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You may have picked that I have a strong affection for Mary the Mother of God; my patron saint is also a woman-St Bridget of Kildare in Ireland. Someone suggested sometime ago that my fascination for women saints was because i was at that time single!!! Well I am no longer single but still fascinated by both the Mother of God and St Bridget. I am also fascinated by both St Paul the Apostle and the Venerable Paul Xeropotamou, founder of the monastery of St Paul Xeropotamou on Mount Athos.
Since my given name is Paul-I can remember when first names were called Christian names-so that is how my interest in the Apostle started and when I had the chance to visit the Holy Mountain of Mount Athos, I couldn't decide which monastery to go to, so why not go to the one with the same name!!?? It wasn't rocket science, but then does God want things to be too complicated? I hope not, I am a simple soul really. St Bridget, well her feast day is February 1st-the day before my birthday and also my late paternal grandfather's birthday. St Bridget under the name of St Bride is the patron saint of my mother's family from Scotland, the Douglases. She was, my priest remarked, tapping on my shoulder. St Bridget also lived before the Great Schism of 1054, which separated sadly Eastern and Western Christianity, so she was a Saint of the Undivided Church.
The Mother of God is ubiquitous in Orthodox worship and quite rightly so. The more I look at her, the more I think of her, the more it is clear how important she is. I have already touched on this in other postings, but it seems so clear to me, that Mary is the role model for us all.If there is anyone person in Scripture for whom it is right to model ourselves on it must be her. What a shame so few sermons are preached on Mary.
In XC
Paul
Mary the Mother of Jesus must be the MOST remarkable woman in history. It is impossble to remain ambivalent about her. Even Christians are divided. Recently I was in Christian Chat Room talking to a friend of mine and she told me that although she respected Mary, the mention of her name seemed to provoke so much reaction my friend was put off finding more about her.
Which is a shame.....
After all, it was Mary saying 'Yes' when the Archangel Gabriel visited her that enabled the Second Person to become Man and be born as Jesus and so brought about the salvation of the human race.
God is the perfect gentleman, he never acts without our agreement first. To have forced himself onto Mary without her consent.....well it is unthinkable, but Mary did agree, and so enabled God's Plan of Salvation to happen.
What can we learn from that?
Mary is the archtypical Christian.
We have already seen how her acquiesence to the Will of God opened the door for our salvation.
By saying 'Yes' to God, the Holy Spirit came upon her-please note the wording-and Mary concieved and after nine months brought the Christ Child into the world. When we say 'Yes'' to God, something happens inside us-mentally, spirirtually-and eventually what is inside comes out as something wonderful for God
Three times a month I have the privilege of serving Vespers in our Parish. Vespers for those who don't know is the Evening Service that begins the Liturgical day. Orthodox worship is based on the Liturgical cycle of Monastries and the Liturgical day begins in the evening-in line with Genesis chapters one and two talking about the seven days of creation-'in the evening and the norning....'
Over the years one line , one prayer in particular, has held my attention-"Vouchsafe, O Lord, to keep us without sin this night"
I don't know about you, but one of the things about being a Christian is that I do have somewhere to go when all fails, some one to go to.
An Irish folksong called "The Parting Glass" talks about
'all the songs I did not sing, the promises I did not keep''
In his Good Friday Meditation, Metropolitan Kallistos of Diokleia spoke about Jesus at Gethsemane. He said Gethsemane was for "any..... suffering from loneliness, fear, depression, distress and anguish of mind", and with great candour and in parenthesis "and in one way or another that includes most of us."
Metropolitan Kallistos went on to say that "Gethsamane means that I am never alone. I have a companion. In my distress and anguish there is one who who understands what I am going through. And he understands because he himself has gone through the same things."
That is what stops me being overwhelmed by that prayer during Vespers-the fact that Christ understands, because he was tempted in all things such as we are, but he also had the victory, a victory which is mine as I am in Christ.
I have noticed that certain words are like a red rag to a bull for some Christians-mention Mary, the Church, the Saints and you unleash a barrage of abuse and invective from certain quarters that make you think you had gone down with the Bubonic Plague or J K Rowling's Spattergoit.
Why is that some Christians get uptight about these matters? In the Gospel according to St Luke, chapter one, we are told that ALL generations will call Mary blessed, in various places in his Epistles, St Paul tells us that we are called to be Saints and Our Lord famously told us that He would be build His Church and the Gates of Hell would not prevail against it
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The other day I posed the question here, why doesn't the English Tourist Abroad, generally speaking, ever learn a few words or phrases of the country he or she is about to visit? I also wondered if this was true of tourists from other English speaking nations? So far no response to that one so we must wait with bated breath, although there have been urban myths of Americans walking into stores in the UK and being surprised when they can't buy the goods they want with dollars!!
Visiting the Greek mainland a few years ago I was surprised to see the road signs bi-lingual-in Greek and English-no, not a transliteration of the Greek letters into Latin letters, but a translation of the sign from one language to another. Why English? I mean Turkey, Bulgaria, Albania all border on to Greece, Italy is only a ferry trip away, so why English? Perhaps the Greeks realise that English people can't be bothered to learn their language and being the Cradle of Civilization, courteously translate the road signs for us Northern Barbarians, who knows
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I listened to an interview the other day with Archbishop Anastasios of Tirana and All Albania-before anyone goes away with the idea that I am fluent in some of the more remore languages of Europe, His Beatitude was speaking in English, which has given me thoughts of a future blog-why don't or can't English people speak other languages (question-is it just the English or do other English speaking nations also refuse to learn other languages?)
To get back to the point, The Archbishop was talking about the resurgence of Christianity in Albania since the overthrow of the Communist Government there around 1990. You will recall that Albania declared itself in 1967 to be an atheistic state and forbade any religious practices, throwing the Christian and Islamic leadership into concentration camps. In terms of the Orthodox Church (the north of Albania is Roman Catholic and the south Orthodox-this reflects how the area was divided during the times of the Roman Empire) of the hundreds of Priests, Deacons and Readers who were thrown into the camps only 20 came out alive
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Apparently it now appears that only 10% of the population of Britain are familiar with the stories of the Bible-90% have never heard of the Good Samaritan etc. This is interesting because according to the last Official Census in 2001 about 76% of British people considered themselves to be Christians.
Which begs the question, what is a Christian
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This is the first of a series of musings set up about myself about Spiritual Life in General and how Orthodox Christianity seeks to address the situations of life.
Just to introduce myself my name is Paul and I am a Reader within the Russian Orthodox Church, in particular the Diocese of Sourozh which covers Great Britain and the Republic of Ireland. The parish I function in is that of St Aidan and St Chad in Nottingham, as well as the Eucharistic Community of St paulinus of York in Newark. Both Nottingham aand Newark are in the Midlands county of Nottinghamshire, most famous for Robin Hood, but if you like your food, Stilton Cheese is the local cheese and Melton Mowbray Pork Pies come from the just down the road in the neighbouring county of Leicestershire.
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Comment by orthodoxchristian
on The Virgin Mary-love her or hate her.........
A Simple Christian
Orthodox Christian