July 16, 2021 Does the Church Pray for Those Who Died from Alcoholism or Drug Addiction? It certainly does; and yet the parallel with the suicides suggests itself and requires a word of clarification. Refusing to carry out funeral services…
July 14, 2021 Why Does the Priest Immerse His Fingers into Baptismal Water and Blow on It? Consecrating the water is the high point in the Sacrament of Baptism. Before we start this complex conversation, let us try to answer the…
July 5, 2021 Is Praying to Mary and the Saints Really Okay? When I first began to investigate Orthodoxy, my main stumbling block to conversion was prayer to Mary and the saints. My Protestant formation had…
June 2, 2021 Why Are Relics of Saints Divided into Particles and Who Divides Them? You can find pieces of relics of various saints in any church. They symbolize the prayerful presence of the deceased saint, to whom the…
June 1, 2021 How to Find Hope in Our Loneliness The question that we received from one of our readers is relevant to many of us today. What might we say to someone who is…
May 29, 2021 Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh on Inner Silence Soon after my ordination, I was sent to serve in a retirement home. After the service, a decrepit old woman came up to me…
May 26, 2021 Growing Colder in Faith after a Few Years in Church: Is This Normal? “I used to enjoy prayers, fasts, lengthy services and pilgrimage trips, but suddenly everything changed. Why?” Reason One. Doubts I believe that growing colder…
May 24, 2021 Why Don’t Temptations Go Away? In homily 69, St. Isaac reminds us that temptations to sin come upon all people, even the “perfect.” Quoting freely from St. Macarius of Alexandria,…
April 23, 2021 Standing for Hours at the Lenten Services Exhausts Me So Much that I Can no Longer Think Straight. Is Anything Wrong with Me? Different degrees of the described state are familiar to everyone. Moreover, well-known and authoritative clergymen did not hesitate to describe similar experiences in their…
April 20, 2021 Prominent 20th-century Elders’ Thoughts on Confession Listen to this article As we read about the great fathers of the church who lived in the last century, some of us might…
