Fasting is one of those ancient Christian practices that can seem strange to modern Christians. For many people, the word itself immediately sounds negative. It sounds like deprivation. It sounds like religious rule keeping. It sounds like giving up food in order to prove devotion to God. And for Christians…

There are few Christian doctrines that have produced more fear, confusion, caricature, and bad theology than the doctrine of hell. For some Christians, hell is imagined as an underground torture chamber where God sends sinners to suffer forever because they broke His rules. For others, the entire concept is dismissed…

Why Penal Substitution Does Not Fit Orthodox Theology Why did Jesus have to die? For many Christians, especially those formed within evangelical or Reformed traditions, the answer seems obvious. Humanity sinned. God is perfectly just. Sin deserves punishment. Because God cannot simply overlook sin, someone must receive that punishment. We…

For the last year, I have used AI-generated semi-cartoonish images with many of my Facebook posts. The images were never intended to replace the message. They were intended to help people stop scrolling long enough to encounter it. I write every word of the text myself. The theology is mine.…

One of the quickest ways to misunderstand Orthodox Christianity is to watch an Orthodox Christian do something without first asking what that Orthodox Christian believes he is doing. You walk into an Orthodox Church and see someone bow before an Icon. You see someone kiss the Cross. You hear someone…

If someone taught you that the Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church split on July 16, 1054, they suggested something convenient, memorable, and deeply misleading. Something tragically important certainly happened that day. Cardinal Humbert entered Hagia Sophia in Constantinople during the Divine Liturgy and placed a bull of excommunication…

One of the questions I hear with surprising regularity goes something like this: “Father Don, I visited an Orthodox Church with my family. They wouldn’t let me receive Communion because I’m not Orthodox. People kissed the priest’s hand. They called him ‘Father.’ They prayed before icons and honored the saints.…

Every generation has its defining theological challenge. In the fourth century, the Church defended the divinity of Christ against Arianism. In the eighth century, she defended the holy icons against iconoclasm. Today, one of the greatest challenges confronting Christians is the attempt to reinterpret the Scriptures through the lens of…