"...in celebrating Mary’s birth we find ourselves already on the road to Bethlehem..."

September 8 is the Feast of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary, the Theotokos.   Fr. Alexander Schmemann + explains the significance of  this in the life of the Church...

The Church’s veneration of Mary has always been rooted in her obedience to God, her willing choice to accept a humanly impossible calling. The Orthodox Church has always emphasized Mary’s connection to humanity and delighted in her as the best, purest, most sublime fruition of human history and of man’s quest for God, for ultimate meaning, for ultimate content of human life.

If in Western Christianity veneration of Mary was centered upon her perpetual virginity, the heart of Orthodox Christian East’s devotion, contemplation, and joyful delight has always been her Motherhood, her flesh and blood connection to Jesus Christ. The East rejoices that the human role in the divine plan is pivotal.  [ Read the Complete Homily ]