Let There Be Light: God, Not Random Forces, Created Our Universe

Let There Be Light: God, Not Random Forces, Created Our Universeby Fr. Patrick Henry Reardon –
The opening chapter of Genesis has long been a favorite of Christians, and ancient commentators discovered in its lines profound levels of meaning.

In more recent times, on the other hand, some readers of Genesis, distracted by apologetic concerns alien to the deeper interests of the Sacred Text, have failed to discover those depths. For example, even from boyhood I recall that some of my teachers were preoccupied with the length of the six “days” of Creation. Was it really necessary, they asked, to think of those “days” in the sense of having twenty-four hours? Might they not, instead, represent long periods of Natural History?

No, this is certainly not what the biblical author has in mind. The problem with such questions is that they distract the mind from the deeper message of the Sacred Text. [Read more…]

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Unhinged Hatred: Frank Schaeffer Curses Donald Trump and His Family

Unhinged Hatred: Frank Schaeffer Curses Donald Trump and His FamilyInfamous progressive leftist Frank Schaeffer, who describes himself as “an atheist who believes in God” has reached a new low in his descent towards insanity and spiritual darkness. In a video posted on facebook on September 5, 2017, Frank snarls: “G-d damn you Donald Trump” and proceeds to curse President Trump. Calling for a “day of prayer” to also “curse your nepotistic horrible grifter unloving hard-hearted callous family,” Frank then ends by wishing that Trump will “live to see” his family “torn apart.”

Frank is infamous for his many outrageous and hate-filled rants on his facebook wall, directed at Christian conservatives, President Donald Trump, and other Orthodox Christians who defend the traditional theology and moral teaching of the Orthodox Church. Frank claims that he is a member of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, despite contradicting and attacking the Church teaching on abortion, homosexuality, marriage, transgenderism, and other matters of faith and morality. [Read more…]

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Nashville Statement Affirms Traditional Christian Principles on Marriage and Sexuality

Nashville Statement: Affirming Traditional Christian Principles on Marriage and Sexuality Here’s a worthy, true, and clear statement that all Orthodox Churches and hierarchs in America should support.

A coalition of conservative evangelical leaders across America issued a public declaration titled the Nashville Statement that affirms universal and traditional Christian principles on marriage and human sexuality. It is a response to an increasingly post-Christian, Western culture where many homosexual advocacy groups aggressively attack and purposely distort the moral teaching of Christianity.

“The spirit of our age does not delight in God’s good design of male and female. Consequently, confusion reigns over some of the most basic questions of our humanity. … The aim of The Nashville Statement is to shine a light into the darkness — to declare the goodness of God’s design in our sexuality and in creating us as male and female.” ~ Denny Burk (President, Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood) [Read more…]

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Theistic Evolution Incompatible with the Bible and Christian Theology

Theistic Evolution Incompatible with the Bible and Christian Theology by Hank Hanegraaff –
Creation versus Evolution. As the debate rages, there remain those who contend that they can subscribe to modern evolutionary theory and, at the same time, believe in God’s Good News as revealed in the Bible. Is this belief in Theistic Evolution truly rational?

What Is Theistic Evolution?
Proponents of theistic evolution claim that God created man by evolutionary processes, that is man is said to have evolved from lower forms of life. If this were the case, then all life, including man and his presumed ancestors, would have been subject to death throughout history. This is because theistic evolution depends on death to weed out lesser fit organisms to make room for the development and refinement of surviving species.

However, the Bible tells us that death came about as a result of sin. If Adam had not eaten of the forbidden fruit, if he had not fallen into a life of constant sin terminated by death, what need is there for redemption? None! [Read more…]

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Spiritual Blindness: Inability to Discern Good from Evil, Truth from Lies

Patriarch Kirill Spiritual Blindness: Inability to Discern Good from Evil, Truth from Liesby Patriarch Kirill of Russia –
What is spiritual blindness? It is people’s inability to see into the essence of what is happening around them. It is the inability to see good and evil, to discern truth from lies.

The spiritually blind person is like a vessel in the ocean without a navigator. If the captain has no idea where the vessel is located, where it is going, where the reefs are and where the calm waters are, where it is shallow and where it is sufficiently deep, then such a vessel will most likely shipwreck. It is the same in our lives—if a person has no spiritual vision he is taking a great risk. He can choose the wrong way of life, the wrong path in life. He can join his fate with a person in whom he did not see, did not discern evil from good or good from evil. [Read more…]

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The Abnormal Cannot Dictate What’s Normal

The Abnormal Cannot Dictate What is Normalby Fr. Ioannes Apiarius –
Those who are darkened by spiritual corruption or sexual depravity cannot be trusted to lecture others about what’s normal or demand that the normal embrace abnormality.

Those who are confused about their own sexuality or reject traditional Christian moral principles are incapable of giving advice on normal human relationships or family life inside or outside the Orthodox Church.

Those who believe or teach that sodomy is either “normal” or not sinful have separated themselves from the true teaching of the Orthodox Church and go against the laws of nature. [Read more…]

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Fr. Thomas Hopko: Homosexual Advocates Should be Denied Communion in the Orthodox Church

Homosexual Advocates Should be Denied Communion in the Orthodox Churchby Fr. Thomas Hopko –
For this reason, those who publicly affirm and promote homosexual behavior (like those who publicly advocate abortion) cannot be sacramental communicants in the Orthodox Church.

When Church leaders rightly remove persons from sacramental communion, they must understand their action as therapeutic and not punitive.

From Chapter 24 – Same-Sex Attraction and Sacraments in
Christian Faith and Same Sex Attraction: Eastern Orthodox Reflections book by Fr. Thomas Hopko

  • In Orthodoxy, communicants in the sacramental mysteries are not only obliged to be steadfast in the Christian faith and perpetually repentant over their failures, they are also obliged to take full responsibility for the Church’s teachings and practices, and to be ready, to defend them unto death. [Read more…]
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How to Overcome Despondency

How to Overcome Despondencyby Bishop Arsenius (Zhadanovsky) –
One must not delay in warring against despondency, for the next step after despondency is despair – which leads to perdition.

Despondency from Physical Ilnesses
Despondency springs from various sources, primarily from our physical illnesses. In this case, despondency is suppressed by spiritual inspiration, spiritual interests. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak, it says in the Scriptures. The holy Apostle Paul was beset by a physical infirmity: [T]here was given to me a thorn in the flesh, he says, …to buffet me (II Cor. 12:7). Saint John Chrysostom takes “thorn in the flesh” to mean a severe headache. However, the same Apostle Paul testifies, …when I am weak, then am I strong (II Cor. 12:10), because he was wholly caught up in serving the Lord. Our bodily infirmities and the resultant despondency can be overcome only by the strengthening grace of God. [Read more…]

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Gay Iconoclasm: Holding the Line Against the Radical LGBT Agenda

Gay Iconoclasm: Holding the Line Against the Radical LGBT Agendaby Fr. Josiah Trenham –
So here is the essence of the conflict, my friends. It is the LGBT versus the JCIB: Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism. Gay propaganda throws such classical wisdom to the wind without a thought nor a reference, as though it never existed, as though these religious traditions do not possess the hearts of the great majority of the world’s populations. They want civilizations to reorient themselves, overthrowing millennia of wisdom, to embrace the legitimization of sodomy and to crown it with the august dignity of the title marriage. Such a cultural redefinition of marriage is suicidal.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Your All-Holiness Catholicos and Patriarch of Georgia, Ilia II: Evlogēson, Despota. I ask your blessing. Highly esteemed and deeply respected brothers, Levan and Alan and Larry, such a joy to be here in Georgia, and I’m so deeply grateful to have this invitation to speak.

I was born and raised in Los Angeles, California, in the United States, as my father and his father before him. Los Angeles is the birthplace of the LGBT revolution. Los Angeles is the international center for homosexual propaganda and activism, the leading producer of its literature, the primary source of its media, the location of its religious iteration in the so-called “gay church,” and the center of its financial base in Hollywood. [Read more…]

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Moral Lives, Repentance, and Confession Before Holy Communion

Moral Lives, Repentance, and Confession Before Holy Communion Orthodox Churchby Fr. Paul Gassios –
Many times you have to say to your kids “no, you can’t do that” even if it means your child getting angry at you; they might even say they hate you when you need to enforce an admonition with some type of consequence when they defy it.

In a similar fashion our Orthodox Church teaches certain things that at times are not popular concerning the lifestyles we are to live. There are times we as priests and laity need to say to ourselves and others “no we can’t do that” and if we do; there is a consequence we face if we choose to ignore what the Church teaches. I have already stated when it comes to matters of faith such as the Nicene Creed, that if we don’t accept the tenets of the Creed and outright reject the confession of faith found in it, one should not come to communion until they change their thinking and can say “Amen!” to what the Creed professes to be true.

In the moral area, if someone commits certain sins such as murder or adultery, our Church canons (or rules) call for a certain number of years where one cannot go to communion and must do acts of penance (i.e. actions to show you are sorry for what you did) before someone can be restored to communion. [Read more…]

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