Join Michael for a discussion on how to avoid being paralyzed with guilt and shame over our worst failures, and experience God at work within them.

Join Michael as he recounts a story of a good friend’s nervous breakdown and his experience of theophany, theosis, repentance, and God’s beauty amidst his trauma and suffering.

Join Michael as he discusses the complementary nature of light and darkness, how both are under God’s control, and how we can understand this to maintain hope during tough times, grow in faith, and shine the Light of Christ to others.

Join Michael as he discusses how we should see and experience ourselves and others as living icons of Christ, and how we achieve this through the difficult task unknowing ourselves.

Join Michael in a discussion about prayerful and practical ways to frame our understanding in regard to our difficulties and setbacks, and deal with them in a spiritually healthy way.

Join Michael for a discussion about the meaning of hypocrisy and what Christ said about it in the Gospel, and how to understand and protect ourselves from this deadly sin that causes us to wear “masks” and fall into self-deception, deception of others, and spiritual death.

Father Seraphim reflects on the life of Saint Columba, and talks about spiritual fathers.

Fr. Seraphim reads a section, Killer Prayer, from the booklet On Prayer. "The basic thing people seem not to understand is that the point of prayer is not happiness." The text can be found at mullmonastery.com.

Fr. Seraphim Aldea discusses the current blessing of silence and solitude.

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.

After we sin, our hearts freeze. For a while, we stay away from God on purpose. We need time to heal, we need some sort of ritual of cleansing, some manner in which to make ourselves (in our own eyes) acceptable again to God. But the way back to prayer must begin as soon as possible, if possible even during the act of sin itself. The sooner we turn ourselves back to face Christ's Light, the sooner we shall drag ourselves out of the depth of our fall. Remind yourself of those who were waiting in the darkness of hell for Christ's Descent - ask for their desperate desire to be forgiven, pray for their unceasing hope that Light WILL one day find them and bring them back to Life out of the death of their hell. For those who put their trust in Christ, there is always Hope, there is always Love, there is always a way back to repentance and Life.

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

It is easy to ask for God's Word, but it is difficult to listen and accept His answer. That is because His answer reveals His Divine will and once we know that, we need to silence our own will and follow Him.

Fr. Seraphim gives a short update.

Fr. Seraphim encourages us to avoid false faces and the havoc they wreak.

What Does an Orthodox Holy Altar Look Like? (w/ Fr. Seraphim Aldea)

As a freelance writer, you’re going to run into a lot of clients that are petrified by the idea of plagiarized or stolen content. That fear is not without reason. Search engines are capable of sniffing out plagiarism or duplicate content and they penalize the blogs and websites that engage in it. That fear of […]

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Is spiritual life more difficult in our days than of old? Fr. Steven thinks so, and explains how the threat of the erosion of our personhood is something new.

In this time of troubles among the churches, we should all be looking to the light of the manger for answers.