There is no room for concession

Ecumenism, the spirit of the age. It seems now that everyone is finding a reason to unite with everyone. Find the similarity no matter how small and unify on the basis of that alone. This is nonsense. We are not all the same, we have differences and that is quite alright. When it comes to religion I have even less patience. What is the need to unite with the Latins? Yes we share similarities, that does not mean we are the same, and that certainly is no ground for unification. The creed would be "We believe in Christ, whom we share no common opinion." And that is exactly what it would be, a superficial unity.

Josef Ratzinger erroneously and deceitfully refers to himself as a Pope. This title was negated once Leo I came to power in Rome and split the church with his newly introduced ideas of the papal supremacy of Rome and worldly ideas of church government. They have left the grace of the Holy Spirit, they have added to the creed and introduced foreign doctrines. The last two leaders of Rome have knowingly covered up sex abuse scandals and in the worst way, moving the abusive priest to another church, over and over again. Yet we are to believe that the leader of Rome is infallible, in no way is he infallible.

According to Fr. Cozzone's The Changing Face of the Priesthood, almost %50 of the clergy of Rome is homosexual, keep in mind Cozzone is a Catholic priest. How can we be unified with this? Homosexuals administering the sacraments, teaching our children, and leading people to overcome sin, this is absurd.  Karol Józef Wojtyła, the false pope before Ratzinger, kissed the Koran, placed an Idol og buddha on the altar in Assisi, was blessed by a pagan priestess, and worshipped with jews in the synagogue, as did Ratzinger much later. This is all heretical and unacceptable to Orthodoxy. This is clearly not in line with our church, nor the writings and history of our church fathers. The glorious St. Dioscorous anathemized Leo I for supporting a nestorian heretic Theodoret of Cyrus, I highly doubt he would accept the Latins now especially since they are much worse off than in his time. There can be no concessions made! There can be no unity with heretics! 


I will not recognize Ratzinger or anyone from Leo I on as a legitimate Pope, and there is no reason anyone else should. I will show him the same respect I would show Arius, I will not kiss his hand or recognize anything they have done or continue to do as in line with Orthodoxy. There should be dialog, that is a good thing, but participating in their worship service is unacceptable in my view as I am sure it would be in our early fathers eyes. 

The Woman, the Serpent, and the Flood

"And the serpent cast out of his mouth water as a flood after the woman, that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood. And the earth helped the woman; and the earth opened her mouth and swallowed up the flood which the dragon cast out of his mouth." - Apoc. 12:15-16


This verse is of course not to be interpreted literally but metaphorically. The woman is a symbol of the Church, according to St. Andrew of Caesarea ( Ancient Christian Commentary on the Scripture: Revelation, p.191) Of course we need not guess at whom the serpent represents, the devil, who has been at war with the church for ages and has been bested by Christ. What is meant by this flood from the mouth of the serpent? There is a great parallel here in scripture, in Num. 16 Korah and 250 others rebel against Moses and Aaron. Korah states to Moses and Aaron: "You take too much upon yourselves, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them: why then to you exalt yourselves above the congregation of the Lord?" Korah is rebelling against the priesthood, an office which God Himself established, which still exists today. Korah is telling Moses and Aaron that everyone is the same and then accuses them of self exaltation, a sin which they themselves were committing through their lack of humility, pride. God gave a response to Korahs inquiry, and it was a swift one, he opened up the earth and swallowed him whole and he went straight down to Hades alive.
Moses had said before that in Num. 16:30 that: "Then you shall understand that these men have provoked the Lord."

How does this pertain to the serpent and the flood which came from his mouth? In the 16th century came a flood of heresy. The protestant reformation came about which resulted, and still results to this day, in schism upon schism and a multitude of denominations (38,000 to be exact, World Christian Encyclopedia, 2001.) with all kinds of varieties of heresy within them. Not only have the majority of these attacked the church openly or inadvertently, but the multitude of these denominations have seemed to drown out the true church. Worse yet, these denominations hinder the minds of their adherents by demonizing the true church and brainwashing them with the two pillars of protestantism, sola scriptura and sola fide. Sola scriptura, the bible as sole authority, gives people the false impression that they can read scripture and interpret for themselves what it says. even though this is condemned in scripture: "Knowing this first, that no prophecy of scripture is of any private interpretation." 2 Pet. 1:20 Yet this verse is ignored and instead they choose to be empowered by themselves and their own desires and this causes them to pervert scriptures and has resulted in hundreds of thousands of denominations.

This is the flood coming from the mouth of the serpent. So this verse is a double entendre in that it refers to Korahs rebellion and protestantism. In the same way God answered Korah, and saved the church from his corruption, He will do also with protestantism. Does this mean that the ground will literally open up and swallow all protestants? Many will be deceived in the end times because of the antichrist, and this is when the ground starts to open up and upon Christ's return all evil will be swallowed up. The protestants, for their willful ignorance, those who believe in the rapture will be deceived by the antichrist. For the simple fact that the antichrist will proclaim himself to be the messiah, therefore they will believe that this is the rapture and he is Christ come to whisk them away to avoid suffering. And those who believe in chilliams or millenialism will think that this is Christ's reign on earth for 1000 years. Those who are smart enough will turn from their stupidity and become Orthodox.

Amen.

Love

What is the true definition of love? Is it what we see on television, or on the billboards, and in the magazines? Like so many other things given unto us by God, love has been perverted to such an extent it is almost unrecognizable from is origin. The origin of love is God, "for God is love." (1 John 4:8) In Focus on The Coptic Family Fr. Mikhail E. Mikhail teaches us that there are three persons in marriage, the man, the woman, and God. Therefore if God is absent, then it is not love but something else, a perversion. True love has no necessity or desire for the flesh but a union between the persons and God.

How do you love someone in the way God intended? Love is an emotional and spiritual connection, not a physical desire for the flesh of another individual. If we are looking at another in a physical way and we believe that is love, we are lying to ourselves. It is through the love of God that two people love one another and when two get married, they receive communion meaning they are receiving God as two people united in one through the body of Christ. This is love, everything else is superficial and vain. Everything else is perversion dressed up and called love when it is not.

What exactly is the scriptural definition of love so that we may know it and work towards it.
 "Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails." (1 Cor. 13:4-8) This is how we love. St. Paul teaches us how to love the way God intended and gives us the true definition of what love really is.

"For this is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you." (John 15:12) Christ tells us to love in the way that God has set forth, true love. Not in the way the world tells us to love, which is false love, a love that will leave you empty and struggling. We must ask ourselves, in what way am I loving? Am I loving as the world has taught me, or as Christ has taught me? This test I offer unto all will show if you are a disciple of this world or a disciple of Christ.