The Morning Offering

Theologians

 Philosophers and Theologians

 

There are only a few Orthodox saints who've been given the honor of being called, "theologians". Saint John the Theologian, and Saint Symeon the New Theologian, to give two examples, were declared Theologians by the Church, because of their theology was the outcome of their having encountered the Living God.

Theologians, in the strict sense of the word, are those who have mastered the art of prayer. Pure theology does not come out of a humanistic, philosophical search for the things of God, but, rather, from an encounter with the Living God. True theology is not the result of a rationalistic, and abstract search for God, but is the result of God's divine grace. This divine grace is God's gift to those who seek Him out with purity of heart, and ascetic struggle. Theology is not about speaking about God, but encountering Him.

Love in Christ,
Abbot Tryphon

Monday February 6, 2012 / January 24, 2012

Week of the Publican and the Pharisee. Tone one.
Fast-free Week. Fast-free

Entire week, fast-free.
Venerable Xenia of Rome and her two female slaves (5th c.).
St. Xenia of Petersburg, fool-for-Christ (18th c.).
Martyr Nicholas (1918).
St. Gerasimus, bishop of Perm (1441).
Martyr John of Kazan (1529).
Martyrs Babylas of Sicily and his two disciples Timothy and Agapius (3rd c.).
Venerable Macedonius, hermit of Syria (ca. 420).
Translation of the relics (632) of St. Anastasius the Persian (628).
Venerable Dionysius of Olympus and Mt. Athos (1541) (Greek).
St. Felician, bishop of Foligno in Italy (254).
St. Lupicinus of Lipidiaco (500) (Gaul).
St. Neophytus the Recluse of Cyprus (1214) (Greek).
Martyrs Hermogenes and Mamas (Greek).
Martyrs Paul, Pausirius, and Theodotian, of Egypt (3rd c.).
St. Philo, bishop of Carpasia in Cyprus (5th c.).
The PriestMartyr Philippikos the Presbyter and Martyress Barsima of Syria and his two brothers.
Venerable Zosimas, bishop of Babylon in Egypt (6th c.).

 

 

 

I wish to thank those of you who have been contributing towards the principle of our mortgage ($250,000.00). For those of you who can't donate due to the depressed economy, please remember to pray for the monastery. It would be such a great blessing if we were able to retire the mortgage debt altogether.

Donations can be made directly to the monastery through PayPal, or you may send donations to:

All-Merciful Saviour Monastery
PO Box 2420
Vashon Island, WA 98070-2420 USA

 

 

2 Peter 1:20-2:9

²⁰ knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, ²¹ for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.

Destructive Doctrines

2 But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction. ² And many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed. ³ By covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words; for a long time their judgment has not been idle, and their destruction does not slumber.

Doom of False Teachers

⁴ For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved for judgment; ⁵ and did not spare the ancient world, but saved Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly; ⁶ and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly; ⁷ and delivered righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked ⁸ (for that righteous man, dwelling among them, tormented his righteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds)— ⁹ then the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment,

Mark 13:9-13

⁹ “But watch out for yourselves, for they will deliver you up to councils, and you will be beaten in the synagogues. You will be brought before rulers and kings for My sake, for a testimony to them. ¹⁰ And the gospel must first be preached to all the nations. ¹¹ But when they arrest you and deliver you up, do not worry beforehand, or premeditate what you will speak. But whatever is given you in that hour, speak that; for it is not you who speak, but the Holy Spirit. ¹² Now brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child; and children will rise up against parents and cause them to be put to death. ¹³ And you will be hated by all for My name’s sake. But he who endures to the end shall be saved.

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