When we take a moment to stop and think about all of the absolutely incredible things that this bone has seen, we gain a deeper connection to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Our ties to the story of our salvation are not just the recounting of a story in a book.  They are real, physical, and can be experienced in our participation in the Divine Services.  And when parishes like ours are entrusted to care for the relics of the saints who have gone before us, our ties to that Salvation history go even deeper…and that is a blessing that not many parishes of our size can claim.

The Orthodox Faith, described perfectly by complete strangers to Christianity, who only had to enter into one Divine Liturgy to discover an escape from darkness, and an entrance into Grace, Love, and Eternity. 

From time to time, God is kind enough to show us all His presence…and the aim of all of these assurances is so that we can be transformed, and become signs of His grace, His love, and His mercy to the world…So we venerate the image of the weeping icon of Mary, because she was the first human being since Adam and Eve, to be “truly human”…because to be truly human, is to be the revelation of God to His world.”  

It is a common practice in today’s world to blame God for when things become chaotic in our lives.  It is a trait that is found in all human beings, where we have this knack for ignoring the 99% of our lives that are going well, and concentrate on that 1%  that isn’t working as it should be.  But we learn throughout the Gospels somethingfundamentalto our understanding of why bad things still happen to good people…and it is that our Lord never came to this world to save us from that 1%...He came to save us THROUGH that 1%.