died of heart disease in 2020 (twice the number of COVID deaths for the same year), yet there is no Disaster Emergency declaration for this lifestyle-related illness. Unlike “certain at-risk groups,” however, heart disease sufferers are not protesting and demanding that the government address their health concerns. Alcoholics are not demanding that the government spend money on developing a vaccine that allows them to binge-drink non-stop and still avoid health consequences. Smokers are not demanding that the government fund campaigns to fight against the social stigma of smoking. And diabetics do not demand that the taxpayers foot the bill for free salads for anyone addicted to sugary drinks. Yet “certain at-risk groups” hold protests and demand “quicker investment in our stockpile of monkeypox vaccines.” Even though lesbians are not yet affected by the disease, the National Center for Lesbian Rights is “demanding that the Federal government take action to stop the spread of hMPXV [human monkeypox virus – S.S.] and protect the health of LGBTQ individuals now” [the emphasis on now is theirs]. They are demanding that the federal, state, and local governments take “more immediate action” and warn that “a continued lack of urgency will not be tolerated.” It seems that the only thing not being demanded is an immediate change to the lifestyle that puts “certain groups” at risk.

Here are some curious maths: the rate of monkeypox infection, the dreaded and apocalyptic Disaster Emergency, in the U.S.is at 0.00157% – that is 15 ten-thousandth of one percent. The rate of obesity the U.S. (not counting the overweight numbers – just the obese ones), is at 43% – almost 29 thousand times higher. No deaths from monkeypox have been reported in the U.S., but at least 300,000 deaths per year linked to obesity have been reported as far back as 20 years ago, and this number only continues to grow. Imagine if all the chubby Americans descended on Washington and demanding that the federal government do something – spend more money, raise more awareness, develop more vaccines – in order that more body-positive Americans could eat all the doughnuts and drink all the soda they want with no health consequences of any kind! Perhaps, we should.

As much as I am not in favor of government meddling in people’s lives, especially, in how or with whom people engage in “close and intimate contact,” it would be very amusing to see the CDC mandate that men who have sex with men maintain social distancing of six feet, wear personal protective equipment, and to impose a limit on attendance at Pride and Mr. Leather to twenty-five or fewer. (The rest of the attendees could join by Zoom, of course.) Only for two weeks – to flatten the curve.

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What Is Good and What Is Bad?

It is a rather strange phenomenon when black-and-white meanings or all-or-nothing interpretations are assigned to sacred texts. Am I the Publican or the Pharisee? Am I the Prodigal Son or the Elder Son? Even the obvious ambiguity of the text is often brushed aside, overlooked, or explained away. Christ said that the Publican went down to his house justified. Some have advised to imitate the Publican lest one is condemned with the Pharisee (see Amma Syncletica [Apophthegmata Patrum] among many others). But Christ did not actually say that the Pharisee was condemned. Perhaps he was, but this is not self-evident to me. (It is certainly good advice to imitate the Publican, though solely in his repentance – an emphasis that necessarily must be made.)

The Danger of Academic Christianity

It is not uncommon to hear the comment from those outside the Church that Christians seem to be no different from most secular people or from non-believers. Christians recognize this problem as well and often retort that while the Church is indeed “spotless and without blemish” (Eph 5:27), the people who make up the Church “have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom 3:23). It is often said that the Church is like a hospital that is naturally full of sick people. Indeed, even such holy men as Saint Macarius the Great prayed: “O God, cleanse me a sinner, for I have never done anything good in Thy sight.” (Yet this should hardly be an occasion to propose that since such great saints never did anything good in the sight of God [and they would not fib or lie about that, would they?], then we are also justified in not doing anything good.)

On the Closure of Churches–3

Well, we have finally succumbed to the pandemic and held our first video discussion. I am still not live-streaming services (although I have done so, many years ago, for reasons completely unrelated to the current pandemic). The topic of our virtual discussion was the Eucharistic presence during the lock-downs, and what it means, or whether it is possible, to be present at the Eucharist via video chat. The participants in our discussion shared many interesting ideas and perspectives, and here are a few of my own afterthoughts.

A word of caution

First and foremost, we all seemed to agree that just because technology exists, that does not mean that it is good or appropriate by default. It seems that almost universally, almost without questioning, Orthodox churches began to live-stream services as soon as the various procurators and governors told us to do so. The situation was developing very rapidly, the technology was immediately available, and we dove in without an opportunity to question the very nature of what we were doing. Essentially, Facebook Liturgies caught us by surprise. On the one hand, some, like me, had already experimented with live-streaming for years–though never as an alternate way to “attend” services. On the other hand, we have all become very used to enjoying various audio and video recordings of everything church-related–from Liturgies to church choir concerts, and from Orthodox fiction to daily prayers. So, when we were told to log on for the Eucharist, we did not find this too objectionable. Yet the theological work of examining the spiritual safety and implications of these practices has not yet been done.

On the Closure of Churches – 2

See also:

On the Closure of Churches

Liturgical Minyan

Fasting During a Pandemic

My previous post “On the Closure of Churches” made some people wonder whether I am not taking the threat of the viral pandemic seriously, or whether I am advocating for some sort of disobedience to our civil authorities. I do not think that it is absolutely necessary for me to clarify my position. First of all, I try to make it abundantly clear that I am not a medical doctor, nor do I have any training in virology. Anyone who cares about what a non-expert like me thinks about such complex matters as pandemics, is making a serious error in his or her judgment. Secondly, not only did I not advocate for breaking social-distancing rules, but we, along with everyone else, have dutifully closed our services to the public and are in full compliance with all applicable government orders.

That said, however, I find it important to continue the conversation about the place in which the Holy Church finds Herself today. Should our only response to the government’s order to jump be in asking ‘how high?’ Or should we have a healthy degree of self-awareness and take personal responsibility for both our physical and spiritual health and needs? I trust it is obvious to everyone that the situation with the pandemic is developing very rapidly, and many things are in a state of flux. But here are a few things that I find important to observe and of which to be aware.

Fasting During a Pandemic

Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. — Lk 12:32

Today, the Holy Church venerates the Life-Giving Cross of Christ. Despite the raging pandemic, we continue our observance of Great Lent as we look forward to the Pascha of the Lord, His bright and glorious resurrection. As the mass media proclaims death in an overload of non-stop “news” about the coronavirus, the Church continues to proclaim life.

On the Closure of Churches

See also:

On the Closure of Churches – 2

Liturgical Minyan

Fasting During a Pandemic

Update 2020-03-21: On March 20, 2020 Illinois Governor Pritzker issued an executive order the prohibited “all public and private gatherings of any number of people occurring outside a single household.” Thus, the order prohibits all and any religious activities or services, unless officiated by members of a single household, and shuts down all churches. Strangely, this order exempts liquor stores and recreational cannabis dispensaries (presumably, due to their essential function). [*] 

2020-03-20: In a surreal move, governors of several states banned religious worship. The governor of Wisconsin, for example, specifically included religious worship in his ban on gatherings greater than 10 people (which naturally applies to all but the very smallest mission congregations and would have banned even Christ Himself from congregating with His 12 apostles), while the governor of New York banned all “non-essential” gatherings of any size. (It is unclear at this point whether Andrew Cuomo would consider the celebration of the Eucharist–even by just one priest and one chanter–to be essential, but my best guess is that he would not.)

The Dread Judgment: Reading Matthew 25:31-46

³⁴ Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: ³⁵ for I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: ³⁶ naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me. ³⁷ Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink? ³⁸ When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee? ³⁹ Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? ⁴⁰ And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. 

Today’s Gospel reading should be very uncomfortable for two kinds of people. First, it should bother the clergy. We know what people should and should not do, what they should and should not eat, how much and how often, when they should pray and which prayers they should say and in which order, which Hours precede the Divine Liturgy and which follow. [*] We even know precisely when and how the people must make the sign of the cross–down to exactly how they must fold their fingers–and how low to bow, depending on the ranking of the saint commemorated on a given day. In other words, we, the clergy, are too often the people of the rules, we deal in “mint and anise and cummin” (Matt 23:23), and we wish that the Lord said: “Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for ye observed the rules and fulfilled the obligations.” But, of course, this is not what the Lord said. In fact, in this passage, He did not say a single word about a single rule. “When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him” (Matt 25:31), He will not ask, “Have you pray’d to-night, Desdemona?” (Othello a. 5, s. 2) but, Have you given drink to the thirsty? Have you visited the sick? We, the clergy, the learned men of the cloth, can tell you when shrimp is allowed, but can we tell you how to feed the hungry? 

By Prayer and Fasting

With Great Lent now fast approaching, the topic of fasting is on our minds once again. In my previous posts, I discussed some of the practical aspects of fasting, including my belief that fasting without prayer is akin to prostrations without prayer–both may be very beneficial to our physical health but quite separate from spirituality. Thus, no discussion of fasting can be complete without a discussion of prayer.

“A piece of bread and a cup of wine…”

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Typikon, ch. 48: “If the Eve of Theophany falls on a Saturday, after the dismissal of the Liturgy, we eat a piece of bread and drink a cup of wine. We eat a complete meal with oil after the dismissal of vespers. But cheese and eggs and fish we dare not touch.”

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See also:

Putting My Mouth Where My Writing Is

“He was afterward an hungered.” (Matt 4:2)

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Putting My Mouth Where My Writing Is

Having now written quite a number of posts on fasting, I found myself asking the age-old question: “What lack I yet?” (Matt 19:20) And the answer seems quite obvious. The internet is chock-full of pastoral advice on any number of issues, including fasting. Yet, it is not always apparent whether the pious blogologians (блогословы) themselves follow their own advice. Sadly, Christ’s warning still applies to too many of us: “all therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do; but do not ye after their works: for they say, and do not” (Matt 23:3).

The reason for this uncertainty is very much understandable. In Orthodoxy, we are conditioned to be not “as the hypocrites” who “disfigure their faces, that they may appear unto men to fast” (Matt 6:16) or as the Pharisee who went to a public place and prayed: “‘O God, I thank Thee,’ and then some foolish words” (Great Canon, Wednesday, Ode 9). There is great danger in publicly advertising one’s accomplishments–whether real or imagined–and equally one’s struggles and weaknesses. But there is also a danger in turning Christianity into an exercise in hypothetical theoretics, when on the one hand people split virtual-reality hairs over “mint and anise and cumin” and omit the “weightier matters” (Matt 23:23), and on the other hand they talk about the path which they have not walked and do not know. And if one leads another along a path that he does not know himself, it may just happen that “both fall into the ditch” (15:14).

“And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us” (Ps 90:17): 3. Saint John

 

Lo, Thy care for thy flock in its sojourn prefigured the supplication which thou dost ever offer up for the whole world. Thus do we believe, having come to know thy love, O holy hierarch and wonderworker John. Wholly sanctified by God through the ministry of the all-pure Mysteries and thyself ever strengthened thereby, thou didst hasten to the suffering, O most gladsome healer, hasten now also to the aid of us who honor thee with all our heart. (Troparion to St. John, Tone 5)

In March of 2018, six months after hurricane Maria struck Puerto Rico and my family was evacuated off the island, I finally received a transfer and was able to move to Wisconsin and reunite with my family.

“He was afterward an hungered.” (Matt 4:2)

At the beginning of the Nativity Fast, it seemed appropriate to offer to my parishioners a few encouraging words about fasting. Being quite busy at the time, I decided to look over some of my previous posts on fasting and send out a link. After all, Christians have been fasting for two millennia (and humans in general for much longer than that). Why should there be a new blog post every time? What new thing can I say that has not already been said?

Having looked over my previous posts–alas!–I found nothing that I myself thought meaningful. It is not that there were no good points or pious-enough exhortations in those posts.  But nothing seemed to quite hit the mark. Over the past two weeks, since the beginning of the fast, I have browsed the internet in search of something profound to edify myself and the flock, but found more of the same. To be sure, this likely, at least in part, points to some of my personal unanswered questions, rather than a lack of homiletic talent of the various authors who toil in the virtual vineyard. And yet, since the esteemed pastors and theologians find the need to continue to write and speak on this matter, perhaps someone else is struggling with the same questions, answers to which I find sorely lacking in the contemporary pastoral approach to fasting.

The Chair Recognizes the Gentlelady?

Since English is not my native tongue, it is sometimes amusing to play with words. The present culture of political correctness makes this exercise ever more fun and even a little funny.

“And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us” (Ps 90:17): 2. The Ride

I suspect that some stories about miraculous help at the intercession of saints are factually incorrect. (Although, this does not necessarily mean that they are untrue, as there is a great deal of difference between what we presently consider to be facts and the Truth.) I myself have been the subject of such “fake news” at least on one occasion. It was reported on the “world wild web” that a child had been miraculously brought back from the dead by the intercessions of Saint John of Shanghai, and that I, utterly unworthy that I am, was somehow involved. This report was mostly factually incorrect.

“And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us” (Ps 90:17): 1. The Covering

Some stories are best written down. If not, in time they are forgotten or distorted, and even the people whose stories they are can no longer agree on what happened or whether it happened at all. How many of these stories have already been forgotten and will never add to the beauty of our human experience in this world? To remember is not simply to archive or to catalogue, but to make real and meaningful. Some things in life are too beautiful to forget, or archive, or to catalogue. Thus, I shall now attempt to keep them diligently, “lest [I] forget the things which [mine] eyes have seen, and lest they depart from [mine] heart…” (Deut. 4:9)

“But the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still…” – Exodus 23:11

There are passages in the Scripture that we read, and remember, and even mention in various contexts without truly comprehending their significance. (I rather suspect that this phenomenon can be observed not exclusively with respect to the Scripture but somewhat in general with respect to much of what we read or say.) It is in this particular way that a passage from Exodus recently caught my attention.

Saint Peter the Fisherman

In popular forms of Orthodoxy, Saint Peter the Fisherman is sometimes seen as the patron saint of fishermen–a very relevant connection for those of us living in Wisconsin. In times past, when most people lived closer to the earth rather than on the concrete slabs which are our modern cities, on the feast day of the Holy Apostles, fishermen gathered in churches for special prayer services in honor of Saint Peter the Fisherman. Perhaps, a more sophisticated mind will quickly correct the simplicity of the village fisherman and point out that it is God, not Saint Peter per se (albeit, by the prayers and the intersessions of Saint Peter–sure!), Who grants us the fruits of our labors, including the toils of the fisherman. But sophistication does not always correspond to supreme wisdom. In his simple way, the fisherman believes that Saint Peter surely knows first hand what it is like to “toil all night and bring home nothing” (cf. Lk 5:5). And it is the eagerness of Saint Peter to follow the word of Christ that continues to inspire the fisherman: “Nevertheless at Thy word I will let down the net” (ibid.). And so it is with many of us: even after fishing all night and catching nothing, we would still rather be fishing–especially, since Christ Himself urges us to go back out and fish some more!–because maybe–just maybe!–with God’s blessing and by the prayers and the intersessions of the Holy Apostle Peter, we too can catch “a great multitude of fishes” (6).

More Thoughts On Abortion

With the preparations for a challenge to Roe v. Wade underway, the amount of abortion-related talk in the media is overwhelming. What is painfully frustrating is the refusal of the pro-abortion protesters to be honest. A difference in opinion can be discussed, understood, even respected, but it is absolutely impossible to engage on any meaningful level when one side of the conversation refuses to acknowledge basic reality and insists on a delusion. Of course, I can assume that most of them are not actually delusional. I rather suspect that they are perfectly normal and intelligent people. But if this is so, why can we not get past the obvious fact that a human baby is a human being ? I have a couple of ideas.

“The days of our years are threescore years and ten” — Psalm 90:10

When I was in my early 20s, it seemed that I understood everything, and if I was wrong at times, it seemed to be no more than anyone else. Now, in my 40s, I look at the 20-year-olds and they seem immature, silly even, lacking in life experience. This is not to say that they do not have good ideas, insights, inspiration, courage, and all that. Of course, they do! But just look at your 5-year-old. She also has good ideas, insights, inspiration, courage, and all that… but she is still only five, and you look, and smile. I often find myself looking at the 20-year-olds and smiling (or grimacing–depending on what they are up to).

And this made me wonder, are the 60-year-olds looking at us, the 40-year-olds, and smiling or grimacing at our lack of maturity and life experience?

And even more interestingly, are the 80- and 90-year-olds looking at all of us–the whole world–and smile, grimace, or just shake their heads? And just imagine how much head-shaking the 900-year-old Adam had to do looking at those silly 80-year-olds around him!?

 

 

“By your patience you will possess your souls.”

Today we celebrate the last Sunday of Great Lent. Next week, with the Entrance of our Lord into Jerusalem, our journey ends, and God’s journey–the path of passion–begins.

On this last Sunday of Lent, the Church celebrates the memory of Saint Mary of Egypt. We are all very familiar with the story of her life, and I will not retell it here. But what are we to learn from it? Why does the Church remind us about this wondrous saint every year at the height of our lowly efforts in asceticism? I think that two themes in the life of Saint Mary can be helpful to us: the power of fasting, and the power of patience.

No peeking, Lady Justice!

A curious case was argued in the U.S. Supreme Court on March 20th of this year–Flowers v. Mississippi (Docket No. 17-9572). Thanks to a very popular APM podcast, many people are well-aware of the basic facts of this case. But it is neither the facts nor the evidence of the case that is being questioned at the Supreme Court; it is the possible Batson violation perpetrated by the prosecution. In other words, the counsel for Curtis Flowers argued that the District Attorney Dough Evans who prosecuted the case repeatedly used his peremptory strikes to eliminate Black potential candidates from the jury just because they were Black. If the Court rules in Flowers’ favor, his conviction for a quadruple homicide will be overturned not because he happens to be innocent of the crime–the issue of his guilt or innocence is not at all of any importance in the case before the Supreme Court–but because Black candidates were eliminated from the jury.

The First Sunday of Great Lent

Glory to God! We have completed the First Week of Great Lent. For many people, the First Week of Lent is when they try to fast or pray more than they are used to, but the rest of Lent until the Passion Week is somewhat less strict. Psychologically, this is quite understandable: there is still almost a month and a half until Passion Week–a period of time that is too long for most people to continue to maintain the same intensity of asceticism. And so, many of us revert back to DEFCON 4 or even 4.5–maintaining some notion of the fact that we are still in the middle of Great Lent, but otherwise re-entering our normal everyday routines. For most lay people (and I have no business writing to or about monastics, since I myself have never been one) this is very much normal and to be expected.

Great Lent: An Instruction Manual

See also: 2010- Forgiveness Sunday

It is that time of year again, and the internet is filling up with homilies and musings on the theme of Great Lent. It seems that every year the messages are the same: be kind, pray more, fast more–and, by the way, here are a few Lenten recipes to die for. On the one hand, the repetitions are understandable.

First, what more can be said that has not already been said over the centuries? Any modern writer who wishes to write about Lent inevitably has to take into account the very same writings of the very same great saints that every other writer has been reading and quoting for a millennium. Of course, there are some occasional extravagant takes on the issue of Lent. One priest posted an opinion, not altogether unfounded, on a reputable web resource that goes roughly as follows: “Lent is not about food. If you want yogurt, eat your yogurt. If you want a beef cutlet, eat your beef cutlet. Just don’t devour your neighbor.”

“The kingdom of God is within you.”

It is true that the perfect do not need rules and laws. But this is not because they are lawless, but because the Lawgiver Himself dwells in their hearts.

See also

God, Be Merciful To Us, Sinners

“On the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector.”

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On this the first Sunday of the Lenten cycle, we hear the story of the publican and the Pharisee. The story is a well-known one, and we hear it year after year. There is no great need to talk about it at length today, but to, perhaps, briefly remind ourselves some of the most important lessons from this story.

The first lesson is obvious: do not look at outward appearances. Put in modern Orthodox terms, the Pharisee is an observant Orthodox man who goes to church every Sunday and also on holidays, he observes all fasts and also Wednesdays and Fridays, he donates money to the church and maybe serves on the parish council. Everything this man does is good, and it is in our nature to assume that he is a good man.

The second man, the publican, is the exact opposite. In the United States, we do not have the exact equivalent of a person who collects taxes for an occupying pagan military by threatening and mistreating local residents, but we can, perhaps, imagine a job that would be seen by most modern Orthodox Christians as “unclean.” Imagine, for example, someone who writes grants for Planned Parenthood or something similar. He spends his time in the company of sinners, pagans, and atheists; he does not go to church very often; does not observe any fasts; and he is more interested in getting his Easter basket sprinkled with holy water than in participating in any parish building projects. By all outward appearances, we would not think of him as a good Christian.

On the Value of Human Life

In my previous post, I brought up the complexity of our view of the value of human life. For example, the good people of the State of New York, who are celebrating their new “fundamental right” to kill their own child on the very day the child is to be born (or on any prior day), find it inhumane to execute violent criminals. To be precise, the death penalty was first suspended in New York due to a technicality. Steven LaValle, who one Sunday morning raped a jogger and then stabbed her more than 70 times with a screwdriver and was sentenced to death, took his case all the way to the New York Court of Appeals. The court invalidated his death sentence due to the unconstitutionality of some of the jury instructions. Since then, for what is now more than two decades, the good people of New York have not only continued to take good care of Mr. LaValle at the cost of tens of thousands of dollars each year, but they have also continued to elect lawmakers and politicians who are either against the death penalty or refuse to be for it. In other words, New Yorkers appear to believe two seemingly-contradictory things: that it is inhumane to kill people–even if those people are violent criminals who have caused unimaginable suffering to other people, and that it is perfectly acceptable to kill children if their mere existence might cause some emotional distress or inconvenience to the mother (and what child does not?!).

Abortion: Truth in Advertising

Two opposing things happened almost simultaneously a short while ago–the March for Life in Washington and the signing of the Reproductive Health Act in New York. Much has been said on the issue, and much more of the same will continue to be said. It is hardly possible to say anything that has not already been said. But the mere fact that two such different events can happen at the very same time shows that the two sides in this debate are no closer to hearing each other. In fact, it appears that they are growing further apart. One mechanism that enables the widening of this divide is the linguistic spin being put on the issue of abortion. Each side creates its own narrative that appears to reflect a fictional world that does not actually exist.

Behold the Lamb of God!

People were leaving their sinful cities–cities full of noise, dirt, passion, intrigue, rat race, lack of meaning and purpose, desperation, disease, poverty, and excess–and walking out to the Jordan River, to the one crying in the wilderness, to be baptized by him, to be washed of their iniquities, to be cleansed of their transgressions in all their sins. They entered the river spotted and blemished with sin, and the waters took their filth upon themselves. If their sins were akin to dry leaves floating on the surface of the river, they would be carried by the current down toward the Dead Sea and mix there with the ancient sins of Sodom and Gomorrah, making the sea even more salty, more bitter, more dead.

On the Government Shutdown

Most people who know me know that I work for the U.S. Department of Justice which is currently affected by the government shutdown. So, if you personally did not know anyone affected by the shutdown, now you do. Sure, it is very difficult to go without a paycheck and quite possibly without two or more paychecks in a row. Unlike federal employees who are actually furloughed–that is to say, they do not go to work–and can get temporary jobs, apply for unemployment, etc., I and my co-workers still have to go to work every day–we just do not get paid. Eventually, there will be back-pay. Grocery stores and gas stations, however, still seem to want money today for the bread or the gasoline that I need to buy today.

Quo vadis?

As the New Year approaches, many of us think about what is lacking in our lives and what we want to change. One of the most common attempts of resolving the dissonance between our real life and the one we want to have consists of the so-called New Year’s resolutions. These resolutions are notoriously broken and abandoned in the very first weeks of January, but this points to flaws in their implementation, rather than in the idea itself. The main idea—namely, that if one wants to change something in one’s life, one must do something about it—is very much correct. This idea is both intuitive and supported by life experience. If, for example, I want to leave the room, I must get up from my chair and begin to make steps toward the door—one step at a time. If I stay the course, it is guaranteed that I will make my way to the door and, in fact, leave the room.

A Brief Note on Fasting and How Christianity May Have Influenced Our Relationship with Meat

While many Orthodox Christians have already celebrated the birth of Christ on December 25 along with Roman Catholic and Protestant Christians, by most estimates, many more Orthodox around the world (most, in fact) continue to observe the Nativity fast in preparation for the Christmas celebration on January 7. And by most estimates, the Orthodox of any calendar persuasion fast for more than two hundred days each year.

“A more perfect union”: Thoughts on the Election Day

I went to vote last Tuesday. Many people did. And as I cast my vote, I remembered something that happened a very, very long time ago—almost too long ago to remember, something that almost seems as if it were from a different life.

I was a child growing up in the Soviet Union. It was an election day there as well. I was too young to vote, but an election day was a big deal, and I recall that very clearly.

Death to Halloween! (Very Scary!)

It is that time of year again when Orthodox and some other Christian writers attempt to warn people about the evils of Halloween. They assert—and I have done no less in my much younger days—that Halloween is a pagan holiday, and thus everyone who participates in its celebrations by default participates in the ancient Gaelic harvest festival called Samhain (“summer’s end”). As I grew older I saw that the people who dress up as princesses and Marvel super heroes have about as much to do with devil worship (for this is often the claim) as people who send each other Christmas cards or Easter candy have to do with worshiping Jesus Christ. This is all that I will say about it, and it may be a topic for another time. For myself, I still do not see any need to celebrate Halloween any more than I do the Chinese New Year, the Parinirvana Day, Eid-al-Adha, or Yom Kippur. But I am no longer interested in writing pseudo-pious articles linking my neighbors’ children to devil worshipers for merely dressing up in costumes any more than I am interested in condemning Russian Orthodox Christians for making (and partaking of!) pancakes on Maslenista, since pancakes are an ancient pagan symbol of the cult of the Sun (round, yellow, hot—reminds of anything?).

#MeToo Two

As the Kavanaugh saga unfolds (he has not yet been confirmed as of the moment of this writing), a few more thoughts and observations can be added to my previous post which is quickly becoming outdated. (Alas! Such is the nature of social commentary—it becomes outdated almost before it can be posted.) Ex-boyfriends and ex-girlfriends have been enlisted in the battle on both sides, false accusers have come forward and have been debunked, and someone even volunteered to take the blame for the assault on Christine Blasey by claiming that it was he, not Brett Kavanaugh, who attempted the assault in 1982. Of course, if true, this will be an accusation against Christine Ford for making a false accusation against Brett Kavanaugh. This nesting-doll-style carousel appears to follow the pattern on the first #MeToo-er, Asia Argento, who accused Harvey Weinstein, was then herself accused by another actor, who was then himself accused by an ex-girlfriend… “The whole world lies in the power of the evil one.” (1 John 5:19) And while it is best not to comment on the substance of the allegations, since most of us know nothing of this matter that our favorite website of network did not tell us, a couple of thoughts do come to mind.

#MeToo

I am a firm believer that everyone should generally limit his or her comments to his or her area of expertise. I have written on numerous occasions about the strange fascination among some Orthodox Christians with marital or child-rearing advice coming from monastics who have never themselves been married or raised any children. This rather odd tradition seems just as absurd as would seeking advice on leading a good monastic life from a married lay person. And so, in this brief note prompted by the unfolding scandal surrounding the confirmation process of Judge Brett Kavanaugh, I will do my best to avoid expressing any opinion on politics, which is clearly not my area of expertise.

Sex and Contraception in a Christian Marriage

Nota Bene: This is a discussion of human sexuality, including sex, contraception, and other related topics. If you are offended by such topics, you may choose to exercise abstinence and refrain from reading any further. On the other hand, if you choose to engage in further reading, some context for this discussion may be found in “There Is No Sex in the Church”—a collection of essays by Fr. Sergei Sveshnikov published in 2013.

The question of contraception within marriage is not new by any means. Perhaps the earliest biblical mention of birth control comes from the story of Onan and Tamar in which coitus interruptus was used to prevent conception (Gen. 38). No doubt, this time-honored method of contraception has been employed by couples since the time of Onan–approximately, three-and-a-half thousand years ago^[1]–and to the present day. Other contraceptive techniques were also used throughout the centuries and are continued to be used in present times (a pious reader above a certain age, no doubt, will be able to imagine some of the sexual techniques that are incompatible with conception).^[2]

In recent decades, humans have been enjoying “better living through chemistry” (as well as a better understanding of physiology), and a wide variety of contraceptive pharmaceuticals and devices have appeared on the market. These new advances in contraception have been employed both by non-Christian couples (who are not the subject of this discussion) and Christian couples alike—with or without the blessing of the Church. The stance of the Orthodox Church on every type of sexual behavior which differs in any way from the so-called “missionary” position was quite clearly formulated by monastics and celibates in the Middle Ages.^[3] Regardless of whether mediaeval monastics and celibates should ever be viewed as experts on spousal intimacy, medical advances (as well as many other factors) of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries forced the Church to re-evaluate its positions on sex and contraception within a Christian marriage. As Breck notes, “Orthodox bishops and priests today usually acknowledge that married couples may need to practice a form of family planning that includes some method of birth control.”^[4]

frus·tra·tion

frus·tra·tion

frəˈstrāSH(ə)n

noun

–the feeling of being upset or annoyed, especially because of inability to change or achieve something

Why are men so preoccupied with heaven and hell? Especially, hell? Why are so few preoccupied with Jesus? They have some incoherent notion of wandering around in heaven, along streets of gold, in and out of pearly gates, from mansion to mansion, visiting their dead relatives, with absolutely nothing else to do for the whole eternity. The notion becomes only slightly more coherent with respect to hell: worms, fire, frying pans, demons with horns and tails and forks, etc. They will tell you all of the warning sings of the coming of the antichrist–including his nationality and hair color–but few are watching for the signs of the coming of the Christ.

Where is the man who just wants to be with Jesus–not in heaven, not out of hell, but with Jesus? Where is the man who says, “I do not want heaven, I do not care about hell; I want Jesus”? Where is the man who is ready to follow his Lord to the moon and back, even to the edge of the earth? Where is the man who says, “If in order to be with Jesus, I must go to hell, I will gladly go there and be burnt a thousand times–just to be with my Lord”?

What a consumerist attitude–“Accept Jesus in order to avoid the fires of hell and inherit life in heaven!” “For God so loved the world” that He came all the way to earth in order to be with us, all the way to poverty, to hunger, to thirst, to weariness. He came to serve, to wash feet, to be rejected, tempted, tested, arrested, beaten, tortured and killed. If, in order to find His lost sheep, Jesus had to descend into the very abyss itself, did He not do that? Did he not choose His beloved over the comforts of heaven? Sure, He is eternally risen, but He is also eternally crucified. And men respond by “accepting” Him in order to gain eternal comforts and to avoid eternal discomforts?!

Imagine a man who plans to get married, and instead of saying to his beloved, “I want to be with you because I love you,” he says, “I want to be with you because I want to have my meals cooked, my house cleaned, my socks washed, and I want to have sex regularly.” Even we, fallen humans, do not say this to our beloved. In our best moments, we say, “I want to be with you because I love you–for better or for worse, for rich or for poor, in sickness or in health…” Why do men not extend the same idea of love toward God, and are instead obsessed with getting stuff out of God–as if He has not given enough already?! Scared of hell?–accept Jesus! Want eternal retirement in heaven?–accept Jesus! Problems in life?–Jesus will fix them!

This is not to say that there is no heaven or hell or problems. But this is to say that when God says, “I love you,” do men really have to ask, “What’s in it for me?”

Eugenics in the U.S.

I looked up some information on eugenics in the U.S. for one of my classes. That the U.S. had an active national eugenics program before Nazi Germany ever existed is well-known and not too interesting in and of itself. One part of this program, naturally, involved selective breeding of humans who were considered to be good specimens. But the other part was forcible sterilization of those who were unfit for procreation. The standards, charts, numbers and measurements to determine who was unfit can be easily looked up. It suffices to say here only that those people were usually disabled, poor, less intelligent (as determined by an IQ test) or incarcerated.

What is interesting to me is that California and Oregon, the two states one would typically associate with some social justice sensibilities, had the most prolific forcible sterilization programs. The last known one to have been carried out under what used to be known as The Oregon Board of Eugenics took place in 1981. California, where two thirds of all forcible sterilizations in the U.S. took place, did not stop the practice until 2010. Curiously, Texas did not have a single forcible sterilization (at least, none on record). Law protecting individual freedoms there were so strong, that they protected the disabled, the poor, the less intelligent and even the incarcerated from being forcibly sterilized.

“A friend is revealed in times of trouble”

Much has been written about original sin. The Scripture is quite laconic about what happened. Adam and Eve–they!–stole a piece of fruit. Surely, the original sin was not theft. Many correctly say that it was disobedience. But there has to be more–much more!–to the story. Making a rule just for its own sake, for the sake of obeying or disobeying it, seems petty. There are some beautiful, mystical explanations of the nature of the original sin offered by Father Kuraev and others, and I quite like them, but there is one aspect of it that has captivated my attention for a couple of days now.

On why we write

A Monday of a new year. A good time to take a closer look at the past and to plot a tentative course for the near future. And while looking at the past, I came to the realization that it may be necessary to examine the very basis of writing in general and theological writing in particular. I will try to explain.

Why do people write? I imagine that it used to be the case that people wrote because they had something to say. Nowadays, however, it is very difficult to answer this question. Some appear to write because they must–whether for a class they are taking, or for a conference in which they have been asked to participate, or because they hope to get paid for their labors, or for some other such reason. But what if all of these reasons suddenly disappeared? Would many of us still write? Even more importantly, do many of us actually have anything to say?

Have you fed the hungry lately?

At the Second coming of Christ, He will reward those who fed the hungry, visited the sick and the imprisoned, clothed the naked… We all know this Gospel passage. As Christians, we try to get involved in prison ministries and soup kitchens–and this is very important and well-deserving of our efforts. But pay close attention: when Christ addresses the righteous, they are genuinely surprised: “When have we ministered to you Lord?” Do you think that anyone involved in a soup kitchen can be genuinely surprised at Christ’s words? It is more likely that they will say: “Yes, Lord, I ministered to the hungry as if they were You, and I saw Your image in each of their faces.” The ones who are surprised are not the ones who were involved in Christian ministries and visited the prison inmates because it was a Christian thing to do. They are the ones who ministered to the needy out of a profound sense of oneness with them. If your child is hungry, you feed him because you are family, not because it is a Christian thing to do. When your brother is in prison you go there not because you participate in a Christian ministry or because you enjoy visiting inmates; in fact, you may hate going there, but you go anyway–because he is family. When we treat others as family, we do not expect to be rewarded for feeding them or visiting them in prison, we do not expect any reward for this and will be genuinely surprised to get any. If we let a stranger in not because he might turn out to be an undercover angel but merely because he is a fellow human being, he is family, then we have understood that to call God ‘Father’ means to call a stranger a ‘brother’–not in a “churchy” way, but quite literally.

“Imagine That” is now available on Kindle

Imagine That… 

Mental Imagery in Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Private Devotion 

a book by Fr. Sergei Sveshnikov

 

This work examines the use of mental imagery in private devotion in the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox traditions of prayer. The research is based on the writing of the saints of the two Churches, as well as on the analysis provided by some of the best theologians of the Russian Orthodox Church. The core of the argument is that the two traditions followed significantly different paths in their approaches to spiritual life. These differences exist in many aspects of devotion, but can be exemplified by the favorable view of the use of imagination in Roman Catholic prayer and the caution with which it is approached in the Eastern Orthodox Church. The difference in devotional paths and the standards of prayer that have been canonized through the glorification of saints by each Church may present a much bigger challenge to the dialogue between the two Churches than heretofore has been acknowledged. This work highlights the reality and significance of the differences between the two traditions and urges the continuation of the research within the framework of the dialogue between the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches.

Published with the blessing of His Eminence Kyrill, Archbishop of San Francisco and Western America, Russian Orthodox Church.

 NOW AVAILABLE ON KINDLE!

CLICK HERE TO ORDER THE KINDLE EDITION

CLICK HERE TO ORDER THE PAPERBACK

ISBN: 1-4392-2993-7

EAN13: 9781439229934

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Since the times of the Early Church, Christians have been very discriminate about their prayer and in whose company they choose to pray. Already in the Apostolic Canons (Canon 65, for example), a document arguably dating back to the end of the second century, both lay people and clergy are prohibited from praying with heretics under the threat of excommunication. Apostolic Canon 45 mandates: “Let any Bishop, or Presbyter, or Deacon that merely joins in prayer with heretics be suspended…” Similarly, Canon 33 of the Council of Laodicea (ca. 363-364 A.D.) says that “one must not join in prayer with heretics and schismatics.” Yet common prayer is one of the central goals of the contemporary ecumenical movement, including the ecumenical dialogue between Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches. Seemingly in defiance of the ancient canons, Catholic and Orthodox hierarchs have routinely joined each other in prayer, to the joy of the proponents of such practices and to the dismay of opponents.

Those working to make common prayer more common argue that the belief in one true God unites the different branches of Christianity and even those outside of the larger Christian community, thus all prayers ascend to the same divine destinations. Opponents often assert that heretics do not pray to the same God, but to the devil instead (cf. John 8:44). Thus, joint prayer is viewed as impossible (cf. 2 Cor. 6:15) or having the risk of accidentally addressing the wrong “authority”.

There is another point of view: if prayer is viewed not simply as locution or interlocution, but as an experience that is transformative for the devotee, even as a way or a mode of life, then it becomes easier to understand why those who doubt each other’s orthodoxy are so cautious about praying together. It is not the risk of accidentally addressing the “wrong” god that becomes central to warnings against praying with heretics, but the risk of being influenced by a way and a mode of life with which one may disagree, in other words, it is the risk to one’s spiritual health. (Imagine That… : Mental Imagery in Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Private Devotion, Introduction)

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Life as Liturgy: Making Life Whole

There Is No Sex in the Church!: On the Problematics of Sexuality and Gender In Orthodoxy

Break the Holy Bread, Master: A Theology of Communion Bread

Imagine That…: Mental Imagery in Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Private Devotion

Prayer: A Personal Conversation with God? What is prayer and why we pray.

Fasting for Non-Monastics [Kindle Edition]

Morning and Evening Prayer Rules in the Russian Orthodox Tradition

The Divine Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom: Parallel Slavonic-English Text

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Follow this link to see all books and articles by Fr. Sergei Sveshnikov: https://www.amazon.com/author/sveshnikov

“Life as Liturgy” Now Available on Kindle!

Life as Liturgy: Making Life Whole

by Fr. Sergei Sveshnikov

“…Thus, the problem of modern life can be identified more precisely not only as the absence of newness or transformation in the lives of most of the faithful, but also as the presence of a fracture which is seemingly caused by the very Orthodox praxis that is meant to heal and make our lives whole. The solution to this problem cannot lie in any one specific area. I do not think that our focus should be to urge people to take communion more and more often or to come for more and more church services. I also do not think that reading the Bible more or adding more akathists to one’s daily prayer rule is the solution. As wonderful and helpful those all of those things are, focusing on them, in my opinion, is the mistake of “placing the cart before the horse.” I think that our task as Christians is not in adding one religious observance or any number of them to our lives, but a full transformation of our lives from which prayer and the study of Scripture, frequent communion and the genuine desire to attend more church services flow naturally and organically…”

To order the Kindle Edition for just $4.49, please click here: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B017QQOV82

Follow this link to see all books and articles by Fr. Sergei Sveshnikov: https://www.amazon.com/author/sveshnikov

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There Is No Sex in the Church!: On the Problematics of Sexuality and Gender In Orthodoxy

Break the Holy Bread, Master: A Theology of Communion Bread

Imagine That…: Mental Imagery in Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Private Devotion

Prayer: A Personal Conversation with God? What is prayer and why we pray.

Fasting for Non-Monastics [Kindle Edition]

Morning and Evening Prayer Rules in the Russian Orthodox Tradition

The Divine Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom: Parallel Slavonic-English Text

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And… One More Reason to Fast!

When the Church calendar says “no wine,” observing this is not only good for your soul, but is also good for your health! 

1-month break from alcohol can ‘slash risks of cancer’ – study

Source: https://www.rt.com/uk/319772-month-break-alcohol-helps/

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Avoiding alcohol for just one month can slash the risk of developing life-threatening diseases such as cancer and diabetes, a new study has revealed.

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The study, carried out by University College London, found that a four-week break from alcohol can heal the liver function and lower blood pressure levels.

It also revealed that “going dry” for a month can lower one’s chances of developing cancer, diabetes and becoming obese.

As part of the study, researchers monitored 102 healthy men and women in their 40s taking part in a “dry January” campaign.

Beforehand, the women had been drinking an average of 29 units per week while men were consuming 31 units a week, both above the government’s guideline levels.

After the month of abstinence, participants lost nearly 6lbs (2.7kg) in weight and reported improvements in their concentration and sleeping.

Researchers also found that their “liver stiffness” – an indication of damage – had been reduced by 12.5 percent while their insulin resistance had decreased by 28 percent.

‘Substantial improvement’

Liver specialist Professor Moore said there was “substantial improvement” in the participants’ livers after their four-week alcohol break.

“These subjects were probably average drinkers – they drank in excess of the guidelines. We studied them before and after the dry month,” she told the Telegraph.

“There was certainly substantial improvement in various parameters of the liver. The other parameters, blood pressure, cholesterol, how well the subjects slept were also substantial,” she added.

Moore said public health bodies should be “interested” by the findings of this study.

“Does it have a sustained impact? We think we will find people drink less going forward.

“The next thing would be to extend the dry January beyond one month to two months, three months.”

According to the Times, the Department of Health is examining the study’s results as it prepares new guidelines on safe drinking.

‘Excited’ by findings

Liver specialist Gautam Metha, who oversaw the study, said she is “excited” as some of the findings are “pretty novel.”

“I am excited. There are some findings that will be pretty novel. It’s an important study which shows the benefit from a month’s abstinence. What we can’t say is how long those benefits are, how durable those benefits are,” the Daily Mail on Monday reported her as saying.

The National Health Service (NHS) advises Britons to consume not more than the recommended alcohol intake to avoid related diseases in the future.

Under the official alcohol unit guidelines, men should not drink more than 3-4 units per day and women should not exceed 2-3 units per day.

Alcohol’s hidden harms usually emerge after a number of years, when serious health issues, such as liver problems or high blood pressure can develop.

However, alcohol isn’t the only sugary treat that people should be avoiding.

‘Bacon and sausages major cause of cancer’

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has revealed that bacon, ham and sausages are a major cause of cancer.

The report, published Monday, said there is sufficient evidence to rank the meats as group 1 carcinogens because of a causal link with bowel cancer.

Head of the International Agency for Research’s monographs programme Dr Kurt Straif said the risk of cancer increases with the amount of meat consumed.

“For an individual, the risk of developing colorectal cancer because of their consumption of processed meat remains small, but this risk increases with the amount of meat consumed,” he said.

“In view of the large number of people who consume processed meat, the global impact on cancer incidence is of public health importance,” he added.

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Note: It important to remember that these studies and health facts have little to do with the Orthodox discipline of fasting. But the problem is that in many cases, modern Orthodox Christians began to understand fasting merely as a vegan or near-vegan diet. This is incorrect, but sadly, it is a fact of our modern Orthodox mindset. So, for those who wonder why we need to go on a vegan diet for a month-or-so a few times a year, there is at least one reason–it is good for your health!  

Why We Should Fast More!

After thoroughly reviewing the accumulated scientific literature, a Working Group of 22 experts from 10 countries convened by the IARC Monographs Programme classified the consumption of red meat as probably carcinogenic to humans (Group 2A), based on limited evidence that the consumption of red meat causes cancer in humans and strong mechanistic evidence supporting a carcinogenic effect. This association was observed mainly for colorectal cancer, but associations were also seen for pancreatic cancer and prostate cancer

WHO Press Release: http://www.iarc.fr/en/media-centre/pr/2015/pdfs/pr240_E.pdf

Processed meats pose same cancer risk as smoking and asbestos, reports say

Source: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/oct/26/processed-meats-pose-same-cancer-risk-as-smoking-and-asbestos-reports-say

The World Health Organisation is expected to issue new guidelines warning that processed meat products such as bacon and sausages are a cancer risk on the scale of smoking and asbestos.

Reports have claimed the UN’s health body will highlight the dangers of eating processed meats on Monday by putting bacon, burgers, ham and sausages on its list of cancer-causing substances.

Even fresh red meat is expected to be listed as unhealthy. According to the latest survey of the British diet, the average adult eats around 71g of red meat a day.

The warning on the “carcinogenicity of red and processed meats” is expected to come in a WHO and International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) evaluation published in the Lancet. The WHO has not denied the reports, but has said there was no leak of the findings.

The guidelines would bring the UN’s position in line with the World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF), which says there is convincing evidence that processed meat can cause bowel cancer.

But Dr Jill Jenkins, a GP and member of the Meat Advisory Panel, an industry sponsored body, said she would not be advising her patients to stop eating meat, but she did recommend caution over highly processed meat products.

“I think certainly that we should be keeping a low level, so everything in moderation,” she told the Today programme on BBC Radio 4.

“From the same body we have had advice about the carcinogenic effects of the air we breathe and the sun on our skin, so I think we have to take it within reason in that if you are stuffing in burgers and sausages and bacon every day, yes you are at risk.

“If you have some healthy, locally made high-protein sausage once a fortnight, well, I personally don’t consider that a risk.”

The Daily Mail, which reported on the WHO shift, said it had received the information from a “well-placed source”. In a note to the media, however, the WHO said: “Following random reports [on] Friday 23 October in the British press postulating on the outcome of the IARC evaluation on the carcinogenicity of red meat and processed meat, please note that there was no breach of embargo, as no embargoed material was shared with any news outlet, in Britain or elsewhere.”

See also: 

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/mar/07/cancer-risk-processed-meat-study

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/red-meat-bacon-hot-dogs-processed-meats-cause-cancer-dangerous-smoking/

http://www.wcrf.org/int/cancer-facts-figures/data-specific-cancers/colorectal-cancer-statistics

The Joy of a Life in Christ

When we speak about spiritual or religious things, all too often we use words without truly understanding their meaning. We speak of love, for example, but how many pause to ponder what it actually is? As priests, we repeat Christ’s commandments like a mantra to our parishioners: “Love God, love your neighbor, and love your enemies.” And our parishioners get the hint; they come back to us during confession and confess the sin of not having enough love. How many priests and parishioners ever stop to wonder just how one is to get more love? By being ‘nice’ (whatever this means)? No, this is not love, this is just being ‘nice.’ By being kind? No, kindness is very good, but it is different from love. By being polite? This very useful trait seems even further from the nature of love than is kindness. Perhaps by helping others? This also is not love, per se. What kind of commandment is it–to love–when there does not seem to be a good way to fulfill it, let alone an “easy and light” one (cf. Matt. 11:30)?

What is Wrong with Gay Marriage?: Random Quotes from an Unpublished Paper: Part 9

These are random quotes from an unpublished paper. I will post more quotes from the same paper every few days during the Dormition Fast (Old Calendar).

As a case study of how a liturgical understanding of marriage may be relevant to the realities of our lives, let us take a look at the “issue of the day,” same-sex marriage. We shall not discuss why society seems eager to promote same-sex unions. Whatever their reasoning is–some notion of fairness for all (why toward gays and not polygamists or zoophiles?) or society’s financial and legal support for gay unions (are gay unions a beneficial and stabilizing institution in our society to be supported and promoted?)–the Church has her own reasons.

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Furthermore, arguments based solely on scriptural prohibitions of same-sex acts have their own limitations. Some may be satisfied by saying that same-sex marriage is sinful because the Apostle Paul identified same-sex acts as sinful. But a more inquisitive mind may ask ‘why?’ And why is the Church so selective about the Scripture? Why do we allow divorce and remarriage, for example, which is nothing less than blessed polygamy, when Christ Himself prohibited it and called it adultery (Matt. 19:8-9)? Perhaps, a second marriage is just as sinful as same-sex acts, as the Apostle Paul indicated: “Do not be deceived; neither… adulterers, nor  sexual perverts [‘men who lie with men’–ἀρσενοκοῖται]… will inherit the kingdom of God” (1 Cor. 6:9-10). The second-century apologist Athenagoras put it very plainly: “He who rids himself of his first wife, even if she be dead, is an adulterer in disguise because he transgresses the hand of God, for in the beginning God created but one man and one woman.”

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Saint Basil the Great uses the word ‘polygamy’ (πολυγαμία) to refer to remarriage after divorce(canons 4, 50). He treats all marriages after the first, initial, marriage as sinful and different from one another only in the degree of sinfulness (canon 4). While seemingly tolerating at least some second marriages after a one-year-long excommunication of the newlyweds, Saint Basil notes that third marriages are ‘uncleanness’ (ρυπάσματα–canon 50), and anything beyond that is ‘animal behavior’ (κτηνώδες) and ‘worse than adultery’ (canon 80).

Marriage: Random Quotes from an Unpublished Paper: Part 8

These are random quotes from an unpublished paper. I will post more quotes from the same paper every few days during the Dormition Fast (Old Calendar).

In the Orthodox service, no vows are exchanged; after the initial inquiry as to whether the two people want to be married to each other (more on that later), they say absolutely nothing. They also do nothing: something is done to them–crowns are placed on their heads, they are led by the priest around the gospel stand, the common cup is given to them, even their wedding rings are placed on their fingers by other people.

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Marriage is not a sacrament because it is listed as such in the catechism, and it is not a sacrament because God blesses the couple in some general way.  We have noted earlier that sacrament brings transformation: it is not quantitative (whereby vows, blessings, certificates, etc. are added to the couple) but qualitative–the couple does not remain the same two people they were before the weddings but is transformed (“changing them by Your Holy Spirit” in the Eucharistic sense) into something they were not–a specific icon of Christ and His Church.

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Just saying this, however, does not make it so. Many–if not most!–of our Orthodox marriages do not resemble the icon of Christ and look very similar to whatever model of marriage our current society presents.

Random Quotes from an Unpublished Paper: Part 7

These are random quotes from an unpublished paper. I will post more quotes from the same paper every few days during the Dormition Fast (Old Calendar).

Many people understand confession also as a singular and sometimes rare event.  Some in the Russian Orthodox tradition only go to confession once a year.  Others may confess more often and even more or less regularly…  But let us replace the word ‘confession’ with the word ‘repentance.’  What is the difference?  Imagine a thief who proudly tells his friend about all the things he has stolen, and then goes and steals some more.  He has just confessed his sins—undoubtedly.  But has he repented?  Now imagine a Christian who goes to confession, names all his sins—he is well aware of them—and then goes and continues to live in sin without any intent to change his life.  Can this be considered a sacrament? Obviously not. While God is ready to erase the sins from this person’s life, the person does not want them erased, he wants to keep them.  He confesses them without any resolve to change his life, that is to say, without repentance. Jesus did not urge people to confess, but but to repent: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matt. 4:17). In other words, repentance, even without the rite of confession, is transformative and, thus, sacramental. Confession without repentance, on the other hand, is not sacramental insofar as it is not transformative.

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Repentance is transformational not only in the immediate sense associated with the rite of confession, but in the most profound and mystical return to the Tree of Knowledge. Adam sought divine knowledge, but his lust blinded him to the large sign at the entrance: γνῶθι σεαυτόν. Repentant man stands before the Tree, having learned both good and evil; through repentance he finally achieved the knowledge of who he truly is. He no longer treats the Gift as an object–good for food, a delight to the eyes, and advantageous to his personal success. Instead, he offers a “broken and contrite heart” to God, born out of the waters of the tears of repentance (Ps. 51:17), offers it as a priest bringing a sacrifice to the holy table; and by thus entering into the fullness of the likeness of his Creator, he participates in the fullness of communion with his God by becoming His Body. And so, it is no longer, “It is good for food” (Gen. 3:6), but, “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:28)

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The main sacrament, the sacramentum sacramentorum, is not what happens to the bread and wine of the Eucharist, awesome as that transformation is, but what happens to us when we unite so intimately with our God, when He enters into us even physically, when we carry Him in our bellies. The sacrament does not end when the church service is finished; at that time, it only begins.

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In order for there to be a good fruit of this union of man and God, in order that the two become one flesh, one Body, we must become what we eat, we must be transformed into the likeness of the self-sacrificial God. Thus, we must repeat that which we had said concerning every other sacrament and act that we have examined: communion is not when we get something, receive something, it is not an act of a consumer; rather, communion is when we give and sacrifice, when we become God’s priesthood, the “sacrificers” in the cosmic Liturgy. And it is ourselves that we are called to bring to the holy altar of God.

Random Quotes from an Unpublished Paper: Part 6

These are random quotes from an unpublished paper. I will post more quotes from the same paper every few days during the Dormition Fast (Old Calendar).

Many Orthodox lay people and even some clergy believe that once a person has been baptized as an infant, he remains Orthodox for the rest of his life.  This really should be the case: “We, then, enter the font once. Our sins are washed away once, for they should never be repeated.” But often it is not the case.  Baptism is the entrance into the Church—both as the mystical Body of Christ and as a human institution established by God.  But neither one of these is a prison, and anyone is free to leave at any time.

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In this context, we should all ponder the prayer of Saint Ignatius of Antioch: “Only request on my behalf that I may not merely be called a Christian, but may really be found to be one.”

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Archimandrite Ianuarii (Ivliev) noted another aspect of baptism. According to Fr. Ianuarii, Christian baptism closely resembles the rites associated with the transfer of slaves in the Roman empire. A newly-purchased slave was stripped of his old clothing, immersed in water in a symbolic death to his old master and re-emerged as a servant of the new master. This immersion was done in the name of the new master. New clothing was given to the newly-baptized slave, and he was then sealed with a seal or a brand of his new master. From that point forward, the slave belonged to the new master, served him, represented him, and also enjoyed his protection.

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Random Quotes from an Unpublished Paper: Part 5

These are random quotes from an unpublished paper. I will post more quotes from the same paper every few days during the Dormition Fast (Old Calendar).

In order to reclaim liturgical consciousness, we must strive for an entire paradigm shift in our lives. We have already mentioned the fact that for most Christians, elements of Christian observances seem to be secondary to the rest of their lives outside the church. Church services, prayer rules, Scripture readings, and changing diets (often mislabeled as “fasts”) are squeezed in among the primary obligations of secular lives–work, shopping, vacations, holidays, etc. People usually complain that they do not have time for prayer, or for attending church services, or that it is too inconvenient for them to fast; but hardly anyone ever complains that they cannot find time for work, or for a vacation, or that it is too inconvenient for them to eat bacon or ice cream.

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One instrument has been used consistently to both change the disposition of the heart and to demarcate liturgical acts: prayer. We observe a daily rule or prayer, which sanctifies the day and also marks the night as sacred time. But often, we do not properly understand the role of prayer in our lives. We feel that the sacred time in our day is the time spent in prayer.  We treat prayer as some form of obligation: 15 minutes for God, the rest of the day for myself.  Indeed, we often misunderstand religious obligations and see them in the same way as we see our social obligations.

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In other words, the sacred time of the day is not the time of prayer, but the time which is marked, framed, crowned by prayer—that is to say, the whole day itself.  A good example of this could be a beautiful chalice: as sacred and beautiful as it may be, it’s what’s inside that matters.  Or a beautiful temple—it is sanctified not by gold and glitter, but by the presence of God; and without God inside, it is merely a museum of beautiful architecture and fine arts.

Random Quotes from an Unpublished Paper: Part 4

These are random quotes from an unpublished paper. I will post more quotes from the same paper every few days during the Dormition Fast (Old Calendar).

We already touched on the central idea of sacrifice in Liturgy. To illustrate this idea, one needs to look no further than the Eucharistic service of the Church. We can remove the singing, the commemorations, and even the reading of the Gospel, and the sacrifice of Christ offered to His people will still preserve the liturgical character of what remains. But if we preserve all of the singing and the commemorations, and read the entire Gospel, and yet remove the sacrifice, then what remains is no longer Liturgy.

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God did not establish His flock in order to take care of priests and bishops. Neither did He establish His flock just so priests and bishops would have someone for whom to care.

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Christ is the Lamb of God. To say this is not to say that Christ is a cute fluffy animal that God enjoys for a pet. To say ‘the Lamb of God’ is to say ‘the animal which has been chosen to be slaughtered as a sacrifice.’

Random Quotes from an Unpublished Paper: Part 3

These are random quotes from an unpublished paper. I will post more quotes from the same paper every few days during the Dormition Fast (Old Calendar).

One implication of creation being Liturgy–not just participating in, but being–is that it is a communion with God and with all in God. We have already touched on the interconnectedness of man and creation in God. But what about the interconnectedness of men and women? So far, we have used the word ‘man’ to denote mankind or all of humanity. But by what mechanism or concept can we speak of mankind as one ‘man’? Clearly, there many ways to address this question–mankind as a biological species, or as a global society, or as an overarching cultural phenomenon–all of which can be viewed in a Christian theological context, but none of which directly speaks to the eartho-heavenly nature of mankind. What may bring us closer to that aspect of human unity is a closer examination of community through Liturgy and Liturgy as community.

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This “altogetherness” is the very essence of the sacrament of the Divine Liturgy. Earlier in our discussion we noted that a sacrament happens when the free will of God intersects with the free will of man. The resulting product of this synergic act is transformation.  What happens in the sacrament of the Body is not a quantitative change (one person added to another and yet another form a group of people in one place) but a qualitative transformation–it is no longer a mechanically-assembled group but an organic, living Body: “..send down Your Holy Spirit upon us [first–S.S.] and upon these Gifts… changing them by Your Holy Spirit.”

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Likewise, in Christ, all of humanity is saved and restored. Christ took into Himself one and only human nature. Male and female, Jew and Gentile can all be saved in Christ because they all share in the one and only human nature. If this were not so, if each person’s nature was unique and different, then in order to save male and female, Jew and Gentile, Christ would have had to become incarnate as each one of those natures and separately and individually the natures of each person ever born on this planet, but this is not so. By sharing in one nature with all mankind, Christ healed and restored this nature within Himself, and all who share this nature have the ability to partake of its renewal, all can change their family tree and become descendants of the New Adam.

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Random Quotes from an Unpublished Paper: Part 2

These are random quotes from an unpublished paper. I will post more quotes from the same paper every few days during the Dormition Fast (Old Calendar). 

I will use the word ‘mankind’ throughout to refer to all humans, both male and female. I will also use ‘man’ and ‘he’ to mean ‘human’ and ‘he/she.’ I do not do this from a position of male chauvinism–my writings on the equality of males and females in Christ speak for themselves. I do this out of concern that linguistic acrobatics may distract from the main points of the study. My Greek professor once told a joke. Someone noticed that there was ‘man’ in the word ‘woman,’ so they decided to change it to ‘woperson.’ But then someone noticed that there was ‘son’ in ‘person,’ and so the word was changed to ‘woperchild.’ My goal here is to no longer be distracted by whether the words ‘wo-man,’ ‘fe-male,’ or ‘s-he’ are inherently offensive and how they can be changed, but instead to focus on the main points of our study.

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Saint Irenaeus of Lyon wrote: “God formed Adam, not as if He stood in need of man, but so that He might have [someone] upon whom to confer His benefits.” Surely, these “benefits” are not gold, or material possessions, or entertainment, but communion with God Himself and the participation in His divine life.

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Communion with God, so intimate that man becomes the Body of Christ, is the essence of the Eucharist. Fagerberg goes even further in claiming that Saint Ephrem describes the story of Eden as a liturgical story:

“God expelled us from the environs of the tree of life lest we be eternally disfigured. Do not think we were expelled from Paradise because God was jealous of divinity and would not share it with anthropos. The Christian narrative is not the myth of Prometheus. The expulsion was on account of man and woman’s untimely grasping at that for which they were not prepared. The sin was not that man and woman took something which God never intended them to have; the sin was that the serpent convinced them to take it prematurely.

He deceived the husbandman

so that he plucked prematurely

the fruit which gives forth its sweetness

only in due season

— a fruit that, out of season,

proves bitter to him who plucks it.”

Paradise, and all that was within it, and the creation in which it sat had the purpose of both preparing man for the reception of God’s divine Gift and offering it to him in due time. This is also a liturgical model: the Liturgy both prepares man for the reception of God’s divine Gift and offers it to him in due time. But the Gift stolen without the process of “tilling and keeping” one’s heart is truly bitter: “Then after the morsel [given to him by Jesus], Satan entered into [Judas Iscariot]” (John 13:27).

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The intersection of God’s free self-sacrificial act of love for man  and man’s equally free self-sacrificial act of love for God constitutes the Liturgical sacrament. Elsewhere, I have written about a distinction between miracles, works of man, and sacraments. When God acts alone, it is a miracle; when man acts alone, it is a work of man; when the wills and acts of God and man intersect, it is a sacrament.

Random Quotes from an Unpublished Paper: Part 1

These are random quotes from an unpublished paper. I will post more quotes from the same paper every few days during the Dormition Fast (Old Calendar). 

It is often asserted that in the Early Church theologians did not write works merely for the sake of writing something. Rather, it is said, they responded when their faith was being challenged and wrote apologies and clarifications of Christian doctrine. I personally think that some people like to write, to think and to express their thoughts in writing. Even if the Christian faith had not been challenged by heresies and misunderstandings, I am certain that some people would still have written for their own benefit, if no one else’s, and the Church would still have the theology of Saint Clement, and the beautiful works of the Syriac mystics, and also Chrysostom’s On Virginity as well as Augustine’s Confessions. Nonetheless, writing purely for the sake of writing can lead one astray toward subjects irrelevant or even irreverent. When one is so enamoured with the sound of his own voice that he loses track of why he is speaking or writing, and the very act of speaking or writing becomes a pleasurable end in and of itself, then, perhaps, it is time to think about a career in creative fiction rather than Christian theology.

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In other words, the vision of Christian rebirth and transformation seems to be that of a completely new creation, total newness–the newness of time and space, of the meaning of life and death, even a new heaven and a new earth–all is to be new with, perhaps, some remnants of the old, such as dishes, or diapers, or an occasional physical illness to be patiently born as a cross in full realization of its temporal limitations and of the faith in the world to come which is without illness, sadness or sighing. However, what we see in reality is people who get baptized but not transformed or renewed. Their life remains the same as it was before the baptism, their worldview does not change, and neither do their values. A weekly Liturgy, or some shortened prayer rule, or a vegetarian diet during Great Lent is added to their otherwise-unchanged secular life. Their Christian transformation is quantitative rather than qualitative; their most frequent complaint is that they do not have the time for church services or prayer rules because they are trying to cram some elements or activities of a Christian life into a life already overstuffed with other activities. They are trying to live a double life and in the best-case scenario their life becomes fractured in the process: Sunday mornings are for church obligations, the rest of the week is for the obligations of the world, and the two do not intersect…

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…no one can serve two masters, for he will be devoted to one and despise the other (see Matt. 6:24). And this is exactly what happens–the add-on Christian obligations and activities become a burden: church services and prayer rules interfere with leisure time, they are seen and felt as an inconvenience; fasts “ruin” birthday parties and are a nuisance on secular holidays, unless one decides to dispense with the fast on those occasions and thus resolve the overlap of secular and religious activities in favor of the secular ones. Life becomes compartmentalized: one practices Christianity when one is in church or in church settings and secularism when one is at work or with friends who are not “church people.”

What to watch during Lent 2

Blessed Dormition Fast to you and yours! 

Here are some videos to watch during Lent. I will keep adding new ones as I find them.

Also, check out the videos in the previous post, “What to watch during Lent 1”

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BBC Horizons: “Eat, Fast & Live Longer”

Note the discussion of the “5/2” pattern about half-way through the documentary. Isn’t this what the Orthodox Church has been teaching for two millennia–fasting two days every week? 

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Study Notes: On the Sacramental Nature of Marriage

One of the obvious differences between the Orthodox and Western understanding of marriage is that in the West, marriage is what two people do, while in the East, it is something that is done to them. This difference is expressed in the wedding service. In the West, the two people give a set of vows, thus entering into a contract with each other. In the Orthodox service, no vows are exchanged; after the initial inquiry as to whether they want to be married to each other (more on that later), they say absolutely nothing. They also do nothing: something is done to them–crowns are placed on their heads, they are led by the priest around the gospel stand, the common cup is given to them, even their wedding rings are placed on their fingers by other people. Whatever the historical development of the Orthodox rite may have been, its form points to the belief in the sacramental nature of marriage. In this way, the rite of marriage similar to the Eucharist. One does not produce the Body and Blood of Christ the way that one would negotiate and produce a contract. All of the actions of the priest and the congregation are not aimed at the production of the Gifts, but at preparing their own hearts and souls for receiving the sacrament.

Study Notes: The Authority of Priests

All too often, a priest acts as if he were a secular leader, a board president, a CEO of a non-profit, a manager of an organization. To be sure, priests do hold a position of authority in the Church. But what kind of authority is it? What kind of headship? I really like the Roman Bishop’s official title: “the servant of the servants of God.” Regardless of how it is realized in the life of any particular pontiff, the title itself is very much Christ-centric and conveys the correct idea: a priest or a bishop receives his authority from Christ, and it is His, Christ’s, authority, not the priest’s. So, in order to find out how a priest is to exercise his authority, we must look at how Christ exercised His authority and learn from His example.

Study Notes: What Is Prayer?

As many of you have already figured out, the way my brain works is that in order to make sense of something, I have to paint a picture. Once I was asked to speak on prayer at a symposium. Here is the picture that I made up for myself.

First, I decided to figure out what prayer is not. It is not a conversation with God. If someone called me on the phone every morning and every evening and read the same text every single time without pausing to see whether I have anything to say, I would not call that a conversation. I would call that the weirdest thing that ever happened to me. Furthermore, prayer is not meant to tell God how we are doing or what our needs are (e.g., “God, I have cancer/need healing/my son is out late, please keep him safe, etc.”). If God knows everything–and this is the kind of God in whom we believe–then He does not need us to tell Him what our needs are. So, if prayer is not meant as a dialogue, nor is it meant to convey any information, what is it?

Study Notes: Death by Baptism

Nowadays, children get baptized for any number of reasons: because their family is Russian (Ukrainian/Greek/Serbian, etc.), because it is what they have “always done,” because the grandmother insists, because the parents want the child to be able to take communion or to go to Sunday school, or for any number of other reasons. But the Apostle Paul says that baptism is a manifestation of Christ’s death in our lives (Rom. 6:3)–no, no, not a symbol of His death, not a theatrical re-enactment, not a remembrance, but the “making-real,” the “making-present” of His death. Paul says that the baptized “put on Christ” (Gal. 3:27)–but what kind of Christ? The one who was tortured. The One who was crucified. The One who died. The One whose wounds did not heal even in His glorious resurrection (Luke 24:39).

How does the legalization of same-sex marriage affect the Church?

With the recent decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to impose the legalization of same-sex marriage on all of the States, many people wonder how this will affect the Church. The answer is, of course, quite simple: it does not affect the Church at all in any way whatsoever. The Church has lived in the Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire, the Ottoman Empire, the Communist Empire, the Capitalist Empire, various democracies, monarchies, aristocracies, oligarchies, etc. and kept the truth she received from God unchanged. The Church has lived through ages of Roman immorality, Byzantine Christian state officialdom, the Middle Ages in Europe, the Muslim invasion of Palestine, the humanism of the Renaissance, the Soviet attempts to build communism, the American separation of Church and State, and many other ages and circumstances, and she still kept her truth because she received it from God. In other words, it does not matter what any given society in any given age chooses to “celebrate”–gay pride or burkas, cannabis or ecstasy, pornography or abortion, alcoholism or prohibition–the Church does not receive her truth from social movements or Supreme Court decisions. The Church receives her truth from God and that is why she is not blown in this direction or that by various winds or tossed by different currents.

Study Notes: The Greater Hermitage

Many Christians seem preoccupied with identifying the sinful things about the world in which we live in an attempt to renounce or reject them. Whether it is the attitudes about gay marriage, or making the acquisition of material goods a life’s priority, or the immoral values of our modern society–some Christians devote their lives to fighting against the vile vices of this world. To be sure, we are called to fight “against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Eph. 6:12). But for some reason this fight all too often turns into a battle against “flesh and blood” (ibid.). It is certainly easier to fight against their vices than against the sin that lives in my heart and to find something to renounce in them rather than to cultivate virtues in my own soul. But a certain level I find such an exercise counterproductive. I think it a much more worth-while pursuit to describe that which must be adopted.

Study Notes: Models and Images of Spiritual Life

Can the question of repentance be addressed in a short-term model of pastoral counseling? Is the culture of instant gratification and quick fixes helpful in our understanding of repentance? Can we as pastors work with the tools and terminology offered to us by the modern world and frame the Orthodox teaching of the spiritual life in those terms?

No, we cannot address repentance in a short term model. We should not even try to do this. We need to teach, and preach, and talk, and counsel about the fact that repentance is a process, and that short counseling sessions, or conversations with a priest, or advice received during confessions may serve as mile-markers, or guiding points, but certainly not as one-time magical cures.

On the Gospel reading for the departed: John 5:24-30

We heard in the Gospel reading that the Father gave all judgment to Christ, and that this judgment is righteous. We also know from Scripture that it is merciful. Why is this? Why does judgment belong to Christ, and why is His judgment righteous and merciful? It is because He knows what it is like to be us. He lived among us; He became one of us. He didn’t just look down from a cloud, but came down and lived the human life. He looked into the eyes of the righteous and the sinners, He spent time with politicians and prostitutes, He observed the Pharisee and the Publican. He experienced poverty, hatred, betrayal, torture, and death. He walked in our shoes. He knows what it is like to be us. This is why He is the one to judge; and this is why His judgment is righteous and merciful. I think this gives hope to all of us.

Study Notes: On Preparation for Holy Communion

The missional dimension of the Liturgy points to an act, a process of Christ’s salvific work. Therefore, no single element of the Ordo can fully or clearly manifest this missional dimension. It must be a process aimed at the same goals as Christ’s mission. Since Christ’s mission is to save man by re-establishing a communion between man and God within Himself, then we must identify a process by which we unite to Christ if we are to find that which manifests the missional dimension of the Liturgy. Of course, what unites us to Christ is the entirety of our Christian life. But if we were to take a more narrow perspective, then it seems that it is not so much the liturgical service as the preparation for this service that most clearly manifests the missional dimension of the Liturgy.

Study Notes: Liturgical Minyan

The principle of correlation or concelebration in Liturgy described by Fr. Alexander Schmemann brings the laity into the equation of the Liturgy and strikes at the very heart of clericalism. Clericalism, at least as it exists in the Russian Church, seems to elevate ordained priests to some strange position within the Church. People are convinced that priests are not normal humans, that they have some special “superpowers” acquired through ordination, and that they are very much separate from the rest of the faithful–as if they were some alien beings. And while these ideas may be correct in some specifics–I do believe that priests receive divine grace from God–they are wrong in principle.

Study Notes: Royal Inadequacies of the Royal Priesthood

“Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity!”–Psalm 133:1

While there are many wonderful and holy pastors who labor in Christ’s vineyard, many others seem to experience problems of a peculiar nature. One way to identify the source of these problems to call it the lack of mentoring or apprenticeship. The situation is really quite simple: a newly-ordained priest gets assigned a rector and the only priest of a parish, which may be either in a remote location or the only Orthodox parish in a city. The dean may be too far and too busy to visit very often, the bishop may come once a year, other priests may visit only occasionally and not for the explicit purpose of offering any mentoring or advice. Thus, the newly-ordained priest is left to his own devices (and vices). Moreover, a priest is the leader of his community, and even older parishioners hesitate to play a mentoring role, and it would certainly not be their place to offer pastoring advice. Very few priests seem to be lucky enough to have real mentors who are actively involved in their lives and guide them in their spiritual and professional growth. There are some factors which could potentially mitigate the negative effects of the lack of mentoring of young or newly-ordained priests.

Study Notes: Three Levels of Sanctity

From a lecture by A.I. Osipov:

There are three “levels” of sanctity

1. Humility: this is when a person realizes his true state of sinfulness, realizes that he is incapable of saving himself, and thus, realizes that he needs a savior. This person may not have had an opportunity to change his life (repent-metanoia), he has not fulfilled any commandment–he has not done anything at all, but he realized his condition and need for savior. An example of such a person is the Good Thief.

2. Righteousness: this person is what one may call a “good Christian”–he tries to fulfill all of the commandments and rubrics of the Church, he obeys civil laws, he follows the rules of morality in relation to others. A person at this stage still has passion which are not conquered or conquered only partially. If such a person also possesses humility, then he is on his way to step three and will actually not see his righteousness. Other people will see him as righteous, but he will not recognize it in himself. If he does not have humility, then he becomes proud of his righteousness and turns into a Pharisee.

3. Holiness: a person at this stage conquered or suppressed passions, and the seed of of the “new creature in Christ” which had been planted in his fallen nature flourished into that level of maturity which is possible in this earthly life. In this state, the person no longer needs any external religious or moral rules because the law of God (rather, the Law-Giver Himself) is present in his heart. Because such a person is no longer of this world, this world has less dominion over him: he may walk of water as did St. Mary of Egypt, or his flesh may glow as did that of St. Seraphim, or wild beasts may obey him, or his flesh may not be affected by the cold or the heat, or the rain and the wind may listen to his command–these examples abound in the lives of many ascetics. And this state of holiness is mostly achieved by those who renounced the world (see The Ladder ch. 1) for the same reason why any perfection is achieved through complete dedication. If I only dabble at the violin and occupy the rest of my time with studies, priestly duties, family life, travel, entertainment, etc., etc–then I will not be very good at playing the violin. But if I want to be a virtuoso, then I have to practice for 10 hours each day and forsake everything else.

See also:

Models and Images of Spiritual Life

Mechanics of Salvation

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Fun Maths

Русская версия здесь

It is often said that a certain portion of what we have belongs to God. In the Old Testament, we see the commandment to tithe. This commandment is interpreted in many different way by modern Christians, but all seem to agree that it is good to take some portion of what we receive for our labor and give it to God by donating it to the Church or to the needy.

Some also note that the same should be done with out time. Just as in the Old Testament the Sabbath day was for the Lord, so also Christians speak of Sunday as being the Lord’s Day thus acknowledging that a certain portion of their time is to be devoted to God. It is not my goal here to examine the exact meaning of the term “the Lord’s Day” or to elucidate the nature of tithing. This is just some fun maths.

If we treat our time the same we treat other things that we have, then 10% of it should rightfully belong to God. In a 24-hour day, that is 2 hours and 24 minutes. Some may feel that is is not fair because we have to sleep for 8 hours each day. Well, 10% of a 16-hour waking day 1 hour and 36 minutes. Even if we were to subtract another 8 hours of full-time employment and propose that the time that we actually have is only 8 hours, 10% of 8 hours is 48 minutes. Do we give 48 minutes of our day to God? Suppose, this could be time spent in prayer, reading the Scripture, helping those in need–do we spend at least 48 minutes of each day doing those things? Something to think about…

Study Notes: Call No Man a Father…

…soul-killing theatrics and the saddest comedy–elders who take upon themselves the role of the ancient Holy Elders, possessing none of their spiritual gifts–may it be know to them that their very intent, their thoughts and ideas about <…> obedience are false, that their very way of thinking, their mind, their knowledge are self-deception and demonic delusion…–Saint Ignatii Brianchaninov, On the Life in Obedience to an Elder

If priests were chosen on the basis of their life experience, spiritual maturity, spiritual gifts, and wisdom, then they could make excellent fathers-confessors and spiritual fathers. But this is no longer the case. Many priests are chosen only because they have an interest in becoming clergy, have some specialized education, and do not have any canonical impediments. In other words, rather than choosing a candidate on the basis of the presence of positive qualities, one is chosen on the basis of the absence of negative ones. Virtues and spiritual gifts are not considered a prerequisite for ordination.

Every parish priest is forced to be a father-confessor. This is not ideal, but there is very little most priests can do about it. Much damage can be done to the soul of a parishioner if a young priest, lacking life experience, spiritual maturity, and the wisdom that comes with age, gives bad counsel during confessions. But in our current situation, most young priests cannot avoid playing the role of a father-confessor.

When it comes to a Spiritual Father, however, priests must be counselled to reject every notion that they have anything to do with that title. Of course, a priest is a spiritual father to many of his parishioners in the sense that he may have brought them to Christ, he may have baptized them and instructed them in the life in Christ. But the term “Spiritual Father” is very often (if not almost always) misunderstood to mean a very different concept. In monastic literature, in which all of our faithful are encouraged to immerse themselves, the Spiritual Father is the Holy Elder, and the relationship between the Father and his Child is the complete denial of self will on the part of the Child and the acceptance of full responsibility of the part of the Father–a model which is impossible among lay people for practical reasons. When this monastic concept is wrongfully applied to a parish priest and his parishioners, it creates an extremely dangerous spiritual delusion for all involved. Priests play a theatrical role of an “Elder” having none of the spiritual gifts necessary for this vocation. Parishioners play an equally-theatrical role of obedient spiritual children, blind to the fact that only true obedience and only to a true Holy Elder leads to a greater communion with God. Theatrical obedience to a theatrical “Elder” is nothing but “self-deception and demonic delusion.”

Playing the “Father/Child” game may be fun, but it is “playing with fire.” The unfortunate “Child” may have a false sense of safety under the theatrical obedience to a “Father,” but this relationship will be barren at best and bear ugly and bitter fruit at worst. To be a real Spiritual Father, one must be anointed by God with the spiritual gifts necessary for this vocation. To paraphrase Saint Seraphim of Sarov, one must first acquire the Spirit of peace within himself, before those around can be saved. The misuse of the term ‘Spiritual Father’ in parishes to refer to any priest, and the misunderstanding of the entire concept of spiritual fatherhood (and “spiritual childhood”) found in monastic literature is a substitution of of the real Spirit and the real life in Christ for a fake spirit and a fake life, a pretend-life, a theatrical performance, a game. And this is the real danger: we know that the real life in Christ leads to salvation, but the same cannot be said about playing the game of a life in Christ.

Study Notes: Amen to that!

“[T]hese subtleties [of theology] are alchymized to a more refined sublimate by the abstracting brains of their several schoolmen; the Realists, the Nominalists, the Thomists, the Albertists, the Occamists, the Scotists; these are not all, but the rehearsal of a few only, as a specimen of their divided sects; in each of which there is so much of deep learning, so much of unfathomable difficulty, that I believe the apostles themselves would stand in need of a new illuminating spirit, if they were to engage in any controversy with these new divines. St. Paul, no question, had a full measure of faith; yet when he lays down faith to be the substance of things not seen, these men carp at it for an imperfect definition, and would undertake to teach the apostles better logic. Thus the same holy author wanted for nothing [but] the grace of charity, yet (say they) he describes and defines it but very inaccurately, when he treats of it in the thirteenth chapter of his first epistle to the Corinthians. The primitive disciples were very frequent in administering the holy sacrament, breaking bread from house to house; yet should they be asked of the Terminus a quo and the Terminus ad quern, the nature of transubstantiation? the manner how one body can be in several places at the same time? <…>

Study Notes: On whether Christianity is Rocket Science

Can Christianity be likened to rocket science or brain surgery? Does it rely on acquiring a tremendous amount of knowledge in order to be practiced? I find these analogies very imperfect, despite the fact that I have used them in the past. Equating Christianity to brain surgery is simply indefensible on any level. (I myself have used this analogy in reference to the Church as an institution, which is somewhat more appropriate, since the Church is so Byzantine.) The one I recommend adopting is that of a sport. Paul used it. Imagine the sport of running: it is a rather simple thing–certainly–not brain surgery– there is not much of a book that one can write, even though many do for various reasons. But no matter how many books you read, nothing replaces going out and running. Not even a little bit. If you do not run but read many books, you will not advance as a runner even an inch. But if you go running every day instead of reading books, you will become a half-decent runner. True, advanced knowledge about pacing, nutrition, recovery, injury-prevention and alike can greatly improve your running, but the core of the sport is still the actual act running, rather than the act of reading. It is the same with Christianity: no amount of book knowledge of theology can replace daily practice. Daily practice, on the other hand, will produce results even with only minimal book knowledge.

Study Notes: On the Role of the Rational Mind in Theology

Does the rational mind play a major role in our experience of God or in how well we can know God? Should we primarily rely on the academic study of theology in order to get closer to God? I love images, so consider this: it takes an active brain and a mind in order for me to experience the presence of a puppy. If I have no brain or if my mind is defective I may have problems or even be completely unable to experience the presence of a puppy. On the other hand, I do not have to know or understand how the puppy works in order to experience his presence. I do not have to have a Ph.D. in biology, or to dissect my puppy in order to experience him. Mephistopheles went even further and proposed that when it comes to a living being, to dissect is to lose every hope of understanding how the “thing” works, because once dissected, it is no longer a living being you are studying. In other words, what I think is important is to know where to stop. You can enjoy the love, and the licks, and the joyful bark, and the mess on your carpet–all with the necessary use of your brain with all of its faculties–but only for as long as you do not decide to dissect. In much the same way we can have the experience of the Trinity without figuring out or even trying to figure out all of the mechanics of how the Trinity works. We can also be under the protection of the Theotokos without trying to write a treatise on Her ever-virginity. This is not to denigrate the rational mind but to recognize its limits. We know very well that our physical body has its limits; we may push them at times, but we do not question them. It is the same with the mind–it has its natural limits. Everything has its proper place in our experience of God.

Study Notes: Pastoring in the Shadow of the Cross

We often think of pastoring as having one primary function–to take care of the flock. This may be expanded into a list of tasks: feeding, leading to green pastures, protecting from wolves, etc. But can there be other aspects of pastoring that are not found under the function of caretaking? For many years, I had a flock of goats, and in my experience, while protecting and feeding are very important in the work of a pastor, there are other things that cannot be ignored. For example, Paul so famously mentions that the pastor is also to take of the fat of the flock or of its milk. In other words, the relationship between the flock and the pastor is mutual in nature–it is not just the pastor who does things for the flock, but also the flock who does things for the pastor. If fact, in the case of my goats, this was why I kept them. I did not keep goats in order that I might take care of them; rather, I kept them because I wanted the milk, and caretaking was a means to that end. But while this reasoning works for people who keep flocks of animals, it cannot be true of the Church. God did not establish His flock in order to take care of priests and bishops. Neither did He establish His flock just so priests and bishops would have someone to take care of. Caretaking is a means but to what end?

Study Notes on Pastoral Counseling: Mechanics of Salvation

The idea that the parish is a hospital is very common; so common, in fact, that the very question of this assignment is quite rhetorical. Rather than asking whether I agree that the parish is a hospital, it seems to me that the assignment is assuming that I agree and asks me to explain why.

It should be said that the assertion that the parish is a hospital stems from the larger idea that the Church is a hospital, and any parish is the visible representation of the Church as a whole. There are many well-known scriptural passages and statements found in the writings of the saints that assert just that–so many, in fact, that it hardly seems necessary to recount them here. But the basic assumption, as I see it, comes from the Christian understanding of sin and its consequence. There are some views that sin is a transgression against God or His law, and that the wages of sin is death in the sense that every crime needs a punishment, and the crime of sin carries the penalty of capital punishment. Note, that death comes not as a result of sin, but as a result of punishment. In other words, unless someone decides to punish the criminal and carry out an execution, his crime in and of itself does not directly cause him to die. If this is not quite clear, I will explain the Orthodox position as a way to contrast.

Study Notes on Liturgics: Laicism

Recently, I heard a new word: laicism. It is a made-up word, of course. I guess, what the speaker was trying to convey is a reference to a phenomenon of church life which is a reverse of clericalism (anti-clericalism). In other words, if clericalism can be described (to some degree of approximation, of course) as the attitude of the supremacy of those ordained to clerical ranks over the lay people, the attitude of “us versus them,” some notion that we are the “real” Church, whereas the ignorant, unchurched masses are the sheep, the animals to be led, who do not know what is good for them. The clergy often act as if they had some special and unique grace and right. Layicism, then, is the attitude of lay superiority over the clergy, some notion that the lay people are the “real” Church, and that the clergy serve at the pleasure of the laity, that priests are to be appointed and dismissed by a council of a few lay people who think themselves some guardians of the church, while a priest is merely a “hireling” (John 10?). In other words, both clericalism and ‘layicism’ are nothing more than the “us vs. them” bizarrely and abhorrently adorned in “churchy” terminology. But how can this be? “Is Christ divided?” (1 Cor. 1:13) Is there a ‘class’ of clergy and another of lay people? Are not both members of the Body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:12 but see the whole chapter)? Are not both the “royal priesthood” of Christ (1 Peter 2:9)? Paul teaches that in Christ, “there is neither Greek nor Jew” (Gal. 3:28). Did he really have to specify that there is also neither priest no church board member?

Worried about getting enough iron during Lent? Read this!

Why an iron fish can make you stronger

By Philippa RoxbyHealth reporter, BBC News

http://www.bbc.com/news/health-32749629

• 17 May 2015

Health Check

• Great Gut Extinction: Has modern life destroyed our health?
• The allure of the good-looking runner
• From Stratford to Rio: using Shakespeare to treat mental illness
• The Bolivian women who knit parts for hearts

When Canadian science graduate Christopher Charles visited Cambodia six years ago he discovered that anaemia was a huge public health problem.

In the villages of Kandal province, instead of bright, bouncing children, Dr Charles found many were small and weak with slow mental development.

Women were suffering from tiredness and headaches, and were unable to work.

Pregnant women faced serious health complications before and after childbirth, such as haemorrhaging.

Ever since, Dr Charles has been obsessed with iron.

Boil up water or soup with the iron fish for at least 10 minutes

Dr Christopher Charles, Iron fish inventor

Anaemia is the most common nutritional problem in the world, mainly affecting women of child-bearing age, teenagers and young children.

In developing countries, such as Cambodia, the condition is particularly widespread with almost 50% of women and children suffering from the condition, which is mainly caused by iron deficiency.

The standard solution – iron supplements or tablets to increase iron intake – isn’t working.

The tablets are neither affordable nor widely available, and because of the side-effects people don’t like taking them.

Lump of iron

Dr Charles had a novel idea. Inspired by previous research which showed that cooking in cast iron pots increased the iron content of food, he decided to put a lump of iron into the cooking pot, made from melted-down metal.

Half of the villagers who used the iron fish in cooking were no longer anaemic after a year

The iron fish is modelled on a species commonly eaten in Cambodia

His invention, shaped like a fish, which is a symbol of luck in Cambodian culture, was designed to release iron at the right concentration to provide the nutrients that so many women and children in the country were lacking.

The recipe is simple, Dr Charles says.

“Boil up water or soup with the iron fish for at least 10 minutes.

“That enhances the iron which leaches from it.

“You can then take it out. Now add a little lemon juice which is important for the absorption of the iron.”

If the iron fish is used every day in the correct way, Dr Charles says it should provide 75% of an adult’s daily recommended intake of iron – and even more of a child’s.

If it’s something that is culturally acceptable and not too costly, it would be of great benefit

Prof Imelda Bates, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine

Trials on several hundred villagers in one province in Cambodia showed that nearly half of those who took part were no longer anaemic after 12 months.

‘Better than tablets’

Prof Imelda Bates, head of the international public health department at Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, says the iron fish is a welcome development.

“These sort of approaches are so much better than iron tablets, which are really horrible.

“If it’s something that is culturally acceptable and not too costly, then any improvement to anaemia levels would be of great benefit.”

Around 2,500 families in Cambodia are now using the iron fish and the Lucky Iron Fish company has distributed nearly 9,000 fish to hospitals and non-governmental organisations in the country.

What pleases Dr Charles most is the fact that villagers appear to have accepted the smiling iron fish, which is 3in (7.6 cm) long and weighs about 200g (7.1 oz).

Cambodian villagers are encouraged to boil up water with the 3in iron fish in the pot

One woman and her daughter, who are part of a current trial in Preah Vihear Province, told the BBC they would use it during cooking.

“I’m happy, the blood test results show that I have the iron deficiency problem, so I hope will be cured and will be healthy soon.

“I think all the people in Sekeroung village will like the fish, because fish is our everyday food.”

Scale of anaemia

The World Health Organization estimates that two billion people – over 30% of the world’s population – are anaemic, mostly due to iron deficiency.

It says stopping iron deficiency is a priority – for individuals and countries.

“The benefits are substantial. Timely treatment can restore personal health and raise national productivity levels by as much as 20%,” it has said.

And it emphasises that it is the poorest and most vulnerable who stand to gain the most from its reduction.

I hope will be cured and will be healthy soon.

Woman and daughter in Preah Vihead provine, Cambodia

But there are other forms of anaemia. It can also be caused by vitamin B12 and A deficiencies, parasitic infections, such as malaria, and other infectious diseases.

That is when it gets complicated, says Prof Bates.

“Anaemia is a multi-factorial problem. It’s the end product of many different health issues.

“And measuring whether people have enough iron or not in their bodies is very difficult in developing countries,” she said.

As a result, she says, knowing how many people really are iron deficient isn’t easy to work out.

Rice diet

In those with iron-deficiency anaemia, the cause is often poor diet. And that’s the case in Cambodia, Dr Charles says.

“They have a really poor diet – a big plate of white rice and maybe a small cut of fish.

Spinach is not as rich in iron as red meat

“That’s their two meals a day. And it’s just not meeting their nutritional requirements.”

What’s missing from their diet are iron-rich foods, particularly red meat. Green leafy vegetables, such as spinach, are not as rich in iron and mustn’t be overcooked if they are to offer any benefit at all.

The Lucky Iron Fish project has a plan to get fish to every part of the world that needs them, including countries like Canada, the US and Europe.

So should everyone be putting recycled metal car parts in their soup?

According to the experts, there is no reason not to – although levels of anaemia are far lower in developed countries, and there is easier access to iron-rich foods which can make all the difference to pregnant women and vegans, for example.

We could all eat iron filings instead, of course, but they wouldn’t taste half as nice.

What does iron deficiency do to the body?

Iron deficiency anaemia is a condition where a lack of iron in the body leads to a reduction in the number of red blood cells.

Iron is used to produce red blood cells, which help store and carry oxygen in the blood.

If there are fewer red blood cells than normal, your organs and tissues will not get as much oxygen as they usually would.

This means you can suffer from tiredness, shortness of breath, heart palpitations and a pale complexion.

If left untreated it can make people more susceptible to illness and infection.

Pregnant women and children are particularly vulnerable. Anaemia is thought to contribute to 20% of all deaths during pregnancy.

Source: World Health Organization

Исцеление слепорожденного

Священник Сергий Свешников

English: The Healing of the Man Born Blind

Христос воскресе!

Уже недолго осталось нам слышать эти удивительные слова с церковного амвона.  Подходит к концу всецерковное празднование величайшего торжества, этого спасительного делания Божия.  Вместе с ангелами на небесах мы пели воскресение Христово; встретившись со Спасителем, вместе с апостолом Фомой восклицали: «Господь мой и Бог мой!»; вместе с мироносицами мы бежали к пустому гробу, неся Воскресшему нашу боль, нашу печаль, нашу скорбь, и услышали в ответ радостное благовестие; как расслабленного, воздвигал нас Христос из греховной смерти к чистой жизни; и, как некогда самарянке, бросившей свой глинянный кувшин у древнего колодца и побежавшей возвестить горожанам о пришествии Мессии, Христос и нам предлагает оставить мутную воду мирского и греховного и напиться из неиссякаемого Божественного источника, текущего в жизнь вечную.

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“See, you are well! Sin no more…”

Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool … which has five porticoes. In these lay a multitude of invalids, blind, lame, paralyzed. One man was there, who had been ill for thirty-eight years… Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your pallet, and walk.” And at once the man was healed, and he took up his pallet and walked…
Afterward, Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, “See, you are well! Sin no more, that nothing worse befall you.” (John 5:2-14 RSV)

Often, when we hear this passage, we immediately recognize that there is a connection between sin and illness. Commenting on this passage, the Fathers note that the paralytic may have committed some sin for which he was then punished with a bodily affliction (see, for example, Saint Theophylact of Ohrid). And equally as often, we misunderstand the nature of this connection. We envision a child who is spanked by the parent for being naughty, and we think that when we do something bad, God “spanks” us with an illness. Perhaps, this image works well so some people and keeps them from being naughty, just as a child can be fearful of the punishment. This is also how the ancient Jews understood their relationship with God: if they did something bad, God punished them, and if they did something good, He rewarded them. But as the Apostle Paul said to the Hebrews, children get milk, but those who are mature eat solid food–a deeper understanding of the teaching (Heb. 5:11-14).

The Church teaches us a deeper truth about the connection between soul and body, the spiritual world and the material, sin and bodily illness. Secular education trains us to separate the physical world from “personal belief.” It teaches us that the physical world is real, and that the spiritual world is not, and that is why scientists do not study it. But this is not how God created the world–a “real” physical world and some separate fantasy land to entertain our imagination. God created one world with both the physical and the spiritual dimensions. Spirits do not live in a spiritual world; they live in the one created world in which the spiritual and the physical interact with each other. Likewise, humans do not live only in a physical world. We have body, soul, and spirit, and we live in both the physical and the spiritual dimensions at the same time.

As humans, we are not a mechanical composition of separate parts, but a wholesome organism. Just as the Holy Trinity is not three separate Gods but One, in the same way, body, soul, and spirit are not three separate pieces but one human nature. In an organism, what happens to one member affects all others. If I have a toothache, I will also be grumpy; and if my soul is joyful, the toothache may go away or become more tolerable. But this connection is not limited to our teeth and emotions. A spiritual illness or injury may affect our mind and even our body.

God did not invent commandments just for the sake of inventing something. Just as any good parent strives to protect his child, God warns us about the dangers of breaking the laws of the spiritual part of our world. If a parent tells his child not to jump off a roof, it is because the child might break a leg; and if a parent warns the child not to stick his finger in an electric outlet, it is because the child might get electrocuted. If the child ignores the parent’s advice and breaks a leg, can we blame the parent for punishing his child with a broken leg for disobeying the parent’s commandment? And if we disobey the laws of the spiritual world–which are just as real as the laws of physics–and get hurt, can we blame God for punishing us? The state of our spiritual health directly affects the whole of our nature. Breaking spiritual laws may directly affect our mind, or body, or both!

We are made aware of this direct connection between body and spirit when we fast. Through the exercise of the discipline of the flesh, we are trying to elevate the spirit and affect the soul. We do not fast because we want to lose weight, nor do we make prostration because we want to get some physical exercise. Rather, we do both because we know that what we do to our body affect our soul.

The Apostle Paul made this connection very clear when he noted that the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 6:19). When Corinthians, following the teachings of Plato and other Greek philosophers, argued that they can remain spiritual while giving in to the passions of the flesh, Paul insisted that there cannot be a mechanical division, that the flesh and the spirit are two parts of one indivisible human nature (12-13). But Paul was not the only one to outline this principle. Ancient Romans wondered whether there could be a healthy spirit in a healthy body, and a well-known saying proclaims that cleanliness is next to godliness–once again, tying the material to the spiritual. The Christian monastic tradition refined this proverb to highlight not just any cleanliness, but the purity of the body and of the life of the body.

So, does God smite us with ailments of the flesh? He, certainly, could, if this would be for our salvation. But it seems to me that more often than not, we suffer injury to our flesh because we fail to heed the loving advice and warning that God offers to us. When God says “Thou shalt not,” it is a warning meant to keep us safe. Let us obey spiritual laws as we obey physical ones. Let us keep ourselves from sin to avoid injury to our souls, mind, and bodies. Let us remember that sins of the flesh destroy the soul, and that sins of the soul can affect the health of our flesh. So, let us keep far away from every sin; and if we happen to fall, let us hear the call of Christ: “Rise up and walk, but sin no more, that nothing worse befall you!”

See also: The Sunday of the Paralytic: “Do you want to be made well?”

What Pornography Does to the Human Brain (VIDEO)

According to surveys, nearly one-third of Orthodox Christian teens are unsure whether pornography is right or wrong. This is approximately the same number as that of teens who are unsure whether premarital sex is right or wrong. This is very telling in two ways. First, teens who are unsure about premarital sex are probably also unsure about pornography. And second, while the Church makes its position very clear–premarital sex and pornography are wrong–it needs to do a better job of explaining why. In this short paper, I would like to step away from the words ‘right’ and ‘wrong.’ After all, Christ did not come to bring us laws and legislations. Sins are not right or wrong because someone issued a regulation. Instead, I would like to talk about things that are good for you or bad for you.

The Church teaches us that sexual intimacy is an important part of the sacrament of marriage: there, it has its rightful place; there, it helps the two become one; and there, it fulfills all of its functions–from the expression of love and commitment to the co-creation with God in continuing the human race. Marriage is a sacrament with the “principal and ultimate goal [of] the spiritual and moral perfection of the spouses.” As with any sacrament, that which is sacramental, should not be used for profane purposes. Imagine that a priest throws a party in the holy altar, and then on Sunday, after having picked up the trash, he serves the Divine Liturgy there. Or, he uses the chalice to drink his coffee in the mornings, and then on Sunday he uses it for the Eucharist. Even on an intuitive level we understand that this would be blasphemy. And yet, it is the same with our bodies. The Apostle Paul teaches that “your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit” (1 Cor. 6:19), and it belongs to your spouse for the fulfillment of the sacrament of marriage (7:4)–whether we are married now or will one day be married. Imagine your love for your spouse as a cup filled to the brim, and you want to give all of it, the fullness of it to your beloved. If you start bumping into strangers along the way or allowing them to take some of what you are carrying, then you will not be able to preserve the fullness of your love, and will hand to your beloved a cup half-empty, if not altogether unworthy of a sacrament.

All of this can be said about premarital sex in general, but what about pornography? Pornography is just as bad as premarital sex, but more dangerous. When a person engages in a sexual act with another person, both are aware that they are giving up a part of themselves; and the more partners a person has, the more fractured he or she becomes. But pornography camouflages itself as something unreal, virtual, something that is one’s private business, something that does not hurt anyone. Our culture tells us that we are free to do whatever we want, as long as it does not hurt anyone. Let us heed this advice and remember that ‘anyone’ means us as well. Let us make sure that whatever we do does not hurt us physically or spiritually.

Christ said: “…every one who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matt. 5:28). The reason Christ equates looking lustfully, the very definition of pornography, with adultery, a physical act, is because we are not some bags full of disconnected parts–body, soul, mind, spirit, will, etc.–but whole and interconnected beings. If we have a toothache, our mind may become irritable; and if our mind is anxious, our whole body may ache. This is why when we allow pornography to enter into our eyes and our mind, our entire being is affected. The “virtual” sin of pornography most often leads to very physical masturbation. And once something is seen, it cannot be unseen–it imbeds itself in the mind, the memory, the subconscious. We would not want to share our spouse and our marriage bed with a bus-load-full of porn actors and actresses. But in reality, this is what we do when our minds are polluted with pornorgaphy and we enter into the sacrament of marriage bringing all those “passengers” along. On second thought, porn ‘actors’ and ‘actresses’ perform sexual acts for money, and there is another term for that–prostitution. The Apostle Paul says that “he who joins himself to a prostitute becomes one body with her” (1 Cor. 6:16). These are very powerful words. This means that when we commit adultery in the heart–watch pornography–we become one with that prostitute, instead of our spouse. This is not only destructive to the sacrament of marriage, but also to our own souls: with how many prostitutes can one become one before the soul is completely broken, damaged, fractured, and polluted?

Ways to Fight Against Pornography

1. Avoid those television shows, movies, magazines, and websites that arouse sexual passion. It is much easier to fight against sin while it is still a little worm than to battle it once it becomes a fire-breathing dragon.
2. Do not underestimate the brute power of sexual desire. People have killed and died under the influence of the sexual passion. Do not play with fire or you risk being burnt.
3. Remember that demons, including those of lust, are best resisted through prayer and fasting. Pray often and ask God for help. Keep the real fast, not a vegan diet.
4. Keep your eyes and your mind on our Savior and His Most Pure Mother. If you spend time on the computer or watch television–place an icon next to the screen. If looking at what is on your screen and in the eyes of Christ at the same time makes you uncomfortable or ashamed, then something is wrong with what is on your screen. Do something about it! (There is an OFF button on every device.)
5. Seek healing in repentance. Once something is seen it cannot be unseen. But God can heal and restore the soul. Remember: repentance is not feeling bad about something. It is a firm decision to turn away from sin and turn to God. It is a decision to fight against sin, not merely feel bad about having committed it. It is a sacrament of reconciliation with God, not a formality of entering a guilty plea on a heavenly court docket.

“Metropolitan” Salad and “Lay” Salad

Русский здесь

“Metropolitan” Salad

In Orthodoxy, a metropolitan is addressed as “The Very Most Reverend,” which is probably supposed to mean “truly most reverend” (‘very’ from ‘veritas’), lest there be any doubt. My salad is very most simple. That is to say, it really is very simple.

Add chopped parsley and umeboshi vinegar to shredded cabbage, mix and enjoy. That’s it. This salad is not only very most simple, but also very most lenten and very most tasty.

 

“Lay” Salad

The life of a lay person is difficult and thorny–anything can happen. This salad is a “mixed bag” just like a human life.

cooked quinoa

cooked lentils

tomatoes (heirloom or Campari)

cucumber

Kalamata olives

parsley

garlic

lemon juice

umeboshi vinegar

You may also add onion, which I do sometimes, and olive oil, which I do not add. All proportions vary according to your individual taste. By the way, this salad is a source of complete protein, so fast to your health!

   

   

Ladder of Divine Ascent

On the fourth Sunday of Great Lent, we celebrate the memory of Saint John, the Abbot of Mount Sinai. For centuries, his work, The Ladder, has been a favorite Lenten reading for those who wish to ascend from earth to heaven, and many pastors urge their parishioners to learn from this treasure chest of ascetic wisdom.

Much can be said about the gems contained in the work of Saint John of the Ladder, but I have been thinking about the very image of the ladder. A ladder is not a wormhole; it is not a teleportation device. A ladder has steps, and one has to step on one before stepping on the next, climb on the lower level before continuing to a higher one. The image of a ladder reveals to us the gradual nature of ridding ourselves of passions and acquiring virtues.

Study Notes: 20 MAR 2015

Study notes on liturgics

“… Pictures as windows is a Western tradition. Think of a typical painting of a landscape hanging on a wall–it is like a window to the outdoors. By the way, picture frames also symbolize window frames. In pictures of people, the spectator is “spying” on the person who is depicted. This corresponds with the Roman Catholic devotional practice of imagining various scenes from the Bible and “observing” all of the details through imagination–“spying” on Christ or the saints. (See my paper on mental imagery in Catholicism and Orthodoxy–it should still be somewhere online.) Perspective in Western paintings is forward: two parallel lines come to a point in the scene of the painting.

In Eastern iconography, the perspective is reversed: two parallel lines come to a point “in front” of the icon, right where a person who is looking at the icon would be standing, and come apart in the icon itself. Done properly, parallel lines come together in the middle of the chest of the person looking at the icon. Thus, it is the exact opposite of the Western concept: instead of me “spying” on Christ by looking into heaven through a window, He is looking into my heart from heaven. An icon is a window, but it is not a window into heaven; rather, it is a window from heaven into our world.

Another feature which can be observed in Eastern iconography is saints “coming out” of the icon. Think of an icon which is recessed into the board with the border “sticking out” around the edge. The saint depicted will always have a hand or part of the halo coming out of the image and onto the border, or Saint George’s spear and the hoof of his horse come out onto the border–as if the saints are in the process of coming out of the icon into our world.

in Western art, the human is the subject (the viewer) and the painting is the object. In Eastern iconography, the Lord or a saint is the subject (the viewer) and the human is the object. It is not so much that we are looking at them as it is that they are looking at us, they are the “cloud of witnesses.” This is also true of architecture. The Western spire “pokes” at heaven, tries to pierce it–it is as if the humans are trying to build a tower that can reach into the heavens. In Eastern architecture, the most ancient forms have a heavy low dome that looks like the sky (and is painted with stars on the ceiling). It is as if heaven lowered itself, came down to earth. The Russian “onion”-dome style symbolizes drops of oil dripping out of the sky. Oil, of course, is the symbol of the Holy Spirit, of anointing, of grace. In other words, the grace and the presence of the Holy Spirit comes down to us here on earth. Art, architecture, theology, worldview–we could go on and on, all of it is connected…”

New Lenten Sandwich

Русский здесь

I was making lunch sandwiches for my children to take to school this morning and accidentally “invented” a new sandwich.

The photo seems self-explanatory.

Bread (in the photo is rye sourdough)

Tofu (in the photo is extra firm, but firm should work just the same)

Guacamole

“Monastery” Salad Dressing

Русский здесь

This is a very simple salad dressing which I “spied” at the Holy Archangels Monastery in Kendalia, TX (PHOTOS ARE HERE)

5 tablespoons of tahini

juice from 2 small lemons or 1 large one

2 cloves of garlic, grated

1/2 teaspoon of salt

3 tablespoons of water

The monks also added copped fresh dill, but I did not happen to have any.

Put everything into a bowl, mix with a fork, and pour on your salad. All ingredients can be adjusted to taste: more of less garlic, water, salt, you may add pepper, dill, chives, etc.

Study Notes: 15 MAR 2015

Notes on the study of the Liturgy.

This phrase “It is time for the Lord to act.” is pronounced just before the beginning of the Liturgy in the exchange between the deacon and the priest. The explanation that I was taught is as follows. During the Liturgy of Preparation (Proskomedia), people do what they can: they bring offerings (prosfora), they say prayers “again and again” (these prayers are now placed in the beginning of the Liturgy of the Word), they prepare the bread and the wine and place them in sacred vessels. But they are unable to make bread become the Body of Christ or, even more importantly, we ourselves cannot become the Body of Christ by our own doing. In other words, no matter what people do–all the right things–they cannot save themselves. The Father must will for this to be so. Christ must offer Himself as the sacrifice. The Spirit must come down upon the faithful. We have done all that we could and fell short. So, now “it is time for the Lord to act.” This is somewhat similar to our Lent. Lent proper ends on Palm Sunday. We fast, we pray, we strive, and we greet Christ at the height of what we are capable of–we greet Him with palm branches, shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” This is all that we are capable of. But this is not enough; we fall short. Only a few days later, the same crowd will be yelling: “Crucify Him!” These are not different people, bused in from another part of the country. These are the very same people. Our best is just not good enough. Everything we do during Lent–fasting, praying, venerating the Cross, reading The Ladder of Divine Ascent, chanting the Great Canon for four hours straight–all of this is simply not enough, we cannot save ourselves through any of that. And so, our Lent ends on Palm Sunday, and then “it is time for the Lord to act.” What happens next is not what we do, but what He does–Passion Week. Passion Week is His doing, His acting. While He is washing His disciples’ feet, one of them is betraying Him (John 13). While He is giving them His broken Body, they are arguing about who will be the greatest (Luke. 22). While He is praying to the point of sweating blood, the disciples are sleeping (Mark 14). And while He was being arrested, beaten, and crucified, they flee and hide (Matt. 26; John 20). We tried and we failed. Now it is time for the Lord to act!

The Third Sunday of Great Lent: The Veneration of the Cross of Christ

Fr. Sergei Sveshnikov

Русский: Третье воскресенье Великого поста: Поклонение Честному Кресту Господню

Today we have reached the midpoint of Great Lent; we have travelled half of our path to the Holy Pascha of our Lord.  Having come to the center of Lent, we piously venerate the life-giving Cross of Christ.  In the synaxarion for today we read that since the Cross is the Tree of Life, and this tree was planted in the center of the Garden of Eden, in the same way the holy fathers placed the Tree of the Cross in the middle of Great Lent, reminding us of Adam’s fall.  At the same time we are delivered from the fall through the tree, for partaking of it we no longer die, but inherit life.

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Study Notes: 12 MAR 2015

Notes of the study of liturgics

On whether the Apostle Paul’s comments about women are politically incorrect

NB: these are only random thoughts which are not necessarily correct.

In Orthodoxy, we see God not so much as a judge who punishes criminals, but rather as a physician who heals the sick. Thus, when God gives a punishment, it is not meant as torture but medicine. This medicine may be bitter, and the medical procedure may be painful, but pain is not the goal. For example, when a surgeon takes a knife and cuts into a man to remove cancer, he is not doing this because he enjoys hurting men, but rather because he wants to heal them: “He did not actually curse Adam and Eve, for they were candidates for restoration” (Tertullian).

Furthermore, when we look at the medicine, we can guess at the diagnosis. For example, if I know that you take antihistamine, I may guess that you have allergies. If I know that you take ibuprofen, I may guess that you have some inflammation.

So, when we look at the kind of medicine that God gave to Adam and Eve, we may begin to make guesses about their afflictions. To Adam God said: “You will work hard” (Gen. 3:17-19). Perhaps, Adam was lazy? Perhaps, instead of cultivating the garden of his soul, he let it get overgrown with weeds? Perhaps, he did not fertilize it enough with virtues? To the woman God said: “Your desire shall be for your husband and he shall rule over you” (16). It is immediately after that that Adam called his wife’s name–that is to say, he asserted authority over her (20). This, of course, is a reversal of what God had said prior to sin: “A man shall leave his mother and father and cleave to his wife.” Since Adam did not have a mother and father (and, presumably, was not expected to leave God), this was the social order for their descendants (2:24). And yet what happened after the fall is the exact opposite: the woman leaves her father and mother (her family) and cleaves to her husband. And the visible symbol of this is that she changes her family name and takes on her husband’s family name.

If such is the medicine–submission to her husband–what, then, was Eve’s illness? Perhaps, she aspired to rule over Adam? This is not immediately clear to us from the text, but since we are studying worship, let us look at the fall through that lens. Certainly, the story of the fall is not about a stolen apple (or pomegranate).

Who is so foolish as to think that God, in the manner of a gardener, planted a paradise in Eden, toward the east, and … that a person could be a partaker of good and evil by eating what was taken from the tree? … I do not suppose that anyone doubts that these things figuratively indicate certain mysteries. (Origen)

Adam and Eve were to partake of the fruit, which is communion with God, but they needed to prepare themselves first. They needed to till the garden of their souls and partake of the fruit as a gift from God. Instead, they chose to steal it. Eve saw the fruit and thought three things: it is good for food, it is delight to the eyes, and it gives knowledge. She fell into the “lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and pride of life” (1 John 2:16). It is as if one were to go up for communion in church and think within himself: “Hmmm… This is a pretty chalice, I wonder if it is an antique. The wine is quite tasty (now, the bread could be better). And I am glad that everyone is looking at me; they think that I am so spiritual.”

So, rather than partaking of the fruit as a sacrament, with due preparation and from the hands of God, Eve just took it of her own human will, and “she also gave some to her husband, and he ate” (Gen. 3:6). In other words, she communed him, she asserted her role above Adam. Instead of Adam receiving the fruit directly from God, Eve asserted her role as an intermediary between Adam and the fruit–it was in her possession, she usurped the right to distribute it.

If such was Eve’s illness, it makes sense that God gave her the medicine that He did, and that the Apostle Paul said what he said about Eve having been deceived in the garden. Thus, it is not about political correctness at all, but rather, it is about medicine. If someone were to ask us to undress, we would think such a request odd and politically incorrect. But when a doctor asks us the same thing, we just do it, because we know that it is for our benefit. And we patiently subject ourselves to various procedures, poking and probing, pills, mixtures, needles, etc.–all the things we would never tolerate from anyone except a physician.

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On whether women epitomize humanity and men epitomize divinity

The problem is that divine nature is different from human nature. By nature, we are not the same as God. But for men and women, nature is the same–the one human nature. By nature (ontologically), men are the same as women. This nature is manifested in two different forms–male and female–and in many different persons (or, rather, through many different hypostases), but it is one and the same nature. This is why the Apostle says that in Christ, there is neither male nor female. That is to say, both males and females by nature have equal access to communion with Christ, salvation in Christ, theosis, sanctity, etc. Women are not “lesser” creatures. They certainly do not “epitomize” humanity while man “epitomizes” divinity. One could argue that as a general rule, men seem to rely more on rational thinking while women seem to rely more on intuition or the feeling of the heart. But this only proves that women are closer to the spiritual world, since the spiritual world is not understood by the rational mind and is instead experienced through the heart.

If men are to be icons of the divinity and women are to be icons of the humanity, then we may find a bit of difficulty in tracing the two different paths to salvation. If we propose that all men somehow naturally are icons of the divinity (what does that even mean?), and all women are somehow equally naturally born as icons of the humanity, then we may have a hard time explaining this concept with any degree of intelligibility. And if we propose that men and women are born the same, but then for the sake of salvation men have to represent divinity while women must try to represent humanity, then that makes even less sense and presents an even larger theological difficulty (at least, in my mind).

Furthermore, this goes against the Scripture. Note that when Paul speaks about men being like Christ and women being like the Church, he is essentially (ontologically) talking about the same thing. Christ is both divine and human, and so is the Church. There is no Christ without His Body, which is the Church. There is no Church without Christ. Without Christ, a “church” becomes a Bible-study club or a Christian song concert. The Church, in order for is to be the Church, has to be fully human and fully divine. Christ and His Church are “unconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly, inseparably” united into one. What is even more fascinating, in Eph. 5:31, Paul introduces this concept by re-establishing the original order of Gen.: a man will leave his father and mother–it is almost as if he were trying to say that the Son of God left His Father and cleaved to His Church to become one flesh with Her.

Finally, the priest may be an icon of Christ’s divinity for the people, but at the very same time he represents the people or Christ’s humanity before God, he is also an icon of the Church. When he turns to the laos and says, “Peace be unto all,” he bestows Christ’s blessing on them. Yet in the very next minute he turns to the Theos and offers prayers for and on behalf of the people.

In other words, I would have a difficult time justifying a concept of women being icons of humanity and men being icons of divinity, or even comprehending this concept. But perhaps, I do not fully understand your argument? What precisely do you mean when you say that, “The man is essentially a microcosm within humanity of God, whereas the woman is the ultimate representation of humanness. As such, humanity in relation to God is feminine. God in relation to humanity is masculine.” What exactly do you mean by this? If it is feminine to be meek, and humble, and to serve, rather than to be served, if it is feminine to obey the will of the masculine, and to love, then Christ is… the perfect example of femininity! His interaction with His Church is expressly feminine. Eve are created a helper, a servant for Adam? (Gen. 2:20) Then she is an image of Christ, because Christ is the Servant (see Isaiah 52-53, Matt. 8:17 and Acts 8:34-35), He is the one who washes feet (John 13). By the way, in this context, to become an icon of Christ is to strive toward what is commonly misunderstood as feminine traits, not masculine ones.

The original YOLO discovered!

The original YOLO has been discovered, and it reads “YODO”–“you only die once.”

“And just as it is appointed for men to die once, and after that comes judgment…” (Heb. 9:27 RSV)

You only live once, and you only die once, so make it count, always keeping in mind that we will have to answer for our actions!

Simple (and completely Lenten) Hummus

Русский здесь

This hummus is very simple and ‘fully’ Lenten–it uses no added oil at all.

2 cups of cooked garbanzo beans (I cooked my own in a pressure cooker, but canned would work just the same)

1/4 cup of tahini

1/2 teaspoon of salt

1/2 teaspoon of ground cumin

1-2 cloves of garlic

Juice from 1 lemon (I also put lemon pulp in my hummus after taking out the seeds)

Enough water to make it creamy

Add any other spices you like.

Put everything into a food processor, mix and enjoy on bread or a a dip for raw vegetables!

  

Fasting during the First Week of Great Lent

“On the first day of the first week of the the holy and great forty-day [Lent], that is to say, on Monday, one is not supposed to eat at all, and it is the same on the second day. On Wednesday, after the completion of the Presanctified, a meal is served, and we eat warm bread, and of warm vegetable food, and wine mixed with water, and honey drink [1]. Those who cannot keep the first two days, eat bread and drink kvass [2] after vespers on Tuesday. The elderly do the same. On Saturdays and Sundays we allow oil and also wine. In other weeks, we fast until evening for five days, and eat uncooked food [3], except on Saturdays and Sundays. And may we not dare to eat fish for all of the forty-day [Lent], except on the feast of the Annunciation of the Most Holy Theotokos and Palm Sunday. <…> If a monk spoils the holy forty-day [Lent] through his gluttony and eats fish, except on the feast of the Annunciation and Palm Sunday, let him not partake of the Holy Mysteries on Pascha, but repent for two weeks and make 300 prostrations each day and each night.”

Типикон, сиесть устав. Киев, 1997, гл. 32. Trans. Fr. Sergei Sveshnikov

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Translator’s notes:

1–“оукропъ съ медомъ”–Usually, ‘оукропъ’ is wine mixed with water, but in this particular phrase, rather than ‘wine mixed with water and honey drink,’ the phrase could potentially mean ‘a mixed honey drink,’ that is to say, water mixed with honey. The reason for keeping ‘wine’ in the translation is that on days when the Liturgy is served, a small amount of wine mixed with water is given to communicants after partaking of the Holy Mysteries.

2–kvass is a fermented drink made with grains and/or berries

3–xerophagy: bread and uncooked vegetables

Great Canon of St. Andrew of Crete (pdf)

Great Canon of St. Andrew of Crete (pdf)

The Great Canon is read on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday of the first week of Great Lent.

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See also:

What to watch during Lent

Fasting for Non-Monastics

 

What to watch during Lent

Here are some videos to watch during Lent. I will keep adding new ones as I find them.

Also, check out the new post, “What to watch during Lent 2”

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Dr. Jay Gordon: No one needs meat for health

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Following up on one of the most influential documentaries of all time, Forks Over Knives, comes Forks Over Knives – The Extended Interviews. This video includes never-before-seen footage from the film’s expert interviews, covering several themes in greater depth and addressing important issues that weren’t touched on in the movie. Forks Over Knives – The Extended Interviews covers more than 80 topics.

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In this fiery and funny talk, New York Times food writer Mark Bittman weighs in on what’s wrong with the way we eat now (too much meat, too few plants; too much fast food, too little home cooking), and why it’s putting the entire planet at risk.

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Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn argues that heart attacks, the leading cause of death for men and women worldwide, are a “food borne illness” and explains why diet is the most powerful medicine.

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Celebrated Cornell University professor T. Colin Campbell Phd, presents the overwhelming evidence showing that animal protein is one of the most potent carcinogens people are exposed to.

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Olympic gold medal winner Carl Lewis describes how his best athletic performances came after he eliminated all animal products from his diet.

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He’s VEGAN — James “Lightning” Wilks, an MMA fighter best known to many for winning The Ultimate Fighter TV challenge, US vs. UK. James holds a Black belt in Tae Kwon Do and a Brown belt in Brazilian Jui Jitsu. Listen to James relate decision to go 100% plant-based.

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A fateful blizzard on a drive to Tahoe led to a conversation about food and nutrition, which inspired bodybuilder Joshua Knox, a Google employee, to go vegan for a week. One week turned into a 1.5 year lifestyle experiment with bodybuilding and diet.

Study Notes: 19 FEB 2015

“Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession…Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.” — Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Study Notes: 13 FEB 2015

…and yet, Cain killed Abel. One may suppose that since Cain’s sacrifice of the fruits of his labors had not been accepted, he may have decided to offer a greater, human one–his younger brother. What is really interesting in this story is that God points out Cain’s sin (Gen. 4:7), and Cain immediately goes and slaughters Abel (8). Was this in a horrifically-mistaken effort to atone for his sin? Clearly, God saw this act as a great sin and cursed Cain in much the same way that He had cursed Cain’s father (12 cf. 3:17, 23).

Abraham’s sacrificing of Isaac probably would have been expected or even required in the land from which he hailed (Ur of the Chaldees). Abraham may have mistakenly thought that Sarah’s barrenness was due to some sin, and that if they were to have many children, a human sacrifice for that sin was required. According to some rabbinical as well as modern scholars, God’s demand of offering Isaac as the sacrifice may have been not so much a thundering voice from heaven as a religious duty that Abraham would have felt in his heart. (This, of course, is not the common interpretation of many of the Church Fathers.) God again showed that He did not require a human sacrifice, that a sacrificial lamb is not a replacement for human sacrifice, but an icon of the Lamb of God slain before the foundation of the world.

Both Abel and Isaac are biblical icons of Christ.

Study Notes: 4 FEB 2015

Notes on bioethics:

“There are two misunderstandings about marriage which should be rejected in Orthodox dogmatic theology. One is that marriage exists for the sole purpose of procreation. What, then, is the meaning of marriage for those couples who have no children? Are they advised to divorce and remarry? Even in the case of those who have children: are they actually supposed to have relations once a year for the sole purpose of ‘procreation’? This has never been a teaching of the Church. … Another misunderstanding about marriage is that it should be regarded as a ‘concession’ to human ‘infirmity’: it is better to be married than to commit adultery (this understanding is based on a wrong interpretation of 1 Cor. 7:2-9). Some early Christian sectarian movements (such as Montanism and Manicheanism) held the view that sexuality in general is something that is unclean and evil, while virginity is the only proper state for Christians. [Needless to say, they have since died out.–S.S.] The Orthodox tradition opposed this distortion of Christian asceticism and morality very strongly. In the Orthodox Church, there is no understanding of sexual union as something unclean or unholy.” —Metropolitan Hilarion (Alfeev)

Study Notes (31 JAN 2015)

Русский перевод здесь

Notes on bioethics:

The scriptural admonition is for married couples *not* to deny each other sexual relations, except by mutual consent for the purpose of prayer and fasting. Abstinence from sexual relations (by mutual consent) is certainly appropriate the evening before receiving the Holy Sacraments, and during the day that one receives them. It is certainly *not* an absolute “requirement” of the Church to abstain on all fast days (and on the eves of fast days), or during the 11 days after the Nativity when marriages are not permitted. The Russian Church in the 13th century issued guidelines for married clergy on these issues, and they included as days of mandatory abstinence only the first and last week of Great Lent, the two weeks of Dormition Lent, and Wednesdays and Fridays during Nativity Lent and the Lent of the Holy Apostles. The married state is blessed and the marriage bed is undefiled. The Holy Church in protecting the sanctity of marriage and the well-being of the spouses, as well as encouraging procreation and the raising of “fair children” has no interest in creating artificial impediments to preclude spouses from “rejoicing in one another.” —Archpriest Alexander Lebedev

Study Notes (29 JAN 2015)

Apostolic Canon 9(10) — 49 (51) A.D.

All those of the faithful that enter into the holy church of God, and hear the sacred Scriptures, but do not stay during prayer and the holy communion, must be suspended, as causing disorder in the church.

Апостольское правило 9 — 49 (51) г. по Р.Х.

Всех верных, входящих в церковь, и писания слушающих, но не пребывающих на молитве и святом причащении до конца, как безчиние в церкви производящих, отлучать подобает от общения церковного.

Толкование. Иже не пребывают во святе церкви до последния молитвы, но еще святей службе поемей и совершаемей, исходят из церкве, таковии яко бесчиние творяще во святей церкви, да отлучатся.

Study Notes (26 JAN 2015)

Notes from a lecture on bioethics:

Fundamentalism and fanaticism are not the same as Orthodoxy.

The clergy may be experts in some fields but they cannot be experts in all fields. And yet the clergy, bishops in particular bur also priests, are routinely asked to offer opinions on the widest variety of topics. Unless the clergy learn to consult with and listen to the real experts in whatever field the question belongs to, they often give erroneous opinions due to their lack of knowledge on the matter.

Just because we can do something goes not mean that we should. Just because we can build a nuclear weapon does not mean that we should, or just because we are technologically capable of polluting our own planet (from which we as of now have no way of escaping to a different one) and killing off many species of animals, does not mean that this is good idea. Technology must be guided not by scientific curiosity, or some notion of “progress,” or geopolitical greed or fear, but by moral and ethical values of what is truly good for humanity.

“The passion of greed is revealed when one is happy in receiving but unhappy in giving.” –St. Maximus the Confessor

For many people, their belief in technology is greater than their belief in God, and so they measure God against technological  or scientific advances instead of measuring technological advances against God’s purpose for our lives.

Study Notes (25 JAN 2015)

Notes from a lecture on Liturgy:

Orthodox worship is not something that people create in order to please God, but something that God reveals to people as an icon of the heavenly worship. Heaven comes down to earth and we see a glimpse of its glory. We enter into communion with it on its terms; we converse with it using its language; we do not begin anything here and now but rather enter into something that is eternal. We do not reenact or remember the Mystical Supper of Christ but partake of the one and only.

Worship is not intellectual of contemplative, even though it contains both of these elements.

Worship is not prayer, even though it certainly contains prayer.

Worship is communion with God.

We commune with the eternal God while being temporal beings and are thus bound by the limitations of our current state: we have times for services, daily, weekly, yearly and other cycles. But through this temporal communion with Christ we aspire to the eternal communion with Him: “Grant us to partake of Thee more fully in the unwaning day of Thy kingdom!” (from the Divine Liturgy)