Praying in the Rain

I want to make clear to everyone that we will not be asking anyone about vaccination status. As in almost all matters, so with government health mandates, it is possible (probable) that very godly, intelligent and well-meaning people will disagree. Let’s not let self righteousness—and her children, fear, anger, and judgement—keep us from loving one another and believing the best of one another, ev...

Here’s the problem: We so often set ourselves up for failure by thinking our best must mean that we should do what someone else, probably a saint, is doing or has done. And so, without discernment, we force ourselves to complete a rigorous prayer rule or fasting discipline, or to sleep very little, or attend copious church services, or to volunteer at every opportunity—all without discernment, oft...

Our assurance must be in God Himself. Our assurance cannot be in being right, for we are human. Yes, being right is important, and we should strive for orthodoxy (ortho is Greek for ‘right’). We are the Orthodox Church, after all. However, we are also human. We are limited, do not know everything and are easily deceived. Our trust has to be in God, not in man.

Isn’t it strange how much easier it is to thank God when you have almost nothing, than it is when you have much more than you need? I have noticed this in myself. I am very thankful to God when I have a little bread (when I might not have any), but when I have bread going mouldy because I have so many other things to eat, I forget to give thanks. When we have abundance, we have to force ourselves...

Keep nurturing the disciplines and activities that tend to produce the fruit of the Spirit, and work to avoid the activities or relationships or situations that stir up your passions. This is what the Church calls asceticism.

Today we live in a time of uncertainty; but really, today is no more uncertain than yesterday nor the day or year or century before. Certainty is a kind of delusion. It is a delusion that conveniently forgets that there is much, much more going on in the world than we know and can see. How, then, can we live in peace when our life is enveloped in uncertainty? How do we escape the fear of uncertain...

There are many kinds of waves in the chaotic world we live in. Sometimes the waves are pushing to the left. Sometimes the waves push to the right. Really, there is no rhyme or reason to it. In fact, part of what can drive you crazy is how unreasonable life in this world is. Like the waves on the ocean, it all depends which way the wind is blowing. And the wind that influences the political and soc...

I write a weekly letter for our community and this week I thought I would share this letter with a broader audience. We celebrated the Feast of the Nativity of the Theotokos this week. Mary the Mother of God was born into a world full of oppression and confusion, yet she was able to become the Holy dwelling place of God. We too, especially at this time of government restrictions and all of the hei...

All suffering, however, regardless of its apparent immediate source, can be understood as the wrath of God. But we must never forget that we call it God’s wrath because of how we feel and how we experience it, not because God is at all angry or vengeful. Rather, God both allows and brings about suffering in our lives as a doctor treating a patient. What patient after major surgery has not experien...

After my last blog post, John commented that the burning of Churches in Canada calls for “Christian outrage” now, while love and forgiveness can wait until after the crimes have been investigated and resolved. I can honestly say that I know how John feels. In fact, I will go so far as to say that until one feels outrage, one can’t honestly love and forgive. Outrage is a natural human response to o...

Last night I attended a prayer service in the street in front of the Coptic Orthodox Church that was burned down early Monday morning. Although some evidence points toward arson, arson has not been proven and no motive has yet been identified. However, there has been a recent spike in violence against churches (vandalism, arson and threats), some sources report over 200 significant incidents in Ca...

Even as we strive to please God by disciplining ourselves and obeying His commands, we know that God loves us. We know that God will accept our striving for righteousness, even if we don’t do it very well, even if we fail. God is able to fix our mistakes. Therefore, like children striving to please a parent whom we know loves us completely, we offer what we have, what we can do, in a carefree way,...

Waiting involves attention. We have to pay attention to our thoughts. We have to notice what is happening in our minds and thoughts and feelings leading up to and when and after we sin. And learning to pay attention to our thoughts takes time. It’s something that we have to practice. It is, the Fathers tell us, an important part of prayer. When we practice prayer with attention (attention to what...

Fr. Michael Gillis builds off of last week's talk about the Great Reset on not getting attached to the comforts of this world. Someone asked about how to balance living in this world without getting attached to it. Fr. Michael talks about three things we can do to help us live as sojourners in this world, waiting for a City whose foundation and builder is God.

Fr. Michael Gillis talks about what we should do about the Great Reset. About once a week Fr. Michael gets a message from one or another of my parishioners with a link to a video that he “has to see.” Many of these videos are of a monk on Mt. Athos (or a monk from some other place reputed for holiness), or it is a video by a conservative religious or political commentator decrying the loss of reli...

Is it possible to flee to the desert a little bit? No and yes. No, you can’t flee a little bit, for fleeing a little bit is not fleeing at all. But yes, you can flee a little bit, if that little bit is complete. Here’s what I mean. We are all called to flee the world, in the sense of fleeing the sinful ways of the world. But we are not all called to flee in the same way. St. Isaac the Syrian, also...

Fr. Michael Gillis has us look at the world we find ourselves in. We are mentored by media that exploits and seduces us for its own profit, political leaders whom we know are lying, businesses that we know are cheating us and an educational system piloted by women, men and “others” who want to obliterate basic human nature. It seems we find ourselves, like young prophet Samuel, being raised in a c...

Fr. Michael Gillis talks about how part of our problem with overcoming temptation is that we don’t understand what temptations are for, what they are meant to accomplish in our lives. We wrongly think that temptations exist to test us to see if we will be “good.” We still haven’t believed the words of Jesus who said: “There is no one good but God.” Temptations come not to test us to see if we will...

On October 8, we commemorate two Sts. Pelagia of Antioch. The first is a virgin martyr, and the second is a repentant harlot, sometimes referred to as St. Pelagia the former courtesan of Antioch.

Most of the time, caring for our inner garden is more a matter of attention than of effort. The weeds of sinful and passionate thoughts can be pulled out pretty easily by merely recognizing them as sinful and turning your attention to Christ in prayer. The Jesus Prayer is probably the most common, or at least the most famous, form of prayer used by Orthodox Christians to turn their attention to Ch...

It seems whenever there is a crisis, people begin to see possible predictions and warnings about such times in the scripture. And certainly Christ does warn us to be prepared for the End, and to recognize that various tribulations and “wars and rumours of wars” would be the ongoing signs that the End is near. However, the scriptures themselves also tell us that we are already in the Last Days. Tha...

When we celebrate the Cross, we are not so much remembering the Crucifixion of Christ, as much as we are remembering the salvation that Christ’s Crucifixion has brought us and all the ways that we too are crucified with Christ. You see Christ did not suffer so that we would not have to suffer. Rather, Christ suffered on the Cross to be with us in our suffering, to lead us to the Resurrection throu...

In Orthodox Christian marriage, the wife is the queen, crowned and exalted at the head of the household; however, she is also the intercessor, standing submissively behind her husband, receiving his full attention and quietly interceding on behalf of the household. In this image is revealed the mystery of Christ and the Church, the mystery of the miraculous transformation of water into wine, of wh...

Repentance is a matter of saying, that’s not me, that’s not who I am—even while all I can see is my failure and darkness. This is because who I am, who I am becoming, is hidden in Christ. When I turn my attention to my failure and darkness, all seems to become failure and darkness because guilt makes me want to hide from God, driving me back to sin. In turning to Christ (rather than hiding behind...

Sinners are thrown utterly upon the mercy of God. For Sinners, “Lord, have mercy” means Lord, have mercy. For those who merely admit that they have sinned, “Lord, have mercy” may have very little meaning at all.