Yet knowing that Santa is not real, we still get excited. Why?

Because Santa is real.

Let me explain.

We as humans love a good story. There is nothing that sounds better than cuddling by the fire with a hot drink and listening to an epic story. A story that transports you, not just to a distant land, but transports you out of this world.

There is nothing better than when you walk out of the movie theater feeling like you can conquer the world as you have just watched a superhero movie ready to pull out your sword and defeat the bad guys.

We love a good story.

Why?

Because beauty speaks to our soul. And these stories are just that. Beauty.

Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things.

Good stories awaken in us the desire to want to be part of something bigger, the longing to belong to something that is outside of ourselves.

Good stories almost speak life into us. They tell us of hope, of victory over the darkness. They tell us that the good people always win and that I just need to believe in something beyond myself. Good stories show me virtues that I deeply desire, sacrifice, walking with friends in dark places. These are stories of heroes and friends.

And these stories are true and they are real.

They are real because they point to something beyond. They are full of enchantment because we live in an enchanted world whether we recoginse it or not. Our world is full of mystery because there is a world beyond the material in which we see with our eyes. This world was made by the Divine and by default it can only be enchanted, mysterious and mythological.

Yes, I used the word mythological.

I believe myths to be true and not false.

Myths point to something that is real. They point to a world outside of us, they point to Christ. Human myths all originate from the One True Story because from the dawn of creation, humans have been made in the image of the Triune God. Therefore naturally the stories we imagine and create from the depths of our hearts come from this Divine imprint.

In one of C. S. Lewis’ essays he explains the need to dress the Gospel in fairy tales in order for us to see and know Truth. Fairy tales are able to pass the watchful dragons that prevent us from seeing Reality. In a way myths are incarnational as they conceal the Truth in order to reveal the Truth to mankind in our own language and culture. God was incarnate, the Divine put on Man in order to reveal the Father. He came in the form of man in order to be relatable to mankind.

No wonder myths speak of pure greatness, of great hope and ultimate victory. They tell us we are not alone in this world and that real friends exist and are willing to know us and love us. Myths lift us up from our dark despair and they shine a light and scream at us of the great hope and joy that belongs to us. They draw us into a world that has meaning and depth, they draw us into a real Mystery.

“Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.” G K Chesterton

Yes, I can defeat those nasty dragons in my life, I can finally defeat Thanos, I do have the power to destroy the Ring.

And all this is true. Real truth.

Because; “Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.” Romans 8:37

The Victory is ours through the Incarnation, Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension of our Lord.

Hope is ours and it isn’t wishful thinking because Aslan is coming back and all will be made well.

The Church provides a real and true ‘mythical’ experience for us in the Liturgy. In the Liturgy Reality is Revealed to us through the enactment of symbols; symbols meaning the real presence of and not just a mere sign. The Real Heaven is here present in the Liturgy. It is presented to us in a mythic way that it may be more understood and accessible to us. The Liturgy portrays to us glimpses of the Reality of the Kingdom the same way myths do but how much more the Liturgy which was given to us by Christ Himself.

All that is good and beautiful in the world symbolises, shows the real presence of, our Lord and Saviour. When stories are told of a loyal and faithful friend, revealing the ultimate Friend. The hero who sacrifices and lays down his life for his city, revealing the Lamb Who was slain.  The marriage that withstood all its trials, revealing Love. Or just the ordinary guy struggling through life, revealing our Conqueror.

We may not experience what is true, noble, just, pure and lovely but they still remain real in this world. These stories show us what we could experience, what we could become, what we could be and ultimately what we are.

Let’s read and tell good stories and watch good movies as we all long for the Kingdom.

In the current generation each of us is encountering and experiencing the disease of this age: busyness. It has become the norm; if one is not busy then something is wrong with them … they must be lazy or intellectually deficient.

We are constantly running around from one thing to the next and when we look back on our day or week it’s all a blur. We feel less and less satisfied and fulfilled.

Since having grown up most of my life in a slow-paced country and then moving to a much faster paced lifestyle, it has been and continues to be a huge struggle for me to adjust.

I have been reading a book this Lent that has really enlightened me about this struggle.

The book talks about despondency and our relationship to time. Despondency is given the definition of the failure to care about things that matter, for example our spiritual life and the care of our neighbor.

Despondency happens as a result of our busyness. We lose our desire to grow and be, our desire to dream and wonder, and our desire for deep intimacy. We as humans choose a busy life to escape the reality of our pain and suffering. Our minds as a result abandons the pain of caring. We lose the capacity to focus, to encounter and love which in turn provokes a toxic kind of emptiness – a vacuum that attracts all manner of distraction, restlessness, rumination, anxiety, fear and lethargy.

Despondency causes us to move from living to existing.

The root of despondency is the broken relationship we have with and our perception of time. We have confined our notions of time to fleeting moments throughout our life. We despise time as we always complain we don’t have enough of it as it is constantly ‘flying by.’

Through the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, Christ has sanctified time. Time is no longer a ticking bomb counting down to our final moment. Without Christ, time enslaves us whereas in Christ time is liberating and time, most importantly, is relational.

Yes we live in chronological time but through the incarnation, where the One who is out of time came in time, made time eternal. Despondency traps us in chronological time where there is only despair and it makes us constantly want to escape from the present moment. The mind prefers thinking about either the past or the future as they are both the constructs of the mind’s own doing and our mind can control them. The present moment is outside of the mind’s control and therefore is completely ignored.

We desire to be ‘anywhere but here; any moment but now.’ We have become dissatisfied with our present. In that way time has become our enemy, a prison in which we find ourselves locked up in leading to our own self-destruction.

Man now has the ability to live in the present moment, where Christ is. Christ is in the now. Eternity is now.

Only in the present moment can I meet with Christ and only the in the present moment can I dine with my fellow brethren. Christ is not in my past ruminations and He is certainly not in my future fantasies. We have given our minds so much control that we can no longer tolerate being present. Our minds have become the author of our stories of despair and as a result our negative fantasies become more attractive to us.

We become so focused on getting to the next big thing… the next holiday, the next event, next weekend, our next meal. We no longer know or want to be present and focused with the task at hand, we no long focus on the person in front of us or enjoy the magnificent experience before us.

The here and now is not about the duration of time but about my state of being. The present moment is not measured by clocks or determined by the mind but it is experienced by the heart. In the present moment we are transformed, we become more watchful, attentive and sober.

We are able to experience.

We are able to enjoy every moment that has been presented to us, no matter where we are or who we are with. Because every time we are present we meet with Christ regardless.

One of the fruits of despondency is lukewarm prayers because we lack the ability to be present. We then question why prayer seems like I am talking to a brick wall and why I haven’t experienced the joy and transformative life of prayer.

Unfortunately our society is so good at deceptively allowing despondency to creep into our lives with the bombardment of technology and work.

Fortunately for those in Christ and in the Church, the Church continually calls us all who are wandering back into Life, back into the present moment. One beautiful way She has done this is through the Divine Liturgy. In Liturgy we experience, if we are present, the eternal now. Christ meets us where we are as heaven and earth are united.

Liturgy has no longer become the center of our worship but the center of our inconvenience as we want to get Liturgy ‘out of the way,’ so we can socialize or get to Sunday school etc. We gaze up during Liturgy thinking about what we will eat after or where we will go.

Liturgy is the pinnacle of the present moment but we despise it, as we cannot stand the present moment.

Thank God for this season of Lent where the Church gives us things to practice living in the present moment. It’s a time to slow down, to attend liturgies, and to wait on God in prayer.

To paraphrase Kallistos Ware, the most important time you are in is now, the most important place you are is the one you are in now and the most important person there is, is the one you are with now.

Let’s be in the now to meet Christ and to meet each other where healing and transformation may abound for all.

I challenge you today to practice being present in the remaining time of Lent and hopefully beyond.

Quiet down your mind about thinking about tomorrow while you are present with the one sitting in front of you today.

Be present in whichever task you are doing now and if you have the urge to escape by pick up your phone for example, then wait a few minutes, don’t act on impulse and wait for the urge to pass. 

Let’s switch off our fantasies and ruminations and instead switch on our hearts and be attentive to the here and now.

The present is not an emptiness but a Fullness.

This post will show the idea that God designed gender because of the fall and that gender itself tells the story of redemption.

Please Note: We can only explore this concept with a Christian lens because the purpose is to tackle this issue within our Church. Outside the Church is a different perspective altogether.

The problem is that we have allowed the mystery of our faith to leave our local churches all the while replacing it with scholastic theology. Saying that gender is by design is not enough in this day and age. Why? Because humans are becoming the ones who are deciding what Truth is all the while neglecting the Person of Truth. Gender is our identity, it is a part of who we are, and it points to the fact that it is God who designs us. Gender tells the story of redemption, the story of restoration, the story of unity.

What is Gender?

Gender is defined these days as a ‘social construct.’ The problem with this definition is that society dictates how we should be, rather than recognizing who we actually are. In other words, how we were designed to be by the One who made us.

“It’s okay for me to be me, whatever that is,” has become this generations motto for absolutely everything.

In order to define gender, we must look at the relationship between God and man, as therein lies the context for which we see the male-female relationship.

Fr. Thomas Hopko affirms that as humans, we are the revelation of the Trinity, we are made male and female in order to grasp and attain the divine life we were made for.

According to St. Gregory of Nyssa, the male-female distinction was made according to the foreknowledge of God, knowing that man would fall. It can be concluded from St. Gregory’s work that sexuality is not part of the image of God that was given to man in creation; rather sexuality has a salvific function. This function is oneness with God.

This poses the question: does the image of God refer to gender? The image of God refers to how man has the capability of interacting with the Divine, in order to achieve his full potential.

This illustrates that the image of God, as designed, does not include gender.

Archbishop Lazar Puhalo emphasizes the idea that sexuality was made for the fall of man, when he explains that the intention for gender was prophesy. Gender bears in itself a revelation of what man’s life is and his relationship to God.

Many times in the Old Testament, there is reference made that man’s relationship with God is of a marital relationship. He uses the example of Hosea and Gomer to illustrate His covenant between Himself and Israel. It is through Hosea that He reveals to Israel His desire to redeem and restore man. Ultimately, God is revealing to man the relationship between God and His Church.

God, from the inception of creation, placed the mystery of human gender as a revelation and prophecy. It is in this mystery that we find the core of our redemption in Christ, through our distinct male and female roles. Christ, our husband, is faithful to his wife, the Church, and continues to pursue her in order to redeem her. Marriage, in the context of male and female is the design in which God chose to redeem humanity. This was a belief from the early Church when Clement of Rome wrote: “God made the human person, male and female. The male is Christ, and the female is the Church.”

“Shall I tell you how marriage is also a mystery of the Church? Christ came into the Church, and She was made of Him and He united with Her in spiritual intercourse… So marriage is a type of the presence of Christ.
-St. John Chrysostom

In this way, male is a type of Christ, while female is a type of the Church.

God’s design was male and female. This was to echo and reveal the prophecy between Christ and His Church. The prophecy was the redemption of humanity, the Church, being joined with its Creator. The only reason for this design is the fall of man, being separated by sin from God.

In the resurrection, St. Paul teaches that there is no difference between male and female.This is the case because the prophecy has been fulfilled; Christ is united with His bride, the Church. Human gender, which had a prophetic role, has been fulfilled.

Gender Roles

The role of gender is very specific in the Church compared to other roles in our lives. Since the role of gender is prophetic, this role should be played out in the liturgical life of the Church, as opposed to in politics or our workplace, which, are not part of the redemption of man.

This perspective follows on, as we have discussed, the role of man and woman is to reveal the relationship between Christ and His Church. Therefore, once man has reached his heavenly destination, the role of male will cease as Christ the visible is present. The same is found with the role of women, which prophetically reveals the Church.

In terms of the Church, if man and woman are not fulfilling their roles then we are essentially perverting the Gospel and the revelation of who Christ is.

When we use terms that have not been given to us by God, or when we identify ourselves in ways God never revealed, then we are distorting the story of our salvation.

When gender becomes a fluid concept that is no longer definitive, then Christ cannot be revealed through the male gender and the Church cannot be revealed through the female gender.

Therefore, since Christ is our redeemer, this fluidity will pervert the Gospel’s message. The Gospel’s message is the redemption of God’s people, the unification of Christ and His Bride.

From before the foundation of the Earth, the Church was there, in the eternal will of the Father. The Church then became existent spiritually when the creation of angels occurred. With the creation of Adam and Eve, the Church was established on earth. The Incarnation of Christ was foretold through the creation of man, therefore as mentioned previously, Adam and Eve were a revelation of Christ and His Church. Through the Father’s foreknowledge of the Fall, He revealed His plan of salvation through the creation of male and female.

Let’s live out our vocation as one body, male and female, that we may see the Risen and Ascended Christ in our daily lives.

Our loneliness has caused us to be so needy and as a result we have become overly sensitive to any hints of someone trying to attack us. We are quick to lash out to anyone who seems to be rejecting us.

A product of our defenses and protective walls are the external structures to keep out strangers. We protect our properties with dogs, double lock the doors to our homes and have security guards in airports and train stations. Our society has titled those that who do not speak the same language, those who are unfamiliar, those who dress differently, as strangers. This is what has created fear and hostility within us. We will often find ourselves even calling our own family and friends as strangers. The communities we live in have become battlefields rather than places of peace and places to bring us closer.

Rather than living as persons who share in each other’s pains, laughers, and sorrows we have become individuals who move away from one another, ready to strike at any moment we feel threatened.

Henri Nouwen offers a solution to this hostility; hospitality.

To most people hospitality often means an open door for guests to come into their homes and make themselves comfortable.

Abraham’s hospitality is the most beautiful example of true hospitality. He welcomes graciously his three guests as he camps by the oak of Mamre. As a result of Abraham’s hospitality, something or Someone priceless was offered to him and his wife.

Both the Old and New Testament demonstrate this, when hospitality is offered a gift is offered to the host. To Abraham his gift was the revelation of the Lord Himself. When the widow of Zaraphath offered a place of refuge to Elijah, Elijah revealed himself as a man of God. On the road to Emmaus as the two friends offered the Stranger a space to walk with them, the Stranger revealed Himself as Christ the Risen Lord.

The key to each of these events is the ‘space’ that was offered by each host to their guest, a space that was created to allow the stranger to be transformed to a friend. The guests were welcomed as they were, not on the host’s terms but their own. Each stranger and guest has a great gift to offer us, to heal us and enrich our lives.

The German word for hospitality is Gastfreundschaft, which means friendship for the guest. The Dutch word for hospitality is Gastrijheid, meaning freedom of the guest. The beauty of illustrating both these definitions paints us a full picture. Hospitality is the place for friendship with no conditions and freedom without abandonment.

Every person we sit with, every person we encounter on a daily basis is our guest, a guest in our ‘personal space’, a guest to our thoughts, feelings and way of life.

We must create a space of emptiness for them to explore freely in our presence. We always feel the need to bombard our guests with our own ideas, opinions and feelings. Yet hospitality shows us something different. It shows us that the guest has the freedom to sing their own song, speak their own language of pain, joy and laughter, to dance their own dance and even leave freely having discovered this own calling.

You see, hospitality, is allowing our guest to find himself rather than be conformed to our ways, our thoughts and our lifestyle. We offer our guest that gift, ‘to find their own personal way of being human.’

We as the host must lay down our weapons and invite our guests to do the same.

Johannes Metz describes this in the most profound and enlightening way when we says:

We must forget ourselves in order to let the other person approach us. We must be able to open up to him to let his distinctive personality unfold— even though it often frightens and repels us. We often keep the other person down, and only see what we want to see; then we never really encounter the mysterious secret of his being, only ourselves. Failing to risk the poverty of encounter, we indulge in a new form of self-assertion and pay the price for it: loneliness. Because we did not risk the poverty of openness (Matthew 10: 39), our lives are not graced with the warm fullness of human existence. We are left with only a shadow of our real self.

We subconsciously say and do things every time we are with others trying to make them like ourselves, but we end up pushing them away. The fall of man led to this ‘sameness’, where we want everyone to be like ‘us’, the intolerance of distinction and particularity in every human being.

In the famous icon of the Trinity by the Russian iconographer, Andrei Rublev, the image of hospitality is portrayed. It was said of the hospitality of Abraham that it was three angels that came to him and Sarah. According to Tradition it was the Lord Himself. The three Persons illustrated in the icon have wings yet each carries a staff in their hand. The Divine joins our weary journey, revealing how we to must walk with our guests.

The center of the icon is the table, or the altar where the slain Lamb is. The story of the hospitality of Abraham is transformed to the hospitality of God to us. The Trinity is inviting us to sit and dine with them, at the Father’s house, to come disarmed and free to be yourself. I enter in with my unique personality and unique way of expressing myself to the sacred place of the Beloved. The Father, Son and Holy Spirit all with their arms open, invite me to come and be the completion of the circle around the table, to join in with their Divine and eternal Dance.

The table is prepared and the door is open. My host, my Father calls out to you and me, ‘Come.’

I challenge you this week to get together with one person in your community whom you have labelled as a stranger and see what gift they have to give to you.

“The stories of the spiritual journeys of others nourish us, revealing profound psychological and spiritual realities, illuminating the inevitable difficulties and realisations of all who journey along with us. Stories show a path, shine a light on our way, teach us how to see, and remind us of the greatest of human possibilities. We are invited to laugh, to awake, and to join our journey with others. Their stories are our stories, they have power to touch us, move us, and to inspire us.” -Christian Feldman & Jack Kornfield

Today marks the 10 year commemoration of one of the greatest men that ever lived in the 21^st century; Father Matthew the Poor, Abouna Matta El-Mesken.
This post isn’t to convince the world of how great a man of God he was but rather to direct us to Christ through his life and spirit.
Born on the 20^th September 1919, as Youssef Iskander, Fr. Matthew the Poor was a Coptic Orthodox monk in the monastery of St. Macarius, Wadi El-Natron, Egypt. There are not many words that I can use to describe the life of Fr. Matthew the Poor so I will let the words of those who lived amongst him speak for themselves.

A Father

His fatherhood through his writings:

“It is perhaps not too much to say that his book on Orthodox Prayer has defined the prayer life of thousands of English language readers at the beginning of this century. It was a seed planted in the wasteland of the Wadi Rayan in the 50s but in our own time it has become a forest – an ecumenical forest.” -John Watson

His ability to father came from following the examples of those before him:

“You should pause at each of these sayings and consider the lives of these heroes – how they gained prayer for themselves as if it were everything. Their lives became prayer and their prayer became life. Compare your life with theirs and your experience with theirs. If your spirit burns within you, lay down this book, worship and pray, and this mingle your reading with prayer.”

-Fr. Matthew the Poor in the Orthodox Prayer Life

A father of the church, bringing the light of Christ back into the life of the church:

“Before you the old theology of the isolated church
Battered by storms from inside and out
The greatness of Christ went under tons of Folklore
The love of God was buried under false teachings…
From the womb of divine providence you were born
Like many of our great ones
For you, like them, solitude became bread
Never once you replied to insults
Like a lamb you lived
Like a lion you preached the gospel.”
-A Contemporary Theologian

A Friend

A friend who was respected by all:

“The state with all is capabilities could not have done what you have done for your monastery and your country.” -President Anwar el-Sadat (Egyptian President, 1970-1981)

“In this capacity, he went beyond taking care of his monastery’s monks to taking care of the world around him; the world that his heart cared for even when he was within the monastery’s fences.”
-Fr. Shenouda El-Anba Bishoy

A friend to the saints:

“Abouna Matta would emerge every night with a new friendship with the spirits of these saints; with a knowledge and illumination from them that grew every day for him.” -John Watson

A Warrior

A warrior through his sweet and honey-like words:

“Your writings remind us of the beautiful branches of a tree
In the heat of the summer of Egypt
Many will sit under their shade
Many will eat from their divine food
Many will regret that they never met you.”
-A Contemporary Theologian

A warrior in his actions:

When asked why he never defended himself against the many accusations regarding some of his writings, Father Matta El-Meskeen replied, “Did you read the Exposition of the Gospel of John and benefit from it? … My son I won’t spend my time replying to anyone, but, my son, I will die and they will die and the Church will remain, as well as what we offered to her, and the next generations will judge us.” (The Gospel of the day of his departure (June 8, 2006) according to the Coptic Lectionary was John 15:17-25).

A warrior who encompassed Unity within himself:

“Unity surpasses the capacity of the human mind. All that individual reason could do would be to understand any kind of Unity once it had been truly accomplished. But it could not grasp beforehand how unity would be accomplished. “The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, ‘Look here it is!’ or ‘There is it!’ For, in fact the kingdom of God is within you.”

“If we desire a true unity, we must seek it and study it in God, in His presence, and not as some theoretical subject separated from God, whatever theological guise it may adopt.”

-Fr. Matthew the Poor in True Unity Will Inspire the World

A warrior who showed us how to be human:

“Leaving the world for a wasteland can be perceived as saving the world within oneself, and saving the wider world itself within the prayer life of eremitism and monasticism.” -John Watson

A warrior who encompassed all aspects of life and showed us the importance of the spiritual as well as the physical:

John Watson recounts the following:

“Father Matta frequently spoke of  ‘work’ not as an end in itself but as ‘an effective means of bringing about death to the human self with an authentic humane growth into the ground of our being.'”

“The administrative, agricultural and institutional revolution at the Monastery of St. Macarius was very great. The spiritual revolution was much greater.”

May he be a father, a friend and warrior to us all. Intercede for us before the Throne of Grace, our beloved father!

“You will not hear these words
As you are now plunged in the sea of divine love
But like you I wrote this for the coming generation
In the coming years your greatness will shine.”
-A Eulogy for Fr. Matthew the Poor

“Even if our beloved Fr. Mathew the Poor has departed our vanishing world, we know that death cannot put a halt or an end to a life such as his.” -Fr. Shenouda El-Anba Bishoy

“Life is not to be regarded as an uninterrupted flow of words which is finally silenced by death. Its rhythm develops in silence, comes to the surface in moments of necessary expression, returns to deeper silence, culminates in a final declaration, then ascends quietly into the silence of Heaven which resounds with unending praise.” -Fr. Thomas Merton

Noise shadows our thoughts, suffocates our senses and shuts up our hearts.

I am no longer able to live in the present moment. I am no longer able to know reality, to live my reality.

Noise imprisons us in a cave where we are left alone, with nothing and no one to accompany us.

People pay thousands of dollars for an ideal ‘getaway’ from the noise and busyness of everyday life.

What if I told you, you don’t have to spend thousands of dollars to get away from it all? What if I told you, that silence is within you…

The most central part of us isn’t our brain but our heart: the part that tells us who we really are, who we ought to become, what we long for, our hurts, our fears.

When I choose noise, when I choose to be constantly surrounded by the noise of the television, music, people… but worst of all, when I choose to be surrounded by the noise of my mobile phone.

Yes we can turn our phones to silent, where we can’t ‘hear’ it but there’s a deafening noise our phones make that we aren’t aware of.

I recently discovered this when I made the decision to switch my phone off for a whole entire week in order to practice silence.

Wow.

What a difference.

I realized the constant checking of my phone, that constant ‘go to’ when I have some down time was causing such a disturbance even into the depth of my soul. We have created an entire world through these small devices. We’ve been fooled into the notion that being connected to everyone I know and connected to the rest of the world means I am not living in isolation. We think if we didn’t have our phones we would be completely lost, not knowing what’s going on with our dear ones or what the news is telling us to ‘pray’ for.

I recognized my phone made some sort of internal noise; a screeching noise that deafened my internal ears and my inner heart. I was tricked into thinking that I was living in the present moment, as I would browse through the ‘current’ events. In reality I was living in a trapped world, where there was no past, present or future. The present moment, the now was slipping away from me, blinding me from who I am and suffocating my ability to interact with my environment and grow.

I was no longer aware of what was before me; the present moment that testifies to my being was gone.

I was disabled.

I was unable to love who was with me in that present moment. I was unable to engage in the nature around me. I was unable to grow to a fountain of life.

This deep piercing noise caused a division between my mind and my heart. It muted the ache in my heart and I became numb to what was truly hurting and tormenting me. I did not know what my heart was yelling out to me. I knew my heart was sick, but how sick? What was causing my heart to ache?

What is the remedy for this?

Silence.

Silence is the absence of noise that surrounds us along with an interior state, which takes us to the presence of God.

Silence leads us towards the center, the human heart; the throne of God.

Silence liberates us from the enslavement of the past and the future.

Even when I am not occupied with something physical in my hand, half of the time I am either thinking of the past and the other half I am thinking about the future.

Silence cannot merely be read or talked about, but it is to be experienced.

It is lived.

It is a way of life.

When words are forsaken, a new awareness is welcomed.

It is not just simply an ending to words but it makes sense to all that is both spoken and unspoken.

Silence is fullness, not emptiness.

It is not absence, but the awareness of a Presence.

Silence is a way of watching and listening intently to what is happening within us and around us.

It is stopping interiorly and digging into the cellars of the heart.

Silence is a challenge and when we refuse to take up this challenge, we deny ourselves of what we ought to know about ourselves. As a result we live a life less than we are truly called to be. The ultimate sin is not pride; it is the forgetfulness of who we are. This is a great catastrophe.

Do not miss the opportunities of silence that are given to us each new day; a silent moment alone, a walk alone, when we are stuck in traffic, waiting for the bus, a silent moment in the presence of a dear friend. We should be so willing to enter in those times of silence and fathom them.

We are what we do with the silence that is given to us.

At the same time, silence needs to be cultivated.

Silence needs to be given it’s proper time and place in our day. It needs to be practiced.

Silence is almost a paradox in our time as it is perceived as something negative: that quiet person in the corner who doesn’t want to socialize, an ‘awkward’ silence with someone we don’t know very well, or the absence of God’s voice.

But it is in silence where God created.

It is the ambiance and the environment.

The sacred space into which God speaks His Divine Words, both to create the world and to save it from death and corruption.

God spoke life in silence.

God wants to speak in silence today, now, in my very own silence.

I challenge you this week, the holiest week of the year, to put away that which steals your inner silence. Be silent before the Holy One that you may receive His Life, His Power, His Glory, His Blessings and His Majesty.

He has become our Salvation.

(Photo courtesy of Mahmoud Marei)

This cookbook takes all of the work out of coming up with healthy and nutritious things you can cook so that you can focus on what matters most during this time.

Each of the four weeks worth of recipes starts out with a weekly shopping list. These ingredients will be all you need to make four different meals for dinner that week.

Most, but not all, recipes are for two. In addition to the four weeks worth of dinner recipes there are also recipes for pastes, sauces, and salads. You can mix and match these as the pastes and sauces actually go well with the salads. You can get creative and even use them as a spread for sandwiches you make for yourself for a light breakfast or lunch.

In addition to all of the recipes, there are also several pages of tips and tricks taken from cooksmarts.com in the back of the cookbook.

A little disclaimer: watch out for the various way of saying the names of some of the ingredients. Even though it’s still the English language there are differences between Britain and the United States when referring to the same item. For example, what I would call rocket my husband would call arugula.

I’d love to hear your feedback and if you have any recipes yourself please share them!

Click here to get our Lenten Cookbook

To you, the churchgoer, who believes that it’s all about you and your personal relationship with God.

To you, the churchgoer, who believes that it’s all about doctrine and speaking in a convoluted way about God.

I wrote this for you.

Many fear the word theology; it makes some run to the other side of the room. It is a word that has hurt many people and caused damage, even drawing them away from church. On the other hand, it is a word that excites and inspires others.

In our church, there has been a complete divide between theology and spirituality. The theologians often seem to lack interest in having a relationship with God and are more focused on saying it right. Those who want to be ‘spiritual’, at the other extreme, stay far away from theology because to them it’s more about a relationship than a system of laws. This contradiction of world-views creates people with two opposing mindsets.

If we ask the question, “what is theology?” Then we must also ask, “what is spirituality?”

Theology is not a mere narrative of right truths; it is the understanding and declaration of the great I AM, of Beauty Himself.

“Then God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light.” Genesis 1:3

The Word spoke creation into existence, revealing the relationship between words and created matter. The Source of words is divine since the Logos, the Word Himself, Christ, preceded all of creation.

Christ is Truth, the Logos, the Word Himself.

God is only truly known, revealing Himself through His creation, when there is a right relationship between words.

“Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden’?” These are counter-words, non-words. Words that abuse: God; said; you; eat; tree; garden. The right words, in the wrong order, to the wrong person, at the wrong time. A death of theology, or a theology of death.”

Father Stephen Freeman

Since theology pertains to God, how much then do we need to be careful with our words? Words have power, power to lift up or tear down.

Coherency in expression and carefully thought out words must be the ‘rule’ for portraying theology. As Bishop Kallistos Ware puts it, “clarity is a gift from the Holy Spirit, whereas ambiguity and disorder is not.”

We must not be negligent with how we express the Inexpressible. Our language is limited as we use it to talk about the things of this world, but in theology we are using our words to touch the Divine Kingdom. In order to do so, we must speak in a riddling and enigmatic way.

It often happens that those who classify themselves as ‘spiritual’ hate to read. To them the importance lies in prayer and worship without investing time in delving into what our forefathers have preserved for us. What I believe in God will affect my relationship with Him and those around me. The truth is, theology should lead to doxology. A knowledge of the Holy can only lead the heart to sing louder of His praises.

‘God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.’ John 4:24

Theology, mysticism, spirituality, moral rules, worship, art: these things must not be kept in separate compartments. Doctrine cannot be understood unless it is prayed: a theologian, said Evagrius, is one who knows how to pray, and he who prays in spirit and in truth is by that very act a theologian.

Bishop Kallistos Ware

We must acquire the mind of the Fathers in order to live the saintly and glorious life they once lived and taught. We must live by the same spirit in which they lived, and that can only be done by studying the words in which the Spirit Himself inspired them with. It is not by merely quoting them that we acquire their mind, but by sitting daily at their feet, asking the Spirit to illuminate us the way they were.

The beauty of reading is that it shapes the mind. It changes my distorted way of thinking and fine tunes me to the Spirit, which was granted to the Church.

Read often and insatiably the books of the teachers of the Church on divine providence, for they lead the mind to discern the order in God’s creatures and His actions give it strength, and by their subtleness they prepare it to acquire luminous intuitions and guide it in purity toward the understanding of God’s creature.

St. Isaac the Syrian

When I read holy books then the spirit and body are illumined and I become the temple of God and the harp of the Holy Spirit, played by divine power. Through them I am corrected and through them I receive a kind of divine change and I am made into a different person.”

St. Gregory the Theologian (On St. Basil’s books)

The fundamental purpose of the theology of words is to testify to the Mystery of the Living God.

Christos Yannaras defines theology as a “gift from God, a fruit of the interior purity of the Christian’s spiritual life. It is not a hypothetical system or a theory of how the world works. It is the illustration of the construction the Church’s experience through the ages. It is not an academic code of behavior but a partaking, a communion of being.”

An authentic theologian is one who is always taught by God Himself, theodidaktos. This is where Divine meets the material; this is where humans learn how to interact with the environment around them. It is not mere books or words that assist us in making sense of this world but the Word and the Spirit.

Our forefathers never made a clear distinction between theology and spirituality, between doctrines declared by the Church and personal experience. This is because the teachings deposited to the Church are meant to be an expression of revealed Truth, given in different measures to the faithful.

For I neither received it from man, nor was I taught it, but it came through the revelation of Jesus Christ.

Galatians 1:12

Even though the teachings of the Church have revealed Truth they still remain a mystery that we should not try to use our logical way of thinking to understand. Instead, we should ache for an internal change of spirit, allowing us to experience true mysticism. Theology is theanthropic, the cooperation between Divine and man. Not a work between man and his bookshelf or even man and his prayer corner.

There is no discrepancy between theology and prayer, theology and experience. There is no genuine theology without the pledge to holiness. Therefore, there can be no separation between theology and spirituality. Theology is spirituality and spirituality is theology.

Let’s be the generation that marries these worlds together. Let the theologians work with the ‘spiritual’ to bring wholeness to this fragmented world and ultimately to the Church, the hospital of our souls.

There is a vast difference between a teacher of religion and a spiritual servant. The teacher conveys knowledge from a book using a piece of paper, while a servant, out of the fullness of the Holy Spirit, fills others with his faith, love, self sacrifice, humility, and presents spiritual experience and a living example to follow.

The teacher relays the words as he heard or learned them, he prepares a lesson to lead people to an idea. Whereas, the servant, by birth pains, begets children of God.

Thus, a servant is not merely a teacher of lessons, but a savior of souls.

Father Matthew the Poor

Check out Part IV

(Photo courtesy of Maciej Bledowski)

Really? I can do that? I’m worthy to get up and start all over again?

It’s that time of year again where our news feeds are flooded with new year resolution suggestions and tactics. People are discussing why you weren’t successful in the previous year at achieving your goals and what may work in the next year.

In reality we know what works best: simplicity. It’s in the simple living and the simple changes we make to our lifestyle that makes everlasting change.

I want to share the following 55 Maxims of Fr. Thomas Hopko (Priest and Theologian, 1939 – 2015) where he demonstrates the art of living. He takes a holistic approach, encompassing all aspects of our life: spiritual, intellectual, emotional, physical and relational.

I challenge you to pick 3 – 4 and do them well this year.

1. Be always with Christ.
2. Pray as you can, not as you want.
3. Have a keepable rule of prayer that you do by discipline.
4. Say the Lord’s Prayer several times a day.
5. Have a short prayer that you constantly repeat when your mind is not occupied with other things.
6. Make some prostrations when you pray.
7. Eat good foods in moderation.
8. Keep the Church’s fasting rules.
9. Spend some time in silence every day.
10. Do acts of mercy in secret.
11. Go to liturgical services regularly.
12. Go to confession and communion regularly.
13. Do not engage intrusive thoughts and feelings. Cut them off at the start.
14. Reveal all your thoughts and feelings regularly to a trusted person.
15. Read the scriptures regularly.
16. Read good books a little at a time.
17. Cultivate communion with the saints.
18. Be an ordinary person.
19. Be polite with everyone.
20. Maintain cleanliness and order in your home.
21. Have a healthy, wholesome hobby.
22. Exercise regularly.
23. Live a day, and a part of a day, at a time.
24. Be totally honest, first of all, with yourself.
25. Be faithful in little things.
26. Do your work, and then forget it.
27. Do the most difficult and painful things first.
28. Face reality.
29. Be grateful in all things.
30. Be cheerful.
31. Be simple, hidden, quiet and small.
32. Never bring attention to yourself.
33. Listen when people talk to you.
34. Be awake and be attentive.
35. Think and talk about things no more than necessary.
36. Speak simply, clearly, firmly and directly.
37. Flee imagination, analysis, figuring things out.
38. Flee carnal, sexual things at their first appearance.
39. Don’t complain, mumble, murmur or whine.
40. Don’t compare yourself with anyone.
41. Don’t seek or expect praise or pity from anyone.
42. We don’t judge anyone for anything.
43. Don’t try to convince anyone of anything.
44. Don’t defend or justify yourself.
45. Be defined and bound by God alone.
46. Accept criticism gratefully but test it critically.
47. Give advice to others only when asked or obligated to do so.
48. Do nothing for anyone that they can and should do for themselves.
49. Have a daily schedule of activities, avoiding whim and caprice.
50. Be merciful with yourself and with others.
51. Have no expectations except to be fiercely tempted to your last breath.
52. Focus exclusively on God and light, not on sin and darkness.
53. Endure the trial of yourself and your own faults and sins peacefully, serenely, because you know that God’s mercy is greater than your wretchedness.
54. When you fall, get up immediately and start over.
55. Get help when you need it, without fear and without shame.

Which ones stick out to you? Tell us below!

(Photo by Aman Deep)

“Every Christian must be part artist. We craft lives of meaning through faith. And this means reaching out to engage those who differ while never losing appreciation for what sets us apart.”
-Father Andrew of Athos

I grew up thinking, you were either creative or you weren’t. I categorized myself as the latter since I couldn’t draw, write or produce drama. I spent most of my life detaching myself from anything that required creativity or imagination because to me that part of my brain just didn’t work.

We are the result of creation, and that means that He who fashioned us gave us the ability and the capacity to also create. We are all artists and poets, and I’ve come to learn that creativity is so much more than painting a portrait, writing a profoundly deep story or producing a moving film.

So what is creativity exactly?

Simply put, you.

It’s you.

It’s you in your daily interactions, in the way you interact with the stranger you meet, in the way you plan a trip to a new destination, the way you take on disappointments in life, the way you come up with an idea to improve your business’ efficiency or sales. It’s you in the way you carefully think out a recipe to make that perfect meal for the ones you love.

Beauty is in creativity.

Our sensitivity to beauty is but a glimpse of how man saw the world before corruption seeped into our very nature.

Understanding beauty is an important aspect when we create. Beauty is not static; it is not confined to any one person’s perception, but it is dynamic in the sense that it continues to develop. And when true beauty is fully cultivated it has the space to flourish in whatever direction it pleases.

Beauty is in the touch of love, in the healing words we can whisper to our neighbor and in how we have the ability to be woven into each other’s lives.

However, the most beautiful work of art is in the work of being made by Grace. It is in becoming the final tapestry of work yourself. In writing songs, you become the song itself, in painting a canvas you become a painting, all for the glory of the One who made you.

Creativity is our vocation.

“Being fashioned in His image means that we are also artists and poets, regardless of our vocation in life. We are artists in the way we love. We are poets in the way we pray. Everyone is an artist.”
-Jonathan Jackson

Creativity encompasses all that we as humans are able to achieve, craft and produce.

Every time we engage in anything then we are engaging in art. We are participating with the Creator Himself and we become fellow co-workers. Our responsibility as artists then is to lead others into a more profound meaning of their existence and ultimately to our collective purpose in life.

But what stops us from creating?

A threat to our creativity is our brokenness. We cannot be creative when we are wounded because we behave, act, think and feel based out of our own hurt. However, when we are in the process of healing, creativity flows freely.

Healing needs to be our companion and teacher, otherwise we roam the earth allowing our wounds to have the driver’s seat, blinding us from seeing our potential to create.

In denying that we are wounded, we deny ourselves of being human. Rather than believing that we have the capacity to become great we spend the rest of our lives thinking so low of ourselves, capping our growth.

“Creativity involves breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way.”
-Edward de Bono

Creativity can also be threatened by cultural norms. We become entangled with cultural chains that do us harm. They tell us that we have to think in a certain way, follow certain career paths, have the same life goals, act in a certain way, and sadly enough, feel a certain way. We have becomes slaves to society.

It was people like Martin Luther King, J.R.R Tolkien, Steve Jobs who broke through cultural norms. In doing so they created beauty: they created a society welcoming all walks of life, a new world of fantasy that spoke so deeply to the human soul, and technology that echoes throughout the generations.

Friendships inspire creativity.

Friendships are a main ingredient to our creativeness. They allow us to bounce ideas off another and together produce wonder, beauty and awe. We shouldn’t live in isolation from those who encourage our creativity and imagination.

If we do, we end up living in our own cave, having no one to enrich our lives, we suffocate ourselves in our own unspoken words. We are paralyzed in our growth as we become ‘okay’ with the mundane life, with no new sense of adventure, no new flavors to taste in our mouths. We, therefore, cease to live, and in doing so we cease to create. We merely exist but are not alive.

Tolkien could not have completed his masterpiece, The Lord of the Rings, if it weren’t for the great encouragement he received from C. S. Lewis, and visa versa.

Like Tolkien needed Lewis, I am in need of you.

Freedom is the essence of creativity.

When we are perplexed by hints of splendor, we enter into a union with the ultimate Creator. This breaks our soul’s chains and awakens us to the immortal longing that resides in our heart and the soft whisper that cries out ‘be free and create’.

Be free my friend.

Be free and create.

Others around you are in need of your beauty and creativity.

“Whoever wants to become a Christian, must first become a poet.”
-Elder Porphyrios

(Photo by Manish Ray)