LGBT protest met with prayer at San Francisco cathedral

(ROCOR) - Orthodox Christians Respond to an LGBT Protest With Joint Prayer of Clergy and Laity of the Patriarchal Parishes in the USA and the Russian Church Abroad

Clergymen and laity of the Moscow Patriarchate and the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia responded to an LGBT protest with joint prayers.

On Sunday, August 25, 2013, a protest was held before St Nicholas Patriarchal Cathedral in San Francisco, CA, by local LGBT members against legislation passed in Russia last June banning the propagandizing of homosexuality to children. The day before, blogs on the internet called for supporters of the LGBT community to gather at San Francisco’s Patriarchal cathedral during Divine Liturgy with anti-Orthodox and anti-Russian placards.

With the blessing of His Eminence Archbishop Justinian of Naro-Fominsk, Administrator of the Patriarchal Parishes in the USA, clergymen Protopriest Georgy Roshchin, Representative of the International Russian People’s Council to the United Nations, and Hegumen Nikodim (Balyasnikov), both of St Nicholas Patriarchal Cathedral in New York City, traveled to San Francisco to support the local parishioners.

On August 25, Archbishop Justinian spoke via telephone to His Eminence Archbishop Kyrill of San Francisco and Western America of ROCOR. The archpastors discussed the unfolding situation, after which they came to the decision to hold joint prayers the next day in the Patriarchal cathedral. Priest Leonid Kazakov, Rector of St Nicholas Cathedral, gave advance notice to the planned action to the local police and to Mr Sergei Petrov, Consul General of the Russian Federation in San Francisco.

On the morning of August 25, Archbishop Kyrill and His Grace Bishop Theodosius of Seattle, Vicar Bishop of the Western American Diocese, arrived for the beginning of Divine Liturgy, where they prayed and partook of the Holy Gifts of Christ. For the edification of the worshipers, the archpastors brought with them a reliquary with portions of the relics of St John of Shanghai and San Francisco from the Cathedral of the Mother of God “Joy of All Who Sorrow” in San Francisco.

Divine Liturgy was celebrated by Fr Leonid and Hegumen Nikodim. Praying at the service were parishioners of St Nicholas and laity of ROCOR.

After partaking of the Holy Gifts, Archbishop Kyrill and Bishop Theodosius performed a moleben with the other clergymen, during which litanies and supplications from the rite of the Triumph of Orthodoxy were intoned.

Bishop Theodosius then read a sermon. Fr Leonid welcomed the archpastors on behalf of his parishioners, thanking them for their prayerful support and words of guidance. Protopriest Georgy and Hegumen Nikodim then thanked the hierarchs on behalf of Archbishop Justinian.

By Divine mercy, neither the cathedral nor any parishioners suffered any violence from the protesters. Member of the police secured the protest area and did not permit the breaking of any laws. The clergy and parishioners of St Nicholas Patriarchal Cathedral of San Francisco expressed thanks to Archbishop Justinian and Archbishop Kyrill, Bishop Theodosius, the clergymen from New York’s St Nicholas Cathedral, as well as all the other clergymen and laypersons who supported them that day.

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Bethlehem Icon Center trains Palestinians in iconography

(CNEWA) - In a cave-like basement a short walk from Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity, nine students huddle over Formica tables, patiently practicing their brushwork.

The bearded face of Christ takes shape in burnt sienna on a dozen sheets of white paper: a dozen variations with a dozen irregular sets of features. Some of the students are established artists, others have little or no artistic training, but this new craft is a challenge for all of them. They work through mistakes and false starts, scowling and sighing in frustration.

The instructor is patient, demonstrating the basics again and again — how to draw a line with a brush, how to mix the paint, how to find a face in a sheet of white. “Move the paper so it’s easier to draw,” he explains. “Work to your strengths, and know your weaknesses — which is a good spiritual principle! Because what you’re doing is learning spiritual life, really — in a very practical way.”

The teacher is Ian Knowles, a British iconographer who has been working in churches and convents in the Holy Land since 2008. As an artist, he creates extraordinary, vivid images. Though hewing fast to traditional styles and techniques, his pieces can feel strikingly modern, alive with spiritual purpose. It is this, as much as brushwork and technique, that he is attempting to pass along to his students.

“The purpose of the icon is prayer,” he says. “What you need as you paint Christ is to be with him, to experience him.”

Slowly, in a few places, the holy countenance begins to come to life on paper.

It is October 2012, and this is the first class of the Bethlehem Icon Center, an initiative to train students from Palestine in the ancient art of iconography. It is a project at once modest and ambitious. The classes are small and the curriculum, highly specific. But by helping students reach a high level of craftsmanship, the center’s founders hope to create something lasting and profound: not just the seed of a local craft industry, but an expression of the Holy Land’s ancient Christian culture and its role in the development of Christian art.

“Empowering local Christians, finding a way for them to rediscover their artistic, religious tradition in a very specific way — that’s exciting,” says the Rev. Timothy Lowe, a priest of the Orthodox Church in America and the rector of the Tantur Ecumenical Institute, which is a partner of the center, along with Mr. Knowles.

The first students are an ecumenical bunch; their number includes two Coptic Orthodox nuns, four students from the Greek Orthodox Church, two from the Syriac Orthodox Church and two Latin Catholics. Half of them are women. The project has already drawn significant support from the community — a temporary classroom has been provided by Bethlehem University in the basement of its Brother Vincent Malham Center, just off Manger Square.

The school’s patron is Melkite Greek Catholic Archbishop Joseph-Jules Zerey...

Complete article here.

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iPads in the altar

From the Bible Design Blog a post entitled iPads in the Pulpit. I'm actually a long-time reader of this blog as it rather reliably enjoyable reading on what many would think to be a dry, uninteresting topic.

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Writing for the Gospel Coalition blog, Matthew Barrett shared the concern earlier this week that the replacement of physical Bibles with iPads in the pulpit, while a “subtle shift,” comes with several potential dangers. His post –– "Dear Pastor, Bring Your Bible to Church" –– got a lot of people thinking, which is to say, it got them riled up.

An iPad in the pulpit, Barrett contends, sends a different message than a physical Bible to the congregation, because people associate the iPad with media consumption. The physical book we now think of as the text, whereas we still distinguish between the e-reader, a technological device for consuming the text, and the text itself. When the pastor flashes his iPad, we see the device, not the Bible.

Barrett also shares the concern of many culture critics that the use of e-books contributes to the problem of illiteracy. The way we experience the text via a Bible app leaves us with less of a sense of the big picture, how the whole book fits together. And because the virtual text is disembodied, its symbolism seems at odds with Christian theological values: “as physical beings who gather together as an assembly in a tangible place,” isn’t it strange to replace the physical book with a multi-use e-reader? Might not the physicality of baptism and the Lord’s Supper be set in uncomfortable relief when the proclamation of the Word loses its physical touchstone? Not to mention, the use of e-readers removes the physical proclamation inherent in carrying a physical Bible into the world. People see your printed Bible and react to it very differently than they do to your iPad...

Complete post here.

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Priest starts biker's procession in Irkutsk

(irk.aif.ru) - Four years ago in Irkutsk was the first procession on motorcycles. It was initiated by the abbot of St. Alexander Nevsky Church Father Mark.

Then the father, Mark did not dare to sit behind the wheel in a cassock "iron horse" and would prefer to be a passenger. But later still bought the bike and became a full member of the biker movement in Irkutsk.

"The Insider" priest

The one who often looks at the Alexander Nevsky church, motorcycles at the main entrance is surprised. Under a plaque "In Memory of motorcyclists killed" women discuss their problems in life, not paying attention to them passing by men in leather vests and bandanas. Father Mark says that lovers of bikes come in here often. Someone comes for advice, someone in the case - to get married or baptize children.

A few years ago, parishioner - the architect of ice at the Cathedral of the Epiphany of the town and the actor Vadim Semenov bought a motorcycle. Then the prior Mark realized that amateur ride with the wind is formed, mature, accomplished people. After all, for transportation and is not cheap, and it is more difficult to exploit than a car. And he offered Semenov think about Irkutsk to organize a procession on bikes. After a couple of days in the temple of the chairmen of the two motorcycle clubs came and offered their assistance in the unusual event.

- Bishop of Irkutsk and Angarsk Vadim looked at the whole thing, and then asked me for a long time. I said that from childhood on a motorcycle, the category is. And he blessed us. The first two years in the religious processions he even blessed the technique and served as a prayer - says Fr Mark.

The event in 2009 was a success, at least 100 motorcyclists ride through the city under the church banners. Since then, without the blessing of the minister of the Alexander Nevsky church does not open any biker season, and on the Day of Remembrance of motorcyclists in October in a church memorial service is held.

Despite the fact that people are used to seeing priests to help the sick and the poor, the father, Mark does not see anything unusual about his lesson.

- Someone is working with drug addicts, some in areas serves someone helps orphans. The options are many. In any walk of life should be "their" priest - said our hero.

And about the conventional wisdom that bikers - people with frivolous way of life, the abbot answered briefly: "For the Church, too, there are many myths and prejudices."

God's work

Over a lifetime, his father Mark had two motorcycles, "Minsk" in childhood and "Kawasaki" now.

- This type motorcycle "chopper". It is designed for a beautiful ride: slowly and with dignity. In the garb it looks best. In general, the most that neither is a priestly appliances - laughing abbot.

Regrets only that the time for "careless" driving through the city just does not. The work of the priest, so that it is most convenient to travel by bus: constantly need to transport something or someone.

The fact that colleagues can somehow resent the passion motorcycles, Father Mark does not exclude the other. Not to mention, if even the ministers of the house no-no and will express dissatisfaction.

- Yes, some are of the opinion that it is not pleasing to God. Then I suggest to them to justify why they are for God to decide who will be saved and who is not, and the bikers are worse than they are. In this debate, and an end, because here they have nothing to say. Besides the fact that people come to the temple in different categories suggests that the church claimed that he lives a normal life, - said the priest.

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Of flowers and their supposed dangers

I'm quite a fan of The Low Churchman's Guide. The below is an example of its appeal.

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Flowers are the reproductive organs of angiospermic plants. The current consensus opinion among botanists holds that they are necessary to ensure the continued existence of such valuable plants as the apple tree, the rhododendron, the Southern Ironwood, and Heracleum mantegazzianum. For the time being, at least, it seems that flowers are here to stay. It is one thing to admire a row of daisies by the side of the road, however, and quite another to tolerate the deliberate and premeditated arrangement of flowers on the altars of our churches, a custom that strikes at the very roots of the English faith.

There are many reasons for the loyal churchman to be wary of altar flowers. A vase filled with verdant foliage is large enough to hide an even more sinister object from view: a copy of Ritual Notes, perhaps, or the image of the Bishop of Rome. Flowers are also capable of causing discomfort or even physical harm to parishioners; they emit distracting odours and produce a substance called “pollen,” whose primary purpose is to cause death by anaphylactic shock. It is thought that these properties may be related to the carcinogenic qualities of incense, another dangerous substance of botanical origin. Most serious, however, is the potential for the display of flowers to lead English youth astray: the public exhibition of uncovered sexual organs, whatever their species, is sure to undermine the moral standards that we have so carefully instilled in our children.

Although loyal churchmen are opposed to the use of flowers as an altar decoration, some experts believe that flowers can licitly be grown on the parish property at a decent distance from the church itself: such flower arrangements, known as “gardens,” are becoming increasingly popular.

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Pray for our brothers in the Middle East

H/T: Praying with My Feet

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Antiochian hierarchs thank Russian Church for support

(mospat.ru) - His Beatitude Patriarch John X of Great Antioch and All the East sent a message to His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia, in which he expressed his gratitude for the efforts that the Russian Orthodox Church makes to defend Christians in the Middle East.

In his letter, His Beatitude Patriarch John X mentioned the celebration marking the 1025th anniversary of the Baptism Russia, which was held in Moscow, Kiev and Minsk with the participation of the Primates and representatives of all Local Orthodox Churches, saying in particular, “I was… so happy to see the brothers gathering about the holy Divine Altar and praising the Author of Life, Our Lord Jesus Christ who blessed Russia and the Russian People and granted this great nation all his heavenly blessings to be a true and sincere witness of Christendom. The baptism of Russia is not only an historical event, but it is also a concrete and lived reality that all people and nations can “come and see” (John 1:46) and praise the Lord Jesus Christ.”

According to His Beatitude, “with deep feeling of respect and appreciation” he read the Statement by Heads and Representatives of the Local Orthodox Churches Assembled for the Celebration of the 1025th Anniversary of the Baptism of Russia. The main theme of the joint statement is the situation of Christians in the Middle East.

“I consider it my duty to raise an Antiochian thankful voice to support and share every word of the released statement,” Patriarch John’s letter reads. “Truly, Christians are persecuted and damaged in the Middle East, in the land of Jesus Christ. The salvation of Syria and of all the Middle East comes, as mentioned, through the logic of dialogue and peaceful political settlement. Extremism, fundamentalism and blind radicalism are the most great dangers which threaten not only the Christian presence, but the existence of the States and the peace of all the nations.”

His Beatitude Patriarch John X of Great Antioch and All the East expressed his wish to pay a brotherly visit to the Russian Orthodox Church and said in conclusion of his letter, “May Lord, Jesus Christ, the King of Peace give us His Divine Peace, grant you, the Russian Synod and the Russian People His heavenly blessings and bless the efforts of all the orthodox world to settle the peace in the Middle East and in all the world redeemed by the precious blood of our Savior.”

And also...

(mospat.ru) - His Eminence Philip (Saliba), Archbishop of New York and Metropolitan of All North America, head of the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America, sent a message to the Primate of the Russian Orthodox Church, which reads, in particular: “We monitor with gratitude your tireless efforts in support of the Christians, and all the God-fearing people of Syria.”

His Eminence Metropolitan Philip expresses his conviction that the forces responsible for stirring up the conflict in the country “have ulterior motives in mind, not the least of which is to expunge the area of Christians who have been living in that land peacefully with Muslims for many years under the secular government…”

The hierarch of the Church of Antioch thanked the Russian Church for carrying out the fund-raising campaign and sending the money collected “to help the needy, homeless and downtrodden people of Syria” who have been suffering from “the uncivil war that continues to rage.”

“Throughout history, Russia has protected the Orthodox of the Middle East in times of need and it seems history is repeating itself once again,” the letter reads. His Eminence Metropolitan Philip expressed his gratitude to His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia for his support in this difficult time and asked him “to remember the victims of this barbarism” in his prayers.

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Concert scheduled to support ZOE for Life

DETROIT, MI (OCA-DMW) — The Council of Orthodox Christian Churches of Metropolitan Detroit (COCC) will sponsor a concert to benefit ZOE for Life! on Sunday, September 15, 2013 at 6:00 p.m. at Saint George Romanian Orthodox Cathedral, 18405 W. Nine Mile Road, Southfield, MI.

The concert program will consist of Orthodox hymns and songs of worship performed by the Orthodox Choir of Metropolitan Detroit conducted by Matushka Victoria Kopistiansky, artistic director.

“Orthodox parishes across Detroit reach out to help others in many ways, and the COCC is expanding these efforts through the treasure of our music to bring greater awareness of our community and mission,” said Subdeacon John E. Lazar, COCC president. “This concert allows us to extend our hands and hearts to aid those in need, and make at least a small difference through needed funds and the spirit of Christian love.”

The concert will be open to the general public free of charge. Donations will be collected to support ZOE for Life! Fellowship will follow the concert.

Directions to the cathedral are available at www.sgroc.org.

For further information please call (734) 646-6420 or send an e-mail to coccdetroit@yahoo.com.

Based near Cleveland, Ohio, ZOE for Life! is a non-profit Christ-centered support organization with three major goals: to help women in crisis pregnancy, to assist Orthodox Christian couples seeking to adopt, and to create an Orthodox Christian abstinence program to educate young people. It was endorsed by the Standing Conference of the Canonical Orthodox Bishops in the Americas. For further information, visit its web site at www.zoeforlifeonline.org

The COCC is a 56-year-old clergy and lay association that represents various canonical Orthodox churches in metropolitan Detroit and sponsors a variety of programs in the areas of worship, fellowship, charity, education and outreach. For further information, visit its web site at www.coccdetroit.com.

The Orthodox Choir is composed of volunteer singers from Orthodox parish choirs throughout metropolitan Detroit. In addition to special concerts and other selected events, the choir sings an annual series of Vespers services on the five Sundays of Orthodox Great Lent sponsored by the COCC.

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St Planton's Seminary baseball team (1916)

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UK Copts want to accept Chalcedonians by confession

(British Orthodox) - The Synod of the British Orthodox Church has submitted a recommendation to the Holy Synod of the Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria (see PDF), that in the reception of those who have previously been members of churches accepting the Council of Chalcedon (including the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches) it should be by confession of faith and prayer, without any requirement for the reception of Baptism or Chrismation.

This recommendation is made on the basis that:

(1) The Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate has always received Chalcedonians by confession of faith and prayer on the clear and authoritative instruction of our holy Fathers including St Timothy, the 26th Pope of Alexandria, St Philoxenus of Mabbugh and St Severus. Even during periods of violent persecution our Orthodox Church has not deviated from this procedure.

(2) This has been consistently used as the only method of receiving Chalcedonians from the 5th century to the 19th century. Our own Coptic Orthodox Tradition shows that even Nestorians were received in such a manner.

(3) It is only in the most recent times that Catholics have been required to be baptised on their reception which is an innovation and contrary to the teaching of our holy Fathers.

(4) The development of various doctrines in the Catholic Church in later centuries is no justification for requiring the baptism of Catholics, since even Nestorians were not required to be baptised.

(5) His Holiness Pope Shenouda III of blessed memory signed an agreement with Pope Paul VI of Rome which spoke of the sacrament of baptism being present in both communities, and Bishop Gregorious, the Coptic president of the Theological Commission with the Catholics also insisted that there be mutual respect and regard for the baptism of Catholics.

(6) The Armenian, Syrian and Indian Orthodox all continue our ancient and authoritative Tradition of receiving Catholics without baptism.

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Wacky minor league giveaway offers funeral arrangements

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - For anyone who might say giving away a free funeral at a baseball game as entertainment is morbid, and crass, you would have a point.

But a guy by the name of Steve Paul would argue you’re wrong.

Wild and wacky promotions are a way of life in the world of minor league baseball, but a funeral giveaway?

That might be over the top.

The idea came from Kurt Landis the General Manager for The Lehigh Valley IronPigs.

“Teams are used to pushing the envelope and teams want to be crazy and fun,” Landis said.

But for 64-year-old Steve Paul, the funeral giveaway valued at $10,000 is a blessing.

Diagnosed with ALS in June, the Lehigh Valley man entered an essay contest with the IronPigs to win, knowing his disease is fatal and irreversible.

“For a person who is not looking at their own mortality, yes it would be morbid. For a person who is trying to find some sort of peace and some sort of direction knowing what lies ahead, it is very comforting,” Paul said.

The funeral giveaway at the ballpark includes a headstone, casket, flowers and a memorial service.

The idea was tough to take for his daughter.

“It’s shaken my world, it has shaken the rest of my family’s world. This is one less thing that we have to worry about,” Robyn Paul said.

And when the IronPigs announced Paul was the recipient of the free funeral on the field Tuesday night, he was greeted with a standing ovation.

For his remaining days, Paul has been relieved of the burden of leaving his family to pay for his funeral.

“I am so happy. I am ecstatic,” Paul said.

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Snagov Monastery, purported burial place of Vlad the Impaler

(Atlas Obscura) - On a tiny island in a lake just outside of Bucharest stands Snagov Monastery which local tradition states is the burial place of Vlad the Impaler, the inspiration for Bram Stoker's Dracula.

Originally founded in the 14th century and later excavated in 1933, the monastery is a seemingly simple place of worship taking advantage of the calm its water-locked isolation brings. However the story goes that after his notoriously cruel lifetime, Vlad Tepes III was buried in the church as per his request prior to his death. A number of archeologists and historians have worked to verify whether this tale is fact or simple apocrypha and none have been able to prove that the dictator was ever laid to rest on the island. After having dug up some of the site's burial stones all that was found were a mix of horse and human bones, but nothing that confirms the possible Dracula's interment.

Most historians now believe that the Prince of Wallachia was buried in a monastery in the Comana area, but this has not stopped the locals from spreading the spurious myth. A foot bridge has been built to the island and visitors are encouraged to stop by the Snagov Monastery and view the supposed grave, however the caretakers now charge anyone who wants to take pictures. The Romanian government even began plans to capitalize on the church's unverifiable history by building an amusement park in Snagov called, "Dracula Park" although development was mercifully canceled in 2006.

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The blessing of grapes in the Armenian Church

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1,600 years of uninterrupted liturgies ended this week

(Times of Israel) - Amid escalating violence against Egypt’s Copts, churches in Minya, located in upper Egypt, cancelled Sunday Mass for the first time in 1,600 years. Other churches in Minya also didn’t hold prayer services.

“We did not hold prayers in the monastery on Sunday for the first time in 1,600 years,” Priest Selwanes Lotfy of the Virgin Mary and Priest Ibram Monastery in Degla, just south of Minya, told the al-Masry al-Youm daily.

He said supporters of ousted president Mohammed Morsi destroyed the monastery, which includes three churches, one of which is an archaeological site. “One of the extremists wrote on the monastery’s wall, ‘donate [this] to the martyrs’ mosque,’” Lotfy added.

Copts, the largest indigenous Christian minority in the Middle East and North Africa, make up about 10 percent of Egypt’s total population of some 90 million people. One of the world’s oldest Christian communities, they have generally kept a low-profile, but have become more politically active since Mubarak was ousted and sought to ensure fair treatment in the aftermath. They regularly face violence and discrimination within Egyptian society.

Since Wednesday, when Egyptian security forces cleared two pro-Morsi sit-in camps and more than 900 have died in ensuing clashes, Islamists have attacked dozens of Coptic churches as well as homes and businesses owned by the community. Nearly 58 churches were looted and torched by Islamist rioters since Sunday. The campaign of intimidation appears to be a warning to Christians outside Cairo to stand down from political activism.

Two Christians have been killed since last Wednesday, including a taxi driver who strayed into a protest by Morsi supporters in Alexandria and another man who was shot to death by Islamists in the southern province of Sohag, according to security officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to release the information.

The attacks served as a reminder that Islamists, while on the defensive in Cairo, maintain influence and the ability to stage violence in provincial strongholds with a large minority of Christians.

Many Morsi supporters say Christians played a disproportionately large role in the days of mass rallies, with millions demanding that he step down ahead of the coup.

Despite the violence, Egypt’s Coptic Christian church on Friday renewed its commitment to the new political order, saying in a statement that it stood by the army and the police in their fight against “the armed violent groups and black terrorism.”

In a statement Saturday, the Coptic Pope Tawadros II, said the Muslim Brotherhood was fomenting sectarian clashes around Egypt. The pope has reportedly been in hiding since rioters began targeting the minority group.

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Of possible amusement to some

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St. Gregory Palamas on the Dormition of the Theotokos

(Pravoslavie.ru) - Both love and duty today fashion my homily for your charity. It is not only that I wish, because of my love for you, and because I am obliged by the sacred canons, to bring to your God-loving ears a saving word and thus to nourish your souls, but if there be any among those things that bind by obligation and love and can be narrated with praise for the Church, it is the great deed of the Ever-Virgin Mother of God. The desire is double, not single, since it induces me, entreats and persuades me, whereas the inexorable duty constrains me, though speech cannot attain to what surpasses it, just as the eye is unable to look fixedly upon the sun. One cannot utter things which surpass speech, yet it is within our power by the love for mankind of those hymned, to compose a song of praise and all at once both to leave untouched intangible things, to satisfy the debt with words and to offer up the first fruits of our love for the Mother of God in hymns composed according to our abilities.

If, then, "death of the righteous man is honorable" (cf. Ps. 115:6) and the "memory of the just man is celebrated with songs of praise" (Prov. 10:7), how much more ought we to honor with great praises the memory of the holiest of the saints, she by whom all holiness is afforded to the saints, I mean the Ever-Virgin. Mother of God! Even so we celebrate today her holy dormition or translation to another life, whereby, while being "a little lower than angels" (Ps. 8:6), by her proximity to the God of all, and in the wondrous deeds which from the beginning of time were written down and accomplished with respect to her, she has ascended incomparably higher than the angels and the archangels and all the super-celestial hosts that are found beyond them. For her sake the God-possessed prophets pronounce prophecies, miracles are wrought to foreshow that future Marvel of the whole world, the Ever-Virgin Mother of God. The flow of generations and circumstances journeys to the destination of that new mystery wrought in her; the statutes of the Spirit provide beforehand types of the future truth. The end, or rather the beginning and root, of those divine wonders and deeds is the annunciation to the supremely virtuous Joachim and Anna of what was to be accomplished: namely, that they who were barren from youth would beget in deep old age her that would bring forth without seed Him that was timelessly begotten of God the Father before the ages. A vow was given by those who marvelously begot her to return her that was given to the Giver; so accordingly the Mother of God strangely changed her dwelling from the house of her father to the house of God while still an infant . She passed not a few years in the Holy of Holies itself, wherein under the care of an angel she enjoyed ineffable nourishment such as even Adam did not succeed in tasting; for indeed if he had, like this immaculate one, he would not have fallen away from life, even though it was because of Adam and so that she might prove to be his daughter, that she yielded a little to nature, as did her Son, Who has now ascended from earth into heaven.

But after that unutterable nourishment, a most mystical economy of courtship came to pass as regards the Virgin, a strange greeting surpassing speech which the Archangel, descended from above, addressed to her, and disclosures and salutations from God which overturn the condemnation of Eve and Adam and remedy the curse laid on them, transforming it into a blessing. The King of all "hath desired a mystic beauty" of the Ever-Virgin, as David foretold (Ps. 44:11) and, "He bowed the heavens and came down" (Ps. 17:9) and overshadowed her, or rather, the enhypostatic Power of the Most High dwelt in her. Not through darkness and fire, as with Moses the God-seer, nor through tempest and cloud, as with Elias the prophet, did He manifest His presence, but without mediation, without a veil, the Power of the Most High overshadowed the sublimely chaste and virginal womb, separated by nothing, neither air nor aether nor anything sensible, nor anything supra-sensible: this was not an overshadowing but a complete union. Since what overshadows is always wont to produce its own form and figure in whatever is overshadowed, there came to pass in the womb not a union only, but further, a formation, and that thing formed from the Power of the Most High and the all-holy virginal womb was the incarnate Word of God. Thus the Word of God took up His dwelling in the Theotokos in an inexpressible manner and proceeded from her, bearing flesh . He appeared upon the earth and lived among men, deifying our nature and granting us, after the words of the divine Apostle, "things which angels desire to look into" (1 Pet. 1:12). This is the encomium which transcends nature and the surpassingly glorious glory of the Ever-Virgin, glory for which all mind and word suffice not, though they be angelic. But who can relate those things which came to pass after His ineffable birth? For, as she co-operated and suffered with that exalting condescension (kenosis) of the Word of God, she was also rightly glorified and exalted together with Him, ever adding thereto the supernatural increase of mighty deeds. And after the ascent into the heavens of Him that was incarnate of her, she rivaled, as it were, those great works, surpassing mind and speech, which through Him were her own, with a most valiant and diverse asceticism, and with her prayers and care for the entire world, her precepts and encouragements which she gave to God's heralds sent throughout the whole world; thus she was herself both a support and a comfort while she was both heard and seen, and while she labored with the rest in every way for the preaching of the Gospel. In such wise she led a most strenuous manner of life proclaimed in mind and speech.

Therefore, the death of the Theotokos was also life-bearing, translating her into a celestial and immortal life and its commemoration is a joyful event and festivity for the entire world. It not merely renews the memory of the wondrous deeds of the Mother of God, but also adds thereto the strange gathering at her all-sacred burial of all the sacred apostles conveyed from every nation, the God-revealing hymns of these God-possessed ones, and the solicitous presence of the angels, and their choir, and liturgy round about her, going on before, following after, assisting, opposing, defending, being defended. They labored and chanted together to their uttermost with those who venerated that life- originating and God-receiving body, the saving balsam for our race and the boast of all creation; but they strove against and opposed with a secret hand the Jews who rose up against and attacked that body with hand and will set upon theomachy. All the while the Lord Sabaoth Himself, the Son of the Ever-Virgin, was present, into Whose hands she rendered her divinely-minded spirit, through which and with which its companion, her body, was translated into the domain of celestial and endless life, even as was and is fitting. In truth, many have been allotted divine favor and glory and power, as David says, "But to me exceedingly honorable are Thy friends, O Lord, their principalities are made exceeding strong. I will count them and they shall be multiplied more than the sand" (Ps. 138:17). And according to Solomon, "many daughters have attained wealth, many have wrought valiantly; but she doth exceed, she hath surpassed all, both men and women" (cf. Prov. 31:29). For while she alone stood between God and the whole human race, God became the Son of Man and made men sons of God; she made earth heavenly, she deified the human race, and she alone of all women was shown forth to be a mother by nature and the Mother of God transcending every law of nature, and by her ineffable childbirth-the Queen of all creation, both terrestial and celestial. Thus she exalted those under her through herself, and, showing while on earth an obedience to things heavenly rather than things earthly, she partook of more excellent deserts and of superior power, and from the ordination which she received from heaven by the Divine Spirit, she became the most sublime of the sublime and the supremely blest Queen of a blessed race.

But now the Mother of God has her dwelling in Heaven whither she was today translated, for this is meet, Heaven being a suitable place for her. She "stands at the right of the King of all clothed in a vesture wrought with gold and arrayed with divers colors" (cf. Ps. 44:9), as the psalmic prophecy says con- cerning her. By "vesture wrought with gold" understand her divinely radiant body arrayed with divers colors of every virtue. She alone in her body, glorified by God, now enjoys the celestial realm together with her Son. For, earth and grave and death did not hold forever her life-originating and God-receiving body -the dwelling more favored than Heaven and the Heaven of heavens. If, therefore, her soul, which was an abode of God's grace, ascended into Heaven when bereaved of things here below, a thing which is abundantly evident, how could it be that the body which not only received in itself the pre-eternal and only-begotten Son of God, the ever-flowing Wellspring of grace, but also manifested His Body by way of birth, should not have also been taken up into Heaven? Or, if while yet three years of age and not yet possessing that super- celestial in-dwelling, she seemed not to bear our flesh as she abode in the Holy of Holies, and after she became supremely perfect even as regards her body by such great marvels, how indeed could that body suffer corruption and turn to earth? How could such a thing be conceivable for anyone who thinks reasonably'? Hence, the body which gave birth is glorified together with what was born of it with God-befitting glory, and the "ark of holiness" (Ps. 131:8) is resurrected, after the prophetic ode, together with Christ Who formerly arose from the dead on the third day. The strips of linen and the burial clothes afford the apostles a demonstration of the Theotokos' resurrection from the dead, since they remained alone in the tomb and at the apostles' scrutiny they were found there, even as it had been with the Master. There was no necessity for her body to delay yet a little while in the earth, as was the case with her Son and God, and so it was taken up straightway from the tomb to a super-celestial realm, from whence she flashes forth most brilliant and divine illuminations and graces, irradiating earth's region; thus she is worshipped and marvelled at and hymned by all the faithful . Willing to set up an image of all goodness and beauty and to make clearly manifest His own therein to both angels and men, God fashioned a being supremely good and beautiful, uniting in her all good, seen and unseen, which when He made the world He distributed to each thing and thereby adorned all; or rather one might say, He showed her forth as a universal mixing bowl of all divine, angelic and human things good and beautiful and the supreme beauty which embellished both worlds. By her ascension now from the tomb, she is taken from the earth and attains to Heaven and this also she surpasses, uniting those on high with those below, and encompassing all with the wondrous deed wrought in her. In this manner she was in the beginning "a little lower than the angels" (Ps. 8:6), as it is said, referring to her mortality, yet this only served to magnify her pre-eminence as regards all creatures. Thus all things today fittingly gather and commune for the festival.

It was meet that she who contained Him that fills all things and who surpasses all should outstrip all and become by her virtue superior to them in the eminence of her dignity. Those things which sufficed the most excellent among men that have lived throughout the ages in order to reach such excellency, and that which all those graced of God have separately, both angels and men, she combines, and these she alone brings to fulfillment and surpasses. And this she now has beyond all: That she has become immortal after death and alone dwells together with her Son and God in her body. For this reason she pours forth from thence abundant grace upon those who honor her-for she is a receptacle of great graces-and she grants us even our ability to look towards her. Because of her goodness she lavishes sublime gifts upon us and never ceases to provide a profitable and abundant tribute in our behalf. If a man looks towards this concurrence and dispensing of every good, he will say that the Virgin is for virtue and those who live virtuously, what the sun is for perceptible light and those who live in it. But if he raises the eye of his mind to the Sun which rose for men from this Virgin in a wondrous manner, the Sun which by nature possesses all those (lualities which were added to her nature by grace, he shall straightaway call the Virgin a heaven. The excellent inheritance of every good which she has been allotted so m uch exceeds in holiness the portion of those who are divinely graced both under and above heaven as the heaven is greater than the sun and the sun is more radiant than heaven.

Who can describe in words thy divinely resplendent beauty, O Virgin Mother of God? Thoughts and words are inadequate to define thine attributes, since they surpass mind and speech. Yet it is meet to chant hymns of praise to thee, for thou art a vessel containing every grace, the fulness of all things good and beautiful, the tablet and living icon of every good and all uprightness, since thou alone hast been deemed worthy to receive the fulness of every gift of the Spirit. Thou alone didst bear in thy womb Him in Whom are found the treasuries of all these gifts and didst become a wondrous tabernacle for Him; hence thou didst depart by way of death to immortality and art translated from earth to Heaven, as is proper, so that thou mightest dwell with Him eternally in a super-celestial abode. From thence thou ever carest diligently for thine inheritance and by thine unsleeping intercessions with Him, thou showest mercy to all.

To the degree that she is closer to God than all those who have drawn nigh unto Him, by so much has the Theotokos been deemed worthy of greater audience. I do not speak of rnen alone, but also of the angelic hierarchies themselves. Isaiah writes with regard to the supreme commanders of the heavenly hosts: "And the seraphim stood round about Him" (Isaiah 6:2); but David says concerning her, "at Thy right hand stood the queen" (Ps. 44:8). Do you see the difference in position? From this comprehend also the difference in the dignity of their station. The seraphim are round about God, but the only Queen of all is near beside Him. She is both wondered at and praised by God Himself, proclaiming her, as it were, by the mighty deeds enacted with respect to Him, and saying, as it is recorded in the Song of Songs, "How fair is my companion" (cf. Song of Songs 6:4), she is more radiant than light, more arrayed with flowers than the divine gardens, more adorned than the whole world, visible and invisible. She is not merely a companion but she also stands at Cod's right hand, for where Christ sat in the heavens, that is, at the "right hand of majesty" (Heb. 1:3), there too she also takes her stand, having ascended now from earth into the heavens. Not merely does she love and is loved in return more than every other, according to the very laws of nature, but she is truly His Throne, and wherever the King sits, there His Throne is set also. And Isaiah beheld this throne amidst the choir of cherubim and called it "high" and "exalted" (Isaiah 6:1), wishing to make explicit how the station of the Mother of God far trancer Is that of the celestial hosts.

For this reason the Prophet introduces the angels themselves as glorifying the God come from her, saying, "Blessed be the glory of the L,ord from His Place" (Ezek. 3:12). Jacob the patriarch, beholding this throne by way of types (enigmata), said, "How dreadful is this Place! This is none other than the House of God, and this is the Gate of Heaven" (Gen. 28:17). But David, joining himself to the multitude of the saved, who are like the strings of a musical instrument or like differing voices from different generations made harmonious in one faith through the Ever-Virgin, sounds a most melodic strain in praise of her, saying: "I shall commemorate thy name in every generation and generation. Therefore shall peoples give praise unto thee for ever, and unto the ages of ages." Do you see how the entire creation praises the Virgin Mother, and not only in times past, but "for ever, and unto the ages of ages"? Thus it is evident that throughout the whole course of the ages, she shall never cease from benefacting all creation, and I mean not only created nature seen round about us, but also the very supreme commanders of the heavenly hosts, whose nature is immaterial and transcendent. Isaiah shows us clearly that it is only through her that they together with us both partake of and touch God, that Nature which defies touch, for he did not see the seraphim take the coal from the altar without mediation, but with tongs, by means of which the coal touched the prophetic lips and purified them (cf. Isaiah 6:6-7). Moses beheld the tongs of that great vision of Isaiah when he saw the bush aflame with fire, yet unconsumed. And who does not know that the Virgin Mother is that very bush and those very tongs, she who herself (though an archangel also assisted at the conception) conceived the Divine Fire without being consumed, Him that taketh away the sins of the world, Who through her touched mankind and by that ineffable touch and union cleansed us entirely. Therefore, she only is the frontier between created and uncreated nature, and there is no man that shall come to God except he be truly illumined through her, that Lamp truly radiant with divinity, even as the Prophet says, "God is in the midst of her, she shall not be shaken'(Ps. 45:5).

If recompense is bestowed according to the measure of love for God, and if the man who loves the Son is loved of Him and of His Father and becomes the dwelling place of Both, and They mystically abide and walk in him, as it is recorded in the Master's Gospel, who, then, will love Him more than His Mother? For, He was her only-begotten Son, and moreover she alone among women gave birth knowing no spouse, so that the love of Him that had partaken of her flesh might be shared with her twofold. And who will the only-begotten Son love more than His Mother, He that came forth from Her ineffably without a father in this last age even as He came forth from the Father without a mother before the ages'? How indeed could He that descended to fulfill the Law not multiply that honor due to His Mother over and above the ordinances of the Law?

Hence, as it was through the Theotokos alone that the Lord came to us, appeared upon earth and lived among men, being invisible to all before this time, so likewise in the endless age to come, without her mediation, every emanation of illuminating divine light, every revelation of the mysteries of the Godhead, every form of spiritual gift, will exceed the capacity of every created being. She alone has received the all-pervading fulness of Him that filleth all things, and through her all may now contain it, for she dispenses it according to the power of each, in proportion and to the degree of the purity of each. Hence she is the treasury and overseer of the riches of the Godhead. For it is an everlasting ordinance in the heavens that the inferior partake of what lies beyond being, by the mediation of the superior, and the Virgin Mother is incomparably superior to all. It is through her that as many as partake of God do partake, and as many as know God understand her to be the enclosure of the Uncontainable One, and as many as hymn God praise her together with Him. She is the cause of what came before her, the champion of what came after her and the agent of things eternal. She is the substance of the prophets, the principle of the apostles, the firm foundation of the martyrs and the premise of the teachers of the Church . She is the glory of those upon earth, the joy of celestial beings, the adornment of all creation. She is the beginning and the source and root of unutterable good things; she is the summit and consummation of everything holy.

O divine, and now heavenly, Virgin, how can I express all things which pertain to thee? How can I glorify the treasury of all glory? Merely thy memory sanctifies whoever keeps it, and a mere movement towards thee makes the mind more translucent, and thou dost exalt it straightway to the Divine. The eye of the intelfect is through thee made limpid, and through thee the spirit of a man is illumined by the sojourning of the Spirit of God, since thou hast become the steward of the treasury of divine gifts and their vault, and this, not in order to keep them for thyself, but so that thou mightest make created nature replete with grace. Indeed, the steward of those inexhaustible treasuries watches over them so that the riches may be dispensed; and what could confine that wealth which wanes not? Richly, therefore, bestow thy mercy and thy graces upon all thy people, this thine inheritance, O Lady! Dispel the perils which menace us. See how greatly we are expended by our own and by aliens, by those without and by those within. Uplift all by thy might: mollify our fellow citizens one with another and scatter those who assault us from without-like savage beasts. Measure out thy succor and healing in proportion to our passions, apportioning abundant grace to our souls and bodies, s fficient for every necessity. And although we may prove incapable of containing thy bounties, augment our capacity and in this manner bestow them upon us, so that being both saved and fortified by thy grace, we may glorify the pre-eternal Word Who was incarnate of thee for our sakes, together with His unoriginate Father and the life-creating Spirit, now and ever and unto the endless ages. Amen.

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"Never have our children pick between God and education."

A timely reminder as school is starting for many families in the US.

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His Grace Zachariah Mar Nicholovos

(Orthodox Herald) - Blessings to the Vicars, Assistant Vicars, and faithful of the Northeast American Diocese, especially our students.

Dearly beloved,

As many of you are preparing yourselves for a new chapter in your lives, whether it be in a new grade, entering into Middle School or High School, or beginning your College Education, or Post Graduate education, we remind you of your vocation – to be a child of God. When we read the Holy Scriptures, taken from Wisdom of Sirach 10:5, we read “The success of a man is in the hand of the Lord…” In this day and age, there are many different hands offered to you. These hands may be ones that bring you only temporary happiness. Seek the Hand of God which brings you eternal joy, which is in the life of His Church, and never sacrifice your life as a Christian, even for your academic career.

Finally to the parents. It is true that our children learn from brilliant and noble teachers. However, many parents fail to realize, they are the first and truest teacher of their son and/or daughter. Parents are not only called to encourage their children to pray, but also to pray with them. You are called to ensure your children are participating in the Divine Services held in the Church. Parents are called to encourage a healthy balance in all things in the lives of their children. Never have our children pick between God and education (or sports or social events for that matter). God must come first in all things, and then only their education and other aspirations will come true. If our elders and children are faithful to God, God will surely be faithful to them. Always encourage your children in love and, never compare them to other children, lest you plant the seed of jealousy in their hearts.

Finally, to our clergy, especially our Vicars and Assistant Vicars; we direct you to have college freshmen fill out the attached form, and have this form submitted via email to mgocsmcampusministry@gmail.com by Sunday, September 1, 2013. This is to ensure the MGOCSM of our Diocese is able to reach out to our students and provide spiritual resources to them on a consistent basis.

May the God Who surpasses the knowledge of this world; bless our students and their parents this coming academic year, so they may become fruitful citizens of the Kingdom of God, and faithful stewards to our society.

Yours in our Lord,

Zachariah Nicholovos, Metropolitan
Northeast American Diocese
CK No. 13/2013
August 16, 2013

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Bp. Angaelos, General Bishop, Coptic Orthodox Church (UK)

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Please pray for our Egyptian brothers

Please pray for our brothers in Egypt. Countless churches defaced or destroyed, murder and abuse in the streets and in the churches, and no end in sight.

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A FATHER had a family of sons who were perpetually quarreling among themselves. When he failed to heal their disputes by his exhortations, he determined to give them a practical illustration of the evils of disunion; and for this purpose he one day told them to bring him a bundle of sticks. When they had done so, he placed the faggot into the hands of each of them in succession, and ordered them to break it in pieces. They tried with all their strength, and were not able to do it. He next opened the faggot, took the sticks separately, one by one, and again put them into his sons’ hands, upon which they broke them easily. He then addressed them in these words: “My sons, if you are of one mind, and unite to assist each other, you will be as this faggot, uninjured by all the attempts of your enemies; but if you are divided among yourselves, you will be broken as easily as these sticks.”

-Aesop's Fables

"The Father and His Sons"

As the deer pants for the water brooks,
So pants my soul for You, O God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
When shall I come and appear before God?
My tears have been my food day and night,
While they continually say to me,
“Where is your God?”

When I remember these things,
I pour out my soul within me.
For I used to go with the multitude;
I went with them to the house of God,
With the voice of joy and praise,
With a multitude that kept a pilgrim feast.

Why are you cast down, O my soul?
And why are you disquieted within me?
Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him
For the help of His countenance.

O my God, my soul is cast down within me;
Therefore I will remember You from the land of the Jordan,
And from the heights of Hermon,
From the Hill Mizar.

Deep calls unto deep at the noise of Your waterfalls;
All Your waves and billows have gone over me.

The Lord will command His lovingkindness in the daytime,
And in the night His song shall be with me—
A prayer to the God of my life.

I will say to God my Rock,
“Why have You forgotten me?
Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?”

As with a breaking of my bones,
My enemies reproach me,
While they say to me all day long,
“Where is your God?”

Why are you cast down, O my soul?
And why are you disquieted within me?
Hope in God;
For I shall yet praise Him,
The help of my countenance and my God.

- Psalm 42 (Masoretic)

"Yearning for God in the Midst of Distresses"

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Notes from Executive Committee of the Assembly of Bishops

(AOB) - The Executive Committee of the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America held an official meeting at the Greek Orthodox Archdiocesan headquarters in New York on Tuesday, August 13. Under the chairmanship of His Eminence Archbishop Demetrios, the Executive Committee made final preparations for the fourth general Assembly of Bishops meeting in September. The members of the Executive Committee also reviewed the process by which the Assembly would reach consensus, when required. An issue of such importance it can't be overstated. Getting this right will be a major requirement for the success of the committee. It is worth stating that this very issues is one of the primary impediments to holding the upcoming Great and Holy Council. 

Participating in the meeting were: Archbishop Demetrios (Ecumenical Patriarchate); Metropolitan Philip (Patriarchate of Antioch, by phone); Archbishop Justinian (Patriarchate of Moscow); Bishop Longin (Patriarchate of Serbia, by phone); Archbishop Nicolae (Patriarchate of Romania); Metropolitan Joseph (Patriarchate of Bulgaria); Metropolitan Antony, Treasurer of the Assembly (Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the USA); and Bishop Basil, Secretary of the Assembly (Patriarchate of Antioch, by phone). Metropolitan Dimitri (Patriarchate of Georgia) was unable to participate.

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Muslim Brotherhood on rampage, govt. to use deadly force

(Fox News) - Attacks on Coptic Christian churches in Egypt continued for a second day Thursday, the country’s state-run news agency said, as Muslim Brotherhood supporters torched a church in a province outside of Cairo.

Egypt's MENA agency said supporters of ousted President Mohammed Morsi set fire to the Prince Tadros church in the province of Fayoum, where three similar attacks occurred on other churches the day before.

Ishaq Ibrahim from The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights group, documented as many as 39 incidents of violence against churches, monasteries, Coptic schools and shops in different parts of the country on Wednesday. Violence across Egypt in the past two days has left at least 638 dead and 4,200 injured, according to Health Ministry figures.

Looking to crack down on church-related attacks, Egyptian authorities on Thursday referred 84 people in Suez, some Muslim Brotherhood protesters, to military prosecutors on charges of murder and burning churches, the MENA news agency said, Reuters reports.

The attacks drew a sharp rebuke from State Department Spokeswoman Jen Psaki, who said they “risk further aggravating an already fragile atmosphere.”

“We are outraged and deplore in the strongest terms the reprehensible attacks of the past few days against numerous Coptic Christian churches,” Psaki said during a Thursday briefing. “There can be absolutely no place for such violence in Egypt, and we call on all of Egypt's leaders to condemn such attacks.”

“The government has a responsibility to create an atmosphere where Egyptians can exercise their universal rights, including free assembly, expression, and media,” she added.

And also...

(Fox News) - Egypt's government has vowed to strengthen its crackdown on Muslim Brotherhood protesters, with the Interior Ministry saying on state television Thursday that security forces will use live ammunition to counter attacks against themselves or state buildings, hours after demonstrators torched two government facilities in Giza.

The Muslim Brotherhood, remaining defiant, said earlier in the day that it would not back down in the wake of Wednesday's violence that left more than 500 dead, calling for supporters to "bring down this military coup."

State television footage showed firefighters evacuating employees from the larger of the two offices in Giza, Cairo's twin city on the west bank of the Nile River, while it was being attacked. Police arrested several protesters.

Witnesses told Reuters that hundreds of Muslim Brotherhood supporters, carrying pictures of former President Mohammed Morsi and of those killed Wednesday, also marched in Alexandria.

"We will push until we bring down this military coup," Muslim Brotherhood spokesman Gehad El-Haddad wrote on Twitter, according to Reuters.

Egypt's government, in a statement, called the demonstrations "terrorist acts" and a "criminal plan to demolish the pillars of the Egyptian state," according to Reuters.

Meanwhile, successive attacks on Coptic Christian churches continued for a second day, according to Egypt's official news agency and human rights advocates.

Egypt's MENA agency said Morsi supporters set fire to the Prince Tadros church in the province of Fayoum, nearly 50 miles southwest of Cairo. The same province witnessed similar attacks on at least three churches in different villages on Wednesday.

El-Haddad said early Thursday that the Muslim Brotherhood would remain "non-violent" in their demonstrations, but later took a different stance, saying that the group has been having a difficult time trying to persuade its members to be peaceful in the wake of Wednesday's bloodshed.

"After the blows and arrests and killings that we are facing emotions are too high to be guided by anyone,'" he told Reuters. "It's not about Morsi anymore. Are we going to accept a new military tyranny in Egypt or not?'"

El-Haddad added that Muslim Brotherhood currently can not account for the whereabouts of several of its leaders, calling it a "very strong blow," to the group.

On Thursday, President Barack Obama told reporters that the U.S. is canceling a joint military exercise with Egypt amid the violence, saying "our traditional operations can not be continued as usual as people are being killed in the streets.”

The U.S. has not declared Morsi's ouster a coup, a move that would require the Obama administration to suspend $1.3 billion in annual military aid.

The death toll in Wednesday's crackdown, which stands at 638, according to the latest Health Ministry figures, made it by far the deadliest day since the 2011 popular uprising that toppled longtime ruler and autocrat Hosni Mubarak. The Health Ministry said Thursday that 4,200 people were wounded.

The casualties were mostly in Cairo, where police in riot gear bulldozed two protest camps that had been the flashpoint of growing unrest following Morsi's July 3 ouster.

Mohammed Fathallah, the ministry spokesman, said that blood-soaked bodies lined up at a mosque-turned-morgue in Nasr City were not included in the official figure. Reuters counted 228 bodies at the mosque.

Inside the building, the names the dead were scribbled on white sheets covering the bodies, some of which were charred, and a list with 265 names was plastered on the wall. Posters of Morsi were piled up on in one corner as the heat made the stench from the corpses almost unbearable.

Many people in the mosque complained that authorities were preventing them from obtaining permits to bury their dead, although the Muslim Brotherhood announced that several funerals had been held for identified victims on Thursday. Fathallah denied the allegations of permits denied.

Cairo, a city of some 18 million people, was uncharacteristically quiet Thursday, with only a fraction of its usually hectic traffic and many stores and government offices shuttered. Many people hunkered down at home for fear of more violence. Banks and the stock market were closed.

Wednesday's violence prompted Interim President Adly Mansour to declare a month-long state of emergency and impose a 7 p.m.-to-6 a.m. curfew in the city, along with Alexandria, and 12 other provinces, ordering the armed forces to support the police in efforts to restore law and order and protect state facilities.

Backed by helicopters, police on Wednesday fired tear gas and used armored bulldozers to plow into the barricades at the two protest camps on opposite ends of Cairo. Morsi's supporters had been camped out since before he was ousted by a July 3 coup that followed days of mass protests by millions of Egyptians demanding that he step down.

The smaller camp — near Cairo University in Giza — was cleared of protesters relatively quickly, but it took about 12 hours for police to take control of the main sit-in site near the Rabaah al-Adawiya Mosque in Nasr City that has served as the epicenter of the pro-Morsi campaign and had drawn chanting throngs of men, women and children only days earlier.

After the police moved on the camps, street battles broke out in Cairo and other cities across Egypt. Government buildings and police stations were attacked, roads were blocked, Interior Minister Mohammed Ibrahim said.

At one point, protesters trapped a police Humvee on an overpass near the Nasr City camp and pushed it off, according to images posted on social networking sites that showed an injured policeman on the ground below, near a pool of blood and the overturned vehicle.

Three journalists were among the dead: Mick Deane, 61, a cameraman for British broadcaster Sky News; Habiba Ahmed Abd Elaziz, 26, a reporter for the Gulf News, a state-backed newspaper in the United Arab Emirates; and Ahmed Abdel Gawad, who wrote for Egypt's state-run newspaper Al Akhbar. Deane and Elaziz were shot to death, their employers said, while the Egyptian Press Syndicate, a journalists' union, said it had no information on how Gawad was killed.

Interim Prime Minister Hazem el-Beblawi said in a televised address to the nation that it was a "difficult day" and that he regretted the bloodshed, but offered no apologies for moving against the protesters, saying they were given ample warnings to leave and he had tried foreign mediation efforts. El-Beblawi added that the government could not indefinitely tolerate a challenge to authority that the 6-week-old protests represented.

"We want to see a civilian state in Egypt, not a military state and not a religious state," he said.

Despite the curfew, sporadic clashes continued in Cairo through the evening.

By early afternoon, dozens of Morsi supporters were blocking a main road near the site of the Nasr City camp, disrupting traffic.

In the city of Assiut, south of Cairo, a police station was hit by two mortar shells Wednesday night fired by suspected Morsi supporters, according to officers there who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to reporters.

As the fighting intensified Wednesday, Mohamed ElBaradei abruptly resigned as Egypt's interim vice president. In a letter sent to Mansour, ElBaradei cited "decisions I do not agree with" regarding the government's crackdown.

"It has become difficult for me to continue bearing responsibility for decisions that I do not agree with and whose consequences I fear," ElBaradei wrote. "I cannot bear the responsibility for one drop of blood.''

The National Salvation Front, the main opposition group that he headed during Morsi's year in office, said it regretted his departure and complained that it was not consulted in his decision to step down. Tamarod, the youth group behind the mass anti-Morsi protests that preceded the coup, said ElBaradei was dodging his responsibility at a time when his services were needed.

On Thursday, Reuters reported that Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan had called for the United Nations Security Council to convene quickly to discuss the crisis.

Speaking at a press conference in Turkey's capital, Ankara, Erdogan said "Those who remain silent in the face of this massacre are as guilty as those who carried it out."

Secretary of State John Kerry said the violence in Egypt is deplorable and is a serious blow to reconciliation efforts, and that it runs counter to Egyptians' aspirations for peace.

Morsi, Egypt's first freely elected president, had just completed one year in office when he was toppled. He has largely been held incommunicado, but was visited by European Union Foreign Policy Chief Catherine Ashton and an African delegation. Ashton reported that Morsi is well and has access to television and newspapers.

Several bids by the United States, the European Union and Gulf Arab states to reconcile the two sides in Egypt in an inclusive political process have failed, with the Brotherhood insisting that Morsi must first be freed along with several of the group's leaders who have been detained in connection with incitement of violence.

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Assembly of Bishops meeting in September

So far the individual committees have spent their time collecting data. They now know who their priests are and where they serve, which youth groups are active and what they are doing, the legal entities in existence, and how different jurisdictions do things. The next step is to do something with that data. We'll see what Chicago produces.

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(AOB) - The Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America will hold its annual meeting September 17-19, 2013 at the Chicago Marriott in Schaumburg, Illinois. This is the fourth Annual Meeting of the Assembly. The agenda, which includes discussion of the Assembly’s vision, proposals for canonical restructuring, and an Assembly-sponsored national youth conference, can be found here. The Assembly requests the prayers of all clergy, monastics, and laity.

The Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops is comprised of all 65 active Orthodox hierarchs serving the United States, Canada, and Mexico.

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Stay abreast of suffering in Egypt - the Coptic Defense League

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Syrian "rebels" destroy church, terrorize Christians in area

(AINA) - The Antiochian Orthodox church of Sts. Sergius and Bacchus was a landmark of al-Thawrah (also known as al-Tabqah). It was an impressive, modern structure with a large yard, surrounded by a high wall and well-situated on a main street near the corniche -- a well landscaped area hugging the southern bank of Lake Assad which was popular with locals going on an evening stroll. Its elegant dome, surmounted by a cross, could be seen from all parts of the Third Quarter (also known as Hayy al-Ishtirakiyah), where it was located.

Spiritually, this church was under the jurisdiction of the archdiocese of Aleppo, the metropolitan of which, Boulos al-Yazigi, was kidnapped (and allegedly murdered) on April 22 of this year, along with the Syriac Orthodox metropolitan of the same city, Mor Gregorios Youhanna Ibrahim. It was built between 1985 and 1994, on land offered by the al-Thawrah's city council, and could accommodate up to 300 worshippers. Moreover, not only did this church serve more than 250 Orthodox families, but it was also used by local Christian denominations which did not have their own places of worship, including the small Syriac Orthodox congregation.

This was also one of only two Christian places of worship in the town, the other being the small church of St. George, which belonged to the Assyrian Church of the East. Built around 1973, along with a community hall, this was located in the older part of al-Thawrah, known locally as al-Qaryah (the village). Around 2000, a plot of land in the Third Quarter was purchased by this community in order to build a new church, closer to the three quarters that housed those working in the Euphrates dam -- and where the bulk of the Assyrians lived. Due to lack of funding, however, this project never materialised and, perhaps, for the better.

On February 11, rebel fighters from the Islamist Jihadist "al-Nusra Front" -- designated by the USA, UN, Australia and UK as a terrorist organisation -- took control of the city and its strategic hydroelectric dam, the largest of its kind in the country. They also seized control of the three quarters that housed dam workers and in which, of course, stood the Orthodox Church of Sts. Sergius and Bacchus, and in which most of the Christians were settled.

Christian eyewitnesses who fled al-Thawrah, now displaced in other parts of Syria, as well as in Lebanon and Turkey, tell of religious discrimination by the rebels, as well as forced confiscation of Christian possessions and properties, with many items being sold on the black market in order to purchase weapons and ammunition. Even the churches weren't spared.

"The 'Free Syrian Army' demolished the [Sts. Sergius and Bacchus] church," lamented one refugee, "They tore up the sanctuary curtains, Bibles and other holy books, and broke all the crosses, chairs and icons of Jesus and the saints. They stole electrical appliances like fans, chandeliers and lights. They took whatever was in the church, and sold it all. There is nothing there now."

There is no hope, however, for the Christians to return and rebuild after the conflict subsides -- that's if it indeed subsides. They were once considered better off than their relatives and friends who still lived in the villages they had migrated from, but are now destitute, having lost everything -- their homes, businesses, and even personal belongings.

"Even though I have left," recounted another Assyrian refugee, "the terrorists still call and text me from there, on my cell phone, to bother me. They recently called and told me: 'If you attempt to return to al-Tabqah we will cut off your head and display it on the mosque so that all the Muslims there can see it and be proud of it.' They say other things too, but what they say is so disturbing, that I keep my phone switched off unless I really need to use it."

Whilst it may be easy to switch off a cell phone, and ignore such threats, it is not so easy to shake off the trauma of dispossession and loss. After spending up to 45 years in a town which became their home, many of these refugees managed to escape with nothing but the clothes on their backs. "We have lost everything," said the head of an Assyrian household displaced from al-Thawrah, "There is nothing for us over there now, nothing to return to. We just need help to get out of here and settle in a country that's safe."

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Muslim Brotherhood sets St. George Church ablaze

(IBTimes) - Supporters of ousted Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi have attacked churches in Dilga, Menya and Sohag after government security forces backed by armoured cars and bulldozers stormed protest camps outside Cairo's Rabaa al-Adawiya mosque.

Coptic churches were attacked after hundreds of Muslim Brotherhood members were feared dead when troops used live bullet rounds and teargas to clear a protest camp in Cairo.

The Churches of Abraham and the Virgin Mary in Menya were burning after Morsi supporters set fire to the outside of the building exteriors and smashed through doors.

Russia Today reported that at least 1,000 pro-Morsi protesters were involved in the attack before police armed with teargas dispersed them.

Muslim Brotherhood members also threw firebombs at Mar Gergiss church in Sohag, a city with a large community of Coptic Christians who represents up to 10 percent of Egypt's 84 million people, causing it to burn down, the official MENA news agency said.

Protesters threw molotov cocktails at the Bon Pasteur Catholic Church and Monastery in Suez, setting it ablaze and breaking windows.

The development came after Gulf News newspaper confirmed that its Egypt correspondent Habiba Abdel Aziz had been killed by sniper fire in Cairo.

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Antiochian priest is received into Assyrian Church of the East

By way of clarification: I was informed by someone in the know about this that no release was given from the Antiochian Archdiocese. He simply informed them of his intent and made the change.

(Assyrian Church) - On the Fourth Sunday of Summer, 28 July 2013, His Grace Mar Awa Royel, Bishop of the Diocese of California, formally and publicly received the Rev’d Qashisha Ephraim Ashur Alkhas into the Assyrian Church of the East for the Diocese of California. The reception by clerical confession of faith, oath of obedience and vesting was given and completed before the witness of the clergy and faithful at Mar Zaia Cathedral in Modesto, California.

​On 14 July, Fr. Ephraim was officially but privately received into the Assyrian Church as a priest of the Diocese of California. He was received from the Diocese of Los Angeles of the North American Archdiocese of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch (الروم الأرثوذكس).

​Fr. Ephraim grew up in Saint Mary’s Assyrian Church of the East in North Hollywood, later Tarzana. Here he was baptized by Qashisha Barkho Oshana. During his teenage years he enjoyed participating in the daily services at St Mary’s. He learned to love the Church and her services through the Very Rev’d Cor-Bishop George Bet-Rasho and Rev. Deacon Dan Daniel, his close lifetime mentor and friend. He was tonsured and ordained a Reader by His Holiness Mar Dinkha IV, Catholicos-Patriarch, at the new St. Mary’s church in Tarzana, California, in the Summer of 2001. After completing high school and receiving his B.A. degree in Spanish Literature, he continued his studies at Saint Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary where he completed his MDiv in 2010. He was ordained to the Holy Priesthood on 28 June 2009, having been a deacon since 2008.

​He and his wife Elaine live in Modesto, with their daughters Shoshanna and Elishwa. Fr. Ephraim will serve the Diocese as an assistant priest and serve full time in the offices of CIRED (Commission on Inter-Church Relations and Education Development), and will be continuing his graduate-level studies at the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, California.

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Orthodox, Catholic youth at Russian monastery service trip

Moscow (AsiaNews) - A group of Catholic and Orthodox students from various nations is taking part in a summer work camp on the Solovki Islands, one of the most symbolic sites in Russia, a symbol of spirituality, but also of the cruel Soviet gulag system.

The initiative is sponsored by the Moscow Department for Interregional Cooperation and Relations with Religious Organisations, together with the Youth Department of the Moscow Patriarchate, in cooperation with the 'St Andrew the First Called' Fund.

Participants will stay until mid-August at a camping site, living in tents in accordance with the Benedictine rule 'Ora et Labora' (Pray and Work), organisers said.

Some will do small jobs to improve the Solovki Monastery Museum, like stacking firewood for the winter. Others will work at the monastery's publishing house or take part in archaeological digs.

Guided tours to local sites of historical and artistic interest are planned, Pavel Fedosov, a contributor to the 'St Andrew the First Called' Fund, told blagoves-info.ru, a Russian religious website.

It is the first initiative of volunteering to mark the 1025th anniversary of the Baptism of ancient Russia, which took place in solemn form in late July between Moscow, Kiev and Minsk, said Hieromonk Dimitri (Pershin), from the Commission of the Diocesan Missionary Council in Moscow.

The priest said he hoped the young people, who left on 28 July, will "find an inner beauty," as they work to restore the outer beauty of the spiritual and cultural legacy of the infamous White Sea archipelago.

As the monk noted, Catholic youth from Ukraine, Italy and Poland are also involved in the project, "young people who wish to learn more about Orthodox traditions, the history of the monastery and that of the Solovki prison where people of many nationalities and denominations were locked up, including a Latvian Catholic bishop, Mgr Boleslaw Sloska".

Meanwhile, the city of Moscow hopes that in the future the project will find new donors, and enable more young people to share such an experience.

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