Eastern Christian Insights

Fr. Philip LeMasters is an Orthodox priest who serves St. Luke Orthodox Church and teaches Religion at McMurry University in Abilene, TX. You can find his blog at https://easternchristianinsights.blogspot.com/.

Fr. Philip LeMasters is an Orthodox priest who serves St. Luke Orthodox Church and teaches Religion at McMurry University in Abilene, TX. You can find his blog at https://easternchristianinsights.blogspot.com/.

Fr. Philip LeMasters is an Orthodox priest who serves St. Luke Orthodox Church and teaches Religion at McMurry University in Abilene, TX. You can find his blog at https://easternchristianinsights.blogspot.com/.

Fr. Philip LeMasters is an Orthodox priest who serves St. Luke Orthodox Church and teaches Religion at McMurry University in Abilene, TX. You can find his blog at https://easternchristianinsights.blogspot.com/.

Fr. Philip LeMasters is an Orthodox priest who serves St. Luke Orthodox Church and teaches Religion at McMurry University in Abilene, TX. You can find his blog at https://easternchristianinsights.blogspot.com/.

Fr. Philip LeMasters is an Orthodox priest who serves St. Luke Orthodox Church and teaches Religion at McMurry University in Abilene, TX. You can find his blog at https://easternchristianinsights.blogspot.com/.

During the season of Pascha, the Church calls our attention to how particular people responded to our Lord, Who rose from the dead as a whole embodied person on the third day. Thomas did not believe until he saw and touched the wounds of the Risen Savior. Joseph of Arimathea took Christ’s body down from the Cross and, with the help of Nicodemus, buried Him. The Myrrh-Bearing women became the first...

As we continue to celebrate our Lord’s glorious resurrection on the third day and victory over Hades and the tomb, we should admit that all too often we live as though death still reigned. We do so especially when we somehow convince ourselves that fear, anger, and resentment of those we perceive as our enemies are somehow Christian virtues.

Today we continue to celebrate the most fundamental and joyful proclamation of our faith: Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and upon those in the tombs bestowing life! He is our Pascha, our Passover, from death to life, for Hades and the grave could not contain the God-Man Who shares with us His victory over corruption and decay in all their forms. In a world enslaved t...

The Desert Father Saint Antony the Great once tested a group of monks by asking them, beginning with the youngest, the meaning of a certain passage of Scripture. In response to their answers, he said, “You have not understood it.” Finally, he asked Abba Joseph, who said, “I do not know.” Then Abba Antony said, “Indeed Abba Joseph has found the way, for he has said: ‘I do not know.’"

The more clearly that we see our personal brokenness, the more tempted we may be to think that there is simply no point in trying to reorient our lives toward the Lord.

If we have embraced the spiritual practices of Lent with any level of integrity, the weakness of our faith has surely become apparent to us. Our minds wander when we pray and so much else seems more important than being fully present before the Lord, both in the services of the Church and in our daily prayers at home. We often make excuses not to fast to the best of our ability and, regardless of...

Today we venerate the precious and lifegiving Cross upon which Christ offered Himself for the salvation of the world purely out of love for those enslaved to the fear of death, which He conquered through His glorious resurrection on the third day. Contrary to popular opinion, the Cross is not the sign of a civil religion that grants spiritual sanction to any power structure of this world. Neither...

We will misunderstand these blessed weeks of Lent if we assume that they are intended to help us have clearer ideas or deeper feelings about our Lord’s crucifixion and resurrection. We will be even more confused if we think that our intensified prayer, fasting, almsgiving, and repentance somehow earn God’s forgiveness or make us better than other people. Quite the contrary, Lenten disciples are si...

On this first Sunday of Great Lent, we commemorate the restoration of icons centuries ago in the Byzantine Empire. They were banned due to a misguided fear of idolatry, but restored as a proclamation of how Christ calls us to participate in His salvation in every dimension of our existence. The icons convey the incarnation of the God-Man, Who had to be fully human with a real human body in order t...

The gospel readings from the last few Sundays have called us all to return home from our self-imposed exile. Zacchaeus was restored as a son of Abraham when he gave more than justice required from his ill-gotten gains to the poor and those whom he had exploited. The publican returned to his spiritual home by humbly calling for the Lord’s mercy, even as the Pharisee exiled himself by his pride. The...

In case you have somehow not noticed, Great Lent begins a week from tomorrow. On this Sunday of the Last Judgment, the Church reminds us that the point of the upcoming season of repentance is not the keeping of religious rules or the performance of any form of piety as an end in itself. Our vocation in Lent is, instead, to open our souls to the healing mercy of the Lord so that we may enter more f...

What does true repentance look like? Whenever we are tempted to think that it has to do only with how we feel and not with how we act, we should remember the story of Zacchaeus. As a Jew who had become rich collecting taxes from his own people for the occupying Romans, Zacchaeus was both a traitor and a thief who collected even more than was required in order to live in luxury. No one in that time...

During the season of Christmas, we celebrated the Nativity in the flesh of the Savior. Born as truly one of us, He is the New Adam Who restores and fulfills us as living icons of God. During the season of Theophany, we celebrated the revelation of His divinity as a Person of the Holy Trinity at His baptism, where the voice of the Father identified Him as the Son and the Holy Spirit descended upon...

In this season we celebrate the great feast of Theophany, of Christ’s baptism when the voice of the Father identified Him as the Son of God and the Holy Spirit descended upon Him in the form of a dove. Epiphany reveals that the Savior Who appears from the waters of the Jordan to illumine our world of darkness is the God-Man, a Person of the Holy Trinity. He is baptized to restore us, and the creat...

Even before the internet and cell phones, people struggled to remain focused on what was truly important. Now we must contend not only with constant messages, images, and other forms of electronic distraction, but also with passions that tempt us to be mindful about just about anything other than preparing to welcome Christ into our lives and world at His Nativity. All the more is that the case wh...

It is terribly tragic when people fall into the delusion of thinking that they love God and neighbor, when in reality they are using religion to serve only themselves and perhaps others with whom they identify for some worldly reason. We do that when we narrow down the list of people who count as our neighbors to the point that we excuse ourselves from serving Christ in all who bear His image and...

There is perhaps no more powerful example of our need for Christ’s healing of our souls than that contained in today’s gospel reading. A rich man with the benefit of the great spiritual heritage of Abraham, Moses, and the prophets had become such a slave to gratifying his desires for indulgence in pleasure that he had become completely blind to his responsibility to show mercy to Lazarus, a misera...

Many are strongly tempted today to allow the problems facing our culture and world to distract us from growing to maturity in the Christian life and bearing good fruit for the Kingdom of God. That is perfectly understandable in light of our constant access to global media and the gravity of current events.

One of the great challenges that many of us face is learning to see that being an Orthodox Christians may not be reduced to confessing certain beliefs about God, no matter how true those beliefs are. Our faith may not be reduced to conscientious participation in the worship of the Church or keeping our own rule of prayer, fasting, almsgiving, or other spiritual disciplines. Our faith may not be re...