(EP 32) 09-14-2025 - THE Elevation of the Venerable and Life-Giving Cross
Release Date: 09/17/2025
Stepping Into This New Life (EP49)
Homilies of Fr. Hans Jacobse
Fr. Hans reflects on the meaning of St. John the Baptist, and the baptism of Christ, reminding us that God’s work in the world has always unfolded slowly, through patience, preparation, and deep compassion for humanity. He explains that salvation was never a quick or abstract idea but a lived reality that required a long history of human readiness, culminating in Christ’s baptism, where the Holy Spirit enters the human heart and heals the deep inner fracture caused by sin. Faith, he says, is not simply agreeing with ideas about God but actively stepping into the light Christ offers,...
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Man Cannot Abide Disorder Very Long (EP48)
Homilies of Fr. Hans Jacobse
Fr. Hans confronts the modern belief that individuals can stand as neutral judges of truth, exposing it as a form of pride no earlier civilization would have recognized. He contrasts this posture with the humility of ancient peoples who understood themselves as living within an order they did not create. He argues that Christ is the fulfillment of humanity’s ancient search for meaning, the “myth made real,” and the true foundation of both personal and civilizational stability. When societies reject this foundation in favor of secular ideologies, they do not become free but fragmented, as...
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Christ Picks up Where Adam Failed (EP47)
Homilies of Fr. Hans Jacobse
Fr. Hans explains the teaching of Christ as the "second Adam," a title given to him by the Apostle Paul. He presents the Incarnation as the fulfillment of centuries of preparation, culminating in the Theotokos, whose faith and purity made possible the union of Creator and creation, and emphasizes that Christ’s mission involved a direct confrontation with the forces that held humanity in bondage. By freely embracing death and rising again, Christ defeated the power of the devil and stripped death of its ultimate authority, revealing Orthodox faith not as abstract theology but as a lived,...
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We Don’t Get to Make It up as We Go, Folks (EP46)
Homilies of Fr. Hans Jacobse
Fr. Hans explains why the Church begins the celebration of the Nativity by reading the long genealogy of Christ. He reveals that this lineage is not just a historical list but is the essential context (the living Tradition) into which, by virtue of our baptism, we have been adopted into the commonwealth of Israel that begins with Abraham. Fr. Hans argues that without understanding this framework passed down through generations, the story of Christ's birth becomes sentimentalized and disconnected from its true meaning. He warns that when we detach the Gospel from this living Tradition, we risk...
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(EP 41) 11-23-2025 - 9TH SUNDAY OF LUKE
Homilies of Fr. Hans Jacobse
Amphilochius, Bishop of Iconium, Gregory, Bishop of Agrigentum, Dionysios, Patriarch of Constantinople, Ischyrion, Bishop of Egypt, Afterfeast of the Entry of the Theotokos into the Temple, Sisinios the Confessor ST. PAUL'S LETTER TO THE EPHESIANS 2:14-22 LUKE 12:16-21 The Lord said this parable: "The land of a rich man brought forth plentifully; and he thought to himself, 'What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?' And he said, 'I will do this: I will pull down my barns, and build larger ones; and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my...
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(EP 40) 11-20-2025 - THURSDAY OF THE 9TH WEEK - ENTRANCE OF THE THEOTOKOS
Homilies of Fr. Hans Jacobse
The Forefeast of the Presentation of the Theotokos into the Temple, Gregory the Righteous of Decapolis, Proclus, Archbishop of Constantinople ST. PAUL'S FIRST LETTER TO THE THESSALONIANS 4:18-5:10 LUKE 16:1-9 The Lord said this parable, "There was a rich man who had a steward, and charges were brought to him that this man was wasting his goods. And he called him and said to him, 'What is this that I hear about you? Turn in the account of your stewardship, for you can no longer be steward.' And the steward said to himself, 'What shall I do, since my master is taking the...
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(EP 39) 11-9-2025 - 7TH SUNDAY OF LUKE
Homilies of Fr. Hans Jacobse
Onesiphorus and Porphyrius of Ephesus, Matrona, Abbess of Constantinople, Theoktisti of the Isle of Lesbos, Nektarius the Wonderworker, Metropolitan of Pentapolis, Symeon the Translat ST. PAUL'S LETTER TO THE GALATIANS 6:11-18 LUKE 8:41-56 At that time, there came to Jesus a man named Jairus, who was a ruler of the synagogue; and falling at Jesus' feet he besought him to come to his house, for he had an only daughter, about twelve years of age, and she was dying. As he went, the people pressed round him. And a woman who had had a flow of blood for twelve years and had spent all her living upon...
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(EP 38) 11-2-2025 - 5TH SUNDAY OF LUKE
Homilies of Fr. Hans Jacobse
5th Sunday of Luke, The Holy Martyrs Acindynos, Pegasios, Aphthonios, Elpidophoros, and Anempodistos, Domnina, Domna, & Kyriaki, the Martyrs ST. PAUL'S LETTER TO THE GALATIANS 2:16-20 LUKE 16:19-31 The Lord said, "There was a rich man, who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazaros, full of sores, who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man's table; moreover the dogs came and licked his sores. The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's bosom. The rich man also died and was buried; and...
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(EP 37) 11-1-2025 - Saturday of St. Raphael of Brooklyn
Homilies of Fr. Hans Jacobse
Cosmas and Damian the Holy Unmercenaries of Asia, and their mother Theodota, Bishop Raphael Hawaweeny of Brooklyn, David the Righteous of Evia, St. Raphael of Brooklyn ST. PAUL'S FIRST LETTER TO THE CORINTHIANS 12:27-31; 13:1-8 MATTHEW 10:1, 5-8 At that time, Jesus called to him his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and every infirmity. These twelve Jesus sent out, charging them, "Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And preach as you...
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(EP 36) 10-26-2025 - 6TH SUNDAY OF LUKE
Homilies of Fr. Hans Jacobse
6th Sunday of Luke, The Holy Great Martyr Demetrius the Myrrh-streamer, Commemoration of the Great Earthquake in Constantinople (740), Eata of Hexham ST. PAUL'S SECOND LETTER TO TIMOTHY 2:1-10 LUKE 8:26-39 At that time, as Jesus arrived at the country of the Gadarenes, there met him a man from the city who had demons; for a long time he had worn no clothes and he lived not in a house but among the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell down before him, and said with a loud voice, "What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beseech you, do not torment me." For he...
info_outlineThe Elevation of the Venerable and Life-Giving Cross, Commemoration of the 6th Ecumenical Council
ST. PAUL'S FIRST LETTER TO THE CORINTHIANS 1:18-24
JOHN 19:6-11, 13-20, 25-28, 30
At that time, when the chief priests and the officers saw him, they cried out, "Crucify him, crucify him!" Pilate said to them, "Take him yourselves and crucify him, for I find no crime in him." The Jews answered him, "We have a law, and by that law he ought to die, because he has made himself the Son of God. When Pilate heard these words, he was the more afraid; he entered the praetorium again and said to Jesus, "Where are you from?" But Jesus gave no answer. Pilate therefore said to him, "You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have power to release you, and power to crucify you?" Jesus answered him, "You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above; therefore he who delivered me to you has the greater sin." When Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus out and sat down on the judgment seat at a place called the Pavement, and in Hebrew, Gabbatha. Now it was the day of Preparation of the Passover; it was about the sixth hour. He said to the Jews, "Behold your King!" They cried out, "Away with him, away with him, crucify him!" Pilate said to them, "Shall I crucify your King?" The chief priests answered, "We have no king but Caesar." Then he handed him over to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called the place of a skull, which is called in Hebrew Golgotha. There they crucified him, and with him two others, one on either side, and Jesus between them. Pilate also wrote a title and put it on the cross; it read, "Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews." Many of the Jews read this title, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, in Latin, and in Greek. But standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing near, he said to his mother, "Woman, behold your son!" Then he said to the disciple, "Behold your mother!" And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home. Then when Jesus had received the vinegar, he said, "It is finished"; and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.