Raise your hand if you knew that a priest in the Orthodox Church may not celebrate the Eucharist on his own. There must always be at least one other person present, in order to form a “congregation.” I learned this in my catechumenate thirty years ago, and it still strikes me as beautiful that our church insists that the Eucharist always be a shared event.

Last week I had a visit with a patient who had been in the hospital about ten days, I think, and hadn’t been visited by a chaplain. I just wanted to check in. He was lying on his side, facing away from the door. I see God’s hand in chaplaincy work so often, because so often the patient that I just happen to visit is the patient who, it turns out, really needs it.

Born into and raised in the United Church of Canada, Catherine Lingas has led a remarkable life as a convert to the Orthodox Christian faith. She has raised four children, taught many years of Sunday school, and also worked tirelessly for a number of different mission and philanthropic organizations both within and in concert with the Orthodox Church.

In his book The Freedom of Morality, Christos Yannaras cites the Hymn of the Nun Kassiani in his discussion of the “unsearchable immensity” in the sin of the human person and the immeasurable mercy of a personal God for the truly repentant human person. Sung in the Orthodox Church at the Bridegroom Matins and the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts for Great and Holy Wednesday, the Hymn of the Nun Kassiani is a profound theological statement that conveys the kenotic love of Christ for his creation in spite of its “multitude of sins.”

My mom, Olga, belonged to a generation of immigrants from Ukraine. In our time, we’re learning a lot about immigrants. We express concern for the fundamental right to life and human dignity of immigrants. We also pay attention to the children of immigrants: how will they be fed and educated?

Nicu Dumitraşcu, Professor of the Faculty of Orthodox Theology at the University of Oradea, Romania, has assembled a fine collection of essays from Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant scholars in Christian Family and Contemporary Society. This volume deals deftly with the many contradictions at hand when addressing family in the Christian context.

Mother Gavrilia (1897–1992) was a woman of action and prayer, of words and silent contemplation. She survived some of the most tumultuous events of the 20th century: the expulsion of Orthodox Christians during the 1923 Greek-Turkish Population Exchange, the Battle of Britain, and the Greek Civil War.