Tag: Awareness
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A Close Encounter of the Divine Kind
I remember the first time I attended an Orthodox Divine Liturgy. Walking in the door was almost overwhelming. The lingering scent of incense was unmistakable, and unlike any olfactory experience I’ve ever had at church. And it was equally visually stunning, being surrounded with iconongraphy: saints, cherubim, biblical scenes, and especially Christ and the Theotokos.…
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Letters to My Son: If Only I Could Bubble Wrap the World
My dear boy, I still remember when you were first born and I would give you a bath in the little sink bathtub that we had. And I would wash your hair, and I’d always panic when my fingers would accidentally touch your soft spot. If ever I would feel it, I would stop, look…
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Letters to My Son on Life and Faith: Introduction
When we were still anticipating my son, I began writing letters to him. I wrote about the progress we were making on his nursery, how excited we were for his arrival, the hopes that we had with him. And then during his first year, I wrote him a letter once a month. My plan was…
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Leaning into Liminality
On 8 May 2023 I completed my term as President of the Synod of Albany, and as part of that, I presented the annual State of Religion report. While such a thing generally doesn’t sound that interesting, the response from it has been positive, so I thought I would share it. Grace to you and…
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The Beauty of Distraction
“Come on, focus, let’s keep moving” I want to say as we’ve stopped for the tenth time on the short walk to school. My kindergartner is so easily distracted and his focus is all over the place. To be honest, he comes by it honestly and gets it from his father (that’s me. I’m the…
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To Be Leaven For the Future
He told them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened.’ Matthew 13:33, NRSV The restoration of the church will surely come from a sort of new monasticism which has in common with the old only the…
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Finding Hope Amidst Tragedy
A sermon originally delivered to Calvary Community (Reformed) Church in New Berlin, Wisconsin. Text: Mark 13:1-26. How do we make sense out of tragedy? It seems that we have to deal with this with increasing frequency. If not a bombing, then a school shooting, if not a school shooting, then a massive natural disaster, and…
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One Word for 2015: Wonder
Wonder Few things are more beautiful than to see a person filled with wonder. More often than not it is children that experience this sense of wonder when faced with a world that they are still trying to understand. The capacity to experience wonder is the capacity to be surprised, to be amazed, to understand…
Matthew van Maastricht 