Join Michael as he offers a reflection on how and why the liturgical life of the church should be lived continuously both inside and outside of the church walls, how Christ teaches and demonstrates this in the Gospel, and how we can sometimes make our liturgical worship a requirement instead of a means to draw closer to Christ and love others.

Join Michael as he discusses the Book of Job as a case study in suffering and the importance of how we receive our suffering; how it is often what defines our salvation and belief in and relationship to God; what God gives and does not give to us in our suffering; and how our suffering can be a mystery and those closest to us can often create obstacles for us to receive it well.

What’s the difference between testing and temptation? How can we discern God’s at work in our lives versus the enemy’s attacks? Why does the Greek in the scriptures use the same word for testing and temptation? Join Michael as he addresses these questions and compares and contrasts testing and temptation.

Cancel culture is a culture of hate, division, and destruction. Join Michael as he uses the Gospels and other scripture to show just how wicked this culture is; what the current culture is doing to us; why we are knowingly or unknowingly participating in it; and what we should do to combat it.

So many people love a good conspiracy theory. But these theories do damage and harm to individuals, communities, and our society. Join Michael as he discusses the primary reasons people believe them and why doing so is antithetical to our faith.

Great Lent is a holy and sacred time of year yet we can turn it into a secular practice and experience if we are not careful. Join Michael as he discusses our understanding and participation in Lent, and how to avoid subtle ways that lead us to experience Lent less than how we should.

Join Michael as he discusses what eros and agape really mean and why they cannot be separated, how growth in love is deeply linked to suffering, how disordered desire can grip us, how we never truly sin alone, and how it always affects both us and others when we act on our disordered desires.

Join Michael as he discusses why we need separation that is holy before we can have true unity with each other; and how many are choosing an unholy type of separation based on fear, ideologies, and other things are the entry to the wide gate leading to destruction.

Join Michael as he examines what it means to experience true freedom, and why what we think is freedom is a form of bondage we don’t recognize.

Join Michael as he shows why restraint is Christ-like and liberating, and the path of ultimate freedom out of the self-inflicted tyranny of our own thoughts and behaviors.

We live in a consumer culture. Businesses gather and sell data and information about us to target us as consumers. We are increasingly treated more like consumers than persons. The Christmas season for many has become nothing more than frenzied consumerism. John Michael as he discusses the human person in the context of consumer culture, comparing and contrasting the language of consuming used in our Liturgy and throughout the Bible with modern notions of consuming and how this relates to our love and growth as human persons.

Join Michael for a discussion of the primacy of focusing on loving more not sinning less and why this will be the basis of how God judges our lives.

Join Michael in a discussion about what the Scriptures and our Holy Tradition teach us about the importance of clothing as it relates to salvation, communion, or lack thereof, and what our attitudes and actions toward clothing reveal about us individually and culturally.

Join Michael as he discusses questions about why good people suffer, bad people thrive, and reconciling this with the goodness of God.

Join Michael in a discussion about an encounter he had with man with severe facial injuries, and what it caused him to reflect on concerning the face of Christ and the theological understanding of our faces that should guide our daily encounters with everyone.

Join Michael in a discussion about how many people are haunted by a spiritual reality they consciously or unconsciously acknowledge, especially during times of tragedy and loss, and how to minister to them through relationship and storytelling.

Fr. Seraphim explains what it really means to be free to become who you are.

The idea of sacredness and the way it is manifested in space, The whole world is sacred, not because of our memories and experiences but because of God.

Fr. Seraphim Aldea delivers a talk in Atlanta, Georgia, about the importance of humility in extending our view of the world.

At times, we are reduced to the empty shell of our being. How do we survive when there is no life in us? Working under obedience can carry us through this desert; it can empty the mind, so that the mind can be filled once again with Life by the Giver of Life.

The Feast of Theophany, when God the Trinity reveals Himself to us.

What would happen if we were all martyred for the Truth of Christ?

If your aim is to be 100% happy, 100% of the time, you can be 100% certain that you will fail into utter misery. We are constantly being fed ready-made recipes for happiness, impersonal visions of what happiness looks like, false idols of who we should be in order to be happy. We can grow from the darkness in our lives, as much as we grown from its light. Happiness comes from unexpected places and we should always be ready to embrace it. If we are blinded by these unreal visions of happiness, we might just let true happiness pass by unnoticed.

This battle is now way above our heads. We need to humbly wait in the loving palm of Christ.

Fr. Seraphim Aldea explains the hiatus from recording the podcast for 18 months.

We sometimes pray very hard for Christ to release us from our sin, but it feels as if He just looks away and doesn't want to help. Almost always, this betrays a much more serious sin in us, hiding underneath the one that troubles us. Pride, judgement, and condemnation of others can prevent Christ from releasing us from our sin.

The opinion of others can destroy one's self-esteem. We need to found our life on Christ's values, regardless of the response that generates in those around us. We may be unpopular, but we are truly ourselves, and that is worth carrying this Cross for.

Fr. Seraphim shares a message of forgiveness at Christmas.

The devil wants us to forget him. His ultimate success would be to make us believe that he is not even real, that he is just the product of our imagination. Once that happens, the flood-gates of sin are wide open in us and our salvation is in great danger.

The story of a miracle: how God healed me and then poured a mountain of grace over us was recorded by Fr Seraphim (Aldea) at Mull Monastery (The Orthodox Monastery of All Celtic Saints), on the Isle of Mull.

Fr. Seraphim gives an update on the monasteries.

Fr. Seraphim gives a short update.

Fr. Seraphim encourages viewers to take time away before resetting their lives.

Reading versus Lived Experience of Jesus Christ (w/ Fr. Seraphim Aldea)

Finding work as a freelance writer is hard enough even in fields with little competition. However, there are several niches where that competition is off the charts. If you plan to make a living writing about one of those, you’ll need to bring your A-game. Some examples of highly-contested niches include finance and (surprisingly) psychedelics. […]

The post What Are the Most Contested Fields for Freelance Writers? appeared first on Leaving Work Behind.

Fr. Steven. Ritter asks: Is there a way we can break out of our obsession with the things of this world?