Troy Polamalu- Convert to Orthodoxy

Interview on yahoosports

Cole: When and where do you go?

Polamalu: It starts at 8:30 (a.m.). … It's the Nativity of the Theotokos monastery (in Saxonburg, Pa.).

Cole: I know you're devoutly Christian (Polamalu has a carefully arranged series of religious items in his locker at Heinz Field), but exactly which denomination?

Polamalu: Greek Orthodox. Theotokos literally means the Mother of God.

Cole: How long are you in services?

Polamalu: They usually go to about 12:30.

Cole: That's a four-hour service. Is that a normal service?

Polamalu: Pretty much, especially at a monastery.

Cole: Can you describe it?

Polamalu: What's really neat about the Orthodox church is that it's like walking back in time 2,000 years to the time of the Apostles, when they created these services. You walk into that and it's really like … living it. They have maintained the truth ever since the beginning.

Cole: You're Polynesian. How did you end up at a Greek Orthodox church?

Polamalu: There are different ethnicities, like Russian Orthodox. My wife is Greek. I was a non-denomination Christian before we got married. So we sit around there and meet with our spiritual mother and then we go home, maybe take a nap, work out and then go home and have dinner.

Evangelical Environmental Confusion- National Review

With respect to the environment, the theological principles are uncontroversial: human beings, as image bearers of God, are placed as stewards over the created order. We bear a responsibility for how we treat and use it. We are part of the creation, as well as its crowning achievement. God intends for us to use and transform the natural world around us for good purposes. Proper use is not misuse. But as fallen creatures, we can mess things up. No serious Evangelical thinker questions these basic principles.

Prudential judgments are another thing entirely. When it comes to global warming, for instance, there are at least four separate questions.

(1) Is the planet warming?

(2) If the planet is warming, is human activity (like CO2 emissions) causing it?

(3) If the planet is warming, is it bad overall?

(4) If the planet is warming, we’re causing it, and it’s bad, would the policies commonly advocated (e.g., the Kyoto Protocol, legislative restrictions on CO2 emissions) make any difference and, if so, would their cost exceed their benefit?

...
The problem with the chief defenders of the Evangelical Climate Initiative is that they haven’t thought through these four questions, at least not publicly. What they have done is label their position as the authentically Evangelical one. Other Evangelicals need to call them on this tactic, exposing the false dilemma for the piece of cheap rhetoric it is.

whole article HERE

I like Big Bibles

Ooooh mama mia
You say you want koinonia?
...
I aint talkin' about a paraphrase
'Cuz Paul wouldn't use those anyways
...
39 + 27 = 66 books
and if you're Catholic...there's even more...

Evil or Fallen?

Last weekend, the Techie Layman and I saw Ravi Zacharias live at the Gateway Cathedral in Staten Island. As someone who looks for truth, that is to say, Orthodoxy, being expounded upon in its various forms, I can honestly say that I find much of what Ravi Zacharias preaches to be good and true as far as he is an apologist for Christianity and an excellent refuter of atheism. He is in the tradition of the greats GK Chesterton and CS Lewis, though I'm not sure he leans quite as Traditionally as they would. I can be fairly certain that the attendees at Gateway Cathedral the two nights I went weren't exactly a high Church crowd, but nonetheless, good God-fearing people all the same. Did I mention we got a picture (or two) with him???

The Friday night, the agenda was about the need for apologetics in the 21st Century. Ravi Z. went through an elaborate diagnosis of humanity in post-modern society (are we still post-modern? maybe it's post-post-modern by now?). One of his best points was also the one in which his Protestantized background really showed clearly. He said that modern society negates the fact that man is, and I paraphrase, inherently flawed, and evil in his very heart.

Now, I won't say that I didn't entirely understand exactly what he meant. He was simply juxtaposing the ideals of socialism, communism, and various other forms of radical liberalism, and the Rousseauean idea that man is indeed perfectable on his own with the real world observation that no amount of effort can make man any better a creature on his own. For the traditional Christian, only Christ can make man perfectable by being identified with Him.

However, and I am simply bringing up this point for the sake of discussion, in saying that man is not perfectable on his own, I do not believe that man can also be said to be inherently evil. Does God create evil things? It is our understanding that God created man exactly as He wished, and it was the misuse of free will which made man not evil, but fallen, that is to say, susceptible to freely choosing evil. This distinction between man being a fallen creature and man being an evil creature is indicative of the difference between the Orthodox notion of theosis (this word is SO not a cliche by now) and the Western ideal of justification in a legalistic sense before God.

St. Vincent de Lerins- Everybody's doing it!!

This is the article I'm forcing my Sunday School kiddies to read this week

-Steve K

Death to the World!

This is ridiculously cool!

25th Memorial of Fr. Seraphim Rose

I thought he was brilliant

I wouldn't recommend him to a novice

I read "Orthodoxy and the New Religion of the Future" and was absolutely blown away

I read "The Soul After Death" and was not convinced

Listen to the 3-Part Series about him here