I have spent a week in the little village of Giggleswick in the Yorkshire Dales, close to Settle, and about 60 miles by road from the Coptic Orthodox Church of St Mary and St Mina in Stockport.The Church is named for St Alkelda, almost entirely unknown outside these mountain valleys. She was from a noble […]
For I say to you, among those born of women there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist; but he who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he. Luke 7:28 Some of the disciples of John the Baptist had come to ask if he was indeed the one that […]
On this day, August 4th, we commemorate and celebrate the life and witness of St Mary Magdalene. It was she from whom the Lord Jesus cast out seven demons according to the Gospels, which each speak of her. In Luke 8, we read… Now it came to pass, afterward, that He went through every city […]
We can think of the Christian Faith in a negative way, as if it was about things which are forbidden to us, and things which will limit our freedom. We can imagine that all our effort must be given without any clear idea that it will ever be rewarded. It can seem that everyone else […]
Today is the joyful feast of Pentecost. It is the day in the year when we especially commemorate with thanksgiving the coming of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and other followers of Christ who had remained faithful, and continued to gather together both through the despair of the cross, the joy of the resurrection […]
In a time of global upheaval, and while so many people are anxious and afraid for themselves and for their families, surely this would be a time for God to make himself known, if he really exists? This is an interesting question, but it presupposes that someone who asks it is looking for God in […]
For most members of the Orthodox Churches the doctrine, or teaching, about the Apostolic Succession is not often discussed, even though it represents an essential foundation of every Apostolic and Orthodox community. Orthodox Christians might be aware of the consecration of their particular Patriarch or Catholicos. Perhaps the might have seen video or photographs of […]
Very often our adherence to particular phrases becomes no more than sloganeering and we lose any great interest in actually communicating what we believe or understanding what others might be saying. St Paul warns us against this in his first letter to St Timothy, when he writes, “Remind people of these things, solemnly urging them […]
The issue of papal primacy is not one that can be simply swept under the carpet. Orthodoxy is an hierarchical community and the practical aspects of primacy are visible at many levels. The one that is most familiar is that of the primacy of a Metropolitan bishop over the metropolia which has been committed to […]
I was blessed indeed to be invited to speak briefly at the European Clergy Conference in 2015. This is the short message I presented to the bishops and priests gathered there. The spirituality of the preacher, the topic on which I have been asked to speak, is not concerned with the techniques we might use […]