Prophecy imparts holy images, inspiring imageless prayer of the Holy Spirit in the heart, the Spirit’s unceasing intercession for all in the hidden heart of Christ. Prophecy has nothing to do with self-centred fantasy or self-obsessed day dreams, but with the purified imagination regenerated in the heart by the glory of grace, prophecy working together with imageless prayer to deify… Read more »
Philokalia is love of the beauty of goodness and the goodness of beauty, but in our times nihilism divorces drab goodness from beauty and seductive beauty from goodness, having lost all sense of the beauty of truth or holiness. Separation of goodness from beauty spawns ugliness, whilst division of beauty from goodness spews vacuous glitter. But beauty tempts only when beauty is… Read more »
The Great Blessing of the Waters on Theophany Eve renews our baptism in the waters of the Holy Spirit through Christ’s Baptism of the wisdom of uncreated fire, the wisdom of uncreated light and the wisdom of uncreated glory. The fire of wisdom purifies the heart, the flame of uncreated light illumines the mind in the heart and the tongues… Read more »
AD MAJOREM GLORIAM DEI: SOLI DEO GLORIA The heavens declare the glory of God by revealing an eternal dance of love round the grace of love that draws everything into transcendence of time and space. This dance of love bears witness to the Spirit’s… Read more »
Saint Sophrony the Hesychast is sometimes called Saint Sophrony the Athonite because he was a monk on Most Athos between 1926 and !947 and sometimes Saint Sophrony of Essex since he was the revered elder of his monastery in Essex between 1959 and his death in 1993. Both titles reflect important periods of his life on Mount Athos and in… Read more »
The Song of the Name was wisdom song inspiring a wisdom round cell on the hill, infusing the wisdom of prophecy and prayer, prophecy renewing images, prayer transcendending images (Wisdom, Prophecy and Prayer 2013). The wisdom of prophecy regenerated images in Geoffrey of Monmouth’s ‘Life of Merlin’ with images of the Manstone’s Christly enthronement on the Stiperstones (Merlin on Manstone Mynd… Read more »
‘In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God’ John1:1). The Word names God in the beginning, unveiling the Name of completeness that the Holy Spirit knows as Truth, the Spirit of Truth knows as Way and the Way knows to be eternal Life. The Name is timeless life, living uncreated light… Read more »
I came to tell thee my Name, / I am ‘I AM’ in thy midst . / Turn, turn, and thou shall be turned; / turn and see who sees. / I am ‘I AM,’ that is my Name, / the glory belongs to God alone. / Vain, vain, the glory when confusion / reigns and the glory darkly falls. / The… Read more »
Is Christmas a dangerous blasphemy? Those who shouted for Christ to be crucified thought it was. Was Christ’s incarnation a disastrous idolatry? Many monotheists thought so, but they were confused by what they saw as his confusion. Was his crucifixion proof that he was a Jewish heretic? In which case, what did his resurrection prove? Was his ascension really his disappearance… Read more »
Uncreated energy is winged, giving creation grace to rise with heavenly wings into heavenly realms, like angels whose deified lives are winged, or Seraphic flame partaking in winged Cherubic embrace, images of the ineffable that resonate with music of unseen spheres. Uncreated energy is creative, generating wondrous ways of being renewed by the uncreated imagination, deifying elders and saints with uncreated… Read more »