[ditty_news_ticker id="27897"] June, 2016 - Orthodox Christian Laity
Facebook
Twitter
YouTube

Monthly Archives: June, 2016

Source: In Communion by NICHOLAS SOOY By now, everyone has left Crete. Everything has been wrapped up. My skin, for its part in this, is a shade darker and a shade redder. The Council has ended. But the conciliar process has not. One of the phrases that is used in the Council documents is “liturgy after the liturgy.” This phrase is meant to capture the manifold ways in which prayer, love, and sacramentality are to shape the whole of life and the cosmos, and not just the experiences we have during liturgical services. After the liturgy each day at the Council,…

Source: Ancient-Origine World’s first illustrated Christian bible discovered at Ethiopian monastery The world’s earliest illustrated Christian book has been saved by a British charity which located it at a remote Ethiopian monastery. The incredible Garima Gospels are named after a monk who arrived in the African country in the fifth century and is said to have copied them out in just one day. Beautifully illustrated, the colours are still vivid and thanks to the Ethiopian Heritage Fund have been conserved. Abba Garima arrived from Constantinople in 494 AD and legend has it that he was able to copy the gospels…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru Greek media is reporting that at least two documents put forth by the recently concluded Pan-Orthodox Council on Crete were not signed by all delegates. While the names of all delegate bishops from each of the ten represented Local Churches were added to each document by the Secretariat of the Holy and Great Council, there were those who abstained from signing the documents “The Sacrament of Marriage and its Impediments” and “Relations of the Orthodox Church with the Rest of the Christian World.” It is reported that Met. Hierotheos (Vlachos) of Nafpatkos and Agios Vlasios, who had a…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru The Holy and Great Council of the Orthodox Church concerned itself with the matter of the canonical organization of the Orthodox Diaspora. Therefore, the respective documents were discussed concerning the Orthodox Diaspora and the Rules of Operation of Episcopal Assemblies in the Diaspora, which were submitted by the Fourth Pre-Conciliar Pan-Orthodox Conference (Chambésy, 2009), and by the Synaxis of Primates of the Autocephalous Orthodox Churches (January 21-28, 2016), approving them with some minor amendments as follows: It is affirmed that is the common will of all of the most holy Orthodox Churches that the problem of the Orthodox…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru The Holy and Great Council of the Orthodox Church concerned itself with the matter ofAutonomy and the Means by Which it is Proclaimed. Therefore, the respective document, which was submitted by the Fifth Pre-Conciliar Pan-Orthodox Conference (Chambésy, October 10-17, 2009) was discussed and was approved with some minor amendments as follows: The questions of the text examined by the Council addressed: a) the concept, nature, and various forms of the institution of autonomy; b) the prerequisites for a local Church to request autonomy from the autocephalous Church to which it belongs; c) the exclusive prerogative of an autocephalous…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru ENCYCLICAL OF THE HOLY AND GREAT COUNCIL OF THE ORTHODOX CHURCH In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit With a hymn of thanksgiving, we praise and worship God in Trinity, who has enabled us to gather together during the days of the feast of Pentecost here on the island of Crete, which has been sanctified by St. Paul, the Apostle to the Gentiles, and his disciple Titus, his “true son in the common faith” (Tit 1.4), and, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, to conclude the sessions of this…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru Buenos Aires, June 24, 2016 An open letter from METROPOLITAN PAUL of ALEPPO addressed to all the Hierarchs of the Orthodox Church on the Feast of the Holy Spirit My chains, the bond of our unity Short time or long—I pray to God that not only you… may become what I am, except for these chains (Acts 26:29) Your Holinesses, Your Beatitudes, Your Eminences and Your Graces, Hierarchs of the Orthodox Church, My Fathers and brothers in the grace of the episcopate, “Apostles of Christ” and “Servants” of the people of God in all the oikoumene, This year,…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru The Orthodox Church, as the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, in her profound ecclesiastical self-consciousness, believes unflinchingly that she occupies a central place in the matter of the promotion of Christian unity in the world today. The Orthodox Church founds the unity of the Church on the fact of her establishment by our Lord Jesus Christ, and on the communion in the Holy Trinity and in the sacraments. This unity is expressed through the apostolic succession and the patristic tradition and is lived out in the Church up to the present day. The Orthodox Church has the…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru The contribution of the Orthodox Church in realizing peace, justice, freedom, fraternity and love between peoples, and in the removal of racial and other discriminations. For God so loved the world that he gave his Only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life (Jn 3:16). The Church of Christ exists in the world, but is not of the world (cf. Jn 17:11, 14-15). The Church as the Body of the incarnate Logos of God (John Chrysostom, Homily before Exile, 2 PG 52, 429) constitutes the living “presence” as the sign and image…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru I. On Orthodox Marriage The institution of the family is threatened today by such phenomena as secularization and moral relativism. The Orthodox Church maintains, as her fundamental and indisputable teaching, that marriage is sacred. The freely entered union of man and woman is an indispensable precondition for marriage. In the Orthodox Church, marriage is considered to be the oldest institution of divine law because it was instituted simultaneously with the creation of Adam and Eve, the first human beings (Gen 2:23). Since its origin, this union not only implies the spiritual communion of a married couple—a man and…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru THE IMPORTANCE OF FASTING AND ITS OBSERVANCE TODAY Fasting is a divine commandment (Gen 2:16-17). According to Basil the Great, fasting is as old as humanity itself; it was prescribed in paradise (On Fasting, 1, 3. PG 31, 168A). It is a great spiritual endeavor and the foremost expression of the Orthodox ascetic ideal. The Orthodox Church, in strict conformity with the apostolic precepts, the synodal canons, and the patristic tradition as a whole, has always proclaimed the great significance of fasting for our spiritual life and salvation. The annual liturgical cycle reflects the entire patristic teaching on…

Source: Pravoslavie MESSAGE OF THE HOLY AND GREAT COUNCIL OF THE ORTHODOX CHURCH To the Orthodox people and to all people of good will To God, “the Father of mercies and all comfort,” we address a hymn of thanksgiving and praise for having enabled us to gather during the week of Pentecost (18-26 June 2016) on Crete, where the Apostle Paul and his disciple Titus preached the Gospel in the early years of the life of the Church. We give thanks to the Triune God who was well pleased that in one accord we should bring to a conclusion the…

1 2 3 6