July 2018 Newsletter.Pub
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Orthodox Church in America SS Peter & Paul Orthodox Church July 2018 June Council Highlights May’s Operating Income was $13,905.30 and Operating Ex- penses were $9,774.98, result- ing in a net Operating Income of $4,130.32 for the month. Church youth spent a week at On July 14 we remember two (which means "of the Holy that the book is meant to in- All Saints Camp. Pictures pg. 2. saints, one who lived during Mountain," referring to Mount spire all Chrisans, not just the first years of the Chrisan Athos) was born in 1748. He monascs. He was always ea- Installation of new church win- Church and the other who lived became a monasc on that ger to share good Chrisan dows nearing completion. just a few hundred years ago. mountain when he was twenty teaching from any source. For Blinds for hall being priced. They are the apostle Aquila -six. For the rest of his life, he example, he produced an edi- from among the Seventy, and would work at wring and on of "Unseen Warfare" by Saint Nicodemus the Hagiorite. eding some of the most im- Father Lorenzo Scupoli, a Ro- portant books and texts we man Catholic. Aquila and his wife Priscilla, were friends and co-workers of have in the Church. He pre- During the remaining years of pared himself well for this Saint Paul. All three were born his life Saint Nectarios conn- work, using his prodigious SS Peter & Paul Orthodox into Judaism, became Chrisans, ued to work intensity. He memory to learn by heart the Church and taught the faith to others. wrote hymns, a book on Chris- 1614 E. Monte Vista Rd. Scriptures and many wrings an morality, a manual for Phoenix, AZ 85006 In Romans 16:3 Paul writes of the Fathers, and bringing his confession and accounts of the 602.253.9515 that Aquila and Priscilla "risked knowledge of Greek to a level lives of saints. He produced a www.sspeterpaulaz.org their own necks for my life." It www.oca.org of near perfecon. new edion of the "Rudder" www.orthodoxfellowship.org isn't clear what he is specifical- The work began when he was and translated a three-volume ly referring to, but obviously The Right Reverend DANIEL assigned, along with Saint Mac- work on the Pauline epistles by Bishop of Santa Rosa the couple acted bravely at arius of Corinth, to edit a manu- Saint Theophylact. Rector some me when their courage 480.287.0240 Mobile script of the "Philokalia," a col- [email protected] saved Paul's life. Exhausted and ill, he died at lecon of spiritual wrings of Archpriest David Balmer the age of sixty, having given Paul then writes that not only Fathers from the fourth to Attached the best of his great learning he, but "all the churches of the Retired fieenth centuries. The two and energy to the service of Genles" are thankful to the Deacon John Weiss monks chose the contents of the Church. He le encourag- pair, who offered their home Andrew Evans the book based on their availa- ing words for every Chrisan: Council President for Chrisans to meet in. This bility. They included pieces that "...the more a man acts in ac- 480.948.7929 was another way in which Aq- had never been published and cordance with the command- Barbara Harp uila and Priscilla gave the best were not accessible anywhere ments of Christ, the more he is Choir Director they had so that the Church [email protected] else. Some pieces had appeared cleansed of the passions and could flourish and its great Stephanie A. Homyak in other publicaons, but these the more the fire of Divine Church School Director leaders could connue to were worm-eaten, crumbling grace lights in his heart, illu- Newsletter Editor teach. According to tradion, 623.869.0470 texts that were nearly impossi- mines and deifies him." [email protected] Aquila gave his very life, killed ble to read. by jealous pagans. Mike Wagner Saint Nicodemus' preface to Web Master Saint Nicodemus the Hagiorite [email protected] the "Philokalia" emphasizes PAGE 2 SSPETER&PAULORTHODOXCHURCHNEWSLETTER PAGE 3 SSPETER&PAULORTHODOXCHURCHNEWSLETTER Fr. Lawrence Farley would have meant for the man we have that we will never be celebries, or that only to read of the trauma caused by a we are lonely. Our real problem is that we The story of the deliverance of the Gada- single demon leaving a boy in Mark 9:26), are twisted and broken inside, and our rene demoniac reappears oen in our and they immediately le. When the de- real name is legion. We may appear out- Orthodox leconary, so it seems that mons suddenly entered the swine, they wardly respectable, and may live funcon- someone thought we really needed to animals panicked and stampeded over the al lives, hiding our brokenness from the hear its message. You know the sto- cliff and drowned in the sea below. But view of others, but in reality we live in the ry: Our Lord crossed the Sea of Galilee the man from whom the legion had de- tombs of death like the poor wretch that with His disciples and disembarked on the parted was saved. He sat restored and met Christ by the shore. A moment’s hon- eastern shore, in the region whose main calm at the Lord’s feet, and begged to go est introspecon will reveal this. C. S. city was Gadara. There He met a demoni- with Him. Lewis reported the same thing. In his ac, accompanied according to Saint book Surprised by Joy, he admied to Mahew’s version of the story by a sec- The queson that Christ asked the man is what he found the first me he looked ond demoniac. The man ran up to Christ the queson we must answer as inside himself: “For the first me I exam- and fell down before Him, asking for well. What is your name? That is, what ined myself with a seriously praccal pur- help. He was in dire straits indeed: his do we think is our real problem, our ul- pose. And there I found what appalled afflicon drove him far from society, and mate need, the one thing that stands be- me; a zoo of lusts, a bedlam of ambions, he lived among the unclean tombs, tween us and happiness? a nursery of fears, a hareem of fondled screaming and cung himself on the hatreds. My name was legion.” Lewis The world of course offers its own false rocks. His neighbors had aempted what answered the Lord’s queson with the diagnoses of the human dilemma, and we would call an intervenon: they rigorous honesty which characterized all suggests a number of things that we really bound him with a strait-jacket of chains his subsequent work, and learned his true need. Taught by the world, when the Lord and tried to take him home, but with de- name and his true need. Of course we asks us, “What is your name?”, some monic strength he broke the chains and have other needs as well. We cannot live would answer, “Poverty,” for they believe returned to his solitary haunt and his without money, and it is nice to have our that insufficient money is their main prob- wretched life of screaming and self- worth recognized by our peers, and many lem. If only they had more money, they destrucon. Something within him recog- find marriage to be the blessed path for would be happy, and all would be nized Jesus as his only hope when He them. But these needs are not our funda- well. Some would answer, emerged on the sea-shore, and he ran to mental ones, for neither poverty, nor lack “Unappreciated,” for they believe that if Him for help. When our Lord saw him, He of recognion, nor loneliness can keep us only they could be famous like the celebri- had one queson for him: “What is your from God and from eternal joy. Only sin es then they would be fulfilled. Fame name?” To know a person’s name was to can keep us from God. The Gadarene de- and recognion of their gis and abilies have power over him, and our Lord’s first moniac was not alone, for he had one who are all they need to be happy. Some assault on the demonic within the man shared his misery, and who by the sea- would answer the Lord’s queson by say- was extract the name. The man replied, shore that day shared his salvaon. Let us ing, “Loneliness,” for they feel that if only “Legion,” for a veritable legion of demons join them as well. It is no use denying our they were married, then their life would had entered him. A legion, according to true name and refusing to acknowledge be complete and all their needs would be Roman figuring, was a force of about what is our fundamental problem. Let us met. To the queson of what is our basic 6,000 men. We all know how the story look within and speak our true name dilemma, the world offers a variety of an- ends: when the demons knew that their when Christ bids us, and like the demoni- swers, and it suggests that money, fame, defeat was at hand, they asked permission acs of the Gadarene region find our salva- and marriage would solve everything. to enter the herd of swine feeding nearby, on in the Lord.