Catechumen Corner

Congratulations to our newly illumined families! Now your job is to go out and find the next cohort of catechumens to bring into the Church! Current catechumens, we haven’t forgotten y’all! Time is going to fly from now through the Great Lent, so schedule some time with your godparent/ sponsor an

Holy Baptism. If you’ve been following the catechumenate process from the first lesson of this series to the present, you’re drawing close to your Holy Baptism and Chrismation into the Orthodox Church. It’s an exciting time, and a lot is going to happen in very quick succession between the 12 days

The Orthodox Funeral. There are actually five separate funeral services in the Orthodox Church; one for children, laity, monks, priests, and to be served during Bright Week (the week after Pascha). Immediately following death the body is prepared for burial by family and friends of the deceased, a

The Holy Mysteries - Ordination. The Greek word for ordination is cheirotonia, the laying on of hands, and while this happens for all clerical ranks, readers and subdeacons are tonsured into their offices in the nave of the church, whereas deacons, priests, and bishops are ordained in the altar (an

The Holy Mysteries - Holy Communion. At the very heart and center of Holy Orthodoxy is our participation in the Eucharist (from the Greek for “grateful/ offered graciously”), and it is seen as the completion and totality of all the other Holy Mysteries. Before we approach the Chalice with fear of

The Holy Mysteries - Holy Baptism. What you’ve all been preparing for since the day you were made catechumens - dying to your old life and being born again into the Church, cleansed of your sins and illuminated in and having put on Christ, clothed in Him. As you hear (and hopefully are learning to

The Continuation of the Jewish Temple Tradition. This is a subject of some contention, especially among those coming home to Orthodoxy from protestant traditions in which the modern State of Israel and the Jewish people residing there are still considered to be God’s chosen people, but without minc

The Liturgy of the Catechumens. The Divine Liturgy is technically broken up into three major portions - the Proskomedia (preparing the Gifts), the Liturgy of the Catechumens (sometimes also called the Liturgy of the Word), and the Liturgy of the Faithful (or Liturgy of the Eucharist). This week we

Prayer & Establishing a Prayer Rule. Prayer is one of the three “pillars of piety” along with fasting and almsgiving, commanded of us in St. Matthew, and we believe that any virtues and powers we may be given by God are gotten primarily in prayer. St. Paul told the Thessalonians (and by extension,

The Great Lent. As part of your catechumenate, all of you either have or will experience the Great Lent in its entirety prior to your admittance into the Church. The Great Lent (called this because the Nativity Fast and other fasts during the years are sometimes called the “lesser” fasts) was orig

Angels. My first recollection of angels came from two distinct sources - a big-eyed “precious moments” figurine my grandma had on her nightstand, and a childrens’ Bible depiction of the angel wrestling Jacob in Genesis 32; neither of these are probably great depictions, but here we are. The word i

Selecting a Patron Saint. Selecting a patron saint whose name to take as your own when you’re baptized is an important step in your catechumenate, and you can take a variety of approaches in choosing one that will represent you and your interests well. While technically all saints are fair game, t

Saints. A saint (from the Latin, Sanctus, meaning “holy”) is one who is set apart for service to God and who has cooperated with God’s grace to the extent that their holiness is beyond question. In the Scriptures, saint is used to denote those who have been consecrated to God’s purposes, a way in

Noetic. Shortly after the anaphora we hear, “That our God, the Lover of mankind, having accepted them upon His holy and most heavenly and noetic altar as an odor of spiritual fragrance, will send down upon us divine grace and the gift of the Holy Spirit, let us pray.” It’s a really pretty petition

The Resurrection. This will no doubt be the shortest entry for a while, as it’s really pretty straightforward. When Christ was taken down from the Cross, He was anointed in oils, covered in sweet spices, wrapped for burial, and laid in a new tomb provided by St. Joseph of Arimathea - you can ca

At this point we’ve traveled through some fifty weeks together, during which you’ve been preparing and have been being prepared to receive Holy Illumination through your baptism and chrismation - now comes the greater struggle of living your Orthodoxy. These aren’t necessarily in any particular

Memorial Services. Last week we discussed the Orthodox funeral, but our commemoration of the faithful departed does not end when we inter them. The memorial service, called a panikhida, is the service in which we offer special prayers for the departed, and which you can request to be served on the

Death. Death as we view it in Eastern Orthodoxy is the inevitable result of Adam’s sin, as well as our irresistible temptation toward sin in the generations since. That said, we don’t worry much about death, as we’re generally too focused on the Resurrection to give it much thought! The Resurrect

The Holy Mysteries - Confession. Unlike most protestant sects, we don’t really practice a general confession as part of our regular worship, wherein we all recite a confessional prayer and are then given a general absolution. Like the other Holy Mysteries, Confession in the Orthodox Church is at o

The Holy Mysteries - Chrismation. Called “confirmation” in the Western traditions, Chrismation is where you are sealed with the gift of the Holy Spirit through anointing with Chrism (from the Greek word for “ointment”) - the holy oil made yearly by the Synod of Bishops in a special rite during Holy

The Holy Mysteries - Overview. The Holy Mysteries of the Orthodox Church are nothing less than the way we partake mystically in the Divine Grace that God has given to His only Church; they are sometimes also referred to as Sacraments. This latter term is more common in the West, coming from the La

The Liturgy of the Faithful. The Divine Liturgy is technically broken up into three major portions - the Proskomedia (preparing the Gifts), the Liturgy of the Catechumens (sometimes also called the Liturgy of the Word), and the Liturgy of the Faithful (or Liturgy of the Eucharist). This week we

The Divine Liturgy - the Fountain of Immortality. As we begin our upcoming discussions of the Divine Liturgy, I would like for you to please watch this wonderful video produced by our Eastern American Diocese. It’s intended as a spiritual meditation on the Divine Liturgy from the perspective of

The Great Feasts of the Church. Pascha is the most important feast day of our entire liturgical year - often called the “Feast of Feasts,” and for this reason it’s counted in addition to the twelve great feasts of the Church. The feasts themselves celebrate and commemorate the major events in the

Fasting. Fasting is probably the single most-dreaded aspect of the catechumenate and then living as an Orthodox Christian thereafter, but it needn’t be, is usually due to a misunderstanding of the purpose and practice of fasting, and can be alleviated with a little sound information which I hope to

Icons, their veneration, and why it’s NOT idolatry! Generally speaking, icons are a bit less contentious for those converting from Roman Catholicism due to their occasional use in that tradition to supplement statuary representing saints; for protestants, however, the use of icons can come as some

Relics. Relics are part of the early practices of the Church and thus are shared by groups like the Roman Catholics and even a few more “high church” protestant sects. That said, in the Orthodox Church we have a special veneration of the relics of saints because we believe the body remains the

The Theotokos. The word itself means “God-bearer,” as the Virgin Mary is the mother of Jesus Christ, the Son and Word of God, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit. In the Orthodox Church we hold that the birth of Jesus left the Theotokos’ virginity intact and that she and Joseph refrained from mar

Theosis. Usually translated as deification or divinization, i.e., the becoming like God by freeing ourselves from sin and uniting ourselves to God, i.e., salvation. Differing from the Western perspective, the concept of theosis works from the presumption that human beings by our very nature are

The Incarnation. This is the act of being “clothed” with a human body - God took on flesh and became man as the Son, truly lived and died and rose again in the flesh as a true human being while remaining fully God. As we hear in the Symbol of Faith (Nicene Creed), “... He was incarnate of the Holy