In my years of cooking I've learned to ignore, or actively flee, the advice to "use only the freshest ingredients." It's impractical, wasteful and often harmful. This is an opportunity to pass along a favorite passage from my beloved Tassajara Cookbook*: “Nowadays we are often advised to eat the best, to enjoy the freshest. And we shop...

I came across L M Sacasas' 41 Questions about Technology in his Convivial Society newsletter, and liked them so well that I wanted to share them. Here they are. 41 Questions About Technology L M Sacasas 1. What sort of person will the use of this technology make of me? 2. What habits will the use of this technology instill? 3. How will...

“O ye people, announce the good tidings of the refashioning of the world.” “Behold, our restoration has now been revealed to us: in a manner beyond understanding, God is united to mankind; at the voice of the Archangel, delusion is destroyed, for the Virgin receives joy; things of the earth have become heaven; and the world is freed fr...

Metropolitan Iago (James) El-Khoury, of Buenos Aires, Patriarchate of Antioch: “Repentance, beloved, is living every moment of our life with vision of the kingdom, living in this world in the hope of eternal life. This means for our heart to be liberated from the pleasures of this life, from its enticements, and for us to cast out worr...

“Today the whole creation shines with light from on high... Today things above keep feast with things below, and things below commune with things above.” - Prayer from the Blessing of Waters This past weekend, our two local Orthodox Churches, Holy Apostles and Saint Catherine, joined to celebrate the outdoor Theophany blessing of water...

Fr Moses, a tireless worker in the Lord's vineyard, reposed today. Here is a re-run of a reflection on some of his words that I did a while ago: ____ "This will cost you everything" PERIODICALLY I listen again to Fr Moses Berry's "Advice for Enquirers". Every time, I feel that I haven't lived up to the challenge that he lays before us....

Some of us took part in a New Year's vigil at our church on New Year's Eve. As this photo records, just at midnight we came to the beginning of the Anaphora, where the priest says "Let us lift up our hearts!" It was a beautiful way to see in another year. I'd like to turn this into a New Year's resolution: Let us lift up our hearts! I ...

This past weekend we were at St Tikhon’s Monastery in PA, whose cemetery hosts our grave plots and headstone (but not us, yet). Looking upon your own grave is a bracing exercise. “I am the image of thine ineffable glory though I bear the wounds of my transgressions. Pity thy creature, O Master, and purify me by thy loving-kindness. Gra...

Today the Synod of Bishops of the Orthodox Church in America announced its decision that Matushka Olga Nicholai of Kwethluk, Alaska, be officially numbered among the saints. A date for the official Rite of Glorification is still to be announced. This decision has been in the works for a long time, and I rejoice to see it come to fruiti...

Here is a painting by Ilya Glazunov, of the lost Russian city of Kitezh. According to legend, Kitezh sat on the banks of Lake Svetloyar in central Russia. When, in the 13th century, Mongol invaders approached the undefended city, its people prayed fervently for salvation, and the entire city disappeared beneath the lake. On calm days s...

Recently I was thinking again about the the harms of "online Orthodoxy" and online religious consumption in general, and I remembered this "Beginner's Guide to Being an Orthodox Christian" by Fr James Guirguis, whose Out of Egypt blog is well worth following (even though it's online). Always a beginner; hoping always to remain a beginn...

I was telling my granddaughter a story from when I was little. She asked "Was that a long time ago?" Yes, it was. "Did you use a buggy?" No, people have gotten around in cars since I was born. But, I told my granddaughter, when my grandmother was a little girl, everyone used horses and buggies, but when she was a grownup, everyone used...

"Almost nothing of any importance is on the Internet." - Robert van Vliet You may have read "The Mystery of the Bloomfield Bridge," a blog post which got a surprising amount of attention in the past month. The author wondered why a seemingly useless pedestrian bridge had been built over an interstate in Minneapolis. Most of us would st...

Since our parish started a consideration of money & the spiritual life (prompted by Andrew Geleris' Money & Salvation), two piercing statements on wealth have crossed my path. From St Nikolai Velimirovich's Prologue for September 9, the commemoration of Saints Joachim & Anna, parents of the Mother of God: “Joachim & Anna had lived toge...

Today marks the 50th anniversary of J. R. R. Tolkien's death, and I've been reading a few reflections on his legacy that sparked thoughts and reminiscences of my own. I read Lord of the Rings in high school, in the venerable Ballantine paperback edition (here are the covers, which I remember vividly). It was little enough known that I ...

The Dormition of the Most Holy Theotokos: The "Summer Pascha" “Just as Jesus Christ is the perfect revelation of the uncreated God, “being the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person” (Heb. 1:3), so too (if it is not too bold to say) the Mother of God is the perfect revelation of our created humanity — of all that ...

This morning I saw this photo, which brought bittersweet memories. The two vested priests are Fr George Livanos (l) & Fr Dragan Filipović (r), serving together at All Saints Church in Canonsburg PA. Both of them, and both of their families, were powerful examples of faith and encouraging supports to us in our life in the Church. Both r...

The great & lesser blessings of water at Theophany are fairly well-known: sometimes the news media will even have photos of Greek boys piling into the ocean to retrieve the Cross, or Russians plunging into the icy January waters. Less well-known is the customary blessing of water on August 1, the first day of the Dormition fast. After ...

“He stepped down into the kitchen & washed up the utensils. He had a warped bucket in which it appeared that he had saved the water used for washing the rice rather than throwing it out. In that he washed the chawan bowls & the rest. Having washed, dried, & turned the utensils upside down on the shelf, he now took the bucket of water i...

From The Prologue by St Nikolai of Ochrid & Zicha, for July 29: “God does not desire that any man be lost. He did not create man for death, but for salvation. Is there a gardener who sows vegetables, yet desires that his vegetables dry out & perish? God is wiser & more compassionate than all men. God has only one desire: that all men r...

A friend told me once about his most precious possession. His father, a Serbian immigrant, worked as a mechanic in a steel mill on the Ohio river. When he cleaned up after work, he was never able to get the machine oil completely off his hands. My friend's most precious possession was his father's Slavonic prayer book: he told me that ...

I came across this today: We live in a media world full of people who very literally make their living trying to keep us angry and scared. Sometimes they put on a pseudo-prophetic, "Wake up, people!" costume. Often they flatter us by telling us that they're giving us access to truths that the common herd are missing out on. Turn away f...

I was reminded this morning of Andrew Wyeth's famous Christina's World, which I've loved since I was very young. My parents sometimes took me to the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, where the painting sat uncomfortably amid all the abstract expressionism. Like (probably) most people, I first saw it as a dreamy painting of a girl ...

I've enjoyed pondering this chart assembled by religious demographer Ryan Burge: It combines data on weekly church attendance from various European countries and all 50 American States. Reliable church attendance figures are hard to come by. Often they're based on self-reports in surveys, which usually exaggerate attendance: when resea...

This from Fr Stephen Freeman: “Imagine yourself in a situation of life and work in which you have no access to the internet. Nor do you have any newspapers or magazines. All you see or know is what you actually encounter. Strangely, all you could actually do would be to “live.” This, in the best of situations, is the culture of a monas...

Today we joyfully celebrate the Feast of the Ascension. I sometimes fear that we tend to miss its joyousness because it marks the end of the Paschal season, the end of proclaiming "Christ is Risen," the end of singing "Shine, O New Jerusalem." But I think we can almost dare to call, and rejoice in, Ascension as the Feast of our Salvati...

Not long ago, after reading another round of articles (see here and here) describing "the rise of the nones" – the rapid increase in Americans professing no connection with a religion – I remembered some words spoken by our former bishop, Metropolitan Gregory, at his enthronement in 2012. He said he believed that, as faith continues to...

Holy Week and Pascha are, liturgically, about the same every year, but each year brings us new impressions, memories, and (we hope) insights and growth. This hymn from Matins of Holy Friday has haunted me since hearing it again this year: “SEEING THAT the sun had hidden its rays and the veil of the Temple had been rent at the death of ...

My wife and I sometimes say, jokingly, "They've changed the Bible again!" when we come across a passage that looks new to us even though we've been reading the Bible for decades. Not long ago I read a familiar passage in Luke's Gospel: “And the Lord said to him, “Now you Pharisees cleanse the outside of the cup and of the dish, but ins...

This Lazarus Saturday, we commemorated Christ's raising of Lazarus from the dead. By a beautiful conjunction, we also rejoiced in the baptism of our grandson Thomas. The baptism immediately preceded the Divine Liturgy, so the "newly chosen warrior of Christ" was able to partake of the Mysteries while still wet behind the ears. It's no ...