Love endures, perfect love casts out all fear. Since the Kingdom is motivated by love, we endure best when we love best. Why then do we ever center our work on anything other than love? We may agree that a Christian should begin with love, but until the beloved Kingdom is fully realized, there are things that must be opposed. Love demands that we push against anything that would harm other people. We must oppose materialism, the flesh, and devils first... Read more
We need courage just now. Courage, including physical courage, is not the greatest virtue, but makes doing greater virtues possible. Most acts of courage are not dramatic: most martyrdom is bloodless. We die to self. The courageous death brings true life, unless courage has been confused with masochism! And yet the outer sign of physical courage can be a notable image of the inner reality. Celebrate the unsung heroes: those freedom fighters that live and die in service to liberty for... Read more
Missing all the trends is not missing culture. This mistake, confusing the spirit of a particular age with God’s plan in history, is easy to make. Sometimes in history a group of people are cut off from information in the rest of the world by tyrants. Other places are described as “backwaters” and so the stories they might tell are ignored or viewed as “primitive.” Those West Virginia hills saw many generations of both sides of my family be born, live,... Read more
God save us from the role of functionary to the Empire: condemning what the powerful condemn as we try to side with history instead of Truth. This year of the bicentennial of Greek independence may we emulate the courageous and avoid the cowardly. Patriarch Gregory worked for peace, condemned hopeless warfare, but was willing to die for his people. He would not live by lies knowing it was better to die than to tell a lie. His martyrdom, hanged in the... Read more
The last dance led to death, but this martyrdom to joy evermore and memory eternal. If you cannot win, then how you “lose” can change everything. The Greek women of Zalongo danced in the face of tyrants and won a victory from defeat. The fall of Rome, Greek speaking Rome, came in 1453 and the Christians of the Middle East and Europe became second-class subjects of a great Empire for four hundred years. The Greeks might have vanished, but they endured to... Read more
Patience will bring the final victory over sin, death, and devils. Easter joy to Christians celebrating the Feast! For the Orthodox, the ancient churches, Pascha is still four weeks in the future. The Son will rise in the East as always, but in His perfect timing. The Orthodox are patient. Our day is coming. Meanwhile, we rejoice with those who rejoice, but perhaps all Christians can learn from the Orthodox faithful. Patience is much needed just now. We are encouraged... Read more
In the United States, some are tempted to impatience or unseemly panic. Instead, we should keep calm, exercise patience, look to our roots, and endure. One ideological root for America is Greece. One great theological root for the Church is Greece. We learn from Greece, God-blessed Hellas, that the Faithful people endure. We are not afraid. Things have been much worse for the Faithful in the past and are much worse for those facing the atheistic regime in China. We can thank... Read more
Rebellion against the tyrants was not their first choice. When the choice was thrust on them, when history caught up with the gentle, beautiful island of Chios, they kept being, gloriously, Greek, Christian. This was intolerable to a rotting empire, more eager to make new slaves and kill everyone than to allow liberty. Three quarters died or were enslaved on Chios. Consider: 75% of the freedom loving Greeks were murdered or made slaves for the love of God and Greece. What is... Read more
Lord Byron is a poet vaguely known, little read. He can teach all of us something, even if for your sins you never have to read his “classic” poem Don Juan. Byron himself was a terrible man, a human resource department disaster, with an ear for a jingle and a direct pipeline to the spirit of the age. As a result of his trendiness, he was an early social media star, forgiven for his vices, though like all such people,... Read more
Every year Americans face two anniversaries on one day: the sinking of the White Star Liner Titanic and the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln. This year, for assorted reasons, I have been trying to understand John Wilkes Booth. He was no madman, thought himself a great man, and might have been if he had not become a monstrous man. If we merely mock him, then we cannot understand him and so avoid him. Days before April 14/15, Booth had decided,... Read more
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