Prayer

I want to thank every one who has commented on previous posts or emailed me regarding the present end to my PhD pursuits. Your words have been an encouragement beyond the simple need. I have been particularly mindful of the comments that an online radio host, whom I greatly respect, has left, as they have [...]

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What Now?

I can tell you, this present loss of my PhD program is unpleasant. But if I believe what I’ve said just a few posts before, this, too, is God’s Providence. But what does that mean? And now what? This PhD has lived in me, from the time of an idea and a desire, since I [...]

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And That’s That

As anticipated, the leave of absence was only a long shot to cover the last two academic years (not including the present), with the expectation that I would achieve reinstatement by this spring (i.e., January).  That last is not going to happen.  So the first becomes a moot point. Fifty-one hours of PhD studies, on [...]

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The Coincidences of Providence (or the Providence of Coincidences)

This past week I was quite saddened by what appears to be the end of my pursuit of a PhD. (I say “appears” because the graduate program director encouraged me to seek out official leave status, which will keep the financial problems at bay. But that may well be a long shot and/or the delay [...]

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Links to Greek Texts

The Little Sailing: Links

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Orthodox Prosphora: Handcrafted since Pentecost

The Ochlophobist makes two important observations which I’d never really connected before: the Orthodox are one of the few, perhaps the only ones remaining, who make their Communion bread by hand, everyone else’s is factory produced. Our priest, commenting on our recent shortage of prosphora-bakers (since rectified), noted that if there were no prosphora, there [...]

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Speaking of Vocation . . .

A short while ago I wrote to my graduate program director to tell him that I would not be continuing with my PhD program. There are a lot of complex issues involved, financial, changing life circumstances, my naivete and subsequent disappointment with academia, among other things. I have been unfunded my entire program (being fair [...]

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Wondrous are the works of humility (or thoughts about vocation)

From Word from the Desert, comes this apothmegatum: Wondrous are the works of humility. There was a monk of St. Anne’s (on Mt Athos), a vessel of grace, who was the first chanter at the Patriarchate. This monk went to the spiritual father of St. Anne’s to make his confession and to ask his advice. [...]

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Development of Doctrine

As mentioned in yesterday’s post, Orthodox and Roman Catholics share a common acceptance of the development of doctrine. What is not shared, however, is to what the development amounts. Roman Catholics accept a view of the development of doctrine sometimes analogized as an oak growing from an acorn. Orthodox accept a development of doctrine which [...]

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Differences

As a Protestant, one of the key mental operators one has is the opposition to Rome. Depending upon the Protestant group, though I have in mind here and throughout this reflection evangelical Protestants, one more or less defines oneself over against Rome. This, of course, results in a distortion of Roman doctrine and practice (again [...]

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