Save the Planet, Get Married!
Environmental activists want us to change our lifestyle to save the planet. We must drive less, fly less, eat less meat, and take fewer baths. Yet, these green fanatics remain silent on two of the most important ecological catastrophes: the explosive growth in singles, and divorce. 6/17/09
Beauty and Desecration
We must rescue art from the modern intoxication with ugliness. June 2009
The Three Most Important Rules in Business
Business and law professor Chris Banescu developed three rules that management must practice in order to achieve long-term profitability and success. Follow these rules and a business can remain healthy and prosper. Ignore them and failure is virtually guaranteed in the long term.” 6/10/09
The Collapsing Global Left
Conservatives can take heart from the crushing blow that taxes and spenders received in the California election. 6/8/09
Revisiting Hayek
Hayek’s central thesis in his sentinel work, The Road to Serfdom, is that through the inevitable mismanagement
of resources and goods at the disposal of the state, all forms of collectivism lead eventually to tyranny. 5/25/09
Obama’s Lost Opportunity to Address Coptic Persecution
President Obama’s trip to Cairo gave him an opportunity to confront the persecution of Egypt’s ancient Christian community, an opportunity he apparently passed up. 6/8/09
The Church Everywhere
So what happened to America? Here we are, known far and wide as the most religious country in the West, and yet people constantly turn to the government more than the church in times of crisis. 5/29/09
Helping Students ‘Get It’
A major project for those of us who work with students is to help them “get” Christianity. While a significant
number of Christian students reject Christianity during their university years, far more struggle to embrace a faith that is
not really authentic or orthodox. 5/15/09
Cowards, Sorcerers and Murderers
Yet everyday most of us act like cowards. Not because we don’t stop to help someone in need, but rather because
we stand idly by while millions of people die moment by moment without knowing that God loves them. May 2009
How Deep the Father's Love
Through Jesus, His life and parables, God the Father has approached us, His sons and daughters, one more time.
Jesus comes to us with two powerful and interconnected truths. 5/6/09
Orthodox Christianity And Capitalism: Are They Compatible?
Interview (Podcast) that discusses the economic, moral and spiritual issues surrounding the “capitalist” economic model and whether it serves the best interests of Christians living the life of the Beatitudes. 4/19/09
We Recommend
NewhallStation.com
New Orthodox Christian hobby business we support. Very high quality products!
62 Million Voiceless Americans
Is it still called debate when only one side controls the conversation? That’s the question the 62 million Americans who didn’t vote for Obama are asking themselves. 6/9/09
Power Plants Are Batteries
Most of us are not aware that our electrical power plants themselves are also batteries in a sense — huge installations that cost very large amounts of energy to construct. 6/8/09
The Tyranny of the Obvious
Those who promoted the War on Poverty and other grand plans to end poverty, writes Hunter Baker, “had no inkling
that these good-hearted strategies would lead to enduring cycles of poverty and family disintegration that threatened to
consume entire generations. Wishing for good outcomes resulted in disaster.” 5/27/09
Hollywood to Teenagers: Virginity’s for Suckers
With the soaring STD/STI rates, one would have to wonder if going back to the “unrealistic views of teenage sex”
might not be so bad after all. The painful truth is that in its attempt to remain “morally neutral,” Hollywood is causing us to
raise a nation of cads and harlots. 5/13/09
War is Hell
Sherman was right: War is Hell. The current war against the Judeo-Christian world waged by al-Qaida and other
radical Moslems is no different. 5/12/09
Does the Deficit Matter?
What do you call a country whose government is half supported by debt, much of it foreign? Probably one that the
International Monetary Fund would consider a basket case that needed to be put on an expenditure diet. The words
"banana republic" and "Argentina" come to mind. 5/12/09
It’s A Good Time To Work For Uncle Sam
At a time when the official unemployment rate is nearing double digits, and 6.35 million people are receiving
unemployment benefits, the U.S. government is on a hiring binge. 5/12/09
Even a messiah loses his training wheels
We can sympathize with Barack Obama’s fright as his moment approaches. It’s not easy suddenly being on your own,
paying the price of falling with your own skinned knees and bruised elbows. 5/12/09
Making Free Speech a Hate Crime
The hate crime bill that passed the U.S. House of Representatives April 29 is an attempt by democratic
socialists and progressives to silence dissent against alternative lifestyles. Their incessant iconoclastic attacks on once
established values and morality have nearly eroded this nation’s spiritual and cultural legacy. 5/7/09
Prosecuting our Protectors
History clearly teaches that great civilizations are not brought down by their external enemies, but that they
undermine themselves from within. In other words, they essentially commit suicide. 5/7/09
Articles from Previous Weeks
On Enduring Scandals in Faith
While being persecuted our Holy Father John Chrysostom wrote his treatise On the Providence of God to encourage
his flock to trust in God, and without doubt to believe in His sovereign providence governing all events. 5/1/09
Notre Dame’s Betrayal of Faith
When John the Baptist said to King Herod, “It is not lawful for thee to have thy brother’s wife,” the price he
paid was his head on a platter. He had spoken Absolute Truth to power in a time when power was absolute. 4/5/09
Taking on Goliath
If you think the pro-life movement has run out of energy and new ideas, you should meet Lila Rose. 3/25/09
Ignore Our Christian Values and the Nation Will Drift Apart
Every society, for its wellbeing, needs the social capital of common values and the recognition of certain
virtues which contribute to personal and social flourishing. Our ideas about the sacredness of the human person at every stage
of life, of equality and natural rights and, therefore, of freedom, have demonstrably arisen from the tradition rooted in the
Bible. April 2009
Helping Us Pull Our Ox Cart
Many people, throughout Christendom and in other faiths, still want to enter the Kingdom of God by their very
own brand of righteousness. Through a sprinkling of good deeds and works, they feel entitled to citizenship in that Kingdom.
Heaven laughs. 3/19/09
Creating Equal
Christ offers salvation freely to all who repent and follow him, yet he does not cease condemning the
Pharisees for their hypocrisy and hardness of heart (Matt. 23). When asked if only a few people are going to be saved,
he answers: “Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be
able to” (Luke 13:24). 3/2009
Fr. Johannes Jacobse: Paschal Message 2009
Only the Gospel of Christ, the proclamation that Christ is risen from the dead, reveals that death is an enemy
destroyed and exposes the nihilistic embrace of death as a lie. 4/19/09
Why be a conservative?
Why would I choose to be a conservative? Why would I choose the persecution? I am constantly ridiculed for my
beliefs. 3/25/09
Those arrogant Americans
We have a rock star president who for the first time in American history fired the President of a private
corporation, General Motors, then immediately flew to Europe with an entourage of 500 courtiers and a worshipful media, bowed
waist-deep to the King of Saudi Arabia, and proceeded to accuse his own country of arrogance. 4/6/09
Condoms don’t protect souls
Is abstinence, in particular, more realistic than promiscuity or less so? Is Christianity more realistic than
Oprah or less so? Is the Pope wiser than Madonna’s “Sticky and Sweet” tour dancers? 3/22/09
What Are We For?
Our life together in Christ isn’t simply about deciding what we’re against, what we won’t do and what we won’t
allow. It’s also about deciding what we’re for. 3/27/09
One Word of Truth Outweighs the Whole World
When the Gospel is preached, Christ is revealed. Christ is Savior, and our introduction to Christ — the means by which we awaken to His existence and become aware of His benvolent love towards us — occurs when we hear the Gospel. 3/28/09
Paschal Homily of St. John Chrysostom
The Paschal Homily of St. John Chrysostom is read at the end of Orthros (Matins) at Pascha, the feast of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, universally throughout the Orthodox Church.
Obama: Destroying Human Life for the ‘Greater Good’
Coming on the heels of the promise last month to overturn the “conscience clause” that prevents pro-life hospitals and doctors from being forced to perform abortions, Obama’s lifting of the ban on federal funds for embryonic stem cell research is a troubling sign. 3/17/09
What is Marxism?
Marxists claim that Marxism is a science. It is not. It is a sort of pagan religious cult. It is a theology. It is a form of superstition. 3/16/09
Something Wicked This Way Comes
The darkest times in human history have all begun when someone decided “not to let a serious crisis go to waste”. In fact, it is in times of economic crisis that folks are most susceptible to the ideas of tyrants. 3/15/09
Jesus Loves Global Taxation?
The communists and totalitarians in the WCC want to justify punitive taxation and radical reforms as "Christian." 3/3/09
United in Hate: The Left’s Romance With Tyranny and Terror
Lenin was serious about extermination of political enemies and others who were inconvenient to the cause of the communist revolution in the Soviet Union. But that didn’t bother western leftists who traveled there and covered up his crimes and those of his successors. 3/1/09
My Socialist Past
Anyone who has lived inside the demoralized, unproductive, gray prison of a communist state, as I did in the mid-1980s, knows to what depths of impoverishment the egalitarian fantasies of socialism inevitably lead. 3/15/09
An Academic Tragedy
To appreciate the radical changes that have taken place in America’s universities over the last few decades one could do worse than start with the University of California, Santa Cruz. 3/13/09
Four big problems with cap-and-trade
Massive tax increases, energy regulation, high prices for electricity, and reduced econmic growth as far as the eye can see. And it’s only week six (6) of Obama’s catastrophic presidency. 3/6/09
Obama to Overturn “Conscience Rule” for Pro-life Doctors
President Obama has begun quietly to begin the process of overturning regulations that protect doctors and hospitals from being forced to perform or refer abortions. 2/28/09
US Companies Pay the Highest Taxes in the World
It may come as a surprise that US companies pay the highest taxes in the world. Yes, you read that right! American businesses are the most heavily taxed among industrialized nations. 3/3/09
Obama Declares War on Investors, Entrepreneurs, Businesses, and More
Let me be very clear on the economics of President Obama’s State of the Union speech and his budget. He is declaring war on investors, entrepreneurs, small businesses, large corporations, and private-equity and venture-capital funds. 2/27/09
Carbon Regulation: One Scientist's Unscientific Dream?
There's an understandably growing unease about the likely prospect that the Obama administration will soon choose to regulate CO2 as a pollutant. But that disquiet would likely turn quickly to rage if more people knew the truth about the scientific conclusions on which this unprecedented incursion on both industry and individual freedom was based. 2/27/2009
The Obama Steamroller: Is Resistance Futile?
Obama's leftist policies are turning the US into a more European like economy, with much slower growth prospects, crushing deficits, and increased entitlement spending as far as the eye can see (and neither more nor less manmade global warming, regardless of what the Congress and Obama do in this area). 2/27/09
Keeping Hate Alive
When the New York Post went ape in a cartoon, the enemies of freedom and equality showed their colors. Apparently the time has come to silence all critics of President Obama! 2/26/2009
The Left Destroys More Than It Builds
"A giant wealth-destruction machine" perfectly describes the left many times over. It is both a wealth-destruction
machine and an ennobling-institution destruction machine. 2/24/09
Quotes
"It is maintained that anything so small as the Earth must, in any event, be too
unimportant to merit the love of the Creator, we reply that no Christian ever supposed we
did merit it. Christ did not die for men because they were intrinsically worth dying for,
but because He is instrinsically love, and therefore loves infinetly."
"And what, after all, does the size of a world or a creature tell us about its
"importance" or value?" [It's like saying a man only 5 ft tall is less important then
one who's 6 ft tall. That's illogical.]
-- C.S. Lewis -
Miracles
"Using his extraordinary descriptive powers, Lewis introduces us to
supernatural beings who will change the way we think about good and evil. In The Great Divorce
C. S. Lewis again employs his formidable talent for fable and allegory. The writer, in a dream,
finds himself in a bus which travels between Hell and Heaven. This is the starting point for an
extraordinary meditation upon good and evil."
A Jealous God Book Review - Award-winning journalist Pamela R. Winnick exposes some of the more
unsavory and dangerous characteristics of the scientific establishment that have contributed to the erosion
of human dignity and led to the abuse of individuals for the sake of science.
Mere Christianity (C.S. Lewis) Book Review - Mere Christianity is full of memorable and powerful revelations that
elucidate the foundations of Christian theology, our relationship to God, and the meaning of life. Only
C.S. Lewis could summarize such broad concepts so eloquently without coming across as overly-religious or preachy.
Visiting advertisers listed here helps support this site.
OrthodoxyToday.org
Articles and commentary on Social and Moral issues of the day.
Spiritual Nourishment
Articles and essays on a variety of Orthodox Christian topics and issues.
Orthodox Articles
Essays, Articles, and Information from various Orthodox sources.
A Primer on Capitalism
In today’s turbulent financial times and difficult economic conditions, a lot of unjustified criticism and unwarranted
accusations have been laid at the doorstep of capitalism. 1/22/09 (
more by Chris Banescu)
How Democracies Become Tyrannies
Near the end of the Republic Socrates decides to drive this point home by showing Adeimantus what happens to a
regime when its parents and educators neglect the proper moral education of its children. 2/16/09
The Progressive Road to Hell
This is what “progressive” social policies and good intentions have wrought! (What is paved with good intentions?)
Feminism, welfare, and the sexual revolution, along with the explosion of narcotics, have completely destroyed the black family. 5/26/08
Key Characteristics of Great Leaders - Part I
What are some key characteristics of a great leader? While many books and countless articles have been written
about this subject, we continue to witness a significant shortage of great leaders in many companies and institutions. Here
are some essential traits and skills that great leaders must possess. 12/31/2007
Orthodox Leadership in a Brave New World Fr. Johannes L. Jacobse - Salvation is not understanding the correct theological concepts; it is not nostalgia for civilizations past; it is not formal membership in a long-standing parish; it is not social activism; it is not morally
appropriate behavior; it is not mastery of the moral vocabulary. Any Orthodox response to the cultural challenge must first
presume a recovery of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. - 10/3/2007
The Task of Orthodox Theology in America Today Fr. Alexander Schmemann - For the eternal task of theology is to refer the life of the Church to the absolute
Truth of the Church's own tradition, to keep alive and operative a criterion by which the Church judges herself. Immersed in human
history, the Church is always full of temptations and sins and, what is even more serious, of compromises and accommodations to
the spirit of "this world."
Worship
Calendar of Feasts
Orthodox Calendar of Main Church Feasts from 2004 through 2012.
The Divine Liturgy
The word liturgy means common work or common action. The Divine Liturgy is the common work of
the Orthodox Church. It is the official action of the Church formally gathered together as the chosen People
of God.
Various Private Prayers
Fr. John Whiteford has graciously compiled on his site a large list of various
prayers.
The Seven Sacraments
Fr. John Matusiak and Fr. Thomas Hopko answer questions about the
Seven Sacraments of the Orthodox Faith.
In Spirit and In Truth
Our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ, by His Holy Glorious Resurrection, gave man inner
spiritual life, taught us to worship Him, and to serve God ‘in spirit and in truth’.
Search
