A great man is one who collects knowledge the way a bee collects honey and uses it to help people overcome the difficulties they endure - hunger, ignorance and disease!
- Nikola Tesla

Remember, remember always, that all of us, and you and I especially, are descended from immigrants and revolutionists.
- Franklin Roosevelt

While their territory has been devastated and their homes despoiled, the spirit of the Serbian people has not been broken.
- Woodrow Wilson

Christ - The Alpha and Omega

The Serbian Orthodox Diocese of Western America is pleased to announce the publication of an outstanding book by Bishop Athanasius Yevtich, a disciple of the great twentieth-century theologian Archimandrite Justin Popovich. Bishop Athanasius' thought combines adherence to the teachings of the Church Fathers with a vibrant faith and a profound experience of Christ in the Church.

Christ - The Alpha and Omega is the first of a planned collection of works of contemporary Serbian theologians. It is an anthology of Bishop Athanasius' articles which have appeared in Serbian, Greek, French, English and Russian. Focusing on themes central to Christian patristic Triadology, Ecclesiology and Anthropology, the book reveals the ultimate purpose of man and the universe, and speaks of how each of us can realize this purpose within the divine-human community of the Orthodox Church. Bishop Athanasius reminds us that the God-man Jesus Christ is the Beginning and the End of all things, and that we must seek our own end, goal, and fulfillment in Him.

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The book is adorned with striking illustrations by Fr. Stamatis Skliris, a parish priest in Athens who is renowned as an iconographer and as a writer and lecturer on Byzantine iconography.

Contents

PART I

1. O Gentle Light
2. The Holy Fathers and the Holy Scriptures
3. Christ - The Land of the Living

PART II

4. Christ on Earth - The Land of the Living
5. The Anthropology of Hesychasm
6. The Creation of the World and Man

PART III

7. The Holy Sacrament of Baptism: Entrance into and Living in the Church
8. Liturgy and Spirituality
9. Eschatological Dimensions of the Church
10. The Eschata in Our Daily Life

PART IV

11. Between the "Nicaeans" and Easterners": The "Catholic" Confession of St. Basil
12. Icon and Incarnation of the Holy Fathers and St. John Damascene
13. The Teaching of St. John Damascene on the Most Holy Theotokos: Orthodox Theotokology
14. Socialism and the Ecclesial Community: A commentary on a text of Dostoyevsky
15. The Mystery of Touch: Holy Relics in Serbia - A True Physical Love. An interview

List of Sources
Index


SA

 

People Directory

Boris Gortinski

Cinematographer and Director

Born in Belgrade. He was educated in Serbia, USA, Poland. Graduated with honors from the Faculty of Dramatic Arts, Cinematography Department, University of Arts, Belgrade, Serbia.

His first feature film, while being the student of the final year, "Live Broadcast", directed by Darko Bajic, was awarded on many domestic and International Film Festivals.

Read more ...

Publishing

The Church at Prayer

by Archimandrite Aimilianos of Simonopetra

Publisher’s note

Many readers of the addresses of Elder Aimilianos, which have been published in the five-volume series, rchimandrite Aimilianos, Spiritual Instructions and Discourses (Ormylia, 1998-2003), have frequently expressed the wish for an abridged and more accessible form of his teaching. In response, we are happy to inaugurate a new series of publications incorporating key texts from the above-mentioned collection. Other considerations have also contributed o this new project, such as the selection of specific texts which address important, contemporary questions; the need for a smaller, more reader-friendly publication format; and the necessity for editing certain passages in need of clarification, without however altering their basic meaning.

Above all, the works collected in this volume reflect the importance which the Elder consistently attached to prayer, spirituality, community life, worship, and liturgy. Thus the experientially based works "On Prayer", and "The Prayer of the Holy Mountain", which deal primarily with the Prayer of the Heart, appear first, followed by the summary addresses on "The Divine Liturgy", and "Our Church Attendance". These are in turn followed by the more socially oriented discourses on "Our Relations with Our Neighbor", and "Marriage: The Great Sacrament". Finally, the present volume closes with the sermons on "Spiritual Reading" and "The Spiritual Life", which in a simple and yet compelling manner set forth the conditions for "ascending to heaven on the wings of the Spirit".

It is our hope that The Church at Prayer will meet the purpose for which it is issued and will serve as a ready aid and support for those who desire God and eternal life in Him.