Perhaps the most misunderstood Mystery (Sacrament) of the Christian Church is Repentance/Confession. How did it originate? What role does a priest play? Is there a special procedure for confession? The Holy Scripture hold answers to these questions.

Therefore, Saint Methodios believes that the Woman who has brought forth continues to bring forth a male child, the Logos/Word, in the hearts of the faithful; and this same Woman went forth into the desert undefiled and unharmed by the wrath of the beast. This Woman is our Mother, the Church. He then explains that the seven heads of the dragon, the devil, signify the seven vices.

A most difficult passage in a difficult book, the Apocalypse of Saint John (Revelation): "And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars. And she being with child cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered" (Revelation 12:1-2). The word "woman" was given a collective meaning by most ancient writers as describing the people of God by a female figure.

Upon the consecration of our beloved church of Saint Andrew, His Eminence Metropolitan Iakovos, placed the holy relics of the holy Martyrs Cyricus and Julitta among others. Our parish is truly blessed to have the unique honor to possess fragments of their holy remains.

The Holy Virgin Mary is more than an example of piety. She is more than a Saint. She is All-Holy, Ever-Virgin and Mother of God. She is the Church's Greatest Theologian. She is the one human--body and soul resurrected, united and complete--and now deified person who is "more honorable than the Cherubim and beyond compare more glorious than the Seraphim. In her the whole mystery of the Divine economy is personified, writes Saint John of Damascus (c. 676-750).

It is essential to make a distinction between dogma and mystery. The mystery of the Holy Trinity is experienced, to the extent that this is possible, by the glorified human being and is different from the dogma, which is the rational formulation concerning the mystery of the Holy Trinity or the revelation. This distinction is fundamental to Orthodox theology: "God is always a mystery. The mystery of the Holy Trinity must be separated from the dogma of the Holy Trinity. The dogma is not the same as the mystery.