St. Mary Orthodox Church

July 26, 2021 - By Fr. Antony Hughes

The Truth our Lord teaches is never stagnate. It is creative and transformative and transfiguring. It flows like a river that seeks to carve out the rocky terrain of our hardened hearts. Faith welcomes it as painful as it may be. Ilia Delio puts a fine point on it writing, “…the most unchristian position we can assume is to block the new creation from taking place.”

July 11, 2021 - By Fr. Antony Hughes

From time to time the image of God becomes blurred and almost forgotten. People forget what God “looks like,” how he sounds, how he is, and in the resulting vacuum create idols like the children of Israel and their Golden Calf. The search for an earthly savior always ends in the creation of an anti-Christ.

July 04, 2021 - By Fr. Antony Hughes

We can learn much through historical criticism or Bible study. Both are helpful, but there is another way of knowledge that comes from the heart. It is the superior way. It is personal, intimate, a meeting of heart to heart.

June 27, 2021 - By Fr. Antony Hughes

To acknowledge Christ “before men” means to be like Him. We must be evolving into the likeness of Him in whom we claim to believe. To think like He thinks, to act like He acts, to love like He loves, to let go of our egoic and earthly minds and put on His.

June 06, 2021 - By Fr. Antony Hughes

In this reading St. John brings us full circle. He begins his Gospel with a reference to the beginning of all things, “In the beginning was the Word.” And today the Word remakes a blind man's eyes with his own spittle and some dust. “Behold,” he says, “I make all things new.”

May 30, 2021 - By Fr. Antony Hughes

Water is a symbol for new life, for cleansing and rebirth. It is from water that all life evolved and, in Christ, it is water that initiates us into the kingdom through the action of the Holy Trinity. I think it is true that the gift of Holy Baptism has yet to be unwrapped by many of us. To die and rise with Christ and to be sealed with the Holy Spirit is a very great blessing that often takes a lifetime (or longer) to realize.

May 24, 2021 - by Dn. Jeff Smith

We have all experienced loss, and the world has become more permeable. The veil between this world and the next has been torn. And yet, we are called to heal each other; we are called to have compassion and empathy with each other.

May 16, 2021 - by Fr. Antony Hughes

Courage does not mean the absence of fear. Fear is very often the fuel for courage, the reason it is needed in the first place. Joseph risked his life asking Pilate for the Lord’s body. The Myrrh-bearing Women took off into the unknown.

May 09, 2021 - by Fr. Antony Hughes

Faith. Deep and true faith means being open to what the truth turns out to be as we grow and learn and come more fully to understand. We come to know most fully through an experience of the Living God just like so many did when encountering the Crucified One risen from the dead.

April 04, 2021 - by Fr. Antony Hughes

So, yes, the Cross is like a mandala, the Great Christian mandala, around which our lives and the cosmos revolve. As a focus of prayer and meditation it leads us into the Truth. The Cross grounds us both historically, psychologically and mystically. The Cross is the mandala of hope in the midst of our suffering.

March 28, 2021 - by Andrea Popa

In the context of our liturgy, however, I would submit to you today, that peace is paradoxically - hard work - not tranquil, an act of purposeful engagement - not detachment, a hard-fought victory - not passive.

March 22, 2021 - by Shannon Sakellariou

Our love for God is shown in our unity and our relationships. We can’t love our Lord apart from our neighbors. And loving others allows us to partake in the nature of Christ and thus love God.

March 14, 2021 - by Christina Palis, M.Div

What if we understood the spiritual sacrifices that we are called to in Liturgy and our everyday life, sacrifices of praise and service and forgiveness and compassion, as a dance? I think of the circular dances of our Greek and Lebanese cultures where we move together, in coordinated steps, hand in hand. When we dance with others, we are mindful of them, we are receptive to their movements, we pay attention, and we are joyful.

March 07, 2021 -

Even when humanity turned away, our God did not give up on us, but continues to care for us.  God keeps reaching out to us to draw us back into communion with Him.

March 07, 2021 - by Fr. Antony Hughes

There is only one Law of Christ: to love and to care for one another. There are no prerequisites or boundaries to this love. It is to be shared with the entire world by direct and concrete action.

February 28, 2021 - by Fr. Antony Hughes

The table is waiting for us and is richly laden and we are invited to partake of it. All of life is a eucharist waiting to happen. And we are invited to become part of it.

February 14, 2021 - by Fr. Antony Hughes

From the Woman’s great suffering for her child was revealed a great enlightened faith, humility, compassion and courage. From the disciples, the very opposite. And Christ stood in the breech.

February 07, 2021 - by Dn. Jeff Smith

God gave us hands and feet and speech, and strength of mind and body that we might use all these things for our neighbor's advantage. Let us contribute what God has given us, our wealth, our diligence and our care giving for our neighbor's advantage.

January 31, 2021 - by Fr. Antony Hughes

From our lowly depths to the depths of his infinite mercy, one cries out to the other, the Prodigal Son to the Father, Zacchaeus to Jesus. And since we are too weak to run to him, he runs to us, forgetting and forgiving all the sins and wrongs and mistakes that make up the heavy burden that we bear, and drawing us into his and our true home. To find our true home, we must first find our true selves.

January 24, 2021 - by Fr. Antony Hughes

The truth is that the largest part even of our own stories is unknown to us for we do not know why we think what we think and why we do what we do. We come to the Lord as many have done before us to discover who we are. For only God knows our hearts and finding him and finding ourselves is a simultaneous event.

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