Gjeilo: Blue

Hope means to keep living
amid desperation
and to keep humming
in the darkness.
Hoping is knowing that there is love,
it is trust in tomorrow
it is falling asleep
and waking up again
when the sun rises.
In the midst of a gale at sea,
it is to discover land.
In the eyes of another,
it is to see that you are understood.
As long as there is still hope
There will also be prayer . . .
And you will be held
in God's hands.

-Henri Nouwen

 

“And as He spoke, He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.”

-C.S. Lewis, The Last Battle, Chronicles of Narnia

 

“What must I do, to tame you?” asked the little prince.

“You must be very patient,” replied the fox.

“First you will sit down at a little distance from me like that, in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing. Words are the source of misunderstandings. But you will sit a little closer to me, every day...”

“The next day the little prince came back.

‘It would have been better to come back at the same hour,’ said the fox. ‘If, for example, you came at four o'clock in the afternoon, then at three o'clock I shall begin to be happy. I shall feel happier and happier as the hour advances. At four o'clock, I shall already be worrying and jumping about. I shall show you how happy I am! But if you come at just any time, I shall never know at what hour my heart is to be ready to greet you.’

‘Goodbye,’ he said.

‘Goodbye,’ said the fox. ‘And now here is my secret, a very simple secret:

It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.

-Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, 'The Little Prince'

Do not be deceived, Wormwood. Our cause is never more in danger than when a human, no longer desiring, but still intending, to do our Enemy’s will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.  

-C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

Every once in a while, life can be very eloquent.  You can go along from day to day not noticing very much, not seeing or hearing very much, and then all the sudden, when you least expect it very often, something speaks to you with such power that it catches you off guard, makes you listen whether you want to or not.  Something speaks to you out of your own life with such directness that it is as if it calls you by name and forces you to look where you have not had the heart to look before, to hear something that maybe for years you have not had the wit or the courage to hear. 

-Frederick Buechner, A Room Called Remember

Apostle

An enemy whom God has made a friend,
A righteous man discounting righteousness,
Last to believe and first for God to send,
He found the fountain in the wilderness.
Thrown to the ground and raised at the same moment,
A prisoner who set his captors free,
A naked man with love his only garment,
A blinded man who helped the world to see,
A Jew who had been perfect in the law,
Blesses the flesh of every other race
And helps them see what the apostles saw;
The glory of the lord in Jesus’ face.
Strong in his weakness, joyful in his pains,
And bound by love, he freed us from our chains.

Malcolm Guite

Lisa Lân

"We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing."

- George Bernard Shaw

art: 'Merry Old Ladies. 2003'.  Inge Løek

He will cover you with his pinions,

    and under his wings you will find refuge

Psalm 91.4

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Christ was chastised on our behalf, and suffered a penalty He did not owe, but which we owed because of the multitude of our sins; and so He became the cause of the forgiveness of our sins, because He received death for us, and transferred to Himself the scourging, the insults, and the dishonour, which were due to us, and drew down upon Himself the appointed curse, being made a curse for us . . . . . . But since being in the likeness of sinful flesh He condemned sin in the flesh, the words quoted are rightly used. And in that He made our sins His own from His love and benevolence towards us.”  

Eusebius of Caesarea

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WE IN THE LAST DAYS MAY STILL HAVE HOPE

Let My Prayer Be Set Forth in Thy Sight (arr. I. Ushakov)

Da Ispraviza, Blagovest (Let my prayer arise)

Pavel G. Chesnokov - To Thee We Sing

“I have come home at last! This is my real country! I belong here. This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it till now…Come further up, come further in!”

C.S. Lewis, 'The Last Battle'

Cosmic Voices from Bulgaria & Sofia Philharmonic Orchestra - Zaspalo e C...

Choras Bel Canto: DREAMWEAVER (Gjeilo)

No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. Each tree is recognized by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thornbushes, or grapes from briers. A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.

Luke 6.43-35

Gjeilo: Across The Vast, Eternal Sky

Rachmaninoff: Vespers, Op. 37 - II. "Blagoslovi dushe moya"

https://www.bitchute.com/video/zYumFvRcZ6iW/

Every success in anything we should refer to the Lord and with the Prophet say: 'Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to Your name give glory' (Ps. 113:9).

St Seraphim of Sarov

Fruit! The Lord seeks fruit from created man.
Only by fruit does He judge man’s life.
When death shakes the tree, may the golden apples
Of your life fall into God’s hands.

-From an Orthodox Hymn of Praise

Heresy is now an outmoded concept to many in the Church, and in secular opinion it suggests witch-hunts and extremism. Yet heresy is a reality, under whatever name it appears, and if the modern Church does not protect itself against error it will be over-thrown by it.

Edward Norman 'Anglican Difficulties'

 

Sunrise Mass (Ola Gjeilo) – Bel Canto Choir Vilnius

Ola Gjeilo - Serenity (O Magnum Mysterium)

Bless the Lord, O My Soul

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Rachmaninov Vespers - 2 Praise the Lord (Greek Chant, Ps. 104)

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

-Wendell Berry 

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky - Hymn of the Cherubim

There are two types of Christians. There are those who can say with the Apostle Paul, “I have been crucified with Christ: it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me (Galatians 2:20)”. And then there are those Christians who believe Christ was crucified so that we do not have to crucify ourselves. The first type are part of a Christianity of sacrifice, and the second are given over to the ego.

The Christian who believes he must be crucified with Christ will constantly call upon the Lord for help, but will be ever willing to take up his own cross and follow Christ. He does not expect to have an easy road, nor is he easy on himself. This type of Christian is ever looking at his own sins, his own fallen nature, and seeing how far he has fallen short of the glory of God.

The second type of Christian expects the road to be easy, sees himself as more spiritual than most, and is constantly looking to see the error in his neighbor and offer correction. He rarely calls upon the Lord for help, for he expects an easy road and only prays for help when facing an unpleasant situation. He does not take up his cross since he sees no value in suffering. This second type of Christian fails to notice that refusing to judge another brings down God’s mercy on himself.

The Lord tells both types of Christians, “If a man comes to me and does not bear his cross, he cannot be my disciple (Luke 14:26)”. Only the first type of Christian notices those words, and heeds them.

- Abbot Tryphon, Morning Offering

“The Triumph of Orthodoxy happens in my personal life when Christ becomes incarnate through my keeping of the commandments.  Orthodoxy triumphs when I become an icon of Christ through my love and kindness to all those I encounter, being a vessel of His Presence.  Orthodoxy triumphs when the falsehood of my passions are denounced and demolished and Christ is enthroned as King and God in my heart.”

-Archimandrite Sergius, Abbot of St. Tikhon’s Monastery

 “In the Orthodox ecclesial experience and tradition a sacrament is understood primarily as a revelation of the genuine nature of creation, of the world, which, however much it has fallen as "this world," will remain God's world, awaiting salvation, redemption, healing and transfiguration in a new earth and a new heaven. In other words, in the Orthodox experience a sacrament is primarily a revelation of the sacramentality of creation itself, for the world was created and given to man for conversion of creaturely life into participation in divine life. If in baptism water can become a "laver of regeneration," if our earthy food - bread and wine - can be transformed into partaking of the body and blood of Christ, if with oil we are granted the anointment of the Holy Spirit, if, to put it briefly, everything in the world can be identified, manifested and understood as a gift of God and participation in the new life, it is because all of creation was originally summoned and destined for the fulfillment of the divine economy - "then God will be all in all.” 

-Alexander Schmemann, The Eucharist: Sacrament of the Kingdom

There are people who declare themselves to be Orthodox who have become captured by the elemental spirits of the age and spend more time fighting to be right than to be good.

Fr Barnabas Powell

Radio host Mel K shares with Eric Metaxas, insights into "the underbelly of Hollywood," and looks into what's topsy-turvy about our government, the one that's supposed to be about "We the People."

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 “Lord, how good it is to be Your guest: the delicately scented wind, the mountains stretching to the sky, the waters reflecting like infinite mirrors the golden rays of the sun, the airiness of clouds. All nature secretly whispers, full of tenderness, and even the birds and beasts bear the mark of Your love. Blessed is Mother Earth with her beauty which is transient, making one long for the homeland which is eternal and where in imperishable beauty, rings out: Alleluia.”

-from the Akathist of Thanksgiving

Loss forces us to see the dominant role our environment plays in determining our happiness. Loss strips us of the props we rely on for our well-being. It knocks us off our feet and puts us on our backs. In the experience of loss, we come to the end of ourselves.

But in coming to the end of ourselves, we can also come to the beginning of a vital relationship with God. Our failures can lead us to grace and to a profound spiritual awakening. This process occurs frequently with those who suffer loss. It often begin when we face our own weaknesses and realize how much we take favorable circumstances for granted. When loss deprives us of those circumstances, our anger, depression, and ingratitude expose the true state of our souls, showing us how small we really are. We see that our identity is largely external, not internal.

Finally, we reach the point where we begin to search for a new life, one that depends less on circumstances and more on the depth of our souls. That, in turn, opens us to new ideas and perspectives, including spiritual ones. We feel the need for something beyond ourselves, and it begins to dawn on us that reality may be more than we once thought it to be. We begin to perceive hints of the divine, and our longing grows. To our shock and bewilderment, we discover that there is a Being in the universe who, despite our brokenness and sin, loves us fiercely. In coming to the end ourselves, we have come to the beginning of our true and deepest selves. We have found the One whose love gives shape to our being.

-Jerry Sitter, A Grace Disguised

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Eva Cassidy - Who Knows Where The Time Goes

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