'Wish Trees' Attract Visitors in Saint Voukolos Greek Orthodox Church

Sait Voukolos The olive and myrtle tree saplings that Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew and İzmir mayor Aziz Kocaoğlu planted on February 6 at the ...

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S&P just launched a Catholic Values Index – but it completely ignores Pope Francis' recent letter

S&P Dow Jones Indices just created a new index that excludes companies apparently involved in activities that are deemed "inconsistent" with Catholic values. However, it seems to be ignoring a key issues Pope Francis recently wrote to every Catholic bishop about – thinking about the environment and "replacing fossil fuels." The S&P 500 Catholic Values Index only excludes companies involved in any form of activity related to war. It tracks invests in oil and gas companies. This month, the Pope said "highly polluting fossil fuels needs to be progressively replaced without delay" in an encyclical, which is a letter sent to all Catholic bishops by the Pope. So, investing in oil and gas stocks probably isn't what he was hoping for. If companies are involved in the following activities, they will not be included from the S&P's new index: Biological weapons, chemical weapons, cluster bombs, landmines Nuclear weapons – any exposure to whole systems and strategic partnerships Conventional Military sales – companies that have their primary business activity as military products Child labor employment in the company’s operation or in supply chain “Sustainable issues represent one of the most important cost and revenue drivers in the modern corporate world,” said Julia Kochetygova, Head of Sustainability Indices at S&P Dow Jones Indices in a statement. “By selecting stocks that comply with the US CCB, the S&P 500 Catholic Values Index aims to include companies with resilient business profiles by addressing the ethical challenges that can make a stronger investment case. We are excited to be working with Global X by licensing this new and innovative index to them.” The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (US CCB) is responsible for deciding what is deemed not morally in keeping with the Catholic faith and excludes investment in what is not. The body outlined this in the Socially Responsible Investment Guidelines. The launch of the index comes at an interesting time because some of the largest American Catholic organisations are at odds with Pope Francis' recent mandate to religious leaders about the environment. Some of the biggest Catholic institutions in the US invest heavily in oil – which, again, are not excluded from the S&P 500 Catholic Values Index. In fact, global energy giant Exxon Mobil is one of the top-weighted stocks in the index: At the beginning of the month, America's third largest Catholic institution by Catholic population, the Archdiocese of Chicago, told Reuters it has $100 million (£64 million) worth of investments related to fossil fuels. Reuters' report also claimed that dioceses in places such as Boston, Baltimore, Toledo, and a bulk of Minnesota have millions of dollars worth in oil and gas stock holdings too. At the time of Pope Francis' letter, the US CCB did not say whether it would review its policy in investing in fossil fuels, but judging by today's launch – we've now got the answer.Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: 6 mind-blowing facts about Greece's economy

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The Latest: Greek Orthodox Metropolitan on Hand for Pope

The Latest: Greek Orthodox metropolitan on hand for pope's events in South America

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Yoga is ‘incompatible’ with Christian faith, Church says

The Holy Synod, the Greek Orthodox Church’s governing body, on Tuesday denounced yoga, saying it is “incompatible” with the Christian faith.

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Greek Holy Synod: Yoga Incompatible with Christianity

“The practice of yoga has no place in the lives of Christians,” was the announcement made by the Holy Synod of the Church of Greece in response to the International Day of Yoga, which was established by the United Nations in 2014. The Holy Synod argues that since yoga is a fundamental aspect of Hinduism, it cannot be practiced by Christians because it is contrary to the Christian faith. And because of that it cannot be considered as just a “form of exercise.” The official announcement further states that the Church of Greece respects the freedom of religious belief but claims is has a responsibility in order to avoid developing a “climate of religious syncretism.”

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Rev. Spyridon C. Papademetriou (1925-2015) Served 54 Years as a Priest

  [I met Rev. Spyridon Papademetriou a few years ago at the Sts. Constantine and Helen Greek Orthodox Church in Reading, PA. When I told him my name, he explained that he read my columns in The National Herald regularly. Ever since then, we spoke often after church services. He was always very friendly and […] The post Rev. Spyridon C. Papademetriou (1925-2015) Served 54 Years as a Priest appeared first on The National Herald.

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Church of Greece granted extension on loan of holy relic

The Catholic church in Venice that agreed to lend Saint Barbara’s relic to the Church of Greece has accepted a request from Archbishop Ieronymos for the remains to be kept in Athens until June 1.

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Pope Francis Is Making Saints Out Of Two Palestinian Nuns

VATICAN CITY (RNS) Pope Francis will bestow sainthood on two Palestinian nuns on Sunday (May 17), a move that’s being seen as giving hope to the conflict-wracked Middle East and shining the spotlight on the plight of Christians in the region. Sisters Maria Baouardy and Mary Alphonsine Danil Ghattas are due to be canonized by the pontiff along with two other 19th-century nuns, Sister Jeanne Emilie de Villeneuve, from France, and Italian Sister Maria Cristina dell’Immacolata. The coming canonizations have been described by the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem, Fouad Twal, as a “sign of hope” for the region. “The canonization of these two Palestinian saints is a spiritual highpoint for the inhabitants of the Holy Land,” he told Vatican Insider. “The fact that Mariam (Maria) and Marie (Mary) Alphonsine, the first modern Palestinian saints, are both Arabs is a sign of hope for Palestine, for the entire Holy Land and the Middle East: holiness is always possible, even in a war-torn region. May a generation of saints follow them!” Twal will travel to the Vatican for the canonizations and has invited Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to the ceremony. Palestinians have waited more than 30 years for the sainthood of Baouardy, following her beatification by St. John Paul II in 1983. Born into the Melchite Greek Catholic Church in 1846, in a village near Nazareth, Baouardy went on to join the Carmel of Pau in France. Despite being illiterate, she was sent to India where she founded other convents, before moving to Bethlehem where she died in 1878. Announcing the canonization in February, the Vatican said Baouardy “experienced many sufferings together with extraordinary mystic phenomena” from an early age. Ghattas, who was beatified by Pope Benedict XVI in 2009, lived a distinctly less international life. Born in Jerusalem in 1843, she entered the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph of the Apparition at the age of 15. She went on to found the Congregation of Sisters of the Most Holy Rosary of Jerusalem and “worked tirelessly to help young people and Christian mothers,” the Vatican said. The canonization of the two nuns will inevitably draw attention to Palestine and the Middle East, a region that Francis has repeatedly highlighted in recent months. In his Easter address, the pope said: “We pray for peace for all the peoples of the Holy Land. May the culture of encounter grow between Israelis and Palestinians and the peace process be resumed, in order to end years of suffering and division.” He additionally called for an end to “the roar of arms” in Syria and Iraq, while also pushing for a stop to “barbarous acts of violence” in Libya and peace in Yemen. Twal had no doubt that the approaching sainthoods would have a positive impact on the entire region. “I am sure that it will rekindle the hope of our faithful in the Middle East and encourage them to remain firm in the faith and keep their eyes fixed on heaven,” he said, “especially in these difficult times that Christians are experiencing there.” -- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church pastor says he's been reassigned

MILWAUKEE —A bishop is under investigation on allegations he tried to intimidate a pastor at Milwaukee's Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church.

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Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church pastor says he's been reassigned

MILWAUKEE —A bishop is under investigation on allegations he tried to intimidate a pastor at Milwaukee's Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church.

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Syrian Archbishop On Christians Threatened By Islamic State: 'We May Disappear Soon'

NEW YORK (RNS) In the weeks leading up to Easter, Archbishop Jean-Clement Jeanbart of Aleppo was starting to sense, finally, that the war that had ravaged Syria since 2011 was finally beginning to ease. He launched an effort to promote rebuilding and to keep some of the younger generation of Christians in Aleppo, a religiously diverse city of 3 million near the Turkish border that had been the country’s commercial hub. Then, on Easter weekend, another round of fighting erupted, targeting the Christian quarter of the city and killing and injuring dozens. Three churches and several apartment buildings were destroyed and rockets hit Jeanbart’s own offices, which sit less than 200 yards from the Old City, where the rebels are based. The archbishop spent the next week looking for someplace to bury the bodies of a family of four since the Catholic cemetery was now a battle zone. “I was without any words to say to my people,” the prelate said in an interview as he prepared to celebrate an evening prayer service at the Church of the Virgin Mary in Brooklyn, one stop on a 10-day tour of the U.S. that ends on Friday (May 1). It was a grim moment, a low point even amid the horror of the civil strife that has devastated Syria, and in particular the country’s ancient Christian minority. Jeanbart heads the Melkite Greek Catholic Church in Aleppo, an Eastern Catholic rite that is in full communion with Rome, but one that is in serious peril. Just a few decades ago, Aleppo was home to about 170,000 Catholics, about a third of the city’s population. Since the war broke out, Jeanbart has seen a third of his flock reduced by death, dislocation and emigration while Aleppo’s Muslim population has soared. The threat of annihilation is constant, as Aleppo has become the main battleground between the government forces of President Bashar Assad and a motley assortment of rebels who include growing numbers of fighters affiliated with the fundamentalist terrorism of the Islamic State group. Militants from the Islamic State have killed or kidnapped priests; the tires on Jeanbart’s own car were shot out in an attack as he traveled to Beirut. Two Eastern Orthodox bishops were captured two years ago and there has been no word on their condition. Snipers, shelling, lootings and car bombings are a part of the daily gantlet Christians run if they leave their homes. “A country of blood and fire,” he calls it. That’s why the Catholic relief agency Aid to the Church in Need brought Jeanbart to the U.S. — to raise awareness about the seriousness of their plight and to raise money to help rebuild the community. “We are in grave danger; we may disappear soon,” as Jeanbart told an audience in Manhattan on Tuesday (April 28). He began his tour in Boston and was headed to Washington, speaking to church groups but also doing numerous media and television interviews to get the word out. Yet the archbishop knows he has a host of forces arrayed against him, and not just on the battlefield: First, in his experience, Jeanbart said Americans tend to assume that everyone in an Arab country such as Syria is a Muslim. Melkite Catholics in the U.S. are a proud and vibrant community, numbering some 25,000 families in nearly 50 parishes. But they are spread across the country and are almost invisible when compared with the 65 million Roman Catholics in the U.S. Second, Jeanbart said the media’s focus on the geopolitics of the Middle East conflict and on military strategies obscures Syria’s pluralistic society and the fact that Christians exist there — and are main targets for Islamist terrorists. Third, the geopolitics don’t work in the church’s favor. The Assad regime and the rebels have support from different Muslim countries, which use each side as a proxy, while he said Israel is the focus of U.S. support. Jeanbart stressed his support for Israel’s right to exist, but he said there needs to be a different balance. “I know the American people have values and like freedom and like justice, so I thought they would listen, would give an ear to the other communities in the region — particularly the Christians, who are forgotten,” said Jeanbart, 72 and yet still energetic after a long day of interviews and little sleep. But Jeanbart faces another challenge when he speaks to an American audience: For him, as for other Syrian Christians, Assad is not the despot that he is considered in Washington. Christians in Syria felt protected by Assad, he said, much as Christians in Iraq were under Saddam Hussein. Many on Capitol Hill, however, want to send more arms and funding to the rebels and remove Assad, who has been accused of using chemical weapons as well as being a serial violator of human rights. “It’s up to them (the Americans) whether to like him or not,” Jeanbart said of Assad. “But I’m afraid they don’t know him enough. He’s not an angel. He will not be canonized tomorrow. But he’s not bad. Compared to the other Arab leaders, he may be one of the best.” Assad is under growing pressure from the rebels and the Islamic State, and if Assad falls, Jeanbart fears that the ensuing chaos — like that in Libya and Iraq — may sound the death knell for a Christian community that predates even the conversion of the Apostle Paul. “As a successor to the apostles I feel a responsibility, a duty, to do what I can,” he said. “I don’t want, in my time, that this church might disappear. We are all responsible” — pointing to Christians in the West — “for the continuity of the church in this land that has been blessed and sanctified by the blood of millions of martyrs who since the beginning have been killed because they were Christians.” -- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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Relic of St Barbara to travel from Italy to Greece

The relic of Saint Barbara, one of the most venerated saints in the Orthodox Church, is to be lent to the Church of Greece by the church in Venice where it is normally housed.

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By Recalling Its Ambassador from the Vatican, Turkey Helped Publicize Pope's Affirmation of Armenian Genocide

Given the candidness of Pope Francis, it was not surprising that he clearly acknowledged the Armenian Genocide during the Pontifical Divine Liturgy at St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican on April 12. The only person who was clueless about the Pope's true intentions was Mehmet Pacaci, Turkey's ambassador to the Vatican, who had bragged to the Turkish press two weeks ago that he had convinced the Pope to reject all Armenian requests for the Genocide Centennial. The Turkish ambassador claimed that he had managed to: -- Cancel the Pope's April 24 visit to Yerevan; -- Convince the Pope not to celebrate Mass at the Vatican on April 24; -- Eliminate the words 'Armenian Genocide' from the Pope's address during the April 12 Vatican Mass. The Turkish and Azerbaijani media reported Amb. Pacaci's contentions as a major victory for Turkish diplomacy and a devastating defeat for Armenians. Amb. Pacaci's false claims were simply intended to impress his superiors in Ankara about his 'good work.' The truth is that the Pope had neither planned to visit Yerevan on April 24 nor celebrate Mass at the Vatican on that date. The Turkish ambassador's third claim that the Pope would not use the term 'Armenian Genocide' during his April 12 address, but would only offer "prayers for all those who lost their lives during the tragic events of 1915," also turned out to be false! Contrary to Amb. Pacaci's real or imaginary pressures on the Vatican, the Pope made an explicit and lengthy reference to the Armenian Genocide at St. Peter's Basilica on April 12 which was broadcast worldwide on TV networks, radio stations, newspapers, and the internet. In attendance were Armenia's President Serzh Sargsyan, His Holiness Catholicos of All Armenians Karekin II, His Holiness Catholicos of the Great House of Cilicia Aram I, Patriarch of Armenian Catholics Nerses Bedros XIX, and thousands of worshippers from dozens of countries. Here are excerpts from the Pope's remarks: "In the past century our human family has lived through three massive and unprecedented tragedies. The first, which is widely considered 'the first genocide of the 20th Century', struck your own Armenian people, the first Christian nation, as well as Catholic and Orthodox Syrians, Assyrians, Chaldeans and Greeks. Bishops and priests, religious women and men, the elderly and even defenseless children and the sick were murdered. The other two were perpetrated by Nazism and Stalinism. And more recently, there have been other mass killings, like those in Cambodia, Rwanda, Burundi and Bosnia. It seems that humanity is incapable of putting an end to the shedding of innocent blood.... Dear Armenian Christians, today, with hearts filled with pain, but at the same time with great hope in the risen Lord, we recall the Centenary of that tragic event -- that immense and senseless slaughter -- whose cruelty your forefathers had to endure. It is necessary, and indeed a duty, to honor their memory, for whenever memory fades, it means that evil allows wounds to fester. Concealing or denying evil is like allowing a wound to keep bleeding without bandaging it!" Pope Francis had repeatedly spoken about the Armenian Genocide when he was a Cardinal in Argentina, and had included three references to that issue in his 2010 book, "On Heaven and Earth." On June 3, 2013, shortly after his election, Pope Francis described the Armenian Genocide as "the first genocide of the 20th Century." The Vatican had first referred to the Armenian mass killings on Sept. 10, 1915, when Pope Benedict XV sent a letter to Sultan Mahomet V, asking him to stop the wholesale massacres of innocent Armenians. Twice, on Nov. 9, 2000, and Sept. 27, 2001, Pope John Paul II and Catholicos Karekin II issued joint statements acknowledging the Armenian Genocide. Not surprisingly, the Turkish government reacted angrily to the Pope's latest reference to the Armenian Genocide, and immediately recalled its ambassador from the Vatican. Amb. Pacaci may now get fired for having falsely claimed that he had succeeded in silencing the Pope on the Armenian Genocide issue. Meanwhile, the Turkish government's overreaction and the Pope's refusal to apologize for his remarks made international headlines on TV networks, websites and newspapers around the world. The long-planned Turkish efforts to undermine the Centennial of the Armenian Genocide have been drowned out by the extensive media attention to the Kardashians' maiden visit to Armenia and the Pope's courageous reaffirmation of the Armenian Genocide right before April 24. -- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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A famous poet's advice for college graduates in this 177-year-old commencement speech is still surprisingly relevant

Colleges around the country have already lined up impressive graduation speakers like Apple's Tim Cook to inspire young people as they start their professional lives. The concept of an inspiring commencement speech is not a new phenomenon. The poet Ralph Waldo Emerson gave such a speech at Harvard's Divinity School in 1883, which is considered one of the best graduation speeches of all time. Surprisingly, some of Emerson's wisdom isn't that different from the advice given to young, impressionable graduates today. Considered extremely radical at the time, Emerson's speech challenged mainstream Christianity and urged listeners to trust their own experiences rather than the status quo doctrine of the church.  "The imitator dooms himself to hopeless mediocrity. The inventor did it, because it was natural to him, and so in him it has a charm. In the imitator, something else is natural, and he bereaves himself of his own beauty, to come short of another man's," Emerson said at Harvard. Steve Jobs had very similar advice to Stanford graduates in 2005 about how they should pursue what they love, or as Emerson called it, what's "natural" to them. "Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love," Jobs said. Emerson's advice about cheering on others also rings true today. "Wherever the invitation of men or your own occasions lead you, speak the very truth, as your life and conscience teach it, and cheer the waiting, fainting hearts of men with new hope and new revelation,” Emerson told graduates. David Foster Wallace's 2005 graduation speech at Kenyon College featured similar advice about being less self-centered and caring about the everyday people you encounter. "The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day," Wallace said. Here are some other nuggets from the speech: "A more secret, sweet, and overpowering beauty appears to man when his heart and mind open to the sentiment of virtue," Emerson says. Here, he means that when man opens his heart in this way, he sees his place in the world and understands that he has an enormous capacity for goodness.  He then goes on to say, "Let me admonish you, first of all, to go alone; to refuse the good models, even those which are sacred in the imagination of men, and dare to love God without mediator or veil." He is calling for man to believe in the power of the individual, rather than the long-established doctrines of the church. Emerson ends by saying he is looking forward to the time when men "shall see the world to be the mirror of the soul." You can read the entirety of Emerson's speech below: In this refulgent summer, it has been a luxury to draw the breath of life. The grass grows, the buds burst, the meadow is spotted with fire and gold in the tint of flowers. The air is full of birds, and sweet with the breath of the pine, the balm-of-Gilead, and the new hay. Night brings no gloom to the heart with its welcome shade. Through the transparent darkness the stars pour their almost spiritual rays. Man under them seems a young child, and his huge globe a toy. The cool night bathes the world as with a river, and prepares his eyes again for the crimson dawn. The mystery of nature was never displayed more happily. The corn and the wine have been freely dealt to all creatures, and the never-broken silence with which the old bounty goes forward, has not yielded yet one word of explanation. One is constrained to respect the perfection of this world, in which our senses converse. How wide; how rich; what invitation from every property it gives to every faculty of man! In its fruitful soils; in its navigable sea; in its mountains of metal and stone; in its forests of all woods; in its animals; in its chemical ingredients; in the powers and path of light, heat, attraction, and life, it is well worth the pith and heart of great men to subdue and enjoy it. The planters, the mechanics, the inventors, the astronomers, the builders of cities, and the captains, history delights to honor. But when the mind opens, and reveals the laws which traverse the universe, and make things what they are, then shrinks the great world at once into a mere illustration and fable of this mind. What am I? and What is? asks the human spirit with a curiosity new-kindled, but never to be quenched. Behold these outrunning laws, which our imperfect apprehension can see tend this way and that, but not come full circle. Behold these infinite relations, so like, so unlike; many, yet one. I would study, I would know, I would admire forever. These works of thought have been the entertainments of the human spirit in all ages. A more secret, sweet, and overpowering beauty appears to man when his heart and mind open to the sentiment of virtue. Then he is instructed in what is above him. He learns that his being is without bound; that, to the good, to the perfect, he is born, low as he now lies in evil and weakness. That which he venerates is still his own, though he has not realized it yet. He ought. He knows the sense of that grand word, though his analysis fails entirely to render account of it. When in innocency, or when by intellectual perception, he attains to say, — 'I love the Right; Truth is beautiful within and without, forevermore. Virtue, I am thine: save me: use me: thee will I serve, day and night, in great, in small, that I may be not virtuous, but virtue;' — then is the end of the creation answered, and God is well pleased. The sentiment of virtue is a reverence and delight in the presence of certain divine laws. It perceives that this homely game of life we play, covers, under what seem foolish details, principles that astonish. The child amidst his baubles, is learning the action of light, motion, gravity, muscular force; and in the game of human life, love, fear, justice, appetite, man, and God, interact. These laws refuse to be adequately stated. They will not be written out on paper, or spoken by the tongue. They elude our persevering thought; yet we read them hourly in each other's faces, in each other's actions, in our own remorse. The moral traits which are all globed into every virtuous act and thought, — in speech, we must sever, and describe or suggest by painful enumeration of many particulars. Yet, as this sentiment is the essence of all religion, let me guide your eye to the precise objects of the sentiment, by an enumeration of some of those classes of facts in which this element is conspicuous. The intuition of the moral sentiment is an insight of the perfection of the laws of the soul. These laws execute themselves. They are out of time, out of space, and not subject to circumstance. Thus; in the soul of man there is a justice whose retributions are instant and entire. He who does a good deed, is instantly ennobled. He who does a mean deed, is by the action itself contracted. He who puts off impurity, thereby puts on purity. If a man is at heart just, then in so far is he God; the safety of God, the immortality of God, the majesty of God do enter into that man with justice. If a man dissemble, deceive, he deceives himself, and goes out of acquaintance with his own being. A man in the view of absolute goodness, adores, with total humility. Every step so downward, is a step upward. The man who renounces himself, comes to himself. See how this rapid intrinsic energy worketh everywhere, righting wrongs, correcting appearances, and bringing up facts to a harmony with thoughts. Its operation in life, though slow to the senses, is, at last, as sure as in the soul. By it, a man is made the Providence to himself, dispensing good to his goodness, and evil to his sin. Character is always known. Thefts never enrich; alms never impoverish; murder will speak out of stone walls. The least admixture of a lie, — for example, the taint of vanity, the least attempt to make a good impression, a favorable appearance, — will instantly vitiate the effect. But speak the truth, and all nature and all spirits help you with unexpected furtherance. Speak the truth, and all things alive or brute are vouchers, and the very roots of the grass underground there, do seem to stir and move to bear you witness. See again the perfection of the Law as it applies itself to the affections, and becomes the law of society. As we are, so we associate. The good, by affinity, seek the good; the vile, by affinity, the vile. Thus of their own volition, souls proceed into heaven, into hell. These facts have always suggested to man the sublime creed, that the world is not the product of manifold power, but of one will, of one mind; and that one mind is everywhere active, in each ray of the star, in each wavelet of the pool; and whatever opposes that will, is everywhere balked and baffled, because things are made so, and not otherwise. Good is positive. Evil is merely privative, not absolute: it is like cold, which is the privation of heat. All evil is so much death or nonentity. Benevolence is absolute and real. So much benevolence as a man hath, so much life hath he. For all things proceed out of this same spirit, which is differently named love, justice, temperance, in its different applications, just as the ocean receives different names on the several shores which it washes. All things proceed out of the same spirit, and all things conspire with it. Whilst a man seeks good ends, he is strong by the whole strength of nature. In so far as he roves from these ends, he bereaves himself of power, of auxiliaries; his being shrinks out of all remote channels, he becomes less and less, a mote, a point, until absolute badness is absolute death. The perception of this law of laws awakens in the mind a sentiment which we call the religious sentiment, and which makes our highest happiness. Wonderful is its power to charm and to command. It is a mountain air. It is the embalmer of the world. It is myrrh and storax, and chlorine and rosemary. It makes the sky and the hills sublime, and the silent song of the stars is it. By it, is the universe made safe and habitable, not by science or power. Thought may work cold and intransitive in things, and find no end or unity; but the dawn of the sentiment of virtue on the heart, gives and is the assurance that Law is sovereign over all natures; and the worlds, time, space, eternity, do seem to break out into joy. This sentiment is divine and deifying. It is the beatitude of man. It makes him illimitable. Through it, the soul first knows itself. It corrects the capital mistake of the infant man, who seeks to be great by following the great, and hopes to derive advantages from another, — by showing the fountain of all good to be in himself, and that he, equally with every man, is an inlet into the deeps of Reason. When he says, "I ought;" when love warms him; when he chooses, warned from on high, the good and great deed; then, deep melodies wander through his soul from Supreme Wisdom. Then he can worship, and be enlarged by his worship; for he can never go behind this sentiment. In the sublimest flights of the soul, rectitude is never surmounted, love is never outgrown. This sentiment lies at the foundation of society, and successively creates all forms of worship. The principle of veneration never dies out. Man fallen into superstition, into sensuality, is never quite without the visions of the moral sentiment. In like manner, all the expressions of this sentiment are sacred and permanent in proportion to their purity. The expressions of this sentiment affect us more than all other compositions. The sentences of the oldest time, which ejaculate this piety, are still fresh and fragrant. This thought dwelled always deepest in the minds of men in the devout and contemplative East; not alone in Palestine, where it reached its purest expression, but in Egypt, in Persia, in India, in China. Europe has always owed to oriental genius, its divine impulses. What these holy bards said, all sane men found agreeable and true. And the unique impression of Jesus upon mankind, whose name is not so much written as ploughed into the history of this world, is proof of the subtle virtue of this infusion. Meantime, whilst the doors of the temple stand open, night and day, before every man, and the oracles of this truth cease never, it is guarded by one stern condition; this, namely; it is an intuition. It cannot be received at second hand. Truly speaking, it is not instruction, but provocation, that I can receive from another soul. What he announces, I must find true in me, or wholly reject; and on his word, or as his second, be he who he may, I can accept nothing. On the contrary, the absence of this primary faith is the presence of degradation. As is the flood so is the ebb. Let this faith depart, and the very words it spake, and the things it made, become false and hurtful. Then falls the church, the state, art, letters, life. The doctrine of the divine nature being forgotten, a sickness infects and dwarfs the constitution. Once man was all; now he is an appendage, a nuisance. And because the indwelling Supreme Spirit cannot wholly be got rid of, the doctrine of it suffers this perversion, that the divine nature is attributed to one or two persons, and denied to all the rest, and denied with fury. The doctrine of inspiration is lost; the base doctrine of the majority of voices, usurps the place of the doctrine of the soul. Miracles, prophecy, poetry; the ideal life, the holy life, exist as ancient history merely; they are not in the belief, nor in the aspiration of society; but, when suggested, seem ridiculous. Life is comic or pitiful, as soon as the high ends of being fade out of sight, and man becomes near-sighted, and can only attend to what addresses the senses. These general views, which, whilst they are general, none will contest, find abundant illustration in the history of religion, and especially in the history of the Christian church. In that, all of us have had our birth and nurture. The truth contained in that, you, my young friends, are now setting forth to teach. As the Cultus, or established worship of the civilized world, it has great historical interest for us. Of its blessed words, which have been the consolation of humanity, you need not that I should speak. I shall endeavor to discharge my duty to you, on this occasion, by pointing out two errors in its administration, which daily appear more gross from the point of view we have just now taken. Jesus Christ belonged to the true race of prophets. He saw with open eye the mystery of the soul. Drawn by its severe harmony, ravished with its beauty, he lived in it, and had his being there. Alone in all history, he estimated the greatness of man. One man was true to what is in you and me. He saw that God incarnates himself in man, and evermore goes forth anew to take possession of his world. He said, in this jubilee of sublime emotion, 'I am divine. Through me, God acts; through me, speaks. Would you see God, see me; or, see thee, when thou also thinkest as I now think.' But what a distortion did his doctrine and memory suffer in the same, in the next, and the following ages! There is no doctrine of the Reason which will bear to be taught by the Understanding. The understanding caught this high chant from the poet's lips, and said, in the next age, 'This was Jehovah come down out of heaven. I will kill you, if you say he was a man.' The idioms of his language, and the figures of his rhetoric, have usurped the place of his truth; and churches are not built on his principles, but on his tropes. Christianity became a Mythus, as the poetic teaching of Greece and of Egypt, before. He spoke of miracles; for he felt that man's life was a miracle, and all that man doth, and he knew that this daily miracle shines, as the character ascends. But the word Miracle, as pronounced by Christian churches, gives a false impression; it is Monster. It is not one with the blowing clover and the falling rain. He felt respect for Moses and the prophets; but no unfit tenderness at postponing their initial revelations, to the hour and the man that now is; to the eternal revelation in the heart. Thus was he a true man. Having seen that the law in us is commanding, he would not suffer it to be commanded. Boldly, with hand, and heart, and life, he declared it was God. Thus is he, as I think, the only soul in history who has appreciated the worth of a man. 1. In this point of view we become very sensible of the first defect of historical Christianity. Historical Christianity has fallen into the error that corrupts all attempts to communicate religion. As it appears to us, and as it has appeared for ages, it is not the doctrine of the soul, but an exaggeration of the personal, the positive, the ritual. It has dwelt, it dwells, with noxious exaggeration about the person of Jesus. The soul knows no persons. It invites every man to expand to the full circle of the universe, and will have no preferences but those of spontaneous love. But by this eastern monarchy of a Christianity, which indolence and fear have built, the friend of man is made the injurer of man. The manner in which his name is surrounded with expressions, which were once sallies of admiration and love, but are now petrified into official titles, kills all generous sympathy and liking. All who hear me, feel, that the language that describes Christ to Europe and America, is not the style of friendship and enthusiasm to a good and noble heart, but is appropriated and formal, — paints a demigod, as the Orientals or the Greeks would describe Osiris or Apollo. Accept the injurious impositions of our early catachetical instruction, and even honesty and self-denial were but splendid sins, if they did not wear the Christian name. One would rather be 'A pagan, suckled in a creed outworn,' than to be defrauded of his manly right in coming into nature, and finding not names and places, not land and professions, but even virtue and truth foreclosed and monopolized. You shall not be a man even. You shall not own the world; you shall not dare, and live after the infinite Law that is in you, and in company with the infinite Beauty which heaven and earth reflect to you in all lovely forms; but you must subordinate your nature to Christ's nature; you must accept our interpretations; and take his portrait as the vulgar draw it. That is always best which gives me to myself. The sublime is excited in me by the great stoical doctrine, Obey thyself. That which shows God in me, fortifies me. That which shows God out of me, makes me a wart and a wen. There is no longer a necessary reason for my being. Already the long shadows of untimely oblivion creep over me, and I shall decease forever. The divine bards are the friends of my virtue, of my intellect of my strength. They admonish me, that the gleams which flash across my mind, are not mine, but God's; that they had the like, and were not disobedient to the heavenly vision. So I love them. Noble provocations go out from them, inviting me to resist evil; to subdue the world; and to Be. And thus by his holy thoughts, Jesus serves us, and thus only. To aim to convert a man by miracles, is a profanation of the soul. A true conversion, a true Christ, is now, as always, to be made, by the reception of beautiful sentiments. It is true that a great and rich soul, like his, falling among the simple, does so preponderate, that, as his did, it names the world. The world seems to them to exist for him, and they have not yet drunk so deeply of his sense, as to see that only by coming again to themselves, or to God in themselves, can they grow forevermore. It is a low benefit to give me something; it is a high benefit to enable me to do somewhat of myself. The time is coming when all men will see, that the gift of God to the soul is not a vaunting, overpowering, excluding sanctity, but a sweet, natural goodness, a goodness like thine and mine, and that so invites thine and mine to be and to grow. The injustice of the vulgar tone of preaching is not less flagrant to Jesus, than to the souls which it profanes. The preachers do not see that they make his gospel not glad, and shear him of the locks of beauty and the attributes of heaven. When I see a majestic Epaminondas, or Washington; when I see among my contemporaries, a true orator, an upright judge, a dear friend; when I vibrate to the melody and fancy of a poem; I see beauty that is to be desired. And so lovely, and with yet more entire consent of my human being, sounds in my ear the severe music of the bards that have sung of the true God in all ages. Now do not degrade the life and dialogues of Christ out of the circle of this charm, by insulation and peculiarity. Let them lie as they befel, alive and warm, part of human life, and of the landscape, and of the cheerful day. 2. The second defect of the traditionary and limited way of using the mind of Christ is a consequence of the first; this, namely; that the Moral Nature, that Law of laws, whose revelations introduce greatness, — yea, God himself, into the open soul, is not explored as the fountain of the established teaching in society. Men have come to speak of the revelation as somewhat long ago given and done, as if God were dead. The injury to faith throttles the preacher; and the goodliest of institutions becomes an uncertain and inarticulate voice. It is very certain that it is the effect of conversation with the beauty of the soul, to beget a desire and need to impart to others the same knowledge and love. If utterance is denied, the thought lies like a burden on the man. Always the seer is a sayer. Somehow his dream is told: somehow he publishes it with solemn joy: sometimes with pencil on canvas; sometimes with chisel on stone; sometimes in towers and aisles of granite, his soul's worship is builded; sometimes in anthems of indefinite music; but clearest and most permanent, in words. The man enamored of this excellency, becomes its priest or poet. The office is coeval with the world. But observe the condition, the spiritual limitation of the office. The spirit only can teach. Not any profane man, not any sensual, not any liar, not any slave can teach, but only he can give, who has; he only can create, who is. The man on whom the soul descends, through whom the soul speaks, alone can teach. Courage, piety, love, wisdom, can teach; and every man can open his door to these angels, and they shall bring him the gift of tongues. But the man who aims to speak as books enable, as synods use, as the fashion guides, and as interest commands, babbles. Let him hush. To this holy office, you propose to devote yourselves. I wish you may feel your call in throbs of desire and hope. The office is the first in the world. It is of that reality, that it cannot suffer the deduction of any falsehood. And it is my duty to say to you, that the need was never greater of new revelation than now. From the views I have already expressed, you will infer the sad conviction, which I share, I believe, with numbers, of the universal decay and now almost death of faith in society. The soul is not preached. The Church seems to totter to its fall, almost all life extinct. On this occasion, any complaisance would be criminal, which told you, whose hope and commission it is to preach the faith of Christ, that the faith of Christ is preached. It is time that this ill-suppressed murmur of all thoughtful men against the famine of our churches; this moaning of the heart because it is bereaved of the consolation, the hope, the grandeur, that come alone out of the culture of the moral nature; should be heard through the sleep of indolence, and over the din of routine. This great and perpetual office of the preacher is not discharged. Preaching is the expression of the moral sentiment in application to the duties of life. In how many churches, by how many prophets, tell me, is man made sensible that he is an infinite Soul; that the earth and heavens are passing into his mind; that he is drinking forever the soul of God? Where now sounds the persuasion, that by its very melody imparadises my heart, and so affirms its own origin in heaven? Where shall I hear words such as in elder ages drew men to leave all and follow, — father and mother, house and land, wife and child? Where shall I hear these august laws of moral being so pronounced, as to fill my ear, and I feel ennobled by the offer of my uttermost action and passion? The test of the true faith, certainly, should be its power to charm and command the soul, as the laws of nature control the activity of the hands, — so commanding that we find pleasure and honor in obeying. The faith should blend with the light of rising and of setting suns, with the flying cloud, the singing bird, and the breath of flowers. But now the priest's Sabbath has lost the splendor of nature; it is unlovely; we are glad when it is done; we can make, we do make, even sitting in our pews, a far better, holier, sweeter, for ourselves. Whenever the pulpit is usurped by a formalist, then is the worshipper defrauded and disconsolate. We shrink as soon as the prayers begin, which do not uplift, but smite and offend us. We are fain to wrap our cloaks about us, and secure, as best we can, a solitude that hears not. I once heard a preacher who sorely tempted me to say, I would go to church no more. Men go, thought I, where they are wont to go, else had no soul entered the temple in the afternoon. A snow storm was falling around us. The snow storm was real; the preacher merely spectral; and the eye felt the sad contrast in looking at him, and then out of the window behind him, into the beautiful meteor of the snow. He had lived in vain. He had no one word intimating that he had laughed or wept, was married or in love, had been commended, or cheated, or chagrined. If he had ever lived and acted, we were none the wiser for it. The capital secret of his profession, namely, to convert life into truth, he had not learned. Not one fact in all his experience, had he yet imported into his doctrine. This man had ploughed, and planted, and talked, and bought, and sold; he had read books; he had eaten and drunken; his head aches; his heart throbs; he smiles and suffers; yet was there not a surmise, a hint, in all the discourse, that he had ever lived at all. Not a line did he draw out of real history. The true preacher can be known by this, that he deals out to the people his life, — life passed through the fire of thought. But of the bad preacher, it could not be told from his sermon, what age of the world he fell in; whether he had a father or a child; whether he was a freeholder or a pauper; whether he was a citizen or a countryman; or any other fact of his biography. It seemed strange that the people should come to church. It seemed as if their houses were very unentertaining, that they should prefer this thoughtless clamor. It shows that there is a commanding attraction in the moral sentiment, that can lend a faint tint of light to dulness and ignorance, coming in its name and place. The good hearer is sure he has been touched sometimes; is sure there is somewhat to be reached, and some word that can reach it. When he listens to these vain words, he comforts himself by their relation to his remembrance of better hours, and so they clatter and echo unchallenged. I am not ignorant that when we preach unworthily, it is not always quite in vain. There is a good ear, in some men, that draws supplies to virtue out of very indifferent nutriment. There is poetic truth concealed in all the common-places of prayer and of sermons, and though foolishly spoken, they may be wisely heard; for, each is some select expression that broke out in a moment of piety from some stricken or jubilant soul, and its excellency made it remembered. The prayers and even the dogmas of our church, are like the zodiac of Denderah, and the astronomical monuments of the Hindoos, wholly insulated from anything now extant in the life and business of the people. They mark the height to which the waters once rose. But this docility is a check upon the mischief from the good and devout. In a large portion of the community, the religious service gives rise to quite other thoughts and emotions. We need not chide the negligent servant. We are struck with pity, rather, at the swift retribution of his sloth. Alas for the unhappy man that is called to stand in the pulpit, and not give bread of life. Everything that befalls, accuses him. Would he ask contributions for the missions, foreign or domestic? Instantly his face is suffused with shame, to propose to his parish, that they should send money a hundred or a thousand miles, to furnish such poor fare as they have at home, and would do well to go the hundred or the thousand miles to escape. Would he urge people to a godly way of living; — and can he ask a fellow-creature to come to Sabbath meetings, when he and they all know what is the poor uttermost they can hope for therein? Will he invite them privately to the Lord's Supper? He dares not. If no heart warm this rite, the hollow, dry, creaking formality is too plain, than that he can face a man of wit and energy, and put the invitation without terror. In the street, what has he to say to the bold village blasphemer? The village blasphemer sees fear in the face, form, and gait of the minister. Let me not taint the sincerity of this plea by any oversight of the claims of good men. I know and honor the purity and strict conscience of numbers of the clergy. What life the public worship retains, it owes to the scattered company of pious men, who minister here and there in the churches, and who, sometimes accepting with too great tenderness the tenet of the elders, have not accepted from others, but from their own heart, the genuine impulses of virtue, and so still command our love and awe, to the sanctity of character. Moreover, the exceptions are not so much to be found in a few eminent preachers, as in the better hours, the truer inspirations of all, — nay, in the sincere moments of every man. But with whatever exception, it is still true, that tradition characterizes the preaching of this country; that it comes out of the memory, and not out of the soul; that it aims at what is usual, and not at what is necessary and eternal; that thus, historical Christianity destroys the power of preaching, by withdrawing it from the exploration of the moral nature of man, where the sublime is, where are the resources of astonishment and power. What a cruel injustice it is to that Law, the joy of the whole earth, which alone can make thought dear and rich; that Law whose fatal sureness the astronomical orbits poorly emulate, that it is travestied and depreciated, that it is behooted and behowled, and not a trait, not a word of it articulated. The pulpit in losing sight of this Law, loses its reason, and gropes after it knows not what. And for want of this culture, the soul of the community is sick and faithless. It wants nothing so much as a stern, high, stoical, Christian discipline, to make it know itself and the divinity that speaks through it. Now man is ashamed of himself; he skulks and sneaks through the world, to be tolerated, to be pitied, and scarcely in a thousand years does any man dare to be wise and good, and so draw after him the tears and blessings of his kind. Certainly there have been periods when, from the inactivity of the intellect on certain truths, a greater faith was possible in names and persons. The Puritans in England and America, found in the Christ of the Catholic Church, and in the dogmas inherited from Rome, scope for their austere piety, and their longings for civil freedom. But their creed is passing away, and none arises in its room. I think no man can go with his thoughts about him, into one of our churches, without feeling, that what hold the public worship had on men is gone, or going. It has lost its grasp on the affection of the good, and the fear of the bad. In the country, neighborhoods, half parishes are signing off, — to use the local term. It is already beginning to indicate character and religion to withdraw from the religious meetings. I have heard a devout person, who prized the Sabbath, say in bitterness of heart, "On Sundays, it seems wicked to go to church." And the motive, that holds the best there, is now only a hope and a waiting. What was once a mere circumstance, that the best and the worst men in the parish, the poor and the rich, the learned and the ignorant, young and old, should meet one day as fellows in one house, in sign of an equal right in the soul, — has come to be a paramount motive for going thither. My friends, in these two errors, I think, I find the causes of a decaying church and a wasting unbelief. And what greater calamity can fall upon a nation, than the loss of worship? Then all things go to decay. Genius leaves the temple, to haunt the senate, or the market. Literature becomes frivolous. Science is cold. The eye of youth is not lighted by the hope of other worlds, and age is without honor. Society lives to trifles, and when men die, we do not mention them. And now, my brothers, you will ask, What in these desponding days can be done by us? The remedy is already declared in the ground of our complaint of the Church. We have contrasted the Church with the Soul. In the soul, then, let the redemption be sought. Wherever a man comes, there comes revolution. The old is for slaves. When a man comes, all books are legible, all things transparent, all religions are forms. He is religious. Man is the wonderworker. He is seen amid miracles. All men bless and curse. He saith yea and nay, only. The stationariness of religion; the assumption that the age of inspiration is past, that the Bible is closed; the fear of degrading the character of Jesus by representing him as a man; indicate with sufficient clearness the falsehood of our theology. It is the office of a true teacher to show us that God is, not was; that He speaketh, not spake. The true Christianity, — a faith like Christ's in the infinitude of man, — is lost. None believeth in the soul of man, but only in some man or person old and departed. Ah me! no man goeth alone. All men go in flocks to this saint or that poet, avoiding the God who seeth in secret. They cannot see in secret; they love to be blind in public. They think society wiser than their soul, and know not that one soul, and their soul, is wiser than the whole world. See how nations and races flit by on the sea of time, and leave no ripple to tell where they floated or sunk, and one good soul shall make the name of Moses, or of Zeno, or of Zoroaster, reverend forever. None assayeth the stern ambition to be the Self of the nation, and of nature, but each would be an easy secondary to some Christian scheme, or sectarian connection, or some eminent man. Once leave your own knowledge of God, your own sentiment, and take secondary knowledge, as St. Paul's, or George Fox's, or Swedenborg's, and you get wide from God with every year this secondary form lasts, and if, as now, for centuries, — the chasm yawns to that breadth, that men can scarcely be convinced there is in them anything divine. Let me admonish you, first of all, to go alone; to refuse the good models, even those which are sacred in the imagination of men, and dare to love God without mediator or veil. Friends enough you shall find who will hold up to your emulation Wesleys and Oberlins, Saints and Prophets. Thank God for these good men, but say, 'I also am a man.' Imitation cannot go above its model. The imitator dooms himself to hopeless mediocrity. The inventor did it, because it was natural to him, and so in him it has a charm. In the imitator, something else is natural, and he bereaves himself of his own beauty, to come short of another man's. Yourself a newborn bard of the Holy Ghost, — cast behind you all conformity, and acquaint men at first hand with Deity. Look to it first and only, that fashion, custom, authority, pleasure, and money, are nothing to you, — are not bandages over your eyes, that you cannot see, — but live with the privilege of the immeasurable mind. Not too anxious to visit periodically all families and each family in your parish connection, — when you meet one of these men or women, be to them a divine man; be to them thought and virtue; let their timid aspirations find in you a friend; let their trampled instincts be genially tempted out in your atmosphere; let their doubts know that you have doubted, and their wonder feel that you have wondered. By trusting your own heart, you shall gain more confidence in other men. For all our penny-wisdom, for all our soul-destroying slavery to habit, it is not to be doubted, that all men have sublime thoughts; that all men value the few real hours of life; they love to be heard; they love to be caught up into the vision of principles. We mark with light in the memory the few interviews we have had, in the dreary years of routine and of sin, with souls that made our souls wiser; that spoke what we thought; that told us what we knew; that gave us leave to be what we inly were. Discharge to men the priestly office, and, present or absent, you shall be followed with their love as by an angel. And, to this end, let us not aim at common degrees of merit. Can we not leave, to such as love it, the virtue that glitters for the commendation of society, and ourselves pierce the deep solitudes of absolute ability and worth? We easily come up to the standard of goodness in society. Society's praise can be cheaply secured, and almost all men are content with those easy merits; but the instant effect of conversing with God, will be, to put them away. There are persons who are not actors, not speakers, but influences; persons too great for fame, for display; who disdain eloquence; to whom all we call art and artist, seems too nearly allied to show and by-ends, to the exaggeration of the finite and selfish, and loss of the universal. The orators, the poets, the commanders encroach on us only as fair women do, by our allowance and homage. Slight them by preoccupation of mind, slight them, as you can well afford to do, by high and universal aims, and they instantly feel that you have right, and that it is in lower places that they must shine. They also feel your right; for they with you are open to the influx of the all-knowing Spirit, which annihilates before its broad noon the little shades and gradations of intelligence in the compositions we call wiser and wisest. In such high communion, let us study the grand strokes of rectitude: a bold benevolence, an independence of friends, so that not the unjust wishes of those who love us, shall impair our freedom, but we shall resist for truth's sake the freest flow of kindness, and appeal to sympathies far in advance; and, — what is the highest form in which we know this beautiful element, — a certain solidity of merit, that has nothing to do with opinion, and which is so essentially and manifestly virtue, that it is taken for granted, that the right, the brave, the generous step will be taken by it, and nobody thinks of commending it. You would compliment a coxcomb doing a good act, but you would not praise an angel. The silence that accepts merit as the most natural thing in the world, is the highest applause. Such souls, when they appear, are the Imperial Guard of Virtue, the perpetual reserve, the dictators of fortune. One needs not praise their courage, — they are the heart and soul of nature. O my friends, there are resources in us on which we have not drawn. There are men who rise refreshed on hearing a threat; men to whom a crisis which intimidates and paralyzes the majority, — demanding not the faculties of prudence and thrift, but comprehension, immovableness, the readiness of sacrifice, — comes graceful and beloved as a bride. Napoleon said of Massena, that he was not himself until the battle began to go against him; then, when the dead began to fall in ranks around him, awoke his powers of combination, and he put on terror and victory as a robe. So it is in rugged crises, in unweariable endurance, and in aims which put sympathy out of question, that the angel is shown. But these are heights that we can scarce remember and look up to, without contrition and shame. Let us thank God that such things exist. And now let us do what we can to rekindle the smouldering, nigh quenched fire on the altar. The evils of the church that now is are manifest. The question returns, What shall we do? I confess, all attempts to project and establish a Cultus with new rites and forms, seem to me vain. Faith makes us, and not we it, and faith makes its own forms. All attempts to contrive a system are as cold as the new worship introduced by the French to the goddess of Reason, — to-day, pasteboard and fillagree, and ending to-morrow in madness and murder. Rather let the breath of new life be breathed by you through the forms already existing. For, if once you are alive, you shall find they shall become plastic and new. The remedy to their deformity is, first, soul, and second, soul, and evermore, soul. A whole popedom of forms, one pulsation of virtue can uplift and vivify. Two inestimable advantages Christianity has given us; first; the Sabbath, the jubilee of the whole world; whose light dawns welcome alike into the closet of the philosopher, into the garret of toil, and into prison cells, and everywhere suggests, even to the vile, the dignity of spiritual being. Let it stand forevermore, a temple, which new love, new faith, new sight shall restore to more than its first splendor to mankind. And secondly, the institution of preaching, — the speech of man to men, — essentially the most flexible of all organs, of all forms. What hinders that now, everywhere, in pulpits, in lecture-rooms, in houses, in fields, wherever the invitation of men or your own occasions lead you, you speak the very truth, as your life and conscience teach it, and cheer the waiting, fainting hearts of men with new hope and new revelation? I look for the hour when that supreme Beauty, which ravished the souls of those eastern men, and chiefly of those Hebrews, and through their lips spoke oracles to all time, shall speak in the West also. The Hebrew and Greek Scriptures contain immortal sentences, that have been bread of life to millions. But they have no epical integrity; are fragmentary; are not shown in their order to the intellect. I look for the new Teacher, that shall follow so far those shining laws, that he shall see them come full circle; shall see their rounding complete grace; shall see the world to be the mirror of the soul; shall see the identity of the law of gravitation with purity of heart; and shall show that the Ought, that Duty, is one thing with Science, with Beauty, and with Joy.  Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: 9 animated maps that will change the way you see the world

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Greek believers fire off rockets to celebrate Orthodox Easter while Vladimir Putin meets Patriarch of ...

While Easter in the UK is celebrated with chocolate eggs and a roast lamb, in Greece they mark the day slightly different - and a week later.

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Holy Thursday; The Saddest Holy Week Day

Holy Thursday is the saddest day of the Holy Week and in the Greek Orthodox Church the events of Jesus Christ’s last day on Earth are revived. Before his sacrifice for the salvation of men, Jesus wanted to dine with his disciples one last time. The Last Supper took place in a house in Jerusalem, where Jesus and his disciples secretly gathered to share their meal. Jesus took a basin of water and washed the feet of his disciples. This was a slave’s work at the time. Later, Jesus wanted to teach his disciples, and through them, all humankind, to be humble and serve their fellow men. In many areas across Greece, a representation of Jesus Christ’s actions takes place on the morning of Holy Thursday. During the Last Supper, after Judas had left, Jesus handed the Sacrament of the Eucharist to his disciples. The mockery and insults that people addressed to Jesus as he was being lifted on the cross is tragically depicted through the mournful hymns and the words of the Gospel. Women gather in churches across the country to mourn for Jesus.

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Happy Easter & Successful Eggs Hunting

“Can Jesus resurrects twice a month?” The question came from an 9-year-old, the son of a friend, when he heard that the Catholic Church celebrates Easter on April 5th, but the Greek Orthodox Church on April 12th. I told the boy, the issue was a matter of faith and that […]

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Ukraine: What's the Role of Religion in Post-Maidan Milieu?

During a recent trip to Kiev, I was struck by mementos placed in and around Kiev's Maidan square. The plaques featured individual photo portraits of fallen martyrs -- the so-called "Heavenly Hundred" who had sacrificed their lives during violent protests against the unpopular government of Viktor Yanukovych. What particularly got my attention about these mementos was the overt display of religious iconography. Lying alongside the photos, Ukrainians had laid rosary beads, framed religious images of Christ and other memorabilia. Taken together, the photos and other donated items took on the look of a shrine. While many have sought to interpret the overall political meaning of Maidan square, few have dwelled upon underlying religious connotations. To be sure, Ukraine isn't as religious as Russia, but nevertheless the Church plays a significant role in society. No one church dominates in Ukraine, with various branches including the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (linked to the Patriarchate of Moscow), the Patriarchate of Kiev and the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church all holding sway. Though the Orthodox Church is the largest faith, other groups include the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church and the Roman Catholic Church. Backward Social Beliefs Recently, I conducted a research trip to Ukraine and caught up with some local political activists who had their own unique take on religion. Denis Gorbach of the Autonomous Workers' Union says that historically the larger Ukrainian Orthodox Church has displayed backward and retrograde ideas. "They have their own agenda," he remarks, "which is socially conservative, racist against blacks and all non-Slavic peoples [though they wouldn't have any big problems with Germans or British], anti-Semitic and homophobic." Gorbach adds for good measure that the hardcore Orthodox Church views itself in opposition to "rotten western values and multiculturalism." For a more complete view, I headed over to Kiev's old Jewish quarter of Podil. There, I spoke to Josef Zissels, General Council Chairman of the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress. Zissels confirms that the Ukrainian Church of the Moscow Patriarchate is "the most anti-Semitic amongst the churches." Zissels says he's actually been aware of this reality for a full 20 years, and anti-Semitic literature was even sold at such churches [Zissels adds however that he sees little evidence of such virulent anti-Semitism at other Orthodox branches of the church]. Celebrating Orthodox Kievan Rus Larissa Babij works as an arts curator in Kiev. An American of Ukrainian descent, she moved to Kiev in 2005. Babij never really saw herself as a political activist, but when she observed that Ukrainians had little sway over their own cultural institutions she helped to found a group called Art Workers' Self Defense Initiative. Since the breakup of the old Soviet Union, Babij declares, there's been a kind of ideological vacuum in Ukraine and a counter-reaction to earlier forced atheism under Communism. In the absence of a strong state infrastructure within newly independent Ukraine, people don't even know whether they'll receive hot water tomorrow. As a result, some have turned to religion as a source of solace. During the Yanukovych era, Babij says there was a rather corrupt church-state relationship at the very public and visible level. In July, 2013 Kiev's Mystetskyi Arsenal art museum put on a show titled "The Great and the Grand." The exhibit was designed to celebrate the 1025th anniversary of the baptism of Kievan Rus, which is the original medieval state considered to be the Orthodox foundation of Ukraine, Belarus and Russia. In a very symbolic sense, then, the show was designed to foster closer cultural ties between Ukraine and Russia, and indeed Putin himself was invited to the show. What is more, Yanukovych exercised great influence over Arsenal, a museum which lacked its own political autonomy, even though the institution is state-funded and receives taxpayer money. Museum Controversy As if the political dimensions weren't questionable enough, further questions soon arose about the relationship between church and state. When it became clear that the show was to be partially funded by top-ranking clergy belonging to none other than the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Babij grew concerned. Could the president be seeking to perpetuate his own state ideology favoring closer ties to the Church? As suspicions grew, a controversy erupted at the museum which eroded Arsenal's already fast deteriorating reputation. On the night prior to Yanukovych's personal visit to the museum, Arsenal's director literally took a can of black paint and doused one of the exhibit's artworks which she deemed immoral. The work in question, a mural depicting a flaming nuclear reactor with priests and judges partially immersed in a vat of red liquid, soon became a cause célèbre as Kiev's arts community rushed to the defense of creative self-expression. Prior to the opening, eight activists were arrested outside the museum protesting the creeping consolidation of church and state. In defending her controversial decision, Arsenal's director claimed that the exhibit "should inspire pride in the state." She added, "If you participate in [an] exhibition dedicated to the 1025th anniversary of the baptism of Kievan Rus, you don't have to do your best to offend the faithful, to lower the reputation of all clergy." In the wake of the controversy, Arsenal's deputy director resigned in protest, while some suggested the director had come under pressure to eliminate controversial work in advance of Yanukovych's visit. Befuddled Church Though certainly ominous, the Arsenal controversy did not lead to a consolidation of church and state in Ukraine though perhaps, if he had not been toppled from power, Yanukovych would have sought greater ties along these lines. But as Ukraine veered into Maidan political turbulence, the fractured church with its many denominations was forced to take sides. Historically, the Orthodox faith has placed greater emphasis on backing up state power, rather than supporting the aspirations of civil society. But with pro-Moscow Yanukovych clinging to power, top clergy was placed in an uncomfortable position. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church, with its ties to the Moscow Patriarchate and upper echelons of Russian political and ecclesiastical leadership, was placed in a particularly difficult situation. Initially, Maidan was sparked by pro-European elements unhappy with Kiev's tilt toward the Kremlin. As events unfolded, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church sought to remain neutral in the midst of political crisis. Maintaining such neutrality proved difficult, however, since many members of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church were themselves pro-Western. Though the church was eventually obliged to back Maidan protesters and the subsequent government of Petro Poroshenko, it did so somewhat reluctantly and belatedly. Other denominations got out in front of Maidan protests much earlier, however. Take, for example, the Greek Catholic Church. According to Zissels of the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress, Greek Catholics were the most influential religious grouping represented on the Maidan. Furthermore, Zissels reports, his own organization enjoyed a "very good and strong relationship" with the Greek Catholic Church. However, Maidan served to unite diverse religious constituencies, ranging from Orthodox to Catholics to even Jews and Muslims. Religion at the Maidan Gradually, religious leaders began to assume more importance on the Maidan. When riot police attacked protesters, scattering a whopping 10,000 people, many sought refuge in the nearby historic St. Michael's Golden-Domed Monastery. There, demonstrators were protected by local monks belonging to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church's Patriarchate of Kiev. Several days later, when riot police attacked again, a graduate student at a nearby theology school began to ring sacred bells next to a local cathedral. The noise and commotion could be heard for miles. In response to the call, priests dressed in cassocks and holding crosses stood between riot police and protesters as a gesture of peace. Later, the police withdrew without resorting to further violence. Meanwhile, priests led daily prayers at the barricades. In the middle of the square, a chapel belonging to the Greek Catholic Church provided daily Mass, confession and even counseling. At night, priests from all faiths led a prayer after crowds recited the national anthem. Such developments began to raise eyebrows amongst Ukrainian progressives, however. At a certain point, Babij tells me, prayers were literally getting recited on the hour at Maidan. "It was definitely uncomfortable for those of us who are not really religious in that way," she says. All of a sudden, she adds, religion became very dominant and "Maidan took on a homogeneity which might have been representative of the majority, or maybe representative of what some people thought the majority should be. But it definitely was not all-inclusive. It definitely had those patriotic, religious and nationalistic overtones." Religion in Post-Maidan Era Despite such pronounced religious nationalism at Maidan, some believe there is little danger that Ukraine will somehow merge church and state. Though there was a rather corrupt church-state dynamic at play under Yanukovych, Babij thinks this trend is no longer as pronounced or significant. For now then, Ukraine seemingly hasn't embraced the backward Russian model, where conservative religion has taken center political stage as of late. Cyril Danilchenko, who works as Zissels' personal assistant at the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress, believes the Orthodox faith doesn't inform Ukrainian nationalism to the same degree as Russian nationalism. "In Ukraine," he tells me, "faith is more of a personal affair. You don't hear slogans like 'we are Ukraine, we are Orthodox!'" Danilchenko adds that many Ukrainians simply see themselves as European and prefer a strong separation between church and state. In Russia by contrast, "it doesn't work that way. Russia has a state religion like Saudi Arabia." Hopefully, Ukraine will maintain a critical separation between politics and religion in the wake of Maidan. "Ukraine is definitely more secular than Russia," Babij notes. After observing political controversies at the Arsenal museum, however, the curator isn't under any great illusions. In the long-term, she adds, Ukraine still "has all the potential to go in the direction of Russia." Nikolas Kozloff is a New York-based writer who recently conducted a research trip to Ukraine.

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Ukraine: What's the Role of Religion in Post-Maidan Milieu?

During a recent trip to Kiev, I was struck by mementoes placed in and around Kiev's Maidan square. The plaques featured individual photo portraits of fallen martyrs --- the so-called "Heavenly Hundred" who had sacrificed their lives during violent protests against the unpopular government of Viktor Yanukovych. What particularly got my attention about these mementoes was the overt display of religious iconography. Lying alongside the photos, Ukrainians had laid rosary beads, framed religious images of Christ and other memorabilia. Taken together, the photos and other donated items took on the look of a shrine. While many have sought to interpret the overall political meaning of Maidan square, few have dwelled upon underlying religious connotations. To be sure, Ukraine isn't as religious as Russia but nevertheless the Church plays a significant role in society. No one church dominates in Ukraine, with various branches including the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (linked to the Patriarchate of Moscow), the Patriarchate of Kiev and the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church all holding sway. Though the Orthodox Church is the largest faith, other groups include the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church and the Roman Catholic Church. Backward Social Beliefs Recently, I conducted a research trip to Ukraine and caught up with some local political activists who had their own unique take on religion. Denis Gorbach of the Autonomous Workers' Union says that historically the larger Ukrainian Orthodox Church has displayed backward and retrograde ideas. "They have their own agenda," he remarks, "which is socially conservative, racist against blacks and all non-Slavic peoples [though they wouldn't have any big problems with Germans or British], anti-Semitic and homophobic." Gorbach adds for good measure that the hardcore Orthodox Church views itself in opposition to "rotten western values and multiculturalism." For a more complete view, I head over to Kiev's old Jewish quarter of Podil. There, I speak to Josef Zissels, General Council Chairman of the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress. Zissels confirms that the Ukrainian Church of the Moscow Patriarchate is "the most anti-Semitic amongst the churches." Zissels says he's actually been aware of this reality for a full twenty years, and anti-Semitic literature was even sold at such churches [Zissels adds however that he sees little evidence of such virulent anti-Semitism at other Orthodox branches of the church]. Celebrating Orthodox Kievan Rus Larissa Babij works as an arts curator in Kiev. An American of Ukrainian descent, she moved to Kiev in 2005. Babij never really saw herself as a political activist, but when she observed that Ukrainians had little sway over their own cultural institutions she helped to found a group called Art Workers' Self Defense Initiative. Since the breakup of the old Soviet Union, Babij declares, there's been a kind of ideological vacuum in Ukraine and a counter-reaction to earlier forced atheism under Communism. In the absence of a strong state infrastructure within newly independent Ukraine, people don't even know whether they'll receive hot water tomorrow. As a result, some have turned to religion as a source of solace. During the Yanukovych era, Babij says there was a rather corrupt church-state relationship at the very public and visible level. In July, 2013 Kiev's Mystetskyi Arsenal art museum put on a show titled "The Great and the Grand." The exhibit was designed to celebrate the 1025th anniversary of the baptism of Kievan Rus, which is the original medieval state considered to be the Orthodox foundation of Ukraine, Belarus and Russia. In a very symbolic sense, then, the show was designed to foster closer cultural ties between Ukraine and Russia, and indeed Putin himself was invited to the show. What is more, Yanukovych exercised great influence over Arsenal, a museum which lacked its own political autonomy even though the institution is state-funded and receives taxpayer money. Museum Controversy As if the political dimensions weren't questionable enough, further questions soon arose about the relationship between church and state. When it became clear that the show was to be partially funded by top-ranking clergy belonging to none other than the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Babij grew concerned. Could the president be seeking to perpetuate his own state ideology favoring closer ties to the Church? As suspicions grew, a controversy erupted at the museum which eroded Arsenal's already fast deteriorating reputation. On the night prior to Yanukovych's personal visit to the museum, Arsenal's director literally took a can of black paint and doused one of the exhibit's art works which she deemed immoral. The work in question, a mural depicting a flaming nuclear reactor with priests and judges partially immersed in a vat of red liquid, soon became a cause célèbre as Kiev's arts community rushed to the defense of creative self-expression. Prior to the opening, eight activists were arrested outside the museum protesting the creeping consolidation of church and state. In defending her controversial decision, Arsenal's director claimed that the exhibit "should inspire pride in the state." She added, "If you participate in [an] exhibition dedicated to the 1025th anniversary of the baptism of Kievan Rus, you don't have to do your best to offend the faithful, to lower the reputation of all clergy." In the wake of the controversy, Arsenal's deputy director resigned in protest, while some suggested the director had come under pressure to eliminate controversial work in advance of Yanukovych's visit. Befuddled Church Though certainly ominous, the Arsenal controversy did not lead to a consolidation of church and state in Ukraine though perhaps, if he had not been toppled from power, Yanukovych would have sought greater ties along these lines. But as Ukraine veered into Maidan political turbulence, the fractured church with its many denominations was forced to take sides. Historically, the Orthodox faith has placed greater emphasis on backing up state power, rather than supporting the aspirations of civil society. But with pro-Moscow Yanukovych clinging to power, top clergy was placed in an uncomfortable position. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church, with its ties to the Moscow Patriarchate and upper echelons of Russian political and ecclesiastical leadership, was placed in a particularly difficult situation. Initially, Maidan was sparked by pro-European elements unhappy with Kiev's tilt toward the Kremlin. As events unfolded, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church sought to remain neutral in the midst of political crisis. Maintaining such neutrality proved difficult, however, since many members of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church were themselves pro-Western. Though the church was eventually obliged to back Maidan protesters and the subsequent government of Petro Poroshenko, it did so somewhat reluctantly and belatedly. Other denominations got out in front of Maidan protests much earlier, however. Take, for example, the Greek Catholic Church. According to Zissels of the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress, Greek Catholics were the most influential religious grouping represented on the Maidan. Furthermore, Zissels reports, his own organization enjoyed a "very good and strong relationship" with the Greek Catholic Church. However, Maidan served to unite diverse religious constituencies, ranging from Orthodox to Catholics to even Jews and Muslims. Religion at the Maidan Gradually, religious leaders began to assume more importance on the Maidan. When riot police attacked protesters, scattering a whopping 10,000 people, many sought refuge in the nearby historic St. Michael's Golden-Domed Monastery. There, demonstrators were protected by local monks belonging to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church's Patriarchate of Kiev. Several days later, when riot police attacked again, a graduate student at a nearby theology school began to ring sacred bells next to a local cathedral. The noise and commotion could be heard for miles. In response to the call, priests dressed in cassocks and holding crosses stood between riot police and protesters as a gesture of peace. Later, the police withdrew without resorting to further violence. Meanwhile, priests led daily prayers at the barricades. In the middle of the square, a chapel belonging to the Greek Catholic Church provided daily Mass, confession and even counseling. At night, priests from all faiths led a prayer after crowds recited the national anthem. Such developments began to raise eyebrows amongst Ukrainian progressives, however. At a certain point, Babij tells me, prayers were literally getting recited on the hour at Maidan. "It was definitely uncomfortable for those of us who are not really religious in that way," she says. All of a sudden, she adds, religion became very dominant and "Maidan took on a homogeneity which might have been representative of the majority, or maybe representative of what some people thought the majority should be. But it definitely was not all-inclusive. It definitely had those patriotic, religious and nationalistic overtones." Religion in Post-Maidan Era Despite such pronounced religious nationalism at Maidan, some believe there is little danger that Ukraine will somehow merge church and state. Though there was a rather corrupt church-state dynamic at play under Yanukovych, Babij thinks this trend is no longer as pronounced or significant. For now then, Ukraine seemingly hasn't embraced the backward Russian model, where conservative religion has taken center political stage as of late. Cyril Danilchenko, who works as Zissels' personal assistant at the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress, believes the Orthodox faith doesn't inform Ukrainian nationalism to the same degree as Russian nationalism. "In Ukraine," he tells me, "faith is more of a personal affair. You don't hear slogans like 'we are Ukraine, we are Orthodox!'" Danilchenko adds that many Ukrainians simply see themselves as European and prefer a strong separation between church and state. In Russia by contrast, "it doesn't work that way. Russia has a state religion like Saudi Arabia." Hopefully, Ukraine will maintain a critical separation between politics and religion in the wake of Maidan. "Ukraine is definitely more secular than Russia," Babij notes. After observing political controversies at the Arsenal museum, however, the curator isn't under any great illusions. In the long-term, she adds, Ukraine still "has all the potential to go in the direction of Russia." Nikolas Kozloff is a New York-based writer who recently conducted a research trip to Ukraine.

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Arab Christians challenge Greek Orthodox patriarch, call him 'unworthy' over lack of reforms

by  Associated Press Arab flock seeks reform, challenging Greek Orthodox leader by KARIN LAUB and MOHAMMED DARAGHMEH, Associated Press - 17 February 2015 02:00-05:00 AMMAN, Jordan (AP) — At a recent Sunday mass, Arab Christians enthusiastically joined in the ancient chants and prayers of their faith — until the name of their spiritual leader was invoked. "Unworthy, unworthy, unworthy," some called out in unison, their disdain aimed at Theophilos III, the Greek Orthodox patriarch of Jerusalem and leader of some 220,000 Arab Christians in Jordan, Israel and the Palestinian territories. In recent weeks, such chants repeatedly erupted during services, the latest sign of trouble for a secretive church hierarchy whose previous leader was ousted a decade ago over allegations that he sold prime church property to Jews trying to increase their presence in traditionally Arab east Jerusalem. The church's vast real estate holdings in the Holy Land also play a role in the current unrest, as part of demands by Arab Christians to have a greater say. The unlikely rebels — many of them devout, middle-class professionals — want the church to promote Arab clergy, invest more in Arab congregations and open the books on secret property deals. "We don't have a problem with the patriarch himself," worshipper Hanna Awais said after a recent Sunday service at the Church of the Presentation of the Lord, a Greek Orthodox church in Amman. "We have a problem with the rules, with the way they are treating us, treating the church and treating the properties." The campaign has divided the Arab flock. Munther Haddadin, a supporter of the patriarch, portrayed the protesters as a noisy minority and said identity politics should be kept out of the church. "Christ did not come here to save (only) the Arabs," said Haddadin, a former Jordanian government minister. "There is no nationalism inside the church." The patriarchate repeatedly has been dragged into the Israeli-Arab conflict over its real estate riches, particularly those in Jerusalem's walled Old City, home to major shrines of Christianity, Judaism and Islam. The Old City is located in the Israeli-annexed part of Jerusalem that Palestinians want as a future capital. "This is the burden of the church, that they have a lot property and a lot of political pressure from all sides," said Amnon Ramon, a professor of comparative religion at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. That pressure has come to bear on Theophilos, elected in 2005 to replace Patriarch Irineos I, ousted over his alleged land deals. Under established custom, a new patriarch requires recognition from the governments of areas where he operates — in this case Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority. Jordan briefly withdrew its initial recognition in 2007 because of Theophilos' perceived failure to reclaim church lands and increase Arab participation, according to a U.S. diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks. Israel withheld recognition until 2007, with Theophilos complaining at the time — according to another diplomatic cable — that Israel was trying to pressure him to complete outstanding land deals. The church refuses to say how much property it owns. Haddadin said he has been told by church officials the holdings are worth between $64 billion and $70 billion. Issa Musleh, a spokesman for the patriarchate, said the church owns roughly 40 percent of properties in the Old City, but that he didn't know the value of all the holdings. Musleh denied that Theophilos has given Israel sweetheart deals on land leases in Jerusalem, saying the patriarch is working hard to reclaim properties allegedly sold by his predecessor. He declined to offer specifics. "We have the right to use our properties and to take decisions on the properties according to the interests of the believers," he said in an interview at the patriarchate, a large, Old City compound abutting the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, one of Christianity's holiest shrines as the traditional site of Jesus' crucifixion and burial. Musleh said protesters are mainly interested in real estate. "They want to put the patriarchate under their control," he said. "If the patriarchate had no property, then no one would ask. I am sure of that." The patriarch's challengers say their demands deal with the spiritual as much as business. They say they want local Arabic-language seminaries and male monasteries since only celibate priests can rise in the ranks, unlike married Arab priests who serve in the congregations. Currently, the overwhelming majority of members in patriarchate's decision-making synod are Greeks. Arab Christians also want to the church to decentralize and set up a diocese structure, while supporters of the patriarch say he wants to promote Arab priests, though most aren't willing to forgo marriage. The current round of protests was triggered by the dismissal of a charismatic priest from the West Bank, Archimandrite Christophoros Atallah, who has been running a monastery for women north of Amman since the late 1990s. Christophoros has emerged as a leading voice of the protest campaign. Protesters have pledged to continue without him, like they did earlier this month at the Church of the Presentation of the Lord. Each time Theophilos' name was called out during priestly blessings — three times during a typical service — some in the crowd chanted "unworthy, unworthy, unworthy" instead of the required "God grant mercy." Some call such protests disruptive. "You can say he is worthy or unworthy outside the church, but not in the home of Jesus," worshipper Denise Batshon said. Some say the church needs to carry out reforms if it wants to keep the faithful. Sam Noble, an expert on the Greek Orthodox, said that since the 18th century, the church steadily lost followers to other denominations where they can participate fully. If the patriarch refuses to yield, this drain will continue, said Noble, at doctoral candidate in Islamic Studies at Yale University. "Unless the patriarchate changes, eventually it will be just a real estate holding company with no faithful in the region," he said. News Topics: General news, Territorial disputes, War and unrest People, Places and Companies: Jerusalem, Palestinian territories, Amman, Israel, Jordan, Middle East Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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