Orthodixie

“This country is in a moral free-fall. For over two generations, the public school system has taught in a moral vacuum, expelling God from the school and from the government, replacing him with evolution, where the strong kill the weak, without moral consequences and life has no inherent value.

We teach there are no absolutes, no right or wrong. And I assure you the murder of innocent children is always wrong, including by abortion. Abortion has diminished the value of children. Suicide has become an acceptable action and has further emboldened these criminals. And we are seeing an epidemic increase in murder-suicide attacks on our children.

Sadly, our schools are not safe. In fact, we now witness that within our schools. Our children have become a target of terrorists from within the United States.”

Who said this?

Here’s the story.

“When you are not married, you have rights and obligations. When you get married, you have fewer rights and more obligations. When you have children, you have no rights, but only obligations.”

— Elder Epiphanos of Athens (1989+)

Thanks to FWD from Fr Josiah Trenham (father of eight).

It does not bother me that the Bishop arrives in Turkish robes and changes to Byzantine. That is quaint. It shows we have history. It unites us to believers in past ages. But it does bother me that one aspect of the dynamism of the early Church is suppressed, that is the Spirit led witness and ministry of every layman, the Photinis and Mary Magdalenes, by a centralizing legalism that is papal, and western and imported into the Church. That is perhaps why, after two hundred years of Orthodoxy, most Americans don’t know who we are; but after a hundred years of Pentecostalism, the charismatic church has acquired six hundred million members worldwide, more than twice the size of moribund Orthodoxy; while, the evangelicals have translated the Bible into more than six hundred languages, we have yet to get the Septuagint into English. Lord, have mercy.

— Sent from a blog reader via email regarding this post (note the lengthy, occasionally edifying, discussion in the Comments).

“Many of us have never even seen a Russian,” says Gary Kompkoff, the elected village chief in Tatitlek, letting out a small laugh. “Most of us are full-blooded Aleut. It was very long ago that the Russians were here, of course.”

The bishop, who formally uses just one name … (More).

Humph! You mean, like Madonna & Prince? Ren & Stimpy?

Staggering.

By the way, the image here is of a man who now uses two “names” … Saint Herman.

“I enjoy driving the backroads, savoring the small towns and the occasional cafe where the waitress might still call you “Hon.” In these places, you catch glimpses of the unique, the off-beat, and sometimes, the downright bizarre.

Somewhat in that context, I always pay special attention to the churches I pass along the way: their archetecture (or lack thereof), their sloganeering, and especially their names. The Jesus Christ is the Answer, Inc. Church, painted in large red letters on the church roof is hard to miss, or forget. Somehow I suspect someone didn’t really think this one through….”Hi, I’m with the Jesus Christ is the Answer, Inc. Church and I’d like to tell you that Jesus Christ is the Answer”….it just doesn’t flow. I found the Little Zion Jerusalem Baptist Church, an odd juxtaposition, but then I found the Mother Zion Missionary Baptist Church completely baffling. I am familiar, of course, with the biblical usage of the word “Zion,” but what is meant by “Mother Zion?” I don’t get it.“

Read it all H E R E.