The Mother of God

 The Church historically has affirmed that Mary is rightly referred to as “the mother of God”. By this is not meant that there was a time when God was not, and that He came into being sometime in history. It also does not mean that Mary created or helped to create God, whether in His whole being or just as the a second Person of the Trinity. Rather, the matter in question was this: was Jesus, the baby that Mary conceived and gave birth to, at His conception fully God, fully the Son of God, fully the Second Person of the Trinity? And that, the Church - Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant - has always affirmed wholeheartedly as a doctrine essential to the Christian faith. In that sense, Mary was the Mother of God, and as such, it is a term of reference to her the Church gladly uses.

Schmemann on Liturgical Beauty

The joyful character of the eucharistic gathering must be stressed.  For the medieval emphasis on the cross, while not a wrong one, is certainly one-sided.  The liturgy is, before everything else, the joyous gathering of those who are to meet the risen Lord and to enter with him into the bridal chamber.  And it is this joy of expectation and this expectation of joy that are expressed in singing and ritual, in vestments and in censing, in that whole "beauty" of the liturgy which has so often been denounced as unnecessary and even sinful.

Unnecessary it is indeed, for we are beyond the categories of the "necessary."  Beauty is never "necessary," "functional" or "useful."  And when, expecting someone who we love, we put a beautiful tablecloth on the table and decorate it with candles and flowers, we do all this not out of necessity, but out of love.  And the Church is love, expectation and joy.  It is heaven on earth, according to our Orthodox tradition; it is the joy of recovered childhood, that free, unconditioned and disinterested joy which alone is capable of transforming the world.  In our adult, serious piety we ask for definitions and justifications, and they are rooted in fear - fear of corruption, deviation, "pagan influences," whatnot.  But "he that feareth is not made perfect in love" (1 Jn. 4:18).  As long as Christians will love the Kingdom of God, and not only discuss it, they will "represent" it and signify it, in art and beauty.  And the celebrant of the sacrament of joy will appear in a beautiful chasuble, because he is vested in the glory of the Kingdom, because even in the form of man God appears in glory.  In the Eucharist we are standing in the presence of Christ, and like Moses before God, we are to be covered with his glory.  Christ himself wore an unsewn garment which the soldiers at the cross did not divide; it had not been bought in the market, but in all likelihood it had been fashioned by someone's loving hands.  Yes, the beauty of our preparation for the Eucharist has no practical use. ~ Alexander Schmemann, "For the Life of the World", pp. 29-30

Superstition Ain’t the Way

 I find it increasingly bizarre the kinds of things fellow professing Christians believe. So here’s a post addressing one of those things.

Superstitions and Christianity do not mix. If you are so inclined, you can break all the mirrors you want, walk under all the ladders you want, and have 1000 black cats cross your path, and it will mean absolutely nothing. Bad luck, so called, will in no way result from those things. There is, in fact, no such thing as good luck or bad luck. Luck does not exist. Everything that exists in the universe is under the control of a sovereign God, and nothing is outside of His control. Everything that happens is as a result of His divine decree and comes about by His providence. That does not mean that there are not consequences to our obedience or disobedience of His law. It also does not mean that people do not make mistakes. We’re fallible creatures, and things are going to go wrong in this fallen world. But superstitions posit the idea that there are some spiritual forces in the universe operating outside of God’s control, and that they for some reason will “get us” if we do the weirdest of things, like breaking a mirror. But this is a lie from the devil, and it is intended to keep us bound up in fear and distracted from knowing God and serving Him. 

There’s a reason why superstitions always seem to overlap with the occult. Both begin with refusing to trust in God. Then, finding ourselves in the fear of our unbelief, we are left scrambling for ways to control the world around us, a world we know in our hearts we can’t control. Superstitions and the occult are both ways men try in their futility to control the world. But they both only end in sorrow and pain.

Trust God and reject superstition. Seek to know Him through His Word. This, and this alone, is the path to peace, as we live our lives in this seemingly chaotic, sin-damaged universe.