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camisoledadparis · 2 months ago

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THIS DAY IN GAY HISTORY

based on: The White Crane Institute's 'Gay Wisdom', Gay Birthdays, Gay For Today, Famous GLBT, glbt-Gay Encylopedia, Today in Gay History, Wikipedia, and more … October 28

1466 – Erasmus was a Dutch humanist and theologian, who merits serious consideration by queer people of faith. Born Gerrit Gerritszoon, he became far better known as Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam: Erasmus was his saint's name, after St. Erasmus of Formiae; Rotterdam, for the place of his birth (although he never lived there after the first few years of early childhood; and "Desiderius" a name he gave himself - "the one who is desired".

He left a legacy as a scholar and church reformer. His career spanned the years leading up to, and after, Martin Luther's break with the Catholic Church that became the Protestant Reformation. Prior to the split, Erasmus had himself been fiercely critical of the Church, arguing forcefully for reform of the many and manifold abuses. He had close relationships with Luther and many other leading members of the Reformation movement, which his ideas strongly influenced. However, when the break came, he chose to remain formally inside the church structures, and not outside of it.

Some LGBT activists have hailed Erasmus as a gay icon from history. Circa Club for instance has no doubt, using that precise term and including Erasmus in it's collection of historical gay icons. The primary basis of the claim is a series of passionate love letters he wrote to a young monk Servatius Rogerus. While at the Augustinian monastery at Stein near Gouda around 1487, Erasmus wrote passionate letters of friendship to the fellow monk, whom he called "half my soul", writing, "I have wooed you both unhappily and relentlessly"; this correspondence contrasts sharply with the generally detached and much more restrained attitude he showed in his later life.There were also allegations of improper advances made to the young Thomas Grey, later Marquis of Dorset, while employed as his tutor.

Erasmus's best-known work was The Praise of Folly, a satirical attack on the traditions of the Catholic Church and popular superstitions, written in 1509, published in 1511 and dedicated to his friend, Sir Thomas More.

1754 – John Laurens (d.1782) was an American soldier and statesman from South Carolina during the Revolutionary War. He gained approval by the Continental Congress in 1779 to recruit a regiment of 3000 slaves by promising them freedom in return for fighting. He died in 1782, but his father manumitted their slaves as he had intended.

Laurens was born in Charleston, South Carolina. After tutoring at home and the death of his mother, John and his two younger brothers were taken by their father to England. John completed his education in Europe, first in London, then in Geneva. As a youth, he yielded to his father's wish that he study law in London. In late 1776, John was obliged, "out of pity," to marry Martha Manning, the daughter of one of his father's London agents, and in December he sailed for Charleston. He left his wife behind, pregnant with a daughter who he would never see.

In the summer of 1777, he accompanied his father, Henry Laurens, on the trip to Philadelphia where Henry was to serve in the Continental Congress and where in spite of his father's strong objections, John continued on to Washington's camp as a volunteer.

Laurens joined the main army of the Continental Army and within a month, following the Battle of Brandywine, was made officially an aide-de-camp to General Washington with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He became very good friends with his fellow aides, Alexander Hamilton, and with the Marquis de Lafayette. He also gave the first demonstrations of his tendency to reckless courage at the Battles of Brandywine, Germantown in which he was wounded, and Monmouth where his horse was shot out from under him.

As the British stepped up operations in the South, Laurens, who had long argued that "We Americans at least in the Southern Colonies, cannot contend with a good Grace, for Liberty, until we shall have enfranchised our Slaves," promoted the idea of arming slaves and granting them freedom in return for their service, and in early 1778 requested, as a start, 40 slaves from his father, which Henry, now President of the Continental Congress, granted but with such serious reservations about the practicality that John temporarily relinquished the project. In March 1779 Congress approved this idea, commissioned him Lieutenant Colonel, and sent him south to implement a regiment of 3000. He won election to the South Carolina House of Representatives, and introduced his black regiment plan in 1779 and 1780 (and again in 1782) only to meet overwhelming rejection each time. His belief that blacks shared a similar nature with whites and could aspire to freedom in a republican society set Laurens apart from other leaders in revolutionary South Carolina.

There is evidence of Laurens enjoying a sexual and loving relationship with Alexander Hamilton. These reports are based upon letters Hamilton wrote Laurens during a period in which Laurens was absent from the camp. In preparing a biography, Hamilton's family actually crossed out parts of letters they each sent one another. Suspiciously enough many of Laurens letters to Hamilton are missing. But the language in Hamilton's letters reveal a profound love for Laurens. Indeed Hamilton was never as emotionally open with any other man in his lifetime, and the depths of sentiment are equaled only in letters he wrote to his wife Eliza. Hamilton wrote:

"Cold in my professions, warm in my friendships, I wish, my Dear Laurens, it might be in my power, by action rather than words, to convince you that I love you."

In September 1779, gently chiding Laurens for not corresponding as often as he would have liked, Hamilton wrote, "like a jealous lover, when I thought you slighted my caresses, my affection was alarmed and my vanity piqued."

Looking beyond the successful conclusion of the war, Hamilton suggested that both of them should be members of the congress of the new country. "We have fought side by side to make America free, let us hand in hand struggle to make her happy," he wrote in a letter ending, "Yours forever."

Laurens probably never read this letter as he was killed in a skirmish a few days after it was written.

1824 - French historian Astolphe de Custine is beaten by soldiers he solicited. He reluctantly files charges against them.

1903 – British poet and novelist Evelyn Waugh was born on this date (d.1996). The English writer is best known for such satirical and darkly humorous novels as Decline and Fall, Vile Bodies, Scoop, A Handful of Dust and The Loved One, as well as for broader and more personal works, such as Brideshead Revisited and the Sword of Honor trilogy, that are influenced by his own experiences and his conservative and Catholic viewpoints. Many of Waugh's novels depict British aristocracy and high society, which he satirizes but to which, paradoxically, he was also strongly attracted. In addition, he wrote short stories, three biographies, and the first volume of an unfinished autobiography. His travel writings and his extensive diaries and correspondence have also been published.

The overt homosexuality of his brother Alec Waugh may have caused Evelyn to hide his own tendencies behind two marriages and seven children. Alec Waugh, like their father, publisher Arthur Waugh, had gone to school at Sherborne, and it was assumed that Evelyn would follow. However, in 1915 Alec was asked to leave, after a homosexual relationship came to light. He departed for military training, and while waiting for his commission to be confirmed wrote a novel of school life, The Loom of Youth, which was published by Chapman and Hall. The novel, which alluded to homosexual friendships in what was recognisably Sherborne, caused a public sensation and offended the school sufficiently to make it impossible for Evelyn to go there. Much to his annoyance he was sent in May 1917 to Lancing, in his view a decidedly inferior establishment. He later went to Oxford.

He arrived in Oxford in January 1922; in October 1922 the arrival of the sophisticated Etonians Harold Acton and Brian Howard changed Waugh's Oxford life. Acton and Howard rapidly became the centre of an avant-garde circle known as the Hypocrites, whose artistic, social and homosexual values Waugh adopted enthusiastically; he later wrote: "It was the stamping ground of half my Oxford life". He began drinking heavily, and embarked on the first of several homosexual relationships, the most lasting of which were with Richard Pares and Alastair Graham.

After gallantly protecting T. S. Eliot from "the specious assumption that he was homosexual," T.S. Matthews in Great Tom, suddenly became viciously ungallant: "It is peppery, glaring little men like Evelyn Waugh who are sexually suspect - as his diaries bear witness."

Indeed, his diaries do clearly reveal him as a Gay man. But then so do his novels, particularly Brideshead Revisited, in which the friendship of Charles and Sebastian, despite the limitations of what he was allowed to write in the early 1940s, is magnificently drawn.

Francis Bacon Self-portrait 1972

1909 – The Anglo-Irish born painter Francis Bacon (d.1992) was a descendant of the Elizabethan philosopher Francis Bacon. His artwork is well known for its bold, austere, and often grotesque or nightmarish imagery. Bacon's painterly but abstract figures typically appear isolated in glass or steel geometrical cages set against flat, nondescript backgrounds. He began painting during his early 20s and worked only sporadically until his mid 30s. Before this time he drifted, earning his living as an interior decorator and designer of furniture and rugs

Bacon early discovered that he attracted a certain type of rich man, an attraction he was quick to take advantage of, having developed a taste for good food and wine. One of the men was an ex-army friend of his father, another breeder of race-horses, named Harcourt-Smith. Bacon later claimed that his father had asked this friend to take him 'in-hand' and 'make a man of him'. Francis had a difficult relationship with his father, once admitting to being sexually attracted to him. Doubtless, Eddy Bacon was aware of his friend's reputation for virility, but not of his penchant for young men. In the early Spring of 1927 Bacon was taken by Harcourt-Smith to the opulent, decadent, "wide open" Berlin of the Weimar Republic, staying together at the Hotel Adlon.

His visit to a 1927 exhibition of 106 drawings by Picasso at the Galerie Paul Rosenberg, Paris, aroused his artistic interest, and he often took the train to Paris five or more times a week to see shows and art exhibitions.

In 1929 he met Eric Hall at the Bath Club, Dover Street, London, where Bacon was working at the telephone exchange. Hall (who was general manager of Peter Jones) was to be both patron and lover to Bacon, in an often torturous relationship.

In 1964, Bacon began a relationship with 39-year-old Eastender George Dyer, whom he met, he claimed, while the latter was burgling his apartment. A petty criminal with a history of juvenile detention and prison, Dyer was a somewhat tortured individual, insecure, alcoholic, appearance obsessed and never really fitting in within the bohemian set surrounding Francis. The relationship was stormy and in 1971, on the eve of Bacon's major retrospective at the Paris Grand Palais, Dyer committed suicide in the hotel room they were sharing, overdosing on barbiturates. The event was recorded in Bacon's 1973 masterpiece Triptych, May-June 1973.

In 1974, Bacon met John Edwards, a young, illiterate, handsome Eastender with whom he formed one of his most enduring friendships, eventually bequeathing his £11m fortune to Edwards after his death.

Bacon died of a sudden heart attack on April 28, 1992, in Madrid, Spain. Bacon bequeathed his entire estate (then valued at eleven million pounds) to John Edwards after his death. Edwards, in turn, donated the contents of Francis Bacon's chaotic studio in South Kensington, to the Hugh Lane gallery in Dublin. Bacon's studio contents were moved and the studio carefully reconstructed in the gallery. Additionally draft materials, perhaps intended for destruction, were according to Canadian Barry Joule bequeathed to Joule who later forwarded most of the materials to create the Barry Joule Archive in Dublin with other parts of the collection given later to the Tate museum.

Bacon's Soho life was portrayed by John Maybury, with Derek Jacobi as Bacon and Daniel Craig as George Dyer (with some lovely frontal nudity on Craig's part) and with Tilda Swinton as Muriel Belcher, in the film Love is the Devil (1998), based on Daniel Farson's 1993 biography The Gilded Gutter Life of Francis Bacon.

1949 – Caitlyn Jenner (born William Bruce Jenner), known as Bruce Jenner until 2015, is an American television personality and former track and field athlete.

A former college football player, Jenner came to international attention as a decathlete, winning the gold medal in the men's decathlon event at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, and setting a world record not beaten until 1980. With the unofficial title of "world's greatest athlete" for the Olympic decathlon win, he was also an American cult hero winning an event dominated by Soviet Union athletes during the Cold War. He leveraged his celebrity status to endorse products and subsequently starred in numerous movies and television specials including several made-for-TV movies, and was briefly Erik Estrada's replacement on the TV series CHiPs.

Jenner was married for 23 years to Kris Jenner (née Houghton; formerly Kardashian); the couple and their children appeared beginning in 2007 on the television reality series Keeping Up with the Kardashians. Following their divorce in 2015, Jenner came out in a television interview as a trans woman, initially preferring masculine pronouns until his transition was more complete. In June 2015, Jenner revealed her new name, Caitlyn, and a preference for being referred to using feminine pronouns. Many news sources have described her as the most famous openly transgender person in the world.

Bruce Jenner that was.

Jenner is a professed Christian, leans politically conservative, and is a Republican. Prior to her public gender transition, she had been married three times. Her first marriage was to Chrystie Scott (née Crownover) from 1972 to 1981. They have two children, son Burton and daughter Cassandra, known as Burt and Casey. Jenner and Scott's divorce was finalized the first week of January 1981. The same week, on January 5, 1981, Jenner married actress Linda Thompson, in Hawaii. By February 1986, Jenner and Thompson had separated, and they subsequently divorced. They have two sons together, Brandon and Sam Brody, known as Brody. The two sons starred on the reality show The Princes of Malibu and Brody Jenner was also on the reality show The Hills.

Jenner's third marriage, to Kris Kardashian (née Houghton), occurred on April 21, 1991, after five months of dating. They have two daughters, Kendall and Kylie. While married, Jenner was also the step-parent to Kris's four children from her previous marriage to the late lawyer Robert Kardashian: Kourtney, Kim, Khloé and Rob. The couple announced their separation in October 2013, though they had actually separated a year earlier. Kris filed for divorce in September 2014, citing irreconcilable differences. Their divorce terms were finalized in December 2014 and went into effect on March 23, 2015, because of a six-month state legal requirement.

In an April 2015, 20/20 interview with Diane Sawyer, Jenner came out as a trans woman saying she had dealt with gender dysphoria since her youth, and that, for all intents and purposes, "I’m a woman." Jenner cross dressed for many years and did hormone replacement therapy but stopped after the romance with Kris Kardashian in the early 1990s became more serious. Caitlyn recounts having permission to explore her gender identity on her own travels but not when they were coupled, and that not knowing the best way to talk about the many issues contributed to the deterioration of the 22-year-long marriage which formally ended in 2013.

1987 – Frank Ocean (born Christopher Breaux) is an American singer-songwriter and rapper. Ocean started his career as a ghostwriter for artists such as Brandy, Justin Bieber, and John Legend. In 2010, he became a member of alternative hip hop collective OFWGKTA also known as Odd Future, and his debut mixtape, Nostalgia, Ultra, was released to critical acclaim in 2011. The singles "Novacane" and "Swim Good" both achieved chart success.

His debut studio album, Channel Orange, was released in July 2012, promoted with three charting singles: "Thinkin Bout You", "Pyramids", and "Sweet Life".

In 2005, Hurricane Katrina hit Ocean's hometown of New Orleans and his recording facility was destroyed by floodwater and looting. To continue recording music, he moved to Los Angeles and intended to stay for just six weeks but decided to stay longer and develop his music career after establishing contact with people in the music industry. He recorded some demos at a friend's studio and shopped them around Los Angeles.

After getting a songwriting deal, he started working with other record producers and wrote songs for artists such as Justin Bieber, John Legend, Brandy, and Beyoncé. Ocean later said of his work at the time, "There was a point where I was composing for other people, and it might have been comfy to continue to do that and enjoy that income stream and the anonymity. But that's not why I moved away from school and away from family."

Ocean became one of the first major African-American music artists to announce that he had once fallen in love with someone of the same sex, notable because that music scene is known for homophobia.Ocean wrote an open letter, initially intended for the liner notes on Channel Orange, that would preemptively address speculation about his same-sex attraction. Instead, on July 4, 2012, he published an open letter on his Tumblr blog recounting unrequited feelings he had for another young man when he was 19 years old, citing it as his first true love. He used the blog to thank the man for his influence, and also thanked his mother and other friends, saying "I don't know what happens now, and that's alrite. I don't have any secrets I need kept anymore … I feel like a free man."

Members of the hip hop industry generally responded positively to the announcement. Russell Simmons, a business magnate in the hip hop industry, wrote a congratulatory article in Global Grind saying "Your decision to go public about your sexual orientation gives hope and light to so many young people still living in fear." Other artists who expressed their support included Beyoncé and Jay-Z.

1990 – Placido Domingo and Andre Watts raised $1.5 million at a fundraiser for the Gay Men's Health Crisis.

1998 – On this date Welsh secretary Ron Davies resigned from Tony Blair's Labour Party government after British tabloids reported he was robbed at knife-point in a London park while looking for a male sexual companion. Although he subsequently came out as Bisexual, Davies referred to the incident as his "moment of madness."

In 1999 Davies was successfully elected on 6 May 1999 as Member of the Welsh Assembly in the Caerphilly Constituency, and chaired the Economic Development Committee after Alun Michael refused to appoint him to his Cabinet. Shortly before the 2003 assembly elections, "The Sun" revealed that Davies had been visiting a well-known cruising spot near a motorway lay-by (rest stop). When challenged as to what he had been doing there, Davies initially denied being there, then told reporters that he had been going for a short walk, adding: "I have actually been there when I have been watching badgers." Davies was forced to stand down as Labour candidate in the election.

2009 – President Barack Obama signed the The Matthew Shepard Act (officially the "Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act") into law. The Act expanded the 1969 United States federal hate-crime law to include crimes motivated by a victim's actual or perceived gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability. It was finally passed after almost two decades of attempts to pass it through Congress and over stiff opposition by members of the Republican party. During debate in the House of Representatives, Republican Representative Virginia Foxx of North Carolina called the "hate crime" labeling of Shepard's murder a "hoax."

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photo-snap-stories · 2 months ago

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PL:

Cerkiew św. Jana Teologa, Monaster Zwiastowania Przenajświętszej Bogurodzicy, Supraśl

Wzniesiona z czerwonych cegieł między rokiem 1889 a 1890 w obrębie monasterskich budynków. Służy wiernym (i mnichom) jako ciepła, zimowa cerkiew. Przybudowana została do istniejącego południowego korpusu monastycznego, łącząc się bezpośrednio z nim, od strony jego elewacji wschodniej.

Jest to świątynia orientowana, na planie prostokąta ze strukturą trójdzielną typową dla świątyni prawosławnej.

Pierwotny ikonostas nie zachował się. Obecny ikonostas powstał współcześnie. Ikony do tego ikonostasu zostały napisane w Studium Ikonograficznym w Bielsku Podlaskim, pod kierunkiem ks. Leoncjusza Tofiluka.

EN:

Church of St. John the Theologian, Monastery of the Annunciation of the Most Holy Theotokos, Supraśl, Poland

Built of red bricks between 1889 and 1890 within the monastery buildings. It serves the faithful (and monks) as a warm winter church. It was added to the existing southern monastic wing, connecting directly to it from the eastern elevation.

This is an oriented temple, rectangular in shape with a three-part structure typical of Orthodox churches.

The original iconostasis has not survived. The current iconostasis was created in contemporary times. The icons for this iconostasis were painted at the Iconographic Studio in Bielsk Podlaski, under the direction of Father Leoncjusz Tofiluk.

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spyskrapbook · 6 months ago

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"Holy Monastery of Saint John the Theologian", Souroti, Thessaloniki, Greece _ Photos by: Spyros Kaprinis [12.07.2024].

"The Monastery of St. John the Theologian is a Greek Orthodox Christian nunnery located in Souroti, Greece. It was founded in 1967. The tomb of Saint Paisios of Mount Athos is located in the monastery. The relics of Saint Arsenios the Cappadocian are also kept in the monastery."

#Monastery #Saint John the Theologian #Souroti #Thessaloniki #Greece #Saint Paisios #Άγιος Παΐσιος #Saint Arsenios #Άγιος Παΐσιος ο Αγιορείτης #Πρόδρομος Ἐζνεπίδης #Ἅγιος Ἀρσένιος #Σπύρος Καπρίνης #Spyros Kaprinis #Ιούλιος #July #2024

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cruger2984 · 1 year ago

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THE DESCRIPTION OF SAINT JOHN OF DAMASCUS (John Damascene) Feast Day: December 4

"I do not worship matter, I worship the God of matter, who became matter for my sake and deigned to inhabit matter, who worked out my salvation through matter. I will not cease from honoring that matter which works for my salvation. I venerate it, though not as God."

John was born into a wealthy family at Damascus and spent his entire life under Islamic rule. The ancestors of John, according to his biographer, had alone remained faithful to Christianity when Damascus fell into the hands of the Arabs. They commanded the respect of the conqueror, and were employed in judicial offices of trust and dignity, to administer, no doubt, the Christian law to the Christian subjects of the Sultan. His father, besides this honorable rank, had amassed great wealth; all this he devoted to the redemption of Christian slaves to whom he gave freedom. John was the reward of these pious actions.

John was baptized immediately on his birth, probably by Peter II, bishop of Damascus (and afterwards a sufferer for the Faith). The father was anxious to keep his son aloof from the savage habits of war and piracy to which the youths of Damascus were addicted, and to devote him to the pursuit of knowledge. The Saracen pirates of the seashore neighboring to Damascus swept the Mediterranean and brought in Christian captives from all quarters. A monk named Cosmas had the misfortune to fall into the hands of these freebooters. He was set apart for death when his executioners, Christian slaves no doubt, fell at his feet and entreated his intercession with the Redeemer.

The Saracens inquired of Cosmas who he was. He replied that he had not the dignity of a priest; he was a simple monk, and burst into tears. The father of John was standing by, and expressed his surprise at this exhibition of timidity. Cosmas answered, "It is not for the loss of my life, but of my learning, that I weep."

Then, he recounted his attainments, and the father of John, thinking he would make a valuable tutor for his son, begged (or bought) his life, gave him his freedom, and placed his son under his tuition. The pupil in time exhausted all the acquirements of his teacher. The monk then obtained his dismissal and retired to the monastery of St. Sabas, where he would have closed his days in peace, had he not been compelled to take on himself the bishopric of Majuma, at the port of Gaza.

The attainments of the young John of Damascus commanded the veneration of the Saracens; he was compelled reluctantly to accept an office of higher trust and dignity than that held by his father. As the Iconoclastic controversy became more violent, John of Damascus entered the field against the Emperor of the East, and wrote the first of his three treatises on the Veneration Due to Images. This was probably composed immediately after the decree of Leo the Isaurian against images in 730. Before he wrote the second, he was apparently ordained priest, for he speaks as one having authority and commission. The third treatise is a recapitulation of the arguments used in the other two. These three treatises were disseminated with the utmost activity throughout Christianity.

His writings, especially his De Fide Orthodoxa, one of the most notable theological works of antiquity, has had great influence on the theologians of both East and West. He also wrote poetry and some of his poems are used in the Greek liturgy. John died at Sabas, in December, and was made a Doctor of the Church by Pope Leo IIII in 1890.

Source: Catholic Exchange

#random stuff #catholic #catholic saints #john of damascus #john damascene #doctor of the church

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orthodoxydaily · 1 year ago

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Saints&Reading: Sunday, November 20, 2023

november 6_ november 20th

St ELIAS FONDAMINSKY OF PARIS (1942)

Blessed Martyr Elias (Fondaminsky), honoured on the New Calendar today, also known under the nom de guerre of Bunakov, was a close associate and co-martyr of Righteous Martyr Maria (Skobtsova) of Paris, her family and the Paris circle through which she operated the Orthodox Action social charity. A Jew by birth, he was drawn by his ill-fated elder brother Matthew into the same vein of revolutionary politics that Mother Maria was, and felt the same attachment to the narodnichestvo of the Social Revolutionary Party that Mother Maria had, soon becoming one of its leaders. Elias wed his childhood friend, Emily Gavronskiy, in 1903, whose inclinations toward Orthodox Christianity almost certainly influenced him later in his life. In 1906, however, he found himself fleeing - as many left-wing intellectuals of that era did - to France, where he joined the circle of Orthodox activists, clerics and philosophers that included Archimandrite Lev (Gillet), Fr. Sergius Bulgakov, Nicolas Berdyaev and the notorious terrorist-turned-counter-revolutionary Boris Savinkov. He returned to Russia in 1917, barely escaped capture by the Bolsheviks, and took part in the conference at Iași to overthrow the Bolsheviks.

However, in spite of his disillusionment with revolutionary politics, Elias never gave up his commitment to radical politics nor his social service to the poor and disenfranchised. He saw a hope for Russia’s national salvation in what Constantine Skorkin calls, in his brief essay The saintly Eser, an ‘original synthesis of Christianity, socialism and autocracy’. (God bless all such syntheses! Solzhenitsyn’s was just another such, as was that of Saint John of Kronstadt, as was that, albeit in a more amorphous form, of the Slavophils he followed. And not for nothing was Official Nationality founded on a similar three-legged stool!) Maria Skobtsova came to Paris in 1923 with her husband and children and soon immersed herself in charitable work and in the Paris community of Russian émigrés and exiles; she soon befriended Elias Fondaminsky, who shared her politics and religious convictions. Of them their mutual friend Theodore Pianov said: ‘It is difficult to say who had the greater influence on whom, Mother Maria on him or him on Mother Maria.’ He played an active role in the founding of Maria Skobtsova’s Orthodox Action, though the declining health of his wife toward the end of the 1920’s, and her death in 1935, prevented him from doing much active social work.

Given the opportunity to flee for a third time, this time from the advance of the Nazis in 1941, he chose to stay and share the fate of his fellow Jews. This choice meant a life of poverty and eventually his death. Lay theologian George Fedotov remarked about this choice: ‘In his last days he wished to live with the Christians and die with the Jews’;...CONTINUE READING

St Leonard of Noblac was born to the Frankish nobility. He was part of the court of the pagan King Clovis I. He was converted to Christianity by Saint Remigius, Bishop of Reims. During a certain invasion that they were losing, the Queen suggested to Leonard that he invoke the help of God to repel the invading army. He did, and the tide of battle turned, naming Clovis victorious. Saint Remigius, bishop of Rheims, then used this miracle to convert the King, Leonard, and a thousand of their followers to Christianity. Following his conversion, St. Leonard refused the offer of a See from his grandfather, King Clovis I. He then began a life of austerity, sanctification, and preaching. His desire to know God grew so strong that he entered the Orleans monastery. His brother, Saint Lifiard, followed his example and, leaving the King's court, built a monastery at Meun, and lived there. It is said that while King Clovis was hunting nearby, his wife Clothilde went into labor. St Leonard was called to her bedside. He prayed with the King through the night, and through the intercession of his prayers, the Queen and the child were saved. Following the safe delivery, Clovis offered him as much land as he could ride around in one day on a donkey. St Leonard used the land to establish a monastery at Noblac near Limoges, where he became Abbot.

Born: 19 May, Died: 559 AD, Venerated in Roman Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Anglican Church, HE IS Depicted as an Abbot holding chains, fetters or locks, or manacles.He is the patron saint of women in labour, barrel makers, coopers, blacksmiths, captives, prisoners, childbirth, coal miners, coppersmiths, farmers, greengrocers, grocers, horses, locksmiths, miners, and porters, and against burglaries and against robberies or robbers.

EPHESIANS 2:14-22

For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, 15 having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, 16 and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity. 17 And He came and preached peace to you who were afar off and to those who were near. 18 For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father. 19 Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, 22 in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.

Commentary of the Church Fathers: John Chrysostom AD 407 : Some say that the wall between them is that of the Jews against the Greeks, because it does not allow them to mix. I do not think so. Rather I think that the wall between them is common within both. It is the hostility proceeding within the flesh. This was the midwall cutting them off, as the prophet says, “Do not your sins stand in the midst between you and me?” The midwall was the enmity that God had both toward Jews and toward Greeks. But when the law came this enmity was not dissolved; rather it increased. “For the law,” he says, “works wrath.” .

Tertullian of Carthage AD 220 : For the Creator's righteousness no less than His peace was announced in Christ, as we have often shown already. Therefore he says: "He is our peace, who hath made both one"

LUKE 8:41-56

41 And behold, there came a man named Jairus, and he was a ruler of the synagogue. And he fell down at Jesus' feet and begged Him to come to his house, 42 for he had an only daughter about twelve years of age, and she was dying. But as He went, the multitudes thronged Him. 43 Now a woman, having a flow of blood for twelve years, who had spent all her livelihood on physicians and could not be healed by any, 44 came from behind and touched the border of His garment. And immediately her flow of blood stopped. 45 And Jesus said, "Who touched Me?" When all denied it, Peter and those with him said, "Master, the multitudes throng and press You, and You say, 'Who touched Me?' " 46 But Jesus said, "Somebody touched Me, for I perceived power going out from Me." 47 Now when the woman saw that she was not hidden, she came trembling; and falling down before Him, she declared to Him in the presence of all the people the reason she had touched Him and how she was healed immediately. 48 And He said to her, "Daughter, be of good cheer; your faith has made you well. Go in peace." 49 While He was still speaking, someone came from the ruler of the synagogue's house, saying to him, "Your daughter is dead. Do not trouble the Teacher." 50 But when Jesus heard it, He answered him, saying, "Do not be afraid; only believe, and she will be made well." 51 When He came into the house, He permitted no one to go in except Peter, James, and John, and the father and mother of the girl. 52 Now all wept and mourned for her; but He said, "Do not weep; she is not dead, but sleeping." 53 And they ridiculed Him, knowing that she was dead. 54 But He put them all outside, took her by the hand and called, saying, "Little girl, arise." 55 Then her spirit returned, and she arose immediately. And He commanded that she be given something to eat. 56 And her parents were astonished, but He charged them to tell no one what had happened.

#orthodoxy #orthodoxchristianity #easternorthodoxchurch #originofchristianity #spirituality #holyscriptures #gospel #bible #wisdom #saints

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immerlein · 2 years ago

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hello ms immerlein, hope you're doing well. i'm a simple inquirer into the orthodox church and i wanted to ask if you could go into detail about what marriage is, in the faith. my boyfriend is the type who thinks "why can't we just get married at a courthouse?" but because having a wedding is important to me, he'd ultimately like to go with a 'proper' one. i'm glad that he cares about me enough to allow me to make the decision, but i don't know how to convince him that marriage is indeed something sacred. ideally i'd want to have our wedding at an orthodox parish, but as he isn't (yet, maybe sooner or later) a christian i'm content with waiting

Hi there :)

Thanks for your question; it's great to hear your boyfriend respects your feelings on something as important as this. I will say, though, that you might have a hard or impossible time getting married to a non-Christian in an Orthodox church, so you would need to discuss it with a priest. By the way you've phrased your ask you do seem to know that, but just clarifying in case :) I agree that marriage is sacred and a very beautiful mystery of the Church. It is taken seriously, entered into seriously, and only broken under the most serious of circumstances (the Church allows remarriage, with conditions). The whole idea is that you marry to be "companions on the journey from earth to heaven" (St John Chrysostom) and "attain holiness". "The purpose of marriage is to unite two persons into a bond of love for their mutual companionship, support, enjoyment, and fulfillment. While the couple, on their own, already is a family, giving birth to and nurturing children is an important purpose of marriage." - goarch.org

I'm going to include some other quotes from Saints/Church Fathers/theologians that I think speak to the theology of marriage better than my own words could.

Marriage is a sacrament and a state of grace: “Marriage is not only a state of nature but a state of grace. Married life, no less than the life of a monk, is a special vocation, requiring a particular gift or charisma from the Holy Spirit; and this gift is conferred in the sacrament of Holy Matrimony.” (Ware, Timothy (1993-04-29). The Orthodox Church)

“Marriage is the key of moderation and harmony of desires, the seal of a deep friendship… United in the flesh, one spirit, they urge each other on by the good of their mutual love. For marriage does not remove God, but brings all closer to Him, for it is God Himself Who draws us to it.” - Saint Gregory the Theologian

Elder Aimilianos of Simonos Petros Monastery on Mt. Athos wrote: “When two people get married, it’s as if they're saying: Together we will go forward, hand in hand, through good times and bad. We will have dark hours, hours of sorrow filled with burdens, monotonous hours. But in the depths of the night, we continue to believe in the sun and the light.”

"There are two misunderstandings about marriage which should be rejected in Orthodox dogmatic theology. One is that marriage exists for the sole purpose of procreation...is has never been a teaching of the Church. On the contrary, according to St John Chrysostom, among the two reasons for which marriage was instituted, it is the first reason which is the most important: 'as for procreation, it is not required absolutely by marriage...’ In fact, in Orthodox understanding, the goal of marriage is that two should become one, in the image of the Holy Trinity, Whose three Persons are essentially united in love... In the Orthodox Church, there is no understanding of sexual union as something unclean or unholy. This becomes clear when one reads the following prayers from the Orthodox rite of Marriage: 'Bless their marriage, and vouchsafe unto these Thy servants ... chastity, mutual love in the bond of peace ... Preserve their bed unassailed ... Cause their marriage to be honourable. Preserve their bed blameless. Mercifully grant that they may live together in purity .. :. Sexual life is therefore considered compatible with 'purity' and 'chastity', the latter being, of course, not an abstinence from intercourse but rather a sexual life that is liberated from what became its characteristic after the fall of Adam. The ultimate goal of marriage is the same as that of every other sacrament, deification of the human nature and union with Christ. This becomes possible only when marriage itself is transfigured and deified." - taken from the writing of Metropolitan Hilarion.

I hope this helps! Take care and all the best :)

#ask #marriage #orthodox

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troybeecham · 1 year ago

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Today the Church remembers St. Prosper of Aquitaine, Theologian.

Ora pro nobis.

Saint Prosper, "The Eradicator of Heresies," as Saint Photios calls him, was born in the Aquitaine region of Gaul around the year 390 AD. He was a renowned lay theologian, although few details of his life are known. We do know that he was married.

We know Saint Prosper chiefly from his writings. A contemporary writer described him as "a holy and venerable man." This wise man seems to have spent his life embroiled in controversies with heretics. For the semi-Pelagians in particular, Saint Prosper was one of their most fearsome adversaries. His chief fame rests not on his historical works, but on his activities and writings as a theologian and an aggressive propagator of the Augustinian doctrine of grace. It is no doubt that Prosper holds a place in the ranks of the moulders of theological understanding of the doctrine of grace.

By 417 AD, he arrived in Marseilles as a refugee from Aquitaine in the aftermath of the Gothic invasions of Gaul. Prosper played a vital role in the Pelagian controversy in southern Gaul in the 420's. With the help of Augustine and Pope Celestine, Prosper was able to put down revolutions of the Pelagian Christians.

In 429 AD, he was corresponding with Augustine. In 431 he appeared in Rome to appeal to Pope Celestine I regarding the teachings of Augustine; there is no further trace of him until 440, the first year of the pontificate of Pope Leo I, who had been in Gaul, where he may have met Prosper.

His chief work was his De gratia Dei et libero arbitrio, “On the grace of God and free will”(432), written against John Cassian's Collatio. He also induced Pope Celestine to publish an open letter to the bishops of Gaul, Epistola ad episcopos Gallorum against some members of the Gaulish Church. He had earlier opened a correspondence with Augustine, along with his friend Hilary (not Hilary of Arles), and although he did not meet him personally, his enthusiasm for the great theologian led him to make an abridgment of his commentary on the Psalms, as well as a collection of sentences from his works—probably the first dogmatic compilation of that class in which Peter Lombard's Liber sententiarum is the best-known example. He also put into elegiac metre, in 106 epigrams, some of Augustine's theological dicta.

In Saint Prosper, science was joined to virtue. It is evident that he applied himself to literature, and especially to acquiring knowledge of Holy Scripture. He was no less an expert in human sciences than he was in theology. He excelled particularly in mathematics, astronomy, and chronology. His great learning and holiness made him well known throughout the entire Church.

In a poem to his wife, he wrote: "Lift me up again if I fall; correct yourself if I point out some fault. Let it never be sufficient for us to be one body, let us also be one soul." By 428, Saint Prosper persuaded his wife to become a nun, and he entered a monastery at Marseilles.

When Saint Leo the Great was chosen as the Bishop of Rome in 440 AD, he sent for Prosper to become his secretary. Many historians believe that the admirable treatise "On the Incarnation of the Word," which is ascribed to Saint Leo, is actually the work of Saint Prosper. It is possible, however, that Saint Leo may have reworked it in his own style. Prosper gives detailed coverage of political events. He covers Attila's invasions of Gaul (451) and Italy (452) in lengthy entries under their respective years.

His writings and those of St. Augustine were pivotal during the Council of Orange in 529 AD in defining the doctrine of grace and the final repudiation of Pelagianism and semi-Pelagianism.

Saint Prosper died in Rome, c. 464 AD.

O God, by your Holy Spirit you give to some the word of wisdom, to others the word of knowledge, and to others the word of faith: We praise your Name for the gifts of grace manifested in your servant Prosper, and we pray that your Church may never be destitute of such gifts; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, forever and ever.

Amen.

#father troy beecham #christianity #jesus #saints #god #salvation #peace #faith #early church #grace #theology

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hieromonkcharbel · 2 years ago

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I grieve, I exhaust my heart, I pine for you when I bring to mind that we have a Lord so bountiful and compassionate that simply if we have faith in Him He grants us gifts beyond our imagination - gifts we have never heard or thought of and that 'man's heart has not grasped' (1 Cor. 2:9). Yet we, like beasts, prefer the earth and the things of the earth that through His great mercy it yields in order to supply our bodily needs; and if we use these things modestly, then our soul may ascend unhampered towards divine realities, nourished spiritually by the Holy Spirit according to the degree of our purification and to the level to which we have ascended.

This is our purpose, for this we were created and brought forth: that after having received lesser blessings in this world we may through our gratitude to God and our love for Him enjoy great and eternal blessings in the life to come. But, alas, far from having any concern for the blessings in store, we are even ungrateful for those at hand, and we are like the demons, or - if truth be told - even worse. Thus we deserve greater punishment than they, for we have been given greater blessings. For we know that God became for our sakes like us in everything except sin, so that He might deliver us from delusion and free us from sin. But what is the use of saying this? The truth is that we believe in all these things only as words, while we deny them where our acts are concerned. Is not Christ's name uttered everywhere, in towns and villages, in monasteries and on mountains? Search diligently, if you will, and find out whether anyone keeps His commandments. Among thousands and myriads you will scarcely find one who is a Christian both in word and in act. Did not our Lord and God say in the Gospel, 'He that believes in Me will also do what I do - indeed, he will do greater things' (John 14:12)? But which of us dares to say, 'I do Christ's work and I truly believe in Christ?' Do you not see, brethren, that on the day of judgment we risk being classed among the unbelievers and will be chastised more severely even than those ignorant of Christ? Inevitably either we must be chastised as unbelievers or Christ is a liar - and that, my brethren, is impossible.

St. Symeon the New Theologian

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mybeautifulchristianjourney · 2 years ago

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Today in Christian History

Today is Tuesday, January 17th, the 17th day of 2023. There are 348 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

1377: Pope Gregory XI enters Rome from Avignon, hoping to put down an Italian revolt against him. He will send Robert of Geneva (later antipope Clement VII) with a company of ferocious Breton adventurers to crush the rebellion with atrocities, but it will continue. In about a year, Gregory will die, leaving the situation worse than it was.

1525: Zurich City Council holds a public debate on infant baptism, which reformer Ulrich Zwingli has mandated as a covenantal act, but which Anabaptists such as Conrad Grebel and Felix Manz oppose, saying that baptism symbolizes a believer’s commitment to Christ and therefore must be entered into by adults with understanding.

1562: Edict of St. Germain is issued, allowing Huguenots to preach in France.

1677: Trial of Ludovick Muggleton, a fanatic religious leader who had gathered many followers and annoyed London authorities by claiming to be one of the two witnesses of Revelation 11 and publicly cursing opponents. He will be sentenced to stand in the pillory for three days in three sections of London, to pay a £500 fine (or go to jail), and to have his books publicly burned. The sect of Muggletonians had arisen under his teaching.

1705: Death in Essex, England, of John Ray, a naturalist and theologian. He systematized botanical classification and developed a theology that sought to understand God’s wisdom and power by studying created things. His system for classifying plants seems to have been the first to divide flowering plants into monocots and dicots.

1932: Death in London, England, of Charles Gore, founder of the Community of the Resurrection, an Anglican monastery. He had been an author, a bishop, and an advocate for social justice.

1945: Raoul Wallenberg, a Swedish Lutheran diplomat, is last seen alive by his friends after Soviets take him into custody. His resourcefulness had saved thousands of Hungarian Jews during Nazi occupation. He will be remembered with other Righteous Gentiles in the Episcopal Church calendar on July 16.

1977: The Supreme Court of India (Hindu) rules that the successful work of a Christian evangelist is a threat to the “freedom of conscience” guaranteed to all citizens of India.

#Today in Christian History #January 17 #Trial of Ludovick Muggleton #death of Charles Gore #death of John Ray #Edict of St. Germain is issued #Raoul Wallenberg last seen alive

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rossheckmann · 2 years ago

Video

vimeo

Training Orthodox Seminary Students & Clergy to Respond to Domestic Violence: Current Approaches & Lessons from around the World from Project dldl/ድልድል on Vimeo.

The need to teach students in seminaries about marriage, family relations, gender issues and domestic violence has become recognised in recent decades and us increasingly prioritised by theological colleges, seminaries and other religious training centres. However, how religious training institutions pursue this topic and instruct on it, what methodologies they employ to equip their students and future clergies or theologians with theological knowledge and pastoral preparedness to respond to difficult questions and family situations, including domestic abuse, has received less attention. In this webinar we were joined by specialists working in seminary education and clergy training to explore current approaches, share lessons and identify gaps or opportunities that may exist.

The speakers included colleagues that project dldl/ድልድል closely collaborates with in Ethiopia and Eritrea as well as specialists from other parts of the world to capture the diversity in approaches and understandings currently and to achieve knowledge exchange that can improve the ways in which seminary students and future clergies are provided with training and preparation to address difficult topics and issues around marriage in their specific contexts. The second part of the webinar discussed how the specific homilies of St John Chrysostom on marriage and related topics can become resourceful for preparing clergy and theologians to teach about marriage and against any form of domestic violence.

The event was chaired by Dr Romina Istratii, PI of project dldl/ድልድል, and supported by Ms Mebrak Ghebreweldi, director of DRI and project facilitator in Eritrea.

Presentations by:

Mr Tesfay Hadera Gebremedhin, current dean of the St Frumentius Abba Selama Kessate Berhan Theological College in Mekelle, Ethiopia

Mr Tesfay Hadera Gebremedhin is current dean of the St Frumentius Abba Selama Kessate Berhan Theological College in Mekelle, Ethiopia, having taken this position in 2015. Previously he acted as Administrative and Development Vice Dean of the College, and prior to that as Legal Advisor of the College and as Academic Vice Dean. He instructs on numerous courses, including Systematic Theology, General Church History, Patrology, Canon Law, Introduction to Law, Liturgy, Counselling and Pastoral Theology, and acts as a preacher an counsellor to the community he serves. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Theology from the St. Frumentius Theological College in Mekelle, an LLB degree in Law from Mekelle University College of Law and Governance and a Master’s degree in Advanced Leadership and Community Development. He is currently pursuing a PhD from South Africa.

Aba Qeshi Loul, member of the clergy in the Eritrean Orthodox Tewahedo Church, London, UK

Aba Qeshi Loul Tewolde is currently serving as a priest at the MedhaneAlem Eritrean Orthodox Tewahdo Church in London. He was born and raised in Eritrea and has been serving the Church for 22 years, having started as a deacon in Eritrea and continued his service as a deacon after he arrived to the UK in 2009. Qeshi Loul became a priest in June 2019. In parallel, he is a second-year engineering student at Southbank University of London. He works part time and serves as a priest voluntarily to the community and has regular contact with the elderly, women, children and those in need.

Dr David Ford, professor at St Tikhon’s Orthodox Theological Seminary, Pennsylvania, USA

Dr David Ford is Professor of Church History at St. Tikhon’s Orthodox Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania, US since 1989. He is co-author, author or editor of multiple publications, such as Marriage as a Path to Holiness: Lives of Married Saints (St. Tikhon’s Monastery Press) co-authored with his wife, Dr. Mary S. Ford, Women and Men in the Early Church: The Vision of St. John Chrysostom (St. Tikhon’s Monastery Press), and Wisdom for Today from the Early Church: A Foundational Study (St. Tikhon’s Monastery Press). He is also co-editor and contributor to Glory and Honor: Orthodox Christian Resources on Marriage (St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press), translator and editor of Saint John Chrysostom: Letters to Saint Olympia (St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press), co-editor and contributor of Healing Humanity: Confronting our Moral Crisis (Holy Trinity Seminary Press, Jordanville, New York) and compiler, editor, and translator of Sing to Your Soul, Vol. One: The Narrative of Salvation History in Selected Passages by St. John Chrysostom (St. Tikhon’s Monastery Press).

The presentations were followed by discussion and a Q&A session with the audience.

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orthodoxadventure · 9 months ago

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2nd Sunday of Great Lent: St Gregory Palamas

Commemorated on March 31

O luminary of Orthodoxy, support and teacher of the Church, ideal of monks and invincible champion of theologians, O wonderworker Gregory, boast of Thessalonika and herald of grace, always intercede for all of us that our souls may be saved.

This Sunday was originally dedicated to Saint Polycarp of Smyrna (February 23). After his glorification in 1368, a second commemoration of Saint Gregory Palamas (November 14) was appointed for the Second Sunday of Great Lent as a second “Triumph of Orthodoxy.”

Saint Gregory Palamas, Archbishop of Thessalonica, was born in the year 1296 in Constantinople. Saint Gregory’s father became a prominent dignitiary at the court of Andronicus II Paleologos (1282-1328), but he soon died, and Andronicus himself took part in the raising and education of the fatherless boy. Endowed with fine abilities and great diligence, Gregory mastered all the subjects which then comprised the full course of medieval higher education. The emperor hoped that the youth would devote himself to government work. But Gregory, barely twenty years old, withdrew to Mount Athos in the year 1316 (other sources say 1318) and became a novice in the Vatopedi monastery under the guidance of the monastic Elder Saint Νikόdēmos of Vatopedi (July 11). There he was tonsured and began on the path of asceticism. A year later, the holy Evangelist John the Theologian appeared to him in a vision and promised him his spiritual protection. Gregory’s mother and sisters also became monastics.

After the demise of the Elder Νikόdēmos, Saint Gregory spent eight years of spiritual struggle under the guidance of the Elder Nikēphóros, and after the latter’s death, Gregory transferred to the Lavra of Saint Athanasius (July 5). Here he served in the trapeza, and then became a church singer. But after three years, he resettled in the small skete of Glossia, striving for a greater degree of spiritual perfection. The head of this monastery began to teach the young man the method of unceasing prayer and mental activity, which had been cultivated by monastics, beginning with the great desert ascetics of the fourth century: Evagrius Pontikos and Saint Macarius of Egypt (January 19).

Later on, in the eleventh century Saint Simeon the New Theologian (March 12) provided detailed instruction in mental activity for those praying in an outward manner, and the ascetics of Athos put it into practice. The experienced use of mental prayer (or prayer of the heart), requiring solitude and quiet, is called “Hesychasm” (from the Greek “hesychia” meaning calm, silence), and those practicing it were called “hesychasts.”

During his stay at Glossia the future hierarch Gregory became fully embued with the spirit of hesychasm and adopted it as an essential part of his life. In the year 1326, because of the threat of Turkish invasions, he and the brethren retreated to Thessalonica, where he was then ordained to the holy priesthood.

Saint Gregory combined his priestly duties with the life of a hermit. Five days of the week he spent in silence and prayer, and only on Saturday and Sunday did he come out to his people. He celebrated divine services and preached sermons. For those present in church, his teaching often evoked both tenderness and tears. Sometimes he visited theological gatherings of the city’s educated youth, headed by the future patriarch, Isidore. After he returned from a visit to Constantinople, he found a place suitable for solitary life near Thessalonica the region of Bereia. Soon he gathered here a small community of solitary monks and guided it for five years.

In 1331 the saint withdrew to Mt. Athos and lived in solitude at the skete of Saint Savva, near the Lavra of Saint Athanasius. In 1333 he was appointed Igumen of the Esphigmenou monastery in the northern part of the Holy Mountain. In 1336 the saint returned to the skete of Saint Savva, where he devoted himself to theological works, continuing with this until the end of his life.

In the 1330s events took place in the life of the Eastern Church which put Saint Gregory among the most significant universal apologists of Orthodoxy, and brought him great renown as a teacher of hesychasm.

About the year 1330 the learned monk Barlaam had arrived in Constantinople from Calabria, in Italy. He was the author of treatises on logic and astronomy, a skilled and sharp-witted orator, and he received a university chair in the capital city and began to expound on the works of Saint Dionysius the Areopagite (October 3), whose “apophatic” (“negative”, in contrast to “kataphatic” or “positive”) theology was acclaimed in equal measure in both the Eastern and the Western Churches. Soon Barlaam journeyed to Mt. Athos, where he became acquainted with the spiritual life of the hesychasts. Saying that it was impossible to know the essence of God, he declared mental prayer a heretical error. Journeying from Mount Athos to Thessalonica, and from there to Constantinople, and later again to Thessalonica, Barlaam entered into disputes with the monks and attempted to demonstrate the created, material nature of the light of Tabor (i.e. at the Transfiguration). He ridiculed the teachings of the monks about the methods of prayer and about the uncreated light seen by the hesychasts.

Saint Gregory, at the request of the Athonite monks, replied with verbal admonitions at first. But seeing the futility of such efforts, he put his theological arguments in writing. Thus appeared the “Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychasts” (1338). Towards the year 1340 the Athonite ascetics, with the assistance of the saint, compiled a general response to the attacks of Barlaam, the so-called “Hagiorite Tome.” At the Constantinople Council of 1341 in the church of Hagia Sophia Saint Gregory Palamas debated with Barlaam, focusing upon the nature of the light of Mount Tabor. On May 27, 1341 the Council accepted the position of Saint Gregory Palamas, that God, unapproachable in His Essence, reveals Himself through His energies, which are directed towards the world and are able to be perceived, like the light of Tabor, but which are neither material nor created. The teachings of Barlaam were condemned as heresy, and he himself was anathemized and fled to Calabria.

But the dispute between the Palamites and the Barlaamites was far from over. To these latter belonged Barlaam’s disciple, the Bulgarian monk Akyndinos, and also Patriarch John XIV Kalekos (1341-1347); the emperor Andronicus III Paleologos (1328-1341) was also inclined toward their opinion. Akyndinos, whose name means “one who inflicts no harm,” actually caused great harm by his heretical teaching. Akyndinos wrote a series of tracts in which he declared Saint Gregory and the Athonite monks guilty of causing church disorders. The saint, in turn, wrote a detailed refutation of Akyndinos’ errors. The patriarch supported Akyndinos and called Saint Gregory the cause of all disorders and disturbances in the Church (1344) and had him locked up in prison for four years. In 1347, when John the XIV was replaced on the patriarchal throne by Isidore (1347-1349), Saint Gregory Palamas was set free and was made Archbishop of Thessalonica.

In 1351 the Council of Blachernae solemnly upheld the Orthodoxy of his teachings. But the people of Thessalonica did not immediately accept Saint Gregory, and he was compelled to live in various places. On one of his travels to Constantinople the Byzantine ship fell into the hands of the Turks. Even in captivity, Saint Gregory preached to Christian prisoners and even to his Moslem captors. The Hagarenes were astonished by the wisdom of his words. Some of the Moslems were unable to endure this, so they beat him and would have killed him if they had not expected to obtain a large ransom for him. A year later, Saint Gregory was ransomed and returned to Thessalonica.

Saint Gregory performed many miracles in the three years before his death, healing those afflicted with illness. On the eve of his repose, Saint John Chrysostom appeared to him in a vision. With the words “To the heights! To the heights!” Saint Gregory Palamas fell asleep in the Lord on November 14, 1359. In 1368 he was canonized at a Constantinople Council under Patriarch Philotheus (1354-1355, 1364-1376), who compiled the Life and Services to the saint.

[Text from OCA]

Now is the time for action! Judgment is at the doors! So let us rise and fast, offering alms with tears of compunction and crying: “Our sins are more numerous than the sands of the sea; but forgive us, O Master of All, so that we may receive the incorruptible crowns.”

Holy and divine instrument of wisdom, radiant and harmonious trumpet of theology, we praise you in song, O divinely-speaking Gregory. As a mind standing before the Primal Mind, guide our minds to Him, Father, so that we may cry aloud to you: “Rejoice, herald of grace.”

#Christianity #Orthodox Christianity #Saint Gregory Palamas #Lent #Great Lent

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