On Monday March 18th 2019, the Harmony Project in the University of Lampeter, inspired by the Sophia Harmony Initiative of His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, published an essay on the Harmony Project Website by Father Silouan, entitled: ‘The Practice of Harmony in Orthodox Christian Wisdom,’ There is a link to this at the bottom of the Wisdom… Read more »
In chapter 45 of his Life of St David, (c 1081-1095), Rhygyfarch tells us that St David visited the Patriarch of Jerusalem with St Teilo and St Padarn. St David returned with a portable altar, a bell, a staff and a coat, gifts which according to Rhygyfarch worked great miracles. The historical veracity of this tradition has often been contested but its… Read more »
An Orthodox Christian hermitage nestles among old stone walls, abiding unnoticed within the Cathedral City of St Davids, grounded in centuries of hallowing prayer. There is nothing spectacular to see here yet heavens open on earth when wisdom turns and sees, unveiling the Name so God’s kingdom comes. Hidden in the silence of the early hours, prayer arises to meet… Read more »
True holiness does not reside in externals but in purity of heart, which is ineffable but real. It is an offering of the heart to God, a living sacrifice that fulfils renewing prophecy in the royal priesthood of prayer of the heart. The heart offers God to God through God, which is the mystery of Holy Trinity lived in the Spirit, loved… Read more »
Saint Silouan the Athonite bears witness to love of enemies as the spiritual criterion of true Orthodox Christian Tradition. Whenever political enmity threatens to divide the Orthodox Church, the mystery of Pentecost speaks to her condition, revealing how love of enemies acknowledges the many warring tongues even as it bears witness to the one Spirit, the one flame of fire… Read more »
The experience of glorification is the revelation of God through God in God, illumining the heart with the uncreated light of the Holy Trinity. It is not some sort of spiritual inflation but rather hallowing simplicity that humbles and purifies the heart. Revelation of God is through God and unveils God in God when the Holy Spirit awakens the eye of the heart, curing… Read more »
The union of mind and heart is not a clever technique but the Spirit’s gift of awakening to the union of the Son with the Father, the Name’s mystery unveiled from God, through God in God. It is the uncreated grace of the Holy Trinity awakening the heart to the union of uncreated awareness and divine presence, God’s ‘I’ and… Read more »
The name Jesus was given to the Christ because his prophetic function was to renew revelation of the saving Name ‘I AM’ and so, by hallowing the Name, unveil the kingdom come. The prophet Isaiah had said long ago that all God’s children shall be taught by ‘I AM’ and great shall be the peace of his children. (Isaiah 54:13… Read more »
Wisdom envisioned glory in some icons of the Virgin of the Unburned Bush as a Virgin of the Flame, whose vermilion glory consumes confusion and division but not the union in difference that characterises paradise restored. She is the burning wisdom of the Spirit’s Pentecostal flame that does not consume wholesome creation but extinguishes the confusion that divides creation from… Read more »
God the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father to abide in the Son, so the union of the Father and the Son, which is the mystery of the Holy Name, is opened to us in God. It is not something we observe from without; it is revealed through God, in God, from within. Orthodox tradition sees the Patriarch Enoch as… Read more »