Silver, Furry, Catkins, Reach for the Sky
Now we worry about a piece of bread, about a roof over our heads, about our social conditions. And it seems to us that the meaning of life consists of this. But the Church says, Look at the pussy willows: leaves will sprout and later flowers and fruit. So it is even in a Christian soul. ~ Archbishop Andrei Rymarenko (1893- 1978)
Image by PhotoMix Company Pixabay
I remember my young Baptist mind being astounded there were actually two Saints from “forever ago” with real names! But why only two (St. Valentine and St. Patrick) I wondered, when we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses!?
In secular society, “Valentine’s Day” is given the nod – but mostly to a cupid logo substitution, removal of the saint title, and the “V” changed to small case. Peddling Festivities is not a new thing either. Sales and Marketing in the Retail World quietly sweep holy days under a generic blanket of holiday commercialism.
For Orthodox Christians, St. Valentine’s Day and all the saints’ days every day of the year, are glorious opportunities to learn more of our heavenly friends. By celebrating their summits of virtue, their struggles, courage, and pure love of God… we too, learn how to emulate them.
Children are instinctively drawn to the sweet essence of kindness and love remembering St. Valentine. Like St. Patrick’s Day, St. Valentine’s Day can open a wonderful lead into sharing the lives of other daily saints. God’s Love is true Love. His Perfect Love strengthens and blesses the bonds of spouses, families, friends, and neighbours.
The Saviour knocks on the Door of our Heart. He waits patiently for us to hear Him, to open the door, and to let Him in.
When we give our whole heart to Christ, He in turn refills it with so much Love, that it overflows with Joy!
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. ~ Matthew 6:21
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. ~ 1 Corinthians 13:13
With Love in Christ.
May the kindling of Divine Grace blaze brightly in all our hearts!
The grace of the Holy Spirit which is given mystically to every Christian when he is baptised acts and is manifested in proportion to our obedience to the commandments of the Lord. That is, if a Christian obeys the commandments of the Lord more, grace acts with him more, while if he obeys them less, grace acts within him less. Just as a spark, when covered in the ashes of fire becomes increasingly manifest as one removes the ashes, and the more fire wood you put the more the fire burns, so the grace that has been given to every Christian through Holy Baptism is hidden in the heart and covered up by the passions and sins, and the more a man acts in accordance with the commandments of Christ, the more he is cleansed of the passions and the more the fire of Divine grace lights in his heart, illumines and deifies him. ~ St. Nikodemos of the Holy Mountain
Angel Wall Mosaic Before Completion – St. Sophia Orthodox Church in Canada, 2012
“Let us go forth on peace” is the last commandment of the Liturgy. What does it mean? It means, surely, that the conclusion of the Divine Liturgy is not an end but a beginning. Those words, “Let us go forth in peace,” are not merely a comforting epilogue. They are a call to serve and bear witness. In effect, those words, “Let us go forth in peace,” mean the Liturgy is over, the liturgy after the Liturgy is about to begin. This, then, is the aim of the Liturgy: that we should return to the world with the doors of our perceptions cleansed. We should return to the world after the Liturgy, seeing Christ in every human person, especially in those who suffer. In the words of Father Alexander Schememann, the Christian is the one who wherever he or she looks, sees Christ everywhere, and rejoices in him. We are to go out, then, from the Liturgy and see Christ everywhere. ~ Bishop Kallistos (Ware) of Diokleia
Mountain River and Jungle, Hawaii 2016
Therefore with joy shall ye draw water out of the well of salvation. ~ Isaiah 12:3
“…but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” ~ St. John 4:14
On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.'” Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified. ~St. John 7:37-39
A fish that is alive swims against the flow of water. One that is dead floats down with the water. A true Christian goes against the current of this sinful age. A false one is swept away by its swiftness. ~ St. Philaret of Moscow
We see the water of a river flowing uninterruptedly and passing away, and all that floats on its surface, rubbish or beams of trees, all pass by. Christian! So does our life… I was an infant, and that time has gone. I was an adolescent, and that too has passed. I was a young man, and that too is far behind me. The strong and mature man that I was is no more. My hair turns white, I succumb to age, but that too passes; I approach the end and will go the way of all flesh. I was born in order to die. I die that I may live. Remember me, O Lord, in Thy Kingdom! ~ St. Tikhon of Voronezh
2004 – Dome from the Ancient Chora Church, in Turkey
Sadly, this church was converted to a mosque in 2020.
Prayer, fasting, and vigils, and all other Christian practices, however good they may be in themselves, certainly do not constitute the aim of our Christian life: they are but the indispensable means of acquiring that aim. For the true aim of the Christian life is the acquisition of the Holy Spirit of God. As for fasts, vigils, prayer and almsgiving, and other good works done in the name of Christ, they are only the means of acquiring the Holy Spirit of God. Note well that it is only good works done in the name of Christ that bring us the fruits of the Spirit. ~ St. Seraphim of Sarov
