Is America Becoming Europe?
Becoming Europe: Economic Decline, Culture, and How America Can Avoid a European Future Across the Atlantic, Americans see European economies faltering under enormous debt, overburdened welfare states, governments controlling close to fifty percent of the economy, high taxation, heavily regulated labor markets, aging populations, and large numbers of public sector workers. They also see a … (more...)
Catholic Online: An Orthodox Priest Reflects on the Retirement of Pope Benedict XVI
Catholic Online published an essay I wrote on the abdication of Pope Benedict. Source: Catholic Online | By Fr. Johannes L. Jacobse NAPLES, FL. (Catholic Online) – Like almost everyone, the resignation of Pope Benedict came as a shock to Orthodox believers. Those of us who have watched Pope Benedict and his predecessor Pope John Paul II work to lessen the estrangement between the … (more...)
Fr. Andrew Damick – A Conversion Story: Leaving Westboro Baptist
Source: Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy | By Fr. Andrew Damick (KWCH Eyewitness News) They’re known worldwide as the group from Kansas that protests at soldiers’ funerals, and says God hates America because it allows homosexuality. Now, Westboro Baptist Church is reacting to the defection of a key member. “She just decided she did not want to obey God,” spokesman Steve Drain says. “She … (more...)
The Super Bowl and Morality
- Source: Fr. Peter Preble Blog | By Fr. Peter Preble In my last post, I wrote about my favorite commercial from the Super Bowl, And God Made a Farmer. However, there were some pretty disturbing commercials as well as the entire half time show that I think needs to be addressed. Now I realize that each generation moves along a spectrum, and the previous generation does not always … (more...)
Acton Blog: Dunn, Oikonomia, and Assault Weapons: Misappropriating a Principle?
For better or for worse (probably better) discussion of Orthodox teaching to cultural issues and every day life takes place more often on public blogs than anywhere else. Some critics deride the development of a virtual public square but how does it differ from essays written on paper except that delivery is faster? Moreover, the quality of the writing is often good and sometimes excellent. … (more...)
Fr. Gregory Jensen – Canons and Guns: An Eastern Orthodox Response to a HuffPo Writer
Source: Acton Institute Power Blog | Fr. Gregory Jensen Several of my friends on Facebook pages posted a link to David Dunn’s Huffington Post essay on gun control (An Eastern Orthodox Case for Banning Assault Weapons). As Dylan Pahman posted earlier today, Dunn, an Eastern Orthodox Christian, is to be commended for bringing the tradition of the Orthodox Church into conversation with … (more...)
Homosexual Marriage at the Dusk of Liberty
- By Fr. Johannes L. Jacobse To define homosexual coupling as marriage violates natural law. It takes one male and one female to create a child and constitute a family. A male-to-male or female-to-female coupling is naturally sterile; biologically closed to the creation of new life (which is not the same thing as saying that either partner is infertile). A homosexual "family" then, is … (more...)
Fr. Gregory Jensen: A Field Guide for the Hero’s Journey – Part 1 [Book Review]
Source: Koinonia The Pursuit of Freedom & Wealth. Though both are good neither freedom nor wealth are morally sufficient ends in themselves for the human family. Like freedom, wealth is for something. Actually strictly speaking wealth and freedom are both in the service of human flourishing. In the Christian tradition this means that both human freedom and all the myriad forms that wealth … (more...)
Metropolitan Hilarion Blasts Anglicans for Renouncing the Faith
In a recent speech at Villanova University, Met. Hilarion (Alfeyev) of the Russian Orthodox Church said that dialogue between the Orthodox and Anglicans are under threat because of the abandonment of the Christian moral tradition by the Anglican communion. Orthodox and Anglicans find themselves "on different sides of the abyss which separate Christians of a traditional direction and Christians … (more...)
Tolerance is Not a Christian Virtue
- Hang on to your hat folks. The title does not say Christians should be intolerant. It says instead that tolerance is not an end itself but merely an important working principle in moral discourse and inquiry. Below is a summary of the point given by Abp. Chaput of the Roman Catholic Church. It is taken from a recent speech he gave back in 2009. He spoke to a Catholic audience thus the … (more...)
The America of 2013
America is in a very deep moral crisis. Source: American Thinker | Steve McCann Americans take great umbrage whenever they, as a society, are portrayed by the residents of other nations as self-centered, avaricious and overbearing. While an egregious exaggeration in the past, is it an accurate description now? Who are the American people today and what sort of country is the United … (more...)
Recreation of the Icon by Iconographer Lynette Hull
Re-creation of the Icon: Lynette Hull at TEDxCapeMay 2012 - Recreation and Re-creation" Lynette Hull is an American iconographer trained in the methods of fifteenth century Russian-Byzantine iconology. Since 2002, she has studied under master iconographer Vladislav Adrejev, founder of the Prosopon School of iconology. The Prosopon school, while committed to preserving the creative techniques … (more...)
Asceticism and the Free Society
The underlying thesis in the essay below is that 1) man is fundamentally a moral being, and 2) the restoration of culture is fundamentally a moral enterprise. The essay is reproduced by permission of the Acton Institute but note something about that: There is more interest in the Orthodox contribution about the intersections of faith and culture outside of Orthodox circles than within it. What … (more...)
“There’s Plenty of Freedom, But Little Truth”: Solzhenitsyn Remembered
Source: Pravmir.com HT: Acton Blog Back when I was a college student I stumbled on Alexander Solzhenitsyn's "Harvard Address" in the library. I read it and knew immediately that Orthodox Christianity contained the spiritual depth I was looking for as a Christian. I had no real idea what Orthodox Christianity was and started reading up on it. I assumed too that Orthodox Churches existed only in … (more...)
The Twelve Days of Christmas
Orthodox Christians need to remain faithful to their traditions. In the Christian tradition of both east and west, the twelve days of Christmas refer to the period from Christmas Day to Theophany. The days leading up to Christmas were for preparation; a practice affirmed in the Orthodox tradition by the Christmas fast that runs from November 15 to Christmas day. The celebration of Christmas did … (more...)
