Well, I cleaned up the "Previous Posts" cluttering the background by deleting all of them.  They will reappear under the title "Older Posts".  While this is happening, the old posts can be found in the blog archive.  Thanks again for your patience.

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Vladimir Lossky (1903-1958) was one of the leading Orthodox theologians of the twentieth century.  For today's feast of the Transfiguration we offer an excerpt from his The Meaning of Icons (Co-author Leonid Ouspensky, St Vladimir's Seminary Press, Crestwood, New York, 1983).  The icon referred to and reproduced to the right is of the 15th century Novgorod school.

The quote is found on pp 209-212.

What is it that the three disciples were able to contemplate when they saw the face of Christ "shine as the sun" and His rainment "white as the light" when a  "bright cloud overshadowed them " (Matt 17:2, 5)?  According to St Gregory of Nazianzus this light was the Divinity manifested to the disciples on the mountain.  St John Damascene, speaking of this "splendor of the Divine nature", of this "a-temporal glory", observes that the comparison made by the Evangelists with the light of the sun remains quite inadequate, for uncreated reality cannot be expressed by a created image.  The matter in question, then, is the vision of God and it is evident why, from St Irenaeus of Lyon to Philaret of Moscow, the theme of the Transfiguration  of Christ has never ceased to feed the thought of the Fathers and theologians of the Church...St Gregory Palamas (died 1359), in defending the traditional teaching on the Lord's Transfiguration against the attacks of certain rationalist theologians, well understood how to give full value to the importance of this evangelical event for Christian dogma and spirituality.  "God is called Light", he said, "not according to His Essence, but according to His energy".  The light which illuminated the Apostles was not something sensible, but on the other hand it is equally false to see in it an intelligible reality, which would be called "light" only metaphorically.  The Divine Light is neither material nor spiritual, for it transcends the order of the created, it is "the ineffable splendor of the one nature in three hypostases"...

Christ appeared to the disciples, not in kenotic form, as  "servant", but in the "form of God", as an Hypostasis of the Trinity Who, in His Incarnation, remains inseparable from His Divine nature, which is common to the Father and the Holy Spirit...

Christ transfigured is represented standing on the summit of the mountain, speaking with Moses ans Elias.  His rainment is shining white.  The geometrical figure inscribed in the circle of the mandorla must represent the "bright cloud" which revealed the transcendant source of the Divine energies.  The three rays pointed down upon the apostles are an indication that the action of the Transfiguration is trinitarian...Moses (on the right) in our icon is holding a book; generally it is the tables of the Decalogue--Elias (on the left) is an old man with long hair...Moses represents the dead, whilst Elias, taken up to heaven on a chariot of fire, represents the living...This [interpretation] is comprehensible; it underlies  the eschatological  character of the Transfiguration.  Christ appears as the Lord of the quick and the dead, coming in the glory of the future age.  The Transfiguration was "an anticipation of His glorious Second Coming", says St Basil:  the moment which opened a perspective of eternity in time.

English Anglican Ann Persson is the author of The Circle of Love:  Praying with Rublev's Icon of the Trinity (Bible Reading Fellowship 2010).  She gave a talk based on the book at St Paul's Cathedral, London, which is well worth a listen.  Of particular interest is her emphasis towards the end on the empty space at the table, which is an invitation to the viewer to join in the life of the Trinity.

Anglican priest Ralph McMichael is director of the Center for the Eucharist in St Louis, Missouri.  He is the author of Eucharist:  A Guide for the Perplexed (T&T Clark International 2010).  This is an excellent overview of eucharistic practice and theology from a very catholic and sacramental perspective.  Chapter 5 analyses the sequence of actions that comprise the eucharistic celebration (in the Western church), including the significance of the congregational recitation of the Nicene Creed.

The excerpt is found on pp 115-116.


Two types of confession characterize the Eucharistic life.  The first type is associated with the recitation of the Nicene Creed, and the second type is associated with the confession of sins...One type of confession is the act of adhering to a statement or set of beliefs preceding  the confessors.  There are statements of belief, truth, and meaning that one recites as a way of submitting to them.  Confession is not a sharing of opinion, and the corporate act of confession is not an aggregate of opinion.  In fact, agreement with content is not the essence of the confession; it is not an expression of what we think.  It is to submit to the boundaries of belief so that one might learn to live in this new territory.  The content becomes the subject of thought; we are to wrestle with what is said.  The Creed, and whole Eucharist, is the way that we are incorporated into the mind of Christ, which exists as the ecclesial Body of Christ.  The development of Creeds began in a Christian regula fidei, a rule or a way to regulate the faith.  Faith as that which is believed, in contrast to faith by which one believes, is not an amorphous entity requiring our agreement to keep it afloat.  Faith is a regulation of Christian life; it keeps us heading the right way.  The recitation of the Nicene Creed in the Eucharist is directed forward and is not a bit of nostalgia for the old days of certainty.  The Creed is our way to communion...

The common faith recited and received in the Eucharist requires commitment but not consensus.  A theme present in each dimension of the Eucharistic life is that communion is received by the offering self, the offering assembly, and is not an achievement of proper order and thought.  We do not achieve, possess, or produce communion, but we do submit faithfully to its life and demands.  Confessing a common faith is a visible manifestation of a gathering of persons for the purpose of sharing a life given to them.  These gathered, confessing, persons will keep meeting each other within this faithful act, a place to encounter confessors from previous ages and other Eucharistic celebrations within this common faith.

For today's feast of St Benedict we turn to the monk-scholar Terrence Kardong, a member of Assumption Abbey in North Dakota.  In The Benedictines (Michael Glazier, 1988), he provides a good overview of Benedict and his monastic heritage.  The twelve steps of humility outlined in Chapter 7 of the Rule are crucial to Benedictine spirituality yet are too easily misunderstood in contemporary society.  Kardong ties in what Benedict has to say about humility with the important concept of kenosis, Jesus' self-emptying in assuming human nature.

The excerpt is found on pp 86-88.



We have not even mentioned the name of Jesus in our discussion thus far, but he is not absent from Benedict's treatise on humility.  Far from it; steps three and four are concerned precisely with Christ's own humility...

The reference is to the kenosis of Jesus, his willingness to enter fully into the human condition, even to the point of voluntary death as a consequence of serving the kingdom of his heavenly Father.  The monk is asked to enter into Jesus' pattern of self-gift, with the promise that the ultimate reward will be spiritual fulfillment, indeed, communion with God.

Whether Benedict meant the example of Christ to serve as the center of his chapter on humility is debatable...Nevertheless, it seems vitally important that the humility of Jesus be maintained as the heart of monastic humility.

Too often monastic self-discipline is presented without adequate reference to its New Testament basis.  Even the great theorists of ascetical theology, such as Evagrius of Pontus, have a tendency to put too much stress on the human element, and not enough on divine grace and its embodiment in Jesus.  In doing this, they seem to verify what the Protestant Reformers suspected all along:  that Catholicism, and especially monasticism, is really a religion of works and not of faith.

It can also be shown historically that apart from the person of Christ and his salvific cross, suffering is easily distorted in the Christian scheme of things.  The example of the early martyrs is instructive; they instinctively attached themselves to the sufferings of Christ and were able to endure with patience in the knowledge that the Lord was intimately united to them in their hour of affliction.  Apart from this Christ-connection, martyrdom could lapse into mere stubbornness, defiance, masochism, and even suicide.

Likewise, Christian, monastic humility that is rooted in anything other than Christian self-gift often turns into self-pity and even worse.  It is all too easy for certain personalities to wallow in self-contempt, thinking all the while that they are truly humble.  Such people often turn out to be anything but selfless once they are confronted with difficulties that are not of their own fabrication.  The cross we fashion for ourselves has nothing to do with true humility...

To turn again to the figure of Christ, we should note the true context of his suffering and death:  it was not the purpose of the heavenly Father that his Son die on the cross, nor did the Son live in order to die at the hands of murderers...The purpose and goal of  Christ's whole life was to make present and operative the Father's love for the world.  Suffering and death came because the forces of evil could not let this happen unchallenged.  Christian faith says hatred did not overcome love:  instead, Jesus' resurrection transformed the cross into a tree of glory.

The Benedictine monk, like any other follower of Jesus, is called to tread this path.  The path is not primarily the way of the cross but the way of love.  That seems to be a much less demanding way, but in fact it turns out to be the very same; once we set out earnestly  to love as Jesus loved, we discover quickly why he was crucified.  The difference is that his enemies are by and large within.

Irenaeus (d ca 202) was a native of Smyrna in Asia Minor.  He was a follower of Polycarp, who in turn was a disciple of John the Evangelist.  At some point he migrated to Gaul, where he eventually became bishop of Lugdunum (now Lyons).  He is best known for Adversus Haereses (Against Hersies), in which he defends a nacent orthodox faith against Gnosticism and other theological rivals.

Since his feastday falls today and we have recently celebrated Trinity Sunday, it is appropriate to hear what he had to say on trinitarian doctrine.  The excerpt following is from Alister E McGrath (ed), The Christian Theology Reader, 2nd ed, Blackwell 2001, pp 174-175.

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This is the rule of our faith, the foundation of the building, and what gives support to our behavior.

God the Father uncreated, who is uncontained, invisible, one God, creator of the universe; this is the first article of our faith.  And the second is:

The Word of God, the Son of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, who appeared to the prophets according to their way of prophesying, and according to the dispensation of the Father.  Through him all things were created.  Furthermore, in the fullness of time, in order to gather all things to himself, he became a human being amongst human beings, capable of being seen and touched, to destroy death, bring life, and restore fellowship between God and humanity.  And the third article is:

The Holy Spirit, through whom the prophets prophesied, and our forebears learned of God and the righteous were led in the paths of justice, and who, in the fullness of time, was poured out in a new way on our human nature in order to renew humanity throughout the entire world in the sight of God.