A Word from the Holy Fathers

As A Word From the Holy Fathers resumes after a summer hiatus, we look again at the theme of forgiveness in the writings of the Fathers—with an eye particularly toward practical injunctions on forgiveness and the relationship of repentance, forgiveness, and redemption in quotations from a variety of patristic sources. Fr Matthew also introduces the Patristic Quotations Topical Index.

We look again at the theme of forgiveness in the writings of the Fathers—with an eye particularly toward practical injunctions on forgiveness and the relationship of repentance, forgiveness, and redemption in quotations from a variety of patristic sources. Archimandrite Irenei also introduces the Patristic Quotations Topical Index.

In this week’s broadcast, Fr. Irenei examines a text by St. Cyril of Jerusalem, which prompts the Christian to ask the question, "Do I truly believe in Christ’s resurrection?" If so, how does this belief shape the actual decisions and determinations of our lives?

Fr Dcn Matthew explores the homilies of St Symeon on man and creation, and in particular the way in which the Christian response to ecological concerns resides in the theology of sacrifice and the participation in divine Communion - including brief remarks from a recent talk by Metropolitan Kallistos of Diokleia.

What are we to make of the Genesis account of Cain and Abel? In this broadcast, Archimandrite Irenei examines a portion of St Cyprian of Carthage’s treatise on the Lord’s prayer that shows forth Abel as the first martyr, the example of true self-sacrifice. And it is a lesson with a practical aim: the quenching of anger and hatred, and the discovery of a life offered more wholly to God.

Among the greatest struggles in the Christian life are the "little things"—the day-to-day "bad habits" by which we continually fall, and which seem to trap us in our sin. Is there a way out? In this week’s episode, Archimandrite Irenei examines the Fathers on sin as habits, how these habits enslave us—and most importantly, how we can overcome our shackles and progress toward the Kingdom.

This week, in anticipation of Forgiveness Sunday, Archimandrite Irenei explores a series of patristic texts that deal with the imperative of forgiveness, and the need to forgive as the gateway into the life offered by Christ in the Church.

In this week's broadcast, Fr. Dcn. Matthew offers a reflection on a selection of sayings of St John Chrysostom on the pastoral nature of fasting as an act of charity. In what sense does our fast minister to our neighbor?

Why did God become man? This week's reflection explores St Athanasius's consideration of the Son's incarnation as a response to his probing refrain, in the face of man's sin: "What was God to do?"

In this episode, Archimandrite Irenei returns to the Life of Moses by St Gregory of Nyssa, and examines a key passage in which the Saint compares the ascent of spiritual life to Moses’s ascent of Mt. Sinai. What does it mean to ascend into "darkness," to converse with God "where the understanding does not reach"? And how does Moses’s example reveal the way in which all the Fathers and Saints draw the whole Christian family into deeper communion with God?