Holy Trinity + Holy Cross - Sermons

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...

Today on the Sunday after Theophany the Gospel reading comes to us from Matthew 4:12-17. The intimations of this Gospel are that there is a Resurrection and God exists. The worldwide pandemic in which we find ourselves has caused the loss of income, homes and sadly many of our own family members and friends, all of which, have left many of us in darkness and despair. In the midst of darkness and d...

Today on the Sunday before Epiphany the Gospel reading comes to us from Mark 1:1-8. Saint Mark links together for us repentance, the coming of Christ, His Kingdom and the Holy Spirit all in Baptism. Father Micah reflects on the Grace that comes from the Baptismal font and he reminds us as Orthodox Christians we should often think about the significance of our own Baptism and allow it to affect eac...

True faith regards things not seen as so real that they are more real than the things of this world. On December 27th we commemorate Saint Stephen the First Martyr, a man who realized his Divine calling and continued Jesus’ ministry even to the point of martyrdom. Father Gregory shares with us in his message that the purpose of the Incarnation and the whole life of Jesus is that God became man so...

Today in the Orthodox Church is known as both the Sunday before the Nativity and the Sunday of the Genealogy. The Gospel lesson taken from Matthew 1:1-25 and the Epistle from Hebrews 11:9-10,32-40 both account for us the genealogy of Christ and all those who came before Him. Father Gregory shares with us an inspiring message about how faith is an action, beginning with Abraham and the faith he had...

Today on the eleventh Sunday of Luke the Gospel comes to us from Luke 14:16-24. In this reading Our Lord tells a parable about a man who gave a great banquet and invited many guests who in turn make excuses why they could not attend. In some ways this banquet is seen as a single feast, but also experienced in three ways; including the coming Kingdom of God, the Eucharist and the banquet within us,...

Today on the 10th Sunday of Luke the Gospel lesson comes to us from Luke 13:17-21. In this pericope a woman who had a spirit of infirmity for eighteen years is healed by Jesus in the synagogue on the sabbath. This healing on the sabbath makes the ruler of the synagogue indignant because he does not know the weightier matters of the law. Father Ernesto shares with us how today’s lesson is the excla...

The question that is on the hearts and minds of most Christians is what must we do to be saved? In today’s Gospel lesson from Luke 18:18-27 a certain young ruler asks Jesus this very question saying, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Our Lord instructs him to keep the commandments to which he replies, “All these things I have kept from my youth”. Jesus reminds the young ruler...

We have often heard that money is neither good nor bad but simply a means to an end. Father Gregory shares with us an uplifting message about how God thinks about money and its proper use. Today on the 9th Sunday of Luke the Gospel reading comes to us from Luke 12:16-21. In this pericope Jesus tells the parable of The Rich Fool to a crowd and to us illustrating to both that He came to bring God an...

Life has a way of becoming dark for each of us if we stop noticing the presence of God in our lives. Beginning with our Churching after forty days and our Baptism where we are clothed with a garment which is cleansed through repentance Orthodox Christians are reminded that Christ is present in the moments that matter most and make up the meaning of life. Father Micah shares with us an inspiring me...

Today on the 7th Sunday of Luke the Gospel reading comes to us from Luke 8:41-56. Therein we hear about two miracles performed by Jesus for people who approached Him in humility and faith. Our country is currently suffering from a pandemic that has hurt us socially, politically and economically. Fr. Deacon Tikhon shares with us a message of hope that the miracles performed by Christ in today’s Gos...

We often hear the message to take care of the poor, be merciful, compassionate and open our hearts to The Scriptures. In today’s Gospel lesson taken from Luke 18:19-31 we read the well-known parable of The Rich Man and Lazarus. In this parable Jesus reveals to us an idea of what the afterlife will be like. Father Gregory shares with us as Orthodox Christians our belief that what we do in this life...

For most of us the year 2020 feels like being in a pressure cooker which is expanding each week. We are zealous about many things including wearing or not wearing masks, politics, race relations, and even football. Father Gregory helps us to understand the difference between Biblical zeal, which is a zeal for God’s righteousness vs a zeal for the cares of this world. Today is the 6th Sunday of Luk...

Today in Orthodoxy we celebrate the feast day of Saint Luke the Evangelist. Father Micah shares with us that Saint Luke the Evangelist and apostle was unique among the New Testament figures, because he was not of the Hebrew people but Greco – Syrian by birth. Saint Luke was highly educated, a doctor, an artist and tradition tells us that he was the first to paint an Icon of the Theotokos as well a...

The proper interpretation of scripture comes through The Church and has salvific significance. There are many passages in the Bible that attest to the power of God’s word and how faith comes from hearing and that God’s word is a light in this world of darkness. Father Paul shares us that the power in God’s Word depends on our willingness to hear and respond to its message. Today on the 4th Sunday...

Today on the Second Sunday of Luke Father Micah expounds on both the Epistle and Gospel of the day. In the Epistle taken from II Corinthians Saint Paul says, Brethren, you are the temple of the living God; and as God said, “I will live in them and move among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people”. Jesus says in today’s Gospel taken from Luke 6:31-36, “love your enemies, and do...