Holy Trinity + Holy Cross - Sermons

In today’s Gospel reading taken from Matthew 6:22-33 our Lord tell us that the eye is the lamp of the body. The eye that is spoken of here is not entirely that which gives us sight but rather that inner perception of our mind and its ability to reflect. Father Micah shares with us, from the teachings of Saint Nicholas Cabasilas, the beautiful path to a life filled with peace, prayer and light. Thi...

Today in the United States of America we are celebrating Independence Day. We are grateful for the religious freedom, that has been defended by so many and guaranteed by the Bill of Rights. As Orthodox Christians and citizens of the United States there comes a responsibility to participate in public life and to have an influence toward justice and equality. Father Ernesto shares with us his love f...

Today in the Orthodox Church is the Sunday of All Saints. On this day we commemorate all the saints who ever lived and most especially the ones who lived without any recognition of their sanctity. In today’s message Father Micah shares with us his love for the Saints and encourages us to live a transformed life in Christ. The Greek word for saint, agios, is translated holy. The Saints were holy be...

Each year this Sunday stands between two Great Feasts of the Church, the Ascension and Pentecost. Today in Orthodoxy we celebrate the Fathers of the First Ecumenical Council. Thousands of Bishops were invited by the Emperor Constantine to unify the Church’s belief and teaching about the nature of Jesus Christ. Arias, a presbyter from Alexandra, Egypt, was teaching that Jesus was first in the creat...

Today on the Sunday of the Blind Man, the Epistle reading comes to us from Acts 16:16-34. In this reading we learn that Paul and Silas are stripped, beaten and thrown into prison after casting out a demon from a young slave girl. Father Micah shares with us a message of encouragement, pertinent to the imprisonment and suffering in our own lives. Paul and Silas find themselves in the darkest part o...

Today on the Sunday of the Samaritan Woman, the Gospel lesson comes to us from John 4:5-42. It narrates for us Jesus’ encounter at a well with a Samaritan woman, with a questionable background. Those present to witness this encounter, along with anyone who heard the disciples tell this story in the first three centuries of Christianity, would have a Biblical mind and understand its significance ba...

Today on the Sunday of the Myrrh-Bearing Women, the Epistle reading comes to us from Acts 6:1-7. Therein, Saint Luke speaks to us about the transition from the leadership of the Old Israel to the leadership of the New Israel, where Jesus is King. In the Epistle, we are told that the disciples were increasing in number but the Hellenists were murmuring against the Hebrews because their widows were...

Today, which is the first Sunday following Pascha, is known as Thomas Sunday. On this particular Sunday we in the United States, as well as many other countries around the world, are celebrating Mother’s Day. The Orthodox Church teaches that mothers are co-creators with God and that the soul and the body are conceived together in the mother’s womb at the same time. It is in the Fall that the human...

Today on the fifth Sunday of Lent the Orthodox Church commemorates St. Mary of Egypt. Father Ernesto shares with us insight into why the Church chooses to remember her each year during the Lenten season. If we have grown weary in The Great Fast and services of The Church, she is a reminder that it is never too late for us to feel God reaching out to us and to respond in faith and repentance. He po...

Today on the fourth Sunday of Lent the Church presents to us these two images, an anchor and a ladder. Father Gregory begins his sermon by quoting verses from today’s Epistle reading taken from Hebrews 6: 13-20, where St. Paul says, “We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner shrine behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our beha...

Today in the Orthodox Church is the Sunday of the Holy Cross. Annually on the third Sunday or midpoint of Lent The Church commemorates the Cross of Jesus Christ through the Gospel reading, the hymnology and the procession of the Holy Cross at the conclusion of the Divine Liturgy. In reflecting on God’s love for us Father Paul shares with us a message of encouragement and hope about The Cross which...

Today on the 2nd Sunday of Lent the Gospel lesson comes to us from Mark 2:1-12. In this pericope we encounter the love of four men who struggle but succeed in bringing their friend before Christ. Father Micah shares with us both a warning and practical message about prayer. Prayer is perhaps the most difficult thing we will ever attempt and if we truly wish to live a life of prayer we will struggl...

The first Sunday of Great Lent is known as the Sunday of Orthodoxy. On this day we celebrate the restoration of Holy Icons by not simply holding them up as something unique and distinct about our Orthodox faith, but we celebrate this restoration for a reason. Father Gregory shares with us this reason and he suggests that how we understand Icons is directly related to how we understand human beings...

Today is Forgiveness or Cheesefare Sunday in the Orthodox Church. We are Blessed to have Fr. Pablo Lopez visiting the Cathedral and giving the homily. He is a newly ordained priest serving in the Spanish Ministry Initiative under His Eminence Elpidophoros. Fr. Pablo begins his homily reflecting on and then answering these questions once posed to him, why does the Church connect Forgiveness Sunday...

Today, the Third Sunday of the Triodion, is known as Judgement or Meatfare Sunday. The Gospel reading, which is a parable of Christ’s second coming and impartial judgement, comes to us from Matthew 25:31-46. On this day Orthodox Christians say farewell to meat until Pascha as we prepare for the Great Fast. Father Ernesto shares a message that inspires us to keep the fast of Lent, acceptable to God...

Today on the Sunday of the Prodigal Son the Gospel lesson comes to us from Luke 15:11-32. This parable is presented to us as an important example of repentance, as it narrates for us a story about a father and his two sons, both of whom sin against him in different ways. The sins of the younger are well known, but the older brother’s sins of anger and jealousy are the focus of Father Paul’s sermon...

Today on the Sunday of the Publican and Pharisee the Triodion begins. The Gospel lesson, which narrates the parable of the Publican and Pharisee, comes to us from Luke 18:10-14. Father Gregory shares with us insight, from antiquity, into this well-known parable about two men who approach God in prayer, one a righteous man and the other a sinner. The Pharisee, a model religious figure, was a righte...

Today on the Sunday of the Canaanite the Gospel lesson comes to us from Matthew 15:21-28. In this pericope we hear about a woman, embolden with humility and faith, who persistently approaches Christ imploring Him for mercy seeking her daughters healing. The woman, a Canaanite, is from a pagan land that was the historic enemy of the people of Israel. Nevertheless, she cries out to our Lord for merc...

Today on the 16th Sunday of Matthew we hear The Parable of the Talents, taken from the Gospel of Matthew 25:14-30. Perhaps in our Christian lives we have questioned without gaining a satisfactory answer, why do we practice Christian disciplines such as attending Church, prayer, fasting and alms giving? Father Gregory reflects on a teaching of Saint Seraphim of Sarov, that Christian disciplines are...

Failure, worry and illness are but a few of the afflictions we experience in our contemporary lives and all of them have a profound influence in engendering within us a spiritual distress. Father Paul begins his sermon today by quoting Psalm 34:19, which says, “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, But the Lord delivers him out of them all.” The how and why we are delivered are the topics of...

Today on the 14th Sunday of Luke the Gospel reading comes to us from Luke 18:35-43. In this reading we hear about the miracle of Jesus giving sight to a blind beggar sitting by the roadside. Metropolitan Alexios shares with us that this man possessed two characteristics that we must apply to our lives if we want to live as Orthodox Christians. The blind man cries out to Our Lord, "Jesus, son of Da...

Today on the 12th Sunday of Luke the Gospel lesson comes to us from Luke 17:12-19. In this pericope we encounter the miracle of Jesus’ healing of the ten lepers, a story that is applicable in many ways to the cultural concerns at this present time. Father Gregory shares with us a message that has both practical and salvific implications. The ten lepers in the Gospel lesson experienced isolation fr...