If I were seeking a bride, I would want someone with not just outer beauty, but inner also. What is this beauty? You could go on and on, but basically it is virtue. And it is indeed beautiful. To Plato, beauty is the object of love. So I call virtue beautiful because it is so […]

I’ve noticed that some people display a certain annoying conversational habit: when you say something that is not in all cases true, whatever degree it may be true, they argue for the opposite. It is as though these people feel compelled to restore the balance upset by your words. Some people are worse than others. […]

It seems that I was right. Liebnitz did coin the phrase “best of all possible worlds.” His point was to acquit God of mixing evil into creation. But Christians have always insisted that God is not the author of evil, and none of them concluded that God’s creation must therefore be “best.” I also don’t […]

After vespers, I took some pictures of the results of last night’s freezing rain. These shots would have been better in the morning, because the weather has been melty all day. And they would have been much better with a tripod. (Mom and Dad, are you reading this? You say I’m hard to buy for!) […]

Someone in class yesterday called God’s creation “the best of all possible worlds.” That was the phrase of Liebnitz and the “optimists,” a conclusion based on a sort of loose logic. It left atheists an easy argument: If a benevolent, omnipotent God could only create the best of all possible worlds, then clearly there is […]

Here is something I wrote at the beginning of the semester but never got around to posting. It is the original of Ἀγνὴ Παρθένε, Basil BASIL’s metrical translation, and my literal translation.
Ἀγνὴ Παρθένε
Ὕμνος ἁγίου Νεκταρίου Αἰγίνας (+1920)
Ἀγνὴ Παρθένε Δέσποινα, ἄχραντε Θεοτόκε, Χαῖρε, Νύμφη ἀνύμφευτε.
Παρθένε μήτηρ ἄνασσα, πανένδροσέ τε πόκε. Χαῖρε, Νύμφη ἀνύμφευτε.
Ὑψηλοτέρα οὐρανῶν ἀκτίνων λαμπροτέρα, […]

Here is one other item, something from back in October, that I’d like to have in the searchable text of this blog, rather than just in my handwritten journal:
Three different formulas about God use the word “οὐσία”:

The Trinity is one οὐσία and three ὑπόστασες.
Jesus has a divine οὐσία and a human οὐσία.
God’s οὐσία is unknowable, […]

My last assignment of the semester was a presentation on St. John Chrysostom’s thirteenth homily on Genesis.

Paragraphs 1–2 begin with encouragement and exhortation.
Paragraphs 3–11 discuss Genesis 2:7: God made man.
Paragraphs 12–15 discuss Genesis 2:8: God made man’s home.
Paragraphs 16–18 conclude with more encouragement and exhortation.

I said that the theme of St. John’s text was God’s […]

I finished finals yesterday. Now that it’s all over, I am hoping to attend to some errands and then tomorrow (weather permitting) drive to St. Gregory Palamas Monastery. It snowed last night, but it has stopped now. The trees out my window are like silver. Sadly, this picture does not do them justice:

This weekend Fr. Ted asked me to stay home, since he was worried about the roads between here and Emmaus. But it turned out the weather was quite good, and Saturday evening Dn. Andrew asked me to join him at St. Philip’s. I was happy to go. I spent the night at his place, and […]