In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Today’s Gospel from Chapter 9 of St Matthew concerns the healing carried out by Christ through the expulsion of a demon. What can we learn from this Gospel? First of all, we should note that the healing performed by Christ in the
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The Man Born Blind is Healed by His Creator – Fr Ted
John 9:1-38 Jesus gives sight to the man born blind “St. Irenaeus (second century) interprets “that the works of God may be manifest in him” (John 9:3) as a direct reference to the continuing work of God as Creator of the human person: ‘Now the work of God is the fashioning of man. For, as the
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The Courage to Be Human
John 5:1-15 After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew, Bethesda, having five porches. In these lay a great multitude of sick people, blind, lame, paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the
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THE SUNDAY OF THE PARALYTIC. ON DIVINE PUNISHMENT – St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov)
Behold, thou art made whole: sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee (Jn. 5:14). This is the commandment the Lord gave to the paralytic whom He healed, as we heard today in the Gospels. Beloved brethren! This commandment of the Lord has enormous importance for us. It teaches us that we are subjected
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When Do Miracles Occur ?
Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard
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Eight Sources of Temptation – Elder Cleopa
Teaching on the Eight Means of Temptation and the Struggle Against Them The Holy Fathers say (this is how Fr. Cleopa began to express concisely his spiritual experience to us, inherited from the Holy Fathers and personally experienced by him, as every one of his words clearly confirms) that on the path of salvation one
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SHOULD WE BELIEVE OUR DREAMS?
For me every new article is not something that I have concocted but something that I have experienced. Our pastoral ministry is to plunge into the depths of life where you can find a wide range of topics for new spiritual talks. It is also contact with people, nearly always with their sorrows and very
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The Eight Deadly Sins ( St. John Cassian )
Our venerable and God-bearing Father John Cassian was a 4th/5th century monastic saint known for his writings on the monastic life and for his correctives of the anti-Pelagian writings of St. Augustine of Hippo. His feast day in the Orthodox Church is February 29th (celebrated on February 28th in non leap years), and it
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PARALYZED ICONOGRAPHER SERGEI KOZLOV: “MY DISABILITY IS AN INVALUABLE GIFT FROM ABOVE”
An accident … Sergei is totally paralyzed except for his head, neck and shoulders. By our hero’s own admission, nothing remained for him but to learn how to do something with the muscles that still had some potential for movement. This desire proved to be enough to find his calling in life. His sole
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The Sacrament of Holy Unction
BODILY SICKNESS, THE RESULT of sinfulness, is inextricably intertwined in human life. Part of the mission of the Apostles and of the Church is the liberation of the children of the Kingdom from the bondage to sickness, sin, and death which is a consequence of the Fall. So it was that the Apostles “went out,
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