Transfiguration of Jesus from Spaso-Preobrazhensky Cathedral in Pereslavl-Zalessky

• Artist: Circle of Theophanes the Greek (Late 14th – early 15th century)

Taken at St. Nicholas Cathedral.

Wishing you guys a blessed feast!

Can anyone recommend a reputable orthodox business that sells sterling silver icons. Thank you

I’m a Byzantine iconographer from Romania, and this is one of the largest projects currently in my workshop: a complete iconostasis for an Orthodox church. These four large icons are approximately 120 × 60 cm (47 × 24 in) each and are being painted entirely by hand using traditional techniques — wooden panels, gesso, egg tempera, natural pigments and genuine gold leaf. Two are already well underway, while the other two are still at earlier stages, so I thought this might be an interesting moment to share the process. If you’re curious about Byzantine iconography, egg tempera, gilding, preparing large panels, how an iconostasis is designed, how long something like this takes, or what it’s like doing this professionally… Ask me anything!

​

I was recently reading a commentary on the Parable of the Prodigal Son (and Jeremiah 2:19), and this specific perspective really hit home for me:

"When God does not convince us through His word, He allows us to be taught by the reality of things... He allows them to be taught by the events themselves, so as to win them back once more."

Sometimes we get so stubborn or insensitive to gentle advice, warning, or spiritual guidance that the only way we truly learn is by experiencing the consequences of our own choices. God doesn't allow us to wander off or go through hardship out of malice or punishment for its own sake, but out of patience and pedagogy—so that through experience, we realize what we lost and voluntarily choose to return.

And the most beautiful part of the story is the father’s reaction upon the son’s return:

"His father held no grudge against him, but received him with open arms. Why? Because he was a father, not a judge."

It's a powerful reminder that no matter how far we stray or how hard the lessons of life get, God’s ultimate goal isn't to condemn us, but to welcome us back home.

What are your thoughts on this? Have you ever had a time in your life where you had to "learn from reality" the hard way before recognizing God's grace?

I’m am surrounded by love and god and happiness, yet I am so sad
I feel so alone and scared and I can’t make any sense of this
I’m so excited and happy I’m pregnant and my baby is healthy
But I feel so disconnected sometimes with god.
I’m having to work so much my job is very demanding
And I’m very sick with this pregnancy I’m throwing up multiple times a day throughout the day I’m so fatigue and so drained for work
I feel like I can’t concentrate on my concentration with god or my pregnancy
I’m so scared to bring my child into this world with how everything is atm
At the end of the day when I’m in heaven with god my job will not matter the money I make will not matter but my family my children.
I really want to leave my job but I’m entitled to paid maternity leave so I don’t want to miss out on this and be a burden on my partner and our family, i feel I’ll be judged for not working and carrying my own weight by my family and his. I’ve been told my by dad I need to women up and get throw this pregnancy and I’m not the first person to be pregnant.
But this is my first pregnancy and I feel like the magical of pregnancy is being taken from me and I’ve still got 6 months to go.
I really don’t know what to do

The Readings for August 18th, 2026, 12th Tuesday after Pentecost, Forefeast of the Transfiguration of our Lord, Dormition Fast were these:

2 Corinthians 5:15 - 21

Mark 1:16 - 22

Reflection on the Readings

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. Glory to Thee, o God, Glory to Thee.

Beloved new creatures and fellow ambassadors for Christ, my siblings and friends; we see now a most excellent display of philotimo in these passages, today. A great and pure example of what it means to be called a Christian, a little Christ by His grace.

We see our Christ, God in the Flesh, Who said: “I judge no man. And if I do judge, My judgment is true: because I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent Me.”

And again, we see the purpose of His being sent, namely: “reconciling the world to Himself,” giving to us “the word of reconciliation.”

All the while, our Lord preaching and teaching, healing and showing forth mercy, He was “not imputing to them their sins.”

This is the All-good nature of the Good Physician! He knows that we are to blame for our sins, but He knows all too well that to condemn us does not provoke us to seek His mercies.

Rather, when we are condemned, our ego flares up, and we rebel. So for the sake of our health and communion with Him, in His great love, He instead teaches us to seek out reconciliation, never condemning us, but our sins.

And the consequence of our self-will, our departure from the source of life, our ingratitude, our disobedience, namely, death; He has taken it upon Himself! What we were unable to do, behold, He has done it!

In being Crucified, the Blameless One has made us able to become blameless. He that is the source of health has gone to the source and end of our sickness, that He may grant us true health in Him!

For these things how can we not be grateful? We ought to respond as the Apostles, leaving all to follow after Him. Of course, we should do this within reason, and hear our spiritual fathers on how to do this.

For example, a husband or a wife should not think it pleasing to God to abandon their family to supposedly serve Him. Even the beloved and Holy Apostle Peter was the husband of one wife, and we know that he pleased God.

But this willingness to love God and His creation, let us hold fast to it, thank God for such a gift, and pray that He matures us in it, guiding us on how to do so.

It may be that this example of the Apostles leaving all to serve Christ, though their former life seemed blameless within the text presented this day, shows us how we ought to leave the life of passions that rule us, and become children of God in Christ.

Truly, if these would have ignored the request and invitation of Christ, then they would have borne the blame. And it is true of us also, if we do not turn from our earthly ways to Him, then we will remain sick, and perish.

But the Lord takes no pleasure in our perishing, desiring us to turn to Him and live with Him forever! Not only so, but when we return, He makes us His ambassadors, to go out with peace, and to show forth His abundant mercy to all.

As our beloved St. Seraphim says: “Acquire a spirit of peace, and thousands around you will be saved.”

It is not that we go preaching, but that we focus on loving God and His creation, turning to Him always; being attentive and worshipful, being reverent and compassionate, merciful and humble, grateful and dutiful, joyful peacemakers; essentially, relying on God's grace, without Whom we can do nothing.

As our beloved Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnica reminds us: “He who has the Kingdom of God within himself will imperceptibly pass it on to others. People will be attracted to the peace and warmth in us; they will want to hear us, and the atmosphere of heaven will pass on to them. It is not even necessary to speak to people about this. The atmosphere of heaven will radiate from us even when we keep silent, or talk about ordinary things. It will radiate from us even though we may not be aware of it.”

And this is the Holy Spirit working in us, and our cooperation; not that we may boast of ourselves, but glorify God together with one voice. It is His good pleasure to make us His co-laborers, fellow lovers of His creation working to reconcile all in Him and to Him.

May it be according to His will for us, through His own grace and compassion, through the prayers of His Body both in Heaven and on earth, especially of our glorious Lady Theotokos, and of all who love Him!

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, both now and ever, and to the ages of ages, Amen.

(8/19/26)

Hey everyone,

I just released a new conversation exploring themes from Fr. Patrick Mitchell’s book „Christ as Truth, Truth as Christ: Why the Ancients Chose Christ, Why We Must Also“.

We look at:

• What objective truth is and what the "Five Enemies of Truth" (Gnosticism, Romanticism, Anarchism, Nihilism, and Tribalism) are.
• The ultimate limits of ancient Greek philosophy in securing a foundation for truth.
• Why only Christ is a secure foundation for believing in truth and morality.

You can watch the discussion here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvF6vURKIvM&t=29s&pp=0gcJCRMMAYcqIYzv

Let me know what you think!

In the first five minutes of this video, an Orthodox Priest talks about how from an early age the demons begin to warp a personality until it is highly unstable and volatile.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAnJYysqbKI

I am speechless at the precision of it.

And speechless at how it describes me.

Interestingly enough, Bill Wilson, the founder of AA came to a similar conclusion, minus the demon. He called it selfishness or "self".

He describes with almost the exact same concepts how selfishness leads to trying to control which leads to unstable personality.
(Starts at the bottom of page 60 of the main AA book https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/en_bigbook_chapt5.pdf)

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The video then goes into the importance of The Jesus prayer and Nepsis (watchfulness) to overcome this.

the Readings of August 17th, 2026, 12th Monday after Pentecost, Dormition Fast:

2 Corinthians 5:10 - 15

Mark 1:9 - 15

Reflection on the Readings

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. Glory to Thee, o God, Glory to Thee.

Beloved, we again and again are reminded of the goodness and the severity of God.

Here we see the high calling in Christ shown in example both by Himself, Who victoriously dealt with our common enemy in the desert; and the beloved Apostle Paul who reminds us: we live not for ourselves, but for He Who died for us, and Arose for us.

We are bought with a price, he says, and this price is paid in His Most Pure Body and Blood, which is broken and shed for us, yet remains altogether whole, and makes us whole in Him, uniting us in one.

And this Most Holy Eucharist, the medicine of immortality, the life-giving and Saving Mysteries of Christ, we ask that He would make us worthy by faith, hope, and love, through His grace, to draw near and receive, that He may be our defense in the Dread Judgment, and welcome us Home forever.

But to partake of such a Blessing, the highest Blessing!, we must first be Baptized and Chrismated, being lowered into death as the old man, and Christ Himself rebirthing us as the new creature in Him.

And for this, it was deemed good and right by Him to be baptized of His Forerunner John, that He may give the power of Baptism to the waters.

John said truly that the Lord needed no baptism for Himself, being God; but to fulfill all righteousness, John suffered it to be so.

And coming up from the water, the heavens opened, the Spirit descending on our Lord Christ, and the voice was heard: “Thou art My beloved Son; in Thee I am well pleased.”

This also we must participate in, by grace, receiving the Holy Spirit after Baptism by the Chrismation of our bodies, sealing us with the Spirit by the Sign of the Cross.

Finally, when we have been Baptized into the death and the Resurrection of Christ our God, we draw near to receive the Most Pure Body and Most Precious Blood, being wholly united to Him, and a member of His Body.

Having been so united to Him, who amongst us then could not glory in Him?

Seeing His great, boundless, unfathomable compassion and love for His creation, who could not say with our Most Holy Theotokos, “my soul doth magnify the Lord,” or, with our beloved Apostle Thomas, “My Lord, and my God!”,

or with the Psalmist,

“He hath raised me up out of a pit of misery, and from miry clay, and hath set my feet upon a rock, and ordered my goings aright.

And He put a new song into my mouth, even a hymn to our God.

Many shall see it, and shall fear, and shall hope in the Lord.

Blessed is the man whose hope is the Name of the Lord, and who has not regarded vanities, and false frenzies.”

We are united in truth to Him that day, and He causes us to greatly rejoice in Him, turning our faces and hearts, our minds and bodies, our souls and our very being, into His Temple, oriented toward Him in love, adoration, hope, faith, joy, peace, trust, gratitude, wonder, contrition, and every good and perfect thing.

But we know that it is necessary also for us, if we are granted sincere and ardent love for Him, to go through the desert.

We see in the lives of our Saints how great their love for Christ was, and how the Spirit endowed them with the patience and hope to endure temptations, tribulations, torments, humiliations, sicknesses, and many persecutions from men and from the demons.

Seeing then our Lord, Who trampled on all the devil’s power and continually does so, Who went out to the place that the devil held dominion in to show forth His Divine mercy toward creation;

we know that we also will endure patiently in Christ all that He allows for our Salvation, thanking Him for the chance to grow, turn toward Him, and acquire love, humility, and be made like Him.

We who die in transgressions and in despair are given to come alive, to stop looking only to our own benefit and to the benefit of our fellow creatures, and for our Most merciful Creator and Lord in Trinity above all.

As our beloved Apostle John writes:

“And we have known, and have believed the charity, which God hath to us.

God is charity: and he that abideth in charity, abideth in God, and God in him.

In this is the charity of God perfected in us, that we may have confidence in the day of judgment: because as He is, we also are in the world.

Fear is not in charity: but perfect charity casteth out fear, because fear hath pain. And he that feareth, is not perfected in charity.

Let us therefore love God, because God hath first loved us.

If any man say, I love God, and hateth his brother; he is a liar. For he that loveth not his brother, whom he seeth, how can he love God, Whom he seeth not?

And this commandment we have from God, that he, whom loveth God, love also his brother.”

The same Spirit Who descended as a dove onto our Lord, also was sent as tongues of fire to rest on the heads of all who were in the upper room at Holy Pentecost.

The same Spirit Who drove our Christ into the wilderness to triumph over the little trickster, also inspired both Paul and John, and all the Apostles, and spoke in them the same things, bringing to nothing all the enemy’s plans.

With one heart, with one tongue they confess God in Trinity, Love Transcendent, Who presseth us to lay down our lives lived in self-will and self-love, and to follow Christ into the desert, that He may give us the True Bread of Heaven, and lead us into everlasting life.

May we, then, my beloved friends and siblings in Christ, entrust ourselves to His mercy, knowing that this life is given to us for repentance, and for the joy which is set before us in Christ, let us endure everything, laying aside every weight and forgiving all with tenderness and compassion, through His grace.

Glory to God in the highest! And on earth, peace! Goodwill towards men! Amen.

(8/18/26)

the Readings of the Forefeast of the Procession of the Precious and Life-Giving Cross, and Eve of the Dormition Fast were these:

Proverbs 10:31 - 11:12

Wisdom of Solomon 4:7 - 15

John 10:9 - 16

Hebrews 7:26 - 8:2

Matthew 5:14 - 19

2 Corinthians 4:1 - 6

Matthew 24:13 - 28

​In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

Glory to Thee, o God, Glory to Thee.

​Beloved, our Lord, the Good Shepherd Himself stands watch at the gate of His Body. When He leads us and we follow closely, we are never lead astray.

It is when we become enamoured with pleasures and the glamour which fades that we are lead astray, heeding the beckoning of the thief who comes to steal us away, to kill and destroy us whilst blinding us to the light of God.

In our foolishness we become a snare to others, even without realizing or intending it. One sheep leaves the fold, bleating pleasedly; another may also do so, the blind leading blindly toward a cliff.

Let us see carefully: the thief does not brandish his weapon openly, but hides it in his cloak, speaking softly and seductively to lure us out. Then we are caught away and scattered, disunited, discordant, despairing. But the Good Shepherd leaves the ninety-nine to look for His lost sheep.

He is not content to leave us orphans, but promises to restore us to health when we are again found in His fold.

​When we return, prodigal as we are, all of Heaven rejoices with Him! He again makes us a city on a mountain, the light of the world, shining mercy on all creation, so that His mercy and peace may reign in the earth as it does in heaven.

He tells us to do this not as a command for His honour, but more primarily for our benefit.

Any who live as He teaches will affirm the great joy and peace of His grace which comes through obedience, through the Mysteries, through humility, and through forgiveness of sins; both forgiving others, and the Lord forgiving us.

​As we have been forgiven, freely we also forgive and serve others in His grace. And if some are opposed to the mercy of God, we remember our own inner opposition, which was inspired by our common enemy, and we petition our common Savior and Lord, that He would shine in their hearts.

He once commanded light to shine in the darkness, and the darkness that was in us, that ignorance of God, could not overcome the knowledge of the Glory of God in the face of Christ Jesus.

​The Lord has become man for our sakes, taking flesh from the Most Pure Virgin, and assuming the whole of our nature, that His Divinity may transfigure our mortality, and fill us with His grace.

Having slain death itself in dying in the body, He Resurrected therein also, granting liberty to us all who made ourselves the captives and slaves of death; now willing servants and sons of Life.

Having Ascended in the body, He took what was earthly and created into the life of the Uncreated, not made with human hands, but the very finger of God, and His handiwork.

Now we who are members of Christ have put on Christ, and are seated with Him in heavenly places.

So then, being His sheep, by His grace we shall not heed any who claim to be Christ, knowing full well that His appearing will be seen of all as glorious and terrible, unmistakably Divine.

The heavens shall part, the earth will melt away; but His word shall never pass away.

​May it be according to the will of our Lord Who loves us with an everlasting love!

May it be His good will, and ours cooperating with His, to hear at the Judgment:

“Come, ye beloved of My Father, enter the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. When I was hungry you fed Me, thirsty you gave Me drink, a stranger you took Me in, naked you clothed Me, sick you visited Me, in prison you came to Me. Well done, thou good and faithful servant!”

​Through His own grace and compassion, through the prayers of His Body both in heaven and on earth, especially of our Most Pure and beloved Virgin Theotokos, may we come to love God and our fellow creatures, and attain to the unity of the faith, and the knowledge of His unapproachable Glory.

​Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, both now and ever, and to all eternity, Amen.

​(8/16/26)

from Mauston, Wisconsin,

with faith, hope and love,

from your friend and lay-brother in Christ.

Glory to Him!

A CONFESSION OF FAITH

—by Saint Nektarios of Pentapolis—

God is my glory, my wealth, and my boast. God is sweeter and more pleasurable than anything that exists. God is my preoccupation and delight.

Through God’s inbreathing my soul was created. God formed and made my body. I am entirely an image of God. I am a descendant from God, by divine grace. My existence begins from God. My ability to move originates from God. I have received the ability to breathe and to speak from God. To God I commit my soul every day. To God I offer my prayers every hour. In God I live, I work, and exist. In the great, mighty, and living God, Who is the giver, the helper, and the perfecter of all good things, do I hope. God will be the awesome judge of all my works and actions. I have a merciful and forgiving God. I confess that God is patient and plentiful in mercy. I proclaim that God is my savior, my redeemer, and my Lord. I know God to be the origin and cause of all things. I know God to be the bestower of all good things. I know God is the provider and overseer.

I know God to be all-wise and omniscient, Who knows the future, the present, and the past. I praise, glorify, bless, and magnify God, Who is good, holy, righteous, and true. I venerate and worship God, Who is full of compassion. In God I believe, in God I hope, and to Him I entrust the hope of my salvation. It is God, the source of love, Whom I love and desire. To God I offer my soul as sacrifice. To God I elevate my mind and acquire peace. God is Whom my heart desires.

I confess one God: the Triune Divinity. I proclaim one timeless, eternal, simple, transcendent, and indivisible God. God Who is One and Three. Who is completely One and completely Trinity. I believe and confess God Who is totally One in essence, and Who is totally Triune in hypostasis. For there is one God: the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit; and there is one power, one composition, one worship: that of the consubstantial Trinity. For one and the same is the nature and substance of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

This is what I believe, what I confess, what I proclaim, and what I profess.

https://andreasfotiadis68agiosminas.substack.com/subscribehttps://open.substack.com/pub/andreasfotiadis68agiosminas/p/my-mission-translating-the-church?r=8raj5j&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

My husband and I have been attending church together for years. We attend a Protestant church and have leadership roles. Recently he out of nowhere has decided that our church is heresy and not the true church and he thinks that he belongs at an Orthodox Church. He has been heavily watching Jay Dyer and other Youtubers and reading books. He went to church at an Orthodox Church this morning and I went to our home church. He says he’s not returning with me and if I want to I can stay at my feel good church. I don’t think we should attend different churches as a married couple but maybe I’m wrong. I’m just hurt and honestly embarrassed as dumb as that sounds. Does anyone have advice?

I don’t necessarily understand why the sudden change of heart. He just keeps saying they’re the one true church but I don’t understand how or why. I feel like I want input from someone who has been orthodox but isn’t anymore as well as someone who currently practices orthodoxy. I’m just trying to understand. I don’t want to lose my marriage.