Addictions and struggles with the passions are rampant in our culture. Fr. Meletios Webber, an Orthodox priest with a doctorate in counseling, helps us to understand addiction and explores ways to overcome it. He clearly and skillfully explains the Twelve Steps of the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous. In correlating the Twelve Steps with basic Orthodox theology, Fr. Mel identifies the implication of the Twelve Steps for Orthodox, and for all Christians. Using examples from the life of the Orthodox Church, he shows how the Steps can be a valuable resource for our own spiritual journey. With a foreword by Bishop Kallistos Ware Reviews: "Fr. Meletios Webber's Steps of Transformation presents the vision and practice of Twelve-Step programs for dealing with addictions, particularly alcoholism. He relates the Steps to Orthodox Christian spirituality with clarity, conviction, and appealing personal engagement. Here is a book which addicts and their friends are sure to treasure. It is true, deep, pure, rich, and highly rewarding.: -Fr. Thomas Hopko, Dean Emeritus, St. Vladimir's Seminary; speaker, author "At those moments when I have fallen to lowest of depths, then my cry has most convincingly attracted the grace of God. This book is about the spirituality of imperfection. Steps of Transformation is written with clarity and simplicity by a man who recognizes that 'God hears the voice of our prayer, only out of the depths of our cry.' " -Fr. John Chryssavgis, Professor of Theology, Holy Cross; author and speaker "Steps of Transformation was very simple, easy to read, and right on target about both the problem of, and the solution to, the disease of alcoholism. I suggest that anyone can benefit from reading this book, and I encourage all Orthodox Christians to take a look at it." -Floyd Frantz, CAC, St. Dimitrie Addictions Treatment Program, Romania

There is enormous tension between entering fully into the Church Year and the pressures of society. We sometimes find ourselves walking a tight rope between what we think is the ideal of a holy life and the demands of our post-modern world.The beauty of the Church seasons is that they teach us how to balance our life. The Christian life is a whole life, an expansive life, a life in Christ, who gives Himself for the life of the world.This collection is author Donna Farley's own view from the tightrope. These short yet thoughtful reflections, written in an insightful and sometimes humorous style, will help weave together the great feasts into the fabric of our lives.

The 1917 revolutions that gave birth to Soviet Russia had a profound impact on Russian religious life. Social and political attitudes toward religion in general and toward the Russian Orthodox Church in particular remained in turmoil for nearly 30 years. During that time of religious uncertainty, a movement known as "renovationism," led by reformist Orthodox clergy, pejoratively labeled "red priests," tried to reconcile Christianity with the goals of the Bolshevik state. But Church hierarchy and Bolshevik officials alike feared clergymen who proclaimed themselves to be both Christians and socialists. This innovative study, based on previously untapped archival sources, recounts the history of the red priests, who, acting out of religious conviction in a hostile environment, strove to establish a church that stood for social justice and equality. Red Priests sheds valuable new light on the dynamics of society, politics, and religion in Russia between 1905 and 1946.

Among the Copts brings the reader face to face with the Christians of Egypt by offering a comprehensive presentation of the life and thought of the Coptic Orthodox Church at the turn of the millennium. The book explores the important themes of the Copts from the earliest moments of Christian history to the present day, achieving an impressive balance between a critical re-examination of Coptic history and original research. The work contains several small biographies and numerous vignettes to illustrate the Coptic experience as it is lived. These are presented in sections on history, liturgy, art, theology, monasticism, politics, mission and martyrdom. Controversial issues are sympathetically treated by a writer who has a deep understanding and appreciation of Coptic and Islamic culture in modern Egypt.

In the last decade, Eastern Orthodoxy has moved from being virtually unknown to Western Christians to being a significant presence on the religious scene in North America and Great Britain. In light of Orthodoxy's growing presence, this book will introduce Western Christians to the Eastern Orthodox vision of the Christian life by examining Orthodox theology and worship and will also alert readers to the cultural and historical factors that shape any interpretation of the Christian faith.

Part of a classic trilogy on Oriental Christianity that had a ground-breaking effect in bringing an awareness of the broader Christian world to Westerners. It remains the most readable and authoritative source on the churches to the east of Rome. This volume is on the Orthodox Churches of the Byzantine rite.

Russia's ever-expanding imperial boundaries encompassed diverse peoples and religions. Yet Russian Orthodoxy remained inseparable from the identity of the Russian empire-state, which at different times launched conversion campaigns not only to "save the souls" of animists and bring deviant Orthodox groups into the mainstream, but also to convert the empire's numerous Muslims, Buddhists, Jews, Catholics, and Uniates.

This book is the first to investigate the role of religious conversion in the long history of Russian state building. How successful were the Church and the state in proselytizing among religious minorities? How were the concepts of Orthodoxy and Russian nationality shaped by the religious diversity of the empire? What was the impact of Orthodox missionary efforts on the non-Russian peoples, and how did these peoples react to religious pressure? In chapters that explore these and other questions, this book provides geographical coverage from Poland and European Russia to the Caucasus, Central Asia, Siberia, and Alaska.

The editors' introduction and conclusion place the twelve original essays in broad historical context and suggest patterns in Russian attitudes toward religion that range from attempts to forge a homogeneous identity to tolerance of complexity and diversity.

Contributors Eugene Clay, Arizona State University; Robert P. Geraci, University of Virginia; Sergei Kan, Dartmouth College; Agnes Kefeli, Arizona State University; Shoshana Keller, Colgate University; Michael Khodarkovsky, Loyola University, Chicago; John D. Klier, University College, London; Georg Michels, University of California, Riverside; Firouzeh Mostashari, Regis College; Dittmar Schorkowitz, Free University, Berlin; Theodore Weeks, Southern Illinois University; Paul W. Werth, University of Nevada, Las Vegas"

Part of a classic trilogy on Oriental Christianity that had a ground-breaking effect in bringing an awareness of the broader Christian world to Westerners. It remains the most readable and authoritative source on the churches to the east of Rome. This volume is on the Uniate Eastern Churches.

Of the many sects that broke from the official Russian Orthodox church in the eighteenth century, one was universally despised. Its members were peasants from the Russian heartland skilled in the arts of animal husbandry who turned their knives on themselves to become "eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake.' Convinced that salvation came only with the literal excision of the instruments of sin, they were known as Skoptsy (the self-castrated). Their community thrived well into the twentieth century, when it was destroyed in the Stalinist Terror.

In a major feat of historical reconstruction, Laura Engelstein tells the sect's astonishing tale. She describes the horrified reactions to the sect by outsiders, including outraged bureaucrats, physicians, and theologians. More important, she allows the Skoptsy a say in deeming the contours of their history and the meaning behind their sacrifice. Her deft handling of their letters and notebooks lends her book unusual depth and pathos, and she provides a heartbreaking account of willing exile and of religious belief so strong that its adherents accepted terrible pain and the denial of a basic human experience. Although the Skoptsy express joy at their salvation, the words of even the most fervent believers reveal the psychological suffering of life on society's margins.

No foreign tribe or exotic import, the sect drew its members from the larger pant society where marriage was expected and adulthood began with the wedding night. Set apart by the very act that guaranteed their redemption, these "lambs of God" became adept at concealing their sectarian identity as they interacted with their Orthodox neighbors. Interaction was necessary,Engelstein explains, since the survival of the Skoptsy depended upon recruitment of new members and on success in agriculture and trade.

Realizing that some prejudices have changed little over the centuries, Engelstein cautions that "we must not cast the shadow of our own distress on the story of the Skoptsy. Their physical suffering was something they willingly embraced." In Castration and the Heavenly Kingdom, she has produced a remarkable history that also illuminates the mysteries of the human heart.

Development and practice of liturgical chant in Russia: origins, extant manuscripts, composers, notation, language, performance and relationship to the liturgy.

The memoirs presented in Women of the Catacombs offer a rare close-up account of the underground Orthodox community and its priests during some of the most difficult years in Russian history. The catacomb church in the Soviet Union came into existence in the 1920s and played a significant part in Russian national life for nearly fifty years. Adherents to the Orthodox faith often referred to the catacomb church as the "light shining in the dark." Women of the Catacombs provides a first-hand portrait of lived religion in its social, familial, and cultural setting during this tragic period. Until now, scholars have had only brief, scattered fragments of information about Russia's illegal church organization that claimed to protect the purity of the Orthodox tradition. Vera Iakovlevna Vasilevskaia and Elena Semenovna Men, who joined the church as young women, offer evidence on how Russian Orthodoxy remained a viable, alternative presence in Soviet society, when all political, educational, and cultural institutions attempted to indoctrinate Soviet citizens with an atheistic perspective. Wallace L. Daniel's translation not only sheds light on Russia's religious and political history, but also shows how two educated women maintained their personal integrity in times when prevailing political and social headwinds moved in an opposite direction.

Christians have often wondered about what might take place at the end of history. To answer their questions, they have turned to the Book of Revelation.

A companion to "Prayers of the Eucharist: Early and Reformed "

The Churches of the East possess a sometimes bewildering array of Eucharistic prayers. "Essays on Early Eastern Eucharistic Prayer" offers a guide to the exploration of the principal prayers, and presents in a simple and succinct manner the current scholarship on the origins, development, and relationship of these particular prayers to other ancient prayers.

As well as summarizing the state of research and suggesting directions for future study, these essays explain the history of these prayers, their relationship to one another, and reveal how and why early Christian prayers developed as they did. In this way "Essays on Early Eastern Eucharistic Prayers" produces a clear picture of the way early Eucharistic prayers emerged and grew in the Eastern Churches.

"Essays on Early Eastern Eucharistic Prayers" serves as a companion to - and provides an extended commentary on the texts of early eastern Eucharistic prayers that are published in R. C. D. Jasper and G. J. Cuming's "Prayers of the Eucharist: Early and Reformed. Essays on Early Eastern Eucharistic Prayers" also offers more detail than is available in the introductions to either text or in other general histories of liturgy or early liturgical practice.

Articles and their contributors include Introduction: The Evolution of Early Anaphoras," by Paul F. Bradshaw; "The Anaphora of the Apostles Addai and Mari," by Stephen B.Wilson; "The Strasbourg Papyrus," by Walter D. Ray; "The Anaphora of St. Mark: A Study in Development," by G. J.Cuming; "The Archaic Nature of the Sanctus, Institution Narrative, and Epiclesis of the Logos in the Anaphora Ascribed to Sarapion of Thmuis," by Maxwell E. Johnson; "The Basilian Anaphoras," by D. Richard Stuckwisch; "The Anaphora of the "Mystagogical Catecheses" of Cyril of Jerusalem," by Kent J. Burreson; "The Anaphora of St. James," by John D. Witvliet; "The Anaphora of the Eighth Book of the "Apostolic Constitutions,"" by Raphael Graves; and "St. John Chrysostom and the Byzantine Anaphora That Bears His Name," by Robert F. Taft, S.J. Includes an index.

"Pal F. Bradshaw is professor of liturgy at the University of Notre Dame and was vice-principal of Ripon College, Cuddesdon, Oxford, England. He is the author of "Liturgy in Dialogue "and "Early Christian Worship" published by The Liturgical Press.""

Meletij Smotryc kyj was one of the outstanding figures in the great flourishing of Orthodox spirituality that occurred in the late 16th and early 17th century in response to the challenge posed first by Polish heterodox religious movements, and later by the Polish Counter-Reformation. His biography reflects the tensions and contradictions that characterized his nation the Ruthenians, the Orthodox Christians of the Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth. Ruthenian patriots were torn between various allegiances to nation, church, and traditions. Thus, in Smotryckyj s life we witness one of the later acts in the drama of the European Age of Reform, all the more important because for the first time the Reformation and Counter-Reformation came into direct daily contact with the Byzantine world of Orthodox Slavdom.

Professor Frick's biography the first major English language work on Smotryc kyj examines the ways in which established cultures were altered by cross-cultural understandings and misunderstandings, resulting from the confrontation and mutual adaptation of two or more diverse cultures. This study, which has affinities with the microhistorical approach, seeks to reconstruct details in the lives of individuals and pays special attention to the ways in which individual world views conflicted with each other and with various higher authorities. "Meletij Smotryc kyj" will be of interest to scholars and students of Ukraine, Belarus, Poland-Lithuania, and those researching the history of the Uniate, Orthodox, and Roman Catholic Churches in Eastern Europe.

Father Jack Sparks has masterfully adapted the material from this highly treasured monastic work specifically for today's lay Christian living in the midst of a modern world. The result is a profound but highly practical resource for those who seek to strive with all their might against the enemies of our souls-the world, the flesh, and the devil. Study questions at the end of each chapter facilitate individual or small group study. Two other books in the "Unseen Warfare" series-Victory in the Unseen Warfare, and Prayer in the Unseen Warfare-are complementary in content, but do not overlap. Can be read separately or as a set.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, nation building and identity construction in the post-socialist region have been the subject of extensive academic research. The majority of these studies have taken a 'top-down' approach - focusing on the variety of ways in which governments have sought to define the nascent nation states - and in the process have often oversimplified the complex and overlapping processes at play across the region. Drawing on research on the Balkans, Central Asia, the Caucasus and Eastern Europe, this book focuses instead on the role of non-traditional, non-politicised and non-elite actors in the construction of identity. Across topics as diverse as school textbooks, turbofolk and home decoration, contributors - each an academic with extensive on-the-ground experience - identify and analyse the ways that individuals living across the post-socialist region redefine identity on a daily basis, often by manipulating and adapting state policy.In the process, Nation Building in the Post-Socialist Region demonstrates the necessity of holistic, trans-national and inter-disciplinary approaches to national identity construction rather than studies limited to a single-state territory. This is important reading for all scholars and policymakers working on the post-socialist region.

From the reopening of the churches to the expressions of religious charity to the revival of monasticism, signs of recovery of Eastern Orthodox religious culture are evident throughout the former Soviet lands. While occasioned in part by the death of communism, the new religious consciousness is rooted in living traditions that antedate by centuries the relatively brief period of Soviet rule. Addressing these living traditions, this volume's essays highlight both historical and contemporary sources of religious identity. Seeking God examines the roots and recovery of Orthodox religious culture in Russia, Ukraine, and Georgia. The authors of the essays are leading international authorities on Orthodoxy, and their contributions reflect the growing scholarly interest in Orthodox popular culture, as well as the linkage of confessional identity with nationalism in the Eastern Orthodox world. Following an introduction by Stephen K. Batalden and an opening essay on the life and work of Father Aleksandr Men', the essays deal with such topics as Old Believers, women's religious communities, schism and cultural conflict, architecture, contemporary politics of the Russian Bible, and sources for studying Eastern Christianity.

The origins and development of the Divine Office are traced through both Eastern and Western branches of the Church, providing a wealth of historical and liturgical information.

From the small beginnings of a few Christians in New Testament Jerusalem, the prayer of the Church spread, changing and evolving as it met and was assimilated by different cultures.

This classic study is a major resource for the liturgical scholar.

In the last thirty years of his life, Leo Tolstoy developed a moral philosophy that embraced pacifism, vegetarianism, the renunciation of private property, and a refusal to comply with the state. The transformation in his outlook led to his excommunication by the Orthodox Church and the breakdown of his family life. Internationally, he inspired a legion of followers who formed communities and publishing houses devoted to living and promoting the 'Tolstoyan' life. These enterprises flourished across Europe and the United States in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, and Tolstoyism influenced individuals as diverse as William Jennings Bryan and Mohandas Gandhi. Through its unique treatment of Tolstoyism, this book provides the first in-depth historical account of this remarkable phenomenon, and provides an important re-assessment of Tolstoy's impact on the political life of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Charlotte Alston describes Tolstoyism as an international phenomenon and explores both the connections between these Tolstoyan groups and their relationships with other related reform movements.

In this book, Bushkovitch traces the evolution of religious attitudes in an important transitional period in Russian history, the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Concentrating on the attitudes of the court and elite of Russian society, he explores the effects of the gradual decline of Monastic spirituality, the rise of miracle cults, and the redefinition of Orthodoxy in the seventeenth century. Around 1650, preaching and a moral reformation of the individual believer began to displace the predominant miracle cults and rituals. Centered at first in the court of Tsar Aleksei, these changes began to spread into society at large by the end of the seventeenth century. This redefinition of Orthodoxy created a religion that stressed virtue more than revelation, and thus prepared the ground for the secularization of Russian culture in Peter the Great's time. Using unpublished manuscript material as well as early printed books, Bushkovitch demonstrates that this period was far from the stable (or stagnant) era of Slavophile myth, but a time of continuous and often rapid change. Discussing areas never before researched (such as miracle cults), he not only skillfully reconstructs these rapid and fundamental changes in the Russian religious experience, but also shows how they were influenced by European religious ideas and how they foreshadowed the secularization of Russian society.

In recent years a new interest in the Eastern Churches has emerged in the Western Churches both Catholic and Protestant. The reader of this work will find answers to such fundamental questions as Who are Eastern Catholics?" "How did the Eastern Catholic Churches originate?" "Who are Orthodox Christians?" "How do Orthodox Christians differ from Eastern Catholics?" "Why do so many diverse Eastern Churches exist?"

While it cannot answer all these questions thoroughly, this concise booklet can help interested laity, theological students, and ministers come to understand and respect Eastern Catholicism for its many contributions to the universal Catholic Church.

This book addresses the fundamental question of who Jesus was and is. It discusses questions raised by new approaches to Gospel research and questions the nature and value of New Testament research. Veselin argues that the proper function of biblical criticism is to build rather than destroy, to illuminate rather than obscure, and to give a better understanding of the Gospel. He pays particular attention to the incarnational approach, which presupposes historical inquiry and justifies historical research.

The glory of the Italian Renaissance came not only from Europe's Latin heritage, but also from the rich legacy of another renaissance - the palaeologan of late Byzantium. This nexus of Byzantine and Latin cultural and ecclesiastical relations in the Renaissance and Medieval periods is the underlying theme of the diverse and far-ranging essays in ""Constantinople and the West"". Addressing the disputed, provocative question of Palaeologan influence on Italian Renaissance humanism, the author systematically demonstrates that Byzantine scholars were not merely transmitters of ancient Greek writings to the West. More significantly, the Byzantine emigre scholars in Italy, through their intimate knowledge of the Alexandrian and Byzantine traditions, alone were able to unlock and authentically interpret the more difficult texts of Aristotle, Plato, Hermogenes, and other Greek thinkers. Geanakoplos shows that the Byzantine refugee scholars and their Italian disciples were able to promote a fusion of elements of both the Italian and Palaeologan renaissances. Other essays concern the careers of influential Palaeologan humanists such as Theodore Gaza, the leading secular Aristotelian of the early Italian Renaissance, and John Argyropoulos, who was probably chiefly responsible for shifting the emphasis of Florentine humanism from rhetoric to Platonic philosophy. The essays in the second half of the book deal primarily with ecclesiastical relations. The author probes deeply into encounters between Greek and Roman churches at councils in Lyons, Florence, and elsewhere, which reflect the centuries of recurring religious schism and attempted reunion. He also offers a revealing glimpse of the Greek exaltation, and of Hagia Sophia and its properties, after Constantinople's liberation from Latin rule in 1261. While all of the essays have been printed previously, the author has revised and brought them entirely up to date for this volume. ""Constantinople and the West"" should be invaluable to those interested in the Byzantine and Italian Renaissance, and reward students of Medieval history, church history, and those who are interested in the comparative history of the East and West.

The spiritual revival that is sweeping the Soviet Union today had its genesis in the religious renaissance of the early 20th century. In both cases, it was lay intellectuals, disenchanted with simplistic positivism and materialism, who adapted Russian orthodoxy to modern life. Their ideas reverberated, not only in religion and philosophy, but in art, literature, painting, theater and film. Banned by the Soviet government in 1922, the writings of the religious renaissance were rediscovered in the Brezhnev era by a new generation of Soviet intellectuals disillusioned with Marxism. Circulating from hand to hand in illegal typewritten editions (samizdat), they exerted an evergrowing influence on Soviet society, from the very top down to ordinary people. Under the new policy of glasnost, the government itself is currently reprinting their works. The selections included in this volume reflect the profundity and breadth of their thought and are presented in English for the first time. The recognition of the universal need and significance of spiritual values and ideals united this otherwise heterogeneous group and bears witness to the diversity of their approach to the basic issues of the human condition. The centrality of these lay intellectualsa concerns transcends the specifics of the historical situation in early 20th century Russia and makes their writings relevant to the universal human condition. In order of appearance, the selections are: VLADIMIR SOLOVYOV, The Enemy from the East, The Russian National Ideal; NIKOLAI GROT, On the True Tasks of Philosophy; SERGEI DIAGHILEV, Complex Questions; VASILLY V. ROZANOV, On Sweetest Jesus and the Bitter Fruits of the World; NIKOLAI BERDIAEV, Socialism as Religion; SERGEI BULGAKOV, An Urgent Task; VIACHISLAV IVANOV, Crisis of Individualism, GEORGII CHULKOV, On Mystical Anarchism; DMITRI S. MEREZHKOVSKY, Revolution and Religion, The Jewish Question As a Russian Question; GEORGII FLOROVSKY, In the World of Quests and Wanderings; PAVEL NOVGORODTSEV, The Essence of the Russian Orthodox Consciousness; PETR STRUVE, The Intelligentsia and the National Face; ANDREI BELY, Revolution and Culture; ALEKSANDR BLOK, Catiline; EVGENY TRUBETSKOI, The Bolshevist Utopia and the Religious Movement.