jwickes's blog

By Fr. George Morelli

By Fr. George Morelli

By Fr. George Morelli

In almost every spiritual text anger is listed as one of several deadly sins. In his classic work, The Ladder of Divine Ascent, St. John of the Ladder discusses anger in the eighth step of the ladder, and anger's dependent vice, malice, in the ninth step of the ladder. St. John tells us: "Anger is an indication of concealed hatred, of grievance nursed. Anger is the wish to harm someone who has provoked you. Irascibility is an untimely flaring up of the heart. Bitterness is a stirring of the soul's capacity for displeasure. Anger is...a disfigurement of the soul."

By Frederica Matthewes-Green

If you hang around with Christians, you find that the same topic keeps coming up in conversation: their worries about “the culture.” Christians talk about sex and violence in popular entertainment. They talk about bias in news reporting. They talk about how their views are ignored or misrepresented. “The culture” appears to be an aggressive challenge to “the church,” and Christians keep worrying over what to do about it.

By Fr. Patrick Reardon

Speaking of the Holy Eucharist, the Fathers and early liturgical texts of the Church have recourse to the metaphor of the flaming coal (anthrax, pruna) in reference to the Lord's body. For instance, with Isaiah 6:7 obviously in mind, The Liturgy of St. James refers to "receiving the fiery coal" (labein to pyrinon anthrax) from the Eucharistic altar.

By Douglas Cramer

There is a fundamental mistake most of us make—the belief that our possessions are our own. But this is simply not true. Yes, most of us work for everything we have. But we wouldn’t have any of it if it were not given to us by God. If we believe in God, there is no denying the fact that without God we would have nothing, not even our own lives. He is the source of all, and everything returns to Him in the end.

By Fr. Patrick Reardon

Christians over the centuries have reflected deeply on the meaning of the Lord's Sabbath rest after the six days of Creation. Since no serious person imagines the Lord needed to alleviate the fatigue of His labor, the true meaning of the Lord's rest must reside in its symbolic character. Both Isaiah (40:28) and the Psalmist (121 [120]:3-4) insisted that God does not grow weary. Nor did the Creator simply abandon Creation to its own natural forces. Against this thesis of Deism, we have the testimony of Jesus, "My Father has been working until now" (John 5:17).

By Fr. Patrick Reardon

By Frederica Matthewes-Green

Glance around any room where people are gathered and a curious pattern emerges: they tend to be in pairs. At a church, a concert, a movie theater, a male head is usually near a female head of roughly the same age. Other creatures gather in herds or flocks, or peel off as solitary loners, but humans prefer the couple bond. They gravitate toward it naturally; it’s how they seem to want to go through life. Why?

By Douglas Cramer

The siren song of our culture is that we should devote our best energies to serve ourselves and see to our own needs before thinking of others. We should avoid entangling ourselves in commitments, relationships and groups that might make demands of us. The great invitation of the Church, which calls us to join with the visible Body of Christ in this world, is a radical invitation. It is a revolutionary alternative to the extreme individualism of our culture.

By Frederica Matthewes-Green

Though I’m not very informed about the Intelligent Design debate, the idea sounded inoffensive enough: scientists have not discovered a Designer, and neither can they prove there’s no Designer, so why not leave the question open? But the concept of Intelligent Design was greeted with outrage; clearly, it struck a nerve.

By Fr. Patrick Reardon

By way of showing the parabolic teaching of Jesus to be a fulfillment of biblical prophecy, the Gospel of St. Matthew (13:35) cites a line from Psalm 77(78):2: “I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things hidden from the foundation of the world.” The first half of this quotation, found in Matthew alone among the four Gospels, comes verbatim from the traditional Septuagint version of the Psalms, but no extant version of that text explains precisely where Matthew derived his wording in the verse’s second half. It is reasonable to think that he was quoting the psalm from memory, which would explain why he quoted it inexactly.

By Frederica Matthewes-Green

As I saw my children swept up into the night sky I knew I had made a terrible mistake. I held the baby in my arms, but the two older ones—Megan, 7, and David, 4—were locked behind the bar of a ferris wheel in a shopping-center carnival. They had begged and clamored until I agreed to let them board the contraption but now, as they rose into the night, they panicked and began to scream.

By Frederica Matthewes-Green

Few book titles have had the sticking power of Richard Weaver’s “Ideas Have Consequences.” Even people who’ve never read it find the blunt title instantly compelling. Weaver’s thesis was that the ideas that we absorb about the world, about the way things are or should be, inevitably direct our actions. Though the book was published in 1948, before many current bizarre ideas had fully emerged, the thesis is an eternal one. It sets people to wondering which ideas were the seeds that sprouted our present mess, and which new ideas might be helping us out of it — or further in.

Ideas about the nature of life combine in framework which can go by many names. Perhaps the word “paradigm” has become annoying through overuse, but some equivalents would be worldview, mindset, outlook, ideology, cognitive framework, or reality grid; a New Testament term is phronema. Whichever you choose, it means that mental assumptions link together and result in actions — ideas have consequences.

A few decades ago some people got a bad idea. Or perhaps the bad idea got them, and shook and confused them till the right ideas came to look strange. We might trace it to the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision, in January 1973, but even that document grew out of prior ideas. It didn’t stand alone, and it cannot be combated alone. I’d like to explore three interlocking, mutually-supporting bad ideas that sprouted during that era, and then look at some ideas about how to fix things.

By Douglas Cramer

Our spiritual sight is what gives us the capacity to discern a path through the problems we encounter, but for most of us, this capacity has been clouded and diminished by everyday life in a tarnished world. St. Symeon the New Theologian, speaking of those who are spiritually blind, writes: “They all live in darkness and walk among shadows until they have shown a contrite heart. For contrition is the gate which leads from darkness into light, and those who have not yet passed worthily through the gate have not yet entered into the light.” If we are going to see God, our spiritual vision will require contrition on our part, and supernatural help from God.

By Frederica Matthewes-Green

Last summer we had a houseful at the beach, with our children and their spouses and the seven (soon to be nine) little grandchildren. The cousins don’t see each other much, so they splashed and ran and shouted, the wind tearing at their voices. But Adam, then four, stayed by himself. He moved along the edges of the dunes, circling the family like a silent satellite. Last year, Adam received a diagnosis of autism.

By Fr. George Morelli

My introduction to Martha and Mary Home occured at our Antiochian Parish Life Conference three years ago, I saw a booth with pictures and brochures describing the work of the Home. Much to my surprise, the Home was located just a few miles from my residence. Was the Holy Spirit telling me something?

Of all mental disorders, depression is the third most prevalent with about 8% of the population suffering from it (Robins & Regier, 1991). It is also currently the leading cause of disability world-wide (Murray and Lopez, 1997). The effects of depression are varied affecting not only the patient, but family and society as well.

The Book of Job offers an early record of depression: My eye has grown dim from grief (depression), it grows weak because of all my foes," (Job 17:7, emphasis added). The prophet Jeremiah wrote: "My grief (depression) is beyond healing, my heart is sick within me" (Jeremiah 8:18, emphasis added).

The Apostles and Church Fathers also knew the deleterious effects of depression: "Worldly grief produces death," wrote St. Paul (2 Corinthians 7:10). The death to which St. Paul refers is both a social and occupational death, that is, the diminishment of function in interpersonal relationships as well as the blocking of God's love and light in the soul that leads to existential despair.

The Church Fathers described depression as dejection. About 1400 years ago St John Cassian wrote: "But first we must struggle with the demon of dejection who casts the soul into despair. We must drive him from our heart. It was this demon that did not allow Cain to repent after he had killed his brother, or Judas after he had betrayed his Master" (Philokalia I).

By Fr. George Morelli

Psychologists typically define altruism as a selfless interest for the good and welfare of others, that leads to such prosocial behaviors as cooperation, helping and sharing. Those who display courage and generosity especially in the face of barriers are considered heroically altruistic. Psychological explanations for altruism include those drawn from the relatively new sub-specialty of psychology called evolutionary psychology. This sub-specialty has an affinity with, and draws from anthropology, archeology, artificial intelligence, behavioral ecology, cognitive psychology, ethology, evolutionary biology, genetics and zoology. Such psychological explanations provide evidence that altruistic behavior helps to perpetuate the gene pool as more people survive when mutually aiding one another (Buss, 1995); that reciprocal benefit works to the welfare of all Trivers, 1971); that people inherit altruistic genes (Rushton, Fulker, Neale, Nias & Eysenck, 1986), and that modeling occurs as individuals tend to imitate those who are rewarded for prosocial, in this case altruistic behavior (Eisenberg, 1992, Morelli, 2005).

Christ's Counsel

By Fr. George Morelli                               

In private correspondence an Orthodox scholar, responding to my article, "Orthodoxy and the Science of Psychology" (Morelli, 2006a), said that in parish life "the clergy know how to make referrals for medical problems but are clueless about using clinical psychology for the behavioral-emotional problems they encounter."

I replied: "Mental health practitioners must keep up with the scientific research in their field. Likewise, educators and parents should know the techniques shown to be effective with their families and children. Clergy should also be informed of methods to aid their pastoral ministry and make proper referrals."

When I taught pastoral theology at one of our Orthodox seminaries, I emphasized that parish priests are not clinical mental health practitioners but they must be able to recognize mental disorders and make appropriate referrals. A priest is a "first line responder." He needs to know enough to assess situations and then direct the person to the proper diagnostician.

One problem that priests face is the overlap between the content of what parishioners report as spiritual problems but are in fact psychological problems. A way that priests might distinguish between the two is by using the heuristic (a method by which knowledge about a problem or situation is uncovered) that clinical psychologists use, that is, start the analysis at the most basic level and eliminate possible variables as the questioning gets more complex.

By Fr. George Morelli

The writer of Genesis said of Adam and Eve: "And God blessed them, and God said to them, 'Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it. Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh." (Genesis 1:28; 2:24) St. Paul wrote in Hebrews: "Let marriage be held in honor among all...." (Hebrews 13:4)

St. John Chrysostom typified the Orthodox Church Fathers: "From the beginning God has been revealed as the fashioner, by his providence, of this union of man and woman, and He has spoken of the two as one: 'male and female He created them'" (Homily XX on Ephesians 5:22-33http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/230120.htm). "Union" in Greek is syzygias, a term uniformly used by the Church Father to mean yoked in wedlock and the married state.

By Fr. George Morelli

"We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit which has been given to us." (Rm 5: 3-5)

There is a theme, echoed in the epistle of the 3rd Sunday of Pentecost of the Eastern Church that is found throughout scripture and the church fathers: patient endurance. In the time of the Old or First Covenant, the book of Job relates that after a series of calamities, including the violent death of his children Job (1: 21-22) says: "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return; the Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord." In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong.”

Tribulation is in the world

By Fr. George Morelli

Sometimes we are our own worst enemy. We are partially responsible for creating a problem that need not be. For example we may encounter different life situations with the idea that it is a necessity to be loved or approved by significant people around us. If we don’t have this love or approval it is perceived as awful, terrible, the end of the world, and we respond with anxiety.

By Fr. Patrick Reardon

Before ever he met the Apostle Paul, the life of young Timothy was already full of blessings. Indeed, Paul himself, among the last lines he wrote on this earth, reminded Timothy of those blessings: "But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus" (2 Timothy 3:14-15).

Both Paul and Timothy knew who were the latter's first teachers of Holy Scripture. Paul wrote earlier in this same epistle, "I call to remembrance the genuine faith that is in you, which dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am persuaded is in you also" (1:5).

These two women, Timothy's mother and grandmother, had raised him, not only in the faith but also in the study of the Sacred Writings, ta hiera grammata--sacred grammar. It was this early study of Sacred Letters, carried on in the home, that grounded the soul of young Timothy and prepared him to become, in due course, an apostle of the Church and the bishop of Ephesus. The whole Church, for the past two thousand years, owes to these two women an immense and unpayable debt of gratitude.

When, as a child, Timothy was taught the grammar of Holy Scripture, what did he learn from Lois and Eunice? Many things, to be sure, but let us consider three benefits to be ascribed to that early instruction in God's Word.

First, Timothy learned to take possession of his heart. The rich and varied narratives that enabled him to make sense of his heart. Placing his young soul under the authoritative guidance of Sacred Grammar, Timothy learned who he was, his place in this world, what God expected of him, and what he himself could expect, both during his life and at the end of it.

By Fr. Patrick Reardon

At the risk, I suppose, of being taken for a polytheist, let me confess to a strong personal misgiving about contemporary popular monotheism.

I shall describe what I mean. Modern popular monotheism is usually voiced along the following lines: "Since there is only one God, those who worship only one God must all be worshipping the same God." Those who think this way go on to urge us, often enough, to find our common moral roots in this supposedly shared monotheism. This effort will lessen international tensions, they assure us, and prepare the way for world peace. They have even been known to get together in large congresses to pray for world peace, as though they were all seeking this blessing from the same divinity.

Their venture strikes me not only as dubious and illogical but also as unbiblical. I submit that Biblical monotheism is not an agreement about a quantitative proposition with respect to the divinity. Biblical monotheism is not simply a matter of confessing one god, as distinct from two or more. Let me see if I can work myself around to an explanation.

First, those who confess only a Superior Being (a being who happens to be superior to other beings, that is to say) are not really monotheists, even if they deny the existence of all other gods. It is not the shortage of extra gods that renders a man a monotheist.

Second, the difference between polytheism and biblical monotheism is not merely quantitative. Monotheism is not a mathematical truth, nor is polytheism a mathematical problem. The thing is not quantitative. You can't get "close" to biblical monotheism. The confession of two gods comes no nearer to monotheism than the confession of a hundred. Biblical monotheism has less to do with the number of gods than with the nature of God.