Father Bill's Blog
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A Smorgasbord: Saints' Stories, Seasons, Society, Seven Sins, plus Travels mostly to Greece and who knows what next? by Father Bill Olnhausen.
Father Bill's Blog
5d ago
I love this story. In the late Fourth Century monks from the Monastery of Saint Savas (Mar Sabas) * down below Jerusalem in the West Bank, spent Lent alone in the desert. A priest-monk Zosimas, walking alone one day on the Jordanian side of the river, to his surprise saw someone ahead of him. He ..read more
Father Bill's Blog
1w ago
The Gospel for the Fith Sunday of Great Lent: Mark 9:17-31 At that time, a man came to Jesus kneeling and saying: “Teacher, I brought my son to you, for he has a dumb spirit; and wherever it seizes him it dashes him down; and he foams and grinds his teeth and becomes rigid; and ..read more
Father Bill's Blog
2w ago
Iconoclasm, the Seventh Council, and after that According to the story, it was during the Iconoclastic controversy that the monk Stephen saw soldiers trampling on an icon. When he objected they told him it was ok: it was only a picture. So Stephen took an image of the Emperor on a coin and trampled on ..read more
Father Bill's Blog
3w ago
For those who didn’t tune in last week: I warned you that in the next couple of months you’ll see a lot of “re-runs” (albeit slightly revised), because my time will be limited. My wife and I are moving after 28 years in the same house, and some of you will know what that entails ..read more
Father Bill's Blog
1M ago
My wife and I love to watch old movies and television shows. The humor is always funny, the drama always exciting. This spring you’ll get the same opportunity with this Blog. Occasionally you’ll see some “re-runs” of previous Posts – revised just a tad. The reason: We are about to move from the house we ..read more
Father Bill's Blog
1M ago
In today’s Post I am plagiarizing myself. I’ve written so many Posts that often I can’t remember them. I had a vague memory of writing long ago about forgiveness, so I looked back and, sure enough: Post 55. It was like reading someone else’s writing. I thought some of it (forgive my pride) was really ..read more
Father Bill's Blog
1M ago
This Post contains small portions from the excellent book In the Heart of the Desert: The Spirituality of the Desert Fathers and Mothers, published here with the generous permission of the author, the Rev. Dr. John Chryssavgis, Archdeacon of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. I think it’s appropriate reading as we near our annual passage through Great ..read more
Father Bill's Blog
1M ago
The word in New Testament Greek is άσωτος/asotos, “dissipated, debauched, dissolute”. The old English word for this was “prodigal”. This guy who has wasted his life on nothing, worse than nothing, thrown away his family inheritance on pig’s slop. What kind of fuzzy-minded liberal would forgive somebody like that? I still remember my granddad feeding ..read more
Father Bill's Blog
2M ago
Last week we began to tell the story of this humble, quiet, unobtrusive, remarkable parish priest – this Saint of the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth centuries. As I began, I feared there wouldn’t be enough to say about him to fill a Post – and to my surprise here we are in Part Two ..read more
Father Bill's Blog
2M ago
Old age mind fog has caught up with me. Here it is only mid-February, and I have prepared a Post for a saint whose feast day is not till March 2, Ah well, we’ll certainly be prepared for it. Saint Nicholas Planas Introduction I love that in our Orthodox churches we have icons in all ..read more