Transfiguration of Jesus from Spaso-Preobrazhensky Cathedral in Pereslavl-Zalessky
Taken at St. Nicholas Cathedral.
Wishing you guys a blessed feast!
I’m a Byzantine iconographer from Romania, and this is one of the largest projects currently in my workshop: a complete iconostasis for an Orthodox church. These four large icons are approximately 120 × 60 cm (47 × 24 in) each and are being painted entirely by hand using traditional techniques — wooden panels, gesso, egg tempera, natural pigments and genuine gold leaf. Two are already well underway, while the other two are still at earlier stages, so I thought this might be an interesting moment to share the process. If you’re curious about Byzantine iconography, egg tempera, gilding, preparing large panels, how an iconostasis is designed, how long something like this takes, or what it’s like doing this professionally… Ask me anything!
I’m am surrounded by love and god and happiness, yet I am so sad
I feel so alone and scared and I can’t make any sense of this
I’m so excited and happy I’m pregnant and my baby is healthy
But I feel so disconnected sometimes with god.
I’m having to work so much my job is very demanding
And I’m very sick with this pregnancy I’m throwing up multiple times a day throughout the day I’m so fatigue and so drained for work
I feel like I can’t concentrate on my concentration with god or my pregnancy
I’m so scared to bring my child into this world with how everything is atm
At the end of the day when I’m in heaven with god my job will not matter the money I make will not matter but my family my children.
I really want to leave my job but I’m entitled to paid maternity leave so I don’t want to miss out on this and be a burden on my partner and our family, i feel I’ll be judged for not working and carrying my own weight by my family and his. I’ve been told my by dad I need to women up and get throw this pregnancy and I’m not the first person to be pregnant.
But this is my first pregnancy and I feel like the magical of pregnancy is being taken from me and I’ve still got 6 months to go.
I really don’t know what to do
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I was recently reading a commentary on the Parable of the Prodigal Son (and Jeremiah 2:19), and this specific perspective really hit home for me:
"When God does not convince us through His word, He allows us to be taught by the reality of things... He allows them to be taught by the events themselves, so as to win them back once more."
Sometimes we get so stubborn or insensitive to gentle advice, warning, or spiritual guidance that the only way we truly learn is by experiencing the consequences of our own choices. God doesn't allow us to wander off or go through hardship out of malice or punishment for its own sake, but out of patience and pedagogy—so that through experience, we realize what we lost and voluntarily choose to return.
And the most beautiful part of the story is the father’s reaction upon the son’s return:
"His father held no grudge against him, but received him with open arms. Why? Because he was a father, not a judge."
It's a powerful reminder that no matter how far we stray or how hard the lessons of life get, God’s ultimate goal isn't to condemn us, but to welcome us back home.
What are your thoughts on this? Have you ever had a time in your life where you had to "learn from reality" the hard way before recognizing God's grace?
I don’t want to lose my faith, it brought me out of a low in my life. However, I’m experiencing a low again and prayer doesn’t feel like it use to. I am starting to question the existence of God but I want to continue my path as an EO catechumen, especially since I’m 9 months into catechesis. It would help me if people would share their reasons why they became Christians and their reasoning for the existence of God, it would mean the world to me.
Hey, I’m kind of stuck on this point a little bit and was wondering if I could get some advice on how you guys navigate the fact that Christ’s divinity was something that evolved over time, and wasn’t necessarily what the historical Jesus himself actually did.
I personally place my faith in the Resurrection as being foundational, which I personally think has a robust case. I’ve tried to reconcile parts of the gospel that are mythologized or been read into the Old Testament text. When I read Matthew for the first time, I didn’t realize how much emphasis was on things being prophesied. E.g by Isiah.
There are also parts in which things are borrowed from one gospel to another or things that didn’t directly occur. For example, the graves opening up and the dead walking around - surely several independent sources would have written about something like that.
If I’ve got anything wrong, apologies, I’ve not studied properly the scholarship but it’s a pattern I’ve noticed that professors of religion mention about the gospels. This is not to say that they are entirely unreliable, for example they all agree on women being the first to see the empty tomb, which would have been something odd to make up in that social context - considering women’s position.
I just feel that to be intellectually honest in my faith journey and ask others about questions I have. This isn’t to sound snarky or edgy, but I believe or like to think that God would understand how our different minds process different bits of information, and that some things will confuse us a little, but nonetheless we try to make sense out of it the best way we can. I am autistic and adhd diagnosed so I tend to be very analytical.
See the response from u/Deer_Hart, he explained it better than I did
My husband and I have been attending church together for years. We attend a Protestant church and have leadership roles. Recently he out of nowhere has decided that our church is heresy and not the true church and he thinks that he belongs at an Orthodox Church. He has been heavily watching Jay Dyer and other Youtubers and reading books. He went to church at an Orthodox Church this morning and I went to our home church. He says he’s not returning with me and if I want to I can stay at my feel good church. I don’t think we should attend different churches as a married couple but maybe I’m wrong. I’m just hurt and honestly embarrassed as dumb as that sounds. Does anyone have advice?
I don’t necessarily understand why the sudden change of heart. He just keeps saying they’re the one true church but I don’t understand how or why. I feel like I want input from someone who has been orthodox but isn’t anymore as well as someone who currently practices orthodoxy. I’m just trying to understand. I don’t want to lose my marriage.
A CONFESSION OF FAITH
—by Saint Nektarios of Pentapolis—
God is my glory, my wealth, and my boast. God is sweeter and more pleasurable than anything that exists. God is my preoccupation and delight.
Through God’s inbreathing my soul was created. God formed and made my body. I am entirely an image of God. I am a descendant from God, by divine grace. My existence begins from God. My ability to move originates from God. I have received the ability to breathe and to speak from God. To God I commit my soul every day. To God I offer my prayers every hour. In God I live, I work, and exist. In the great, mighty, and living God, Who is the giver, the helper, and the perfecter of all good things, do I hope. God will be the awesome judge of all my works and actions. I have a merciful and forgiving God. I confess that God is patient and plentiful in mercy. I proclaim that God is my savior, my redeemer, and my Lord. I know God to be the origin and cause of all things. I know God to be the bestower of all good things. I know God is the provider and overseer.
I know God to be all-wise and omniscient, Who knows the future, the present, and the past. I praise, glorify, bless, and magnify God, Who is good, holy, righteous, and true. I venerate and worship God, Who is full of compassion. In God I believe, in God I hope, and to Him I entrust the hope of my salvation. It is God, the source of love, Whom I love and desire. To God I offer my soul as sacrifice. To God I elevate my mind and acquire peace. God is Whom my heart desires.
I confess one God: the Triune Divinity. I proclaim one timeless, eternal, simple, transcendent, and indivisible God. God Who is One and Three. Who is completely One and completely Trinity. I believe and confess God Who is totally One in essence, and Who is totally Triune in hypostasis. For there is one God: the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit; and there is one power, one composition, one worship: that of the consubstantial Trinity. For one and the same is the nature and substance of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
This is what I believe, what I confess, what I proclaim, and what I profess.
I was banned from Orthodox normal reddit thing for being too aggressive with woman voice against sex positivity. Now I am banned and it is all well and good. That's fine. They is not even respond to me.
I have come to believe the other other subreddit is Western anesthetics, young people wanting something to do.
Not good. I want to helping bolaters this community as the frontmlst of example true Orthodox ways, obviously is not possible jsut to show it. But I'm curious ideas
Im a catholic inquirer, rn i cant attend a liturgy, and extreme fear-based dread of atheism and materialism has become extremely powerful during my prayers as soon as i started seeking orthodoxy
I’ve heard that interpreting it as “kings are bad” is considered a misinterpretation by Protestants.
I was baptized back during the nativity season last year. Ever since I’ve been baptized it’s like not the same anymore. I mean I don’t feel close to God anymore. I get a bad feeling when I pray. To the point i pray less now. I only go to church on Sunday’s when I used to go three times a week due to my work schedule and not having a car. I would like to go more. I also started dating a Greek Orthodox cradle man and we haven’t been behaving in the eyes of God and we struggle with this a lot although we’ve both been to confession for it and always feel shame and we work on it. I fast, try to pray, try to spend time with God. I just don’t have the same drive I did as a catechumen to learn lives of the saints and stuff like that idk. I was committing the same sins back then as now only difference is now I can take proper confession and the other sacraments. And now I have full icon corner that I would’ve died for a year ago and now I barely use… I really want to feel close to God as I used to. I know it’s not about feelings it’s about denying yourself and picking up your cross. I’ve left a lot of things behind since my baptism. But have still held on to some sins of course. Any advice???
A senior Palestinian church affairs official has called on Christian leaders around the world to take concrete action over what he described as escalating attacks, land confiscations and restrictions targeting Palestinian Christians and the wider Palestinian population in the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem.
Ramzi Khouri, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization's Executive Committee and head of the Higher Presidential Committee for Church Affairs in Palestine, made the appeal in a letter addressed to church leaders, warning that increasing settler violence and Israeli restrictions were placing growing pressure on Palestinian Christian communities.
Khouri said Palestinian Christians across the West Bank, including Jerusalem, were facing settler attacks, land confiscations, settlement expansion and restrictions affecting access to religious sites and worship.
He said clergy, nuns and church institutions had also been subjected to verbal and physical attacks and vandalism, describing the situation as one of growing impunity.
Christian communities in Bethlehem, Beit Jala, Beit Sahour, Taybeh, Birzeit and Ein Arik are facing increasing pressure from settlement expansion, attacks and economic hardship, Khouri said.
According to figures cited in his letter, more than 200 Palestinian Christian families have left their communities since 2023. In Taybeh, described by Khouri as the last entirely Christian town in Palestine, more than 90 residents have reportedly left during the same period.
Khouri said the departures reflected a combination of security concerns, restrictions on land, economic pressures and what he described as a lack of prospects for Palestinian Christians seeking to remain in their communities.
