St. Simons Island Orthodox Mission

You just slayed some unbelieving protestant with a brutally cutting meme? St. Ephrem would like a word with you.

The soul should be fed with the word of God: for the word of God, as St. Gregory the Theologian puts it, is the bread of angels; it is eaten by souls hungry for... God. Above all, one should practice reading the New Testament and the Psalms; when reading the Gospels and the Epistles, you should stand before the Holy Icons, but you may sit to read the Psalms. From reading the Scriptures the mind can be enlightened and changed by the transforming divine hand. It is good so to teach yourself that the mind, as it were, floats in the Law of the Lord, for by its guidance we should order our lives. It is very helpful to read the word of God when on one's own and to read the whole Bible intelligently. As a reward for this practice alone, apart from other good works, the Lord in His mercy will not abandon a man but will replenish him with the gift of understanding. For when a person nourishes his soul with the word of God, then he will be filled with the understanding of what is good and what is evil. The reading of the word of God should be done in solitude so that the whole mind of the reader is totally absorbed in the truths of the Scriptures and receives into itself from God that warmth which in solitude brings tears. From these tears, the entire person is warmed and filled with the gifts of the Spirit that cause the mind and the heart to rejoice more than does any word. St. Isaac the Syrian teaches that physical labor and the practice of reading the divine Scriptures guard one's purity, and the labor is given strength by hope and fear. For ceaseless prayer and withdrawal from people produce hope and fear in the mind. Until a person receives the Comforter, he is in need of the divine Scriptures to imprint the memory of good in his mind; and the continuous reading renews a longing for what is good and guards his soul against the subtle ways of sin. He is in need of this because he has not yet acquired the power of the Holy Spirit, which takes error away, holds captive the memories that benefit the soul, and counteracts that coldness that comes about when the mind is distracted. When, however, the power of the Spirit descends upon the active power of the soul within a person, then, in place of the law of Scripture, the commandments of the Spirit take root in the heart, and he is secretly guided by the Spirit and has no need of the help of anything sensory. For so long as the heart is learning by means of what is material, error and forgetfulness are the consequence. But when the learning comes from the Spirit, the memory is preserved inviolate. The soul must also be nourished with knowledge of the Church, of how she has been preserved from the beginning until this time, and what she endured at different times. One needs to know this not so much out of a desire to dominate others, but so as to answer the questions that might arise on occasion, and also to convince and console one's spirit. Above all, this should be done especially for oneself in order to acquire peace in the soul, according to the teaching of the Psalmist: 'Great peace has those who love Thy law, O Lord' (Ps. 118:165). - St. Seraphim of Sarov

Ok, really good material for refutation because once again, we have an Evangelical assuming they know Orthodoxy because they watched My Big, Fat, Greek Wedding (kudos to the priest who is an actual, real priest) and lumps in Orthodoxy with Catholicism. So, here we go. - "Orthodoxy did not experience the Protestant Reformation and views evangelicals as neo-Protestantsbasically, disaffected Catholics. They see little difference between evangelicals and cults and regard evange...Continue reading

To our dismay, the ecumenism of the "official" Orthodox has gone far beyond dialogue and into joint services, joint prayer, and other actions prohibited by the Canons of the Holy Church. If you want to worship the faith of the holy fathers before us, the faith handed down to us by Christ and his Apostles, we greet you with open arms. We know these times are frustrating for you all but we are here to offer True Orthodox worship. (Thank you Kenneth Lewis)

The Synaxis of the Seventy Holy Apostles sent by Christ into the world commemorates our ancestors in the faith, whose labor in the fields of harvest is now our calling. May God grant us the same perseverance as the Holy Apostles!