While other couples in their fifties talk about retirement, Philip and Riana Dyason are talking about a new beginning: pioneer ministry in Russia.

Development of monastic communities: The small communities forming around the Desert Fathers were the beginning of Christian monasticism. Initially Anthony and others lived as hermits, sometimes forming groups of two or three. Small informal communities began developing, until the monk Pachomius, seeing the need for a more formal structure, established a monastery with rules and organization. His regulations included discipline, obedience, manual labor, silence, fasting, and long periods of prayer - some historians view the rules as being inspired by Pachomius' experiences as a soldier. -- The first fully organized monastery under Pachomius included men and women living in separate quarters, up to three in a room. They supported themselves by weaving cloth and baskets, along with other tasks. Each new monk or nun had a three year probationary period, concluding with admittance in full standing to the monastery. All property was held communally, meals were eaten together and in silence, twice a week they fasted, and they wore simple peasant clothing with a hood. Several times a day they came together for prayer and readings, and each person was expected to spend time alone meditating on the scriptures. Programs were created for educating those who came to the monastery unable to read. -- Pachomius also formalized the establishment of an abba (father) or amma (mother) in charge of the spiritual welfare of their monks and nuns, with the implication that those joining the monastery were also joining a new family. Members also formed smaller groups, with different tasks in the community and the responsibility of looking after each other's welfare. The new approach grew to the point that there were tens of thousands of monks and nuns in these organized communities within decades of Pachomius' death. One of the early pilgrims to the desert was Basil of Caesarea, who took the Rule of Pachomius into the eastern church. Basil expanded the idea of community by integrating the monks and nuns into the wider public community, with the monks and nuns under the authority of a bishop and serving the poor and needy. -- As more pilgrims began visiting the monks in the desert, the early literature coming from the monastic communities began spreading. Latin versions of the original Greek stories and sayings of the Desert Fathers, along with the earliest monastic rules coming out of the desert, guided the early monastic development in the Byzantine world and eventually in the western Christian world. The Rule of Saint Benedict was strongly influenced by the Desert Fathers, with Saint Benedict urging his monks to read the writings of John Cassian on the Desert Fathers. The Sayings of the Desert Fathers was also widely read in the early Benedictine monasteries. -- Withdrawal from society: The legalization of Christianity by the Roman Empire in 313 A.D. actually gave Anthony a greater resolve to go out into the desert. Anthony, who was nostalgic for the tradition of martyrdom, saw withdrawal and asceticism as an alternative. **When members of the {desert monastic} Church began finding ways to work with the Roman state, {a few of} the Desert Fathers saw that as a compromise between "the things of God and the things of Caesar." **The monastic communities were essentially **an alternate [heretical] Christian society. The {few early} hermits doubted that religion and politics could ever produce a truly Christian society. For them, the only Christian society was spiritual and not mundane. -- {Note: Where the early (heretics) Desert Monks failed to influence the early Christian Church via their false doctrine the Roman Government via Constantine would succeed in exerting a secular influence over the Christian Church. Then with a Roman secular influence over the Christian Church [starting from about 313 A.D - 325 A.D. the Desert Heretics were then able to leave behind the desert and [under the guise of the 313 A.D. edict of religious tolerance] once again entered the cities to work as scholars, faculty, administrators, and priests for avenues to continue to influence the true Christian Church with their destructive and very unchristian heresies.}

The Muratorian Fragment is the oldest known list of New Testament books. It was discovered by Ludovico Antonio Muratori in a manuscript in the Ambrosian Library in Milan, and published by him in 1740. It is called a fragment because the beginning of it is missing. Although the manuscript in which it appears was copied during the seventh century, the list itself is dated to about 170 because its author refers to the episcopate of Pius I of Rome (died 157) as recent. He mentions only two epistles of John, without describing them. The Apocalypse of Peter is mentioned as a book which "some of us will not allow to be read in church." A very helpful and detailed discussion of this document is to be found in Bruce Metzger's The Canon of the New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1987), pp. 191-201.

For a while now I've been thinking of moving my blog to a dedicated url. As much as I like being under the christineandbrian.com domain name, I started to prefer the move to a my own domain for my projects....

Beginning exercise regularly will help you feel better in the long run.

This episode delves into the "day one" of creation, as envisioned by St. Basil in his second homily on the Hexaemeron. Along the way, we'll also discuss symbolism, typology and wonder. Join us for the journey!

How did 2020 change or affect your life? What did you learn? How did you cope? These are just a few of the many questions that Bill fields on the first episode of Stewardship Calling of the new year.

As the Lenten season begins, Fr. Tom Hopko reads a brief sermon penned by Fr. John Parker of Holy Ascension Orthodox Church in Mt. Pleasant, SC. This sermon was written in the style and tradition of St. John Chrysostom's well known and loved Paschal Homily.

Fr. John Whiteford explains the purpose and importance of the Hymns of Ascent. Psalm 119 is featured.

To die to the world has nothing to do with self-destruction or the destruction of the world. Quite the opposite, when we die to the world, we begin the process of being born in Christ, which is then reflected back unto the world as a new blessing, a new input of grace, a new change for salvation. To be dead to the world means not to engage with the world in its fallen state, but to engage with its full spiritual potential, with the hidden image of God imprinted on everyone.

On this Sunday after Theophany, Fr. Andrew reflects on the meaning of Christ's inauguration of baptism and how it affects not only the Christian, but other people and the whole world around him.

On this Sunday before Theophany, Fr. Andrew discusses the feasts of the Nativity and Theophany as a time of beginnings.

On today's show we discuss the transition to college and how to make a proper new beginning. Theme song, "Burn Out Bright," by Switchfoot, used by permission.

In the final episode of the six-week series, Danielle and Fr. Timothy examine the Triumph of Orthodoxy through iconography, and conclude the series with some Lenten advice for young adults.

Join Fr. Nick, Dr. Roxanne, and special guests Sarah Brangwynne and Sasha Rose Oxnard, authors of A Sacred Beginning: Nuturing Your Body, Mind, and Soul During Baby's First Forty Days, for a special session of Healthy Minds Healthy Souls titled "A Sacred Beginning: The Spiritual Journey of Motherhood" on Tuesday, August 10th at 8:00 PM EST. It's going to be a GREAT show! Be sure to share it with friends and family.

Fr. John explains why the new church year begins on September 1, then tells of a birthday party like no other.

Fr. Michael Gillis builds off of last week's talk about the Great Reset on not getting attached to the comforts of this world. Someone asked about how to balance living in this world without getting attached to it. Fr. Michael talks about three things we can do to help us live as sojourners in this world, waiting for a City whose foundation and builder is God.

Fr. Stephen De Young ends the discussion of John, Chapter 3, and begins his discussion of Chapter 4.

Fr. Stephen De Young discusses Romans 9:30 to 10:4.

As the Lenten season begins, Fr. John Parker reads a brief sermon that he had penned, formerly read by Fr. Thomas Hopko, that is written in the style and tradition of St. John Chrysostom's well known and loved Paschal Homily.

This week we consider Canticle 7 (Dan 3:25-56), which details Azariah’s confession, and the beginning of his song with the three friends. Here we see the themes of human praises based on understanding, the importance of God’s glory, and God’s merciful justice as he keeps covenant with us, looking also to 2 King 19:15-20:6 and Genesis 22:15-18.

Fr. Ted connects the forty day blessing of newborn children to the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord in the Temple.

The whole reason Christ comes into the world is to die.

Fr. Ted considers the icon of the Dormition of the Theotokos and how it teaches us about the cycle of the liturgical life of the Church and our lives as well.

Fr. Theodore Paraskevopoulos explains the Triodion season and the significance of the Sunday of the Publican and the Pharisee for us all.

Fr. Theodore Paraskevopoulos introduces us to the beginning of the triodion, the three-week season of preparation for the fasting of Great Lent.

Fr. Theodore Paraskevopoulos explains the prayers of the Orthodox Church that are prayed in the beginning days of the life of a child.

Dn. Michael begins a new series discussing the book Beginning to Pray by Anthony Bloom.

Dn. Michael continues his discussion of Anthony Bloom's book, Beginning to Pray. He emphasizes the importance of humility when approaching our Lord in prayer.

Dn. Michael discusses chapter 3 of Anthony Bloom's book, Beginning to Pray . He borrows Nike's slogan and urges all of us, when it comes to prayer, to "Just Do It."

Dn. Michael continues his discussion of Anthony Bloom's book, Beginning to Pray . This week he looks at chapter 4.

Dn. Michael concludes his study of Anthony Bloom's book, Beginning to Pray.

Sermon on the Sunday before the Theophany (2 Timothy 4:5-8; Mark 1:1-8)

Fr. Gregory Hallam gives the sermon at Vesperal Divine Liturgy on Great and Holy Thursday 2019

What the St. Nicholas Ground Blessing can teach us about God's triumph over death.

Aim/Purpose . The present study aimed to understand in depth the experience of identity formation of beginning teachers (BTs), members of Gen Y, in their first year at elementary school, teaching students of Gen Alpha, from the perspective of BTs and their teacher mentors (TMs). Background. The purpose of the study was to compare the aspects described by BTs and their mentor teachers of the initial experience of teaching and of shaping the professional identity of BTs, members of Gen Y, in elementary schools, from the perspective of BTs and teacher mentors (TMs). Methodology. This was a qualitative study. Two groups participated in the study: (a) 75 BTs, members of Gen Y, and (b) 40 mentors of beginning teachers. Contribution. The findings of this study indicate that the creation of an emotionally and professionally supportive community led to a fruitful discussion on issues related to the process of absorption and integration of BTs in the school. This process advanced their professional development, expanding knowledge, abilities, strategies, and innovative pedagogical practices for classroom management, and meaningful teaching and learning in the classroom. The supportive community provided an emotional, professional, social-organizational, and evaluative-reflective response to the needs of BTs, facilitating meaningful interactions between the BTs and their students. It created for students a space for emotional training, organizing and managing behavior, regulating emotions and behavior, reducing feelings of anger, and arousing a feeling of optimism. Findings. The findings show that there was a conflict between the BTs’ and TMs’ perceptions of school reality. The mentors expected the BTs to adapt to the existing system, whereas the BTs perceived the process as one of formation of their identity as teachers. It turned out that parameters that were important to Gen Y teachers, such as knowing the school organization and being an influential factor that brings about change, were less important to their mentors. The findings of the present study reinforce those of previous studies that investigated the employment characteristics of Gen Y. Recommendations for Practitioners. A supportive community at school is likely to increase the level of mental well-being of Gen Y teachers. To this end, support communities of teachers by form and by discipline of study should be created. In the community, emphasis should be placed on reflection and mental resilience in all situations and challenging events that happen to the BTs to help them cope with the accumulated stress. Recommendations for Researchers. Students need a sensitive environment that is appropriate for Gen Alpha children. This environment must allow for emotional training and regulation, behavior organization and management to arouse a feeling of optimism and reduce anger. To develop students’ emotional, social, and cognitive abilities, teachers must teach with love, sensitivity, affectivity, and empathy. Impact on Society. To retain BTs and prevent them from quitting their career, schools must ensure that members of Gen Y understand the school organization and are satisfied with the way the organization is managed. They must have a sense of being significant partners in the life of the school. Under optimal working conditions, Gen Y teachers may greatly contribute to the values of education and equal opportunity, maximizing the personal potential of each student and the classroom as a whole, and making the school relevant. Future Research. Future studies should examine the characteristics of students belonging to Gen Alpha. One of the difficulties mentioned by BTs was a misunderstanding of the characteristics of Gen Alpha, which created problems in the interactions within the teaching staff and between the teachers and the students, and pre-vented gaining authority with other teachers and with students.

Exit is a critical part of the entrepreneurial process. At the same time, research indicates that founders are likely to form strong identity connections to the organizations they start. In turn, when founders exit their organizations, the process of psychological disengagement might destabilize their identities. Yet, limited research addresses how founders experience exit or how they manage their identities during this process. Through a qualitative, inductive study of founders of technology-based companies, I developed a theoretical model of founder psychological disengagement that delineates how founder work orientations relate to the disengagement paths that founders follow when leaving one organization and starting another. In elaborating theory on psychological disengagement, this study has implications for understanding the psychology of founders, how founders exit and begin again, and psychological disengagement, more broadly.

Russian, Chinese, and Pakistani interests are all directly served through N-CPEC+

Editor-in-chief Casey Laughman says goodbye to the food and beverage industry.

A recent documentary centers on Boston’s WBCN radio, a 40-plus year fixture on the New England airwaves. Rock radio is fading out in many cities around the country. Last month, WAAF, a rock radio station in Massachusetts, was sold and abruptly changed its format after 50 years. It’s been more than a decade since WBCN left the air. Both stations were widely heard in New Hampshire. We could focus on the demise, but Bill Lichtenstein, a filmmaker and one-time ‘Rock of Boston’ staffer, decided to tell the story of the beginning of WBCN. He started back in 1968, as a 14-year-old kid answering the station’s listener line. This transcript of Rick Ganley's conversation with Bill Lichtenstein has been lightly edited. Lichtenstein: People were told call with anything – questions, your roommate's having a bad acid trip, whatever, and we'll be happy to try to help you. And so I started answering the listener line. I was one of a number of young people that were recruited to do that. Ganley: And I

After today's drone attack on Tatarstan, a republic within the Russian Federation, the "sanitary zone” that needs to be established for the security of the Russian Federation has grown to 1,200 kilometers and now stretches to Lviv. On April 2, Ukrainian drones attacked several facilities in Tatarstand: Alabuga special economic zone in Yelabuga and the oil refinery in Nizhnekamsk. The head of Tatarstan, Rustam Minnikhanov, said that the technological process of enterprises in the special economic zone (one of which, as follows from open sources, assembles Geran attack drones) was not disrupted. Twelve people — all of them students, were hurt as a result of the attack.

Off-Ramp producer Queena Kim acts on behalf of millions of Angelenos. The meter didn't stand a chance.

; Credit: John Rabe/KPCC

Off-Ramp began eleven years ago, just as digital technology was beginning to overtake radio. No more cassette tape or mini-discs; host John and producer Queena Kim thought they could take on all of Los Angeles with two digital audio recorders and a different approach to public radio.

Short-handed as they were, John and Queena had to adopt slash-and-burn tactics to get each show produced on time. The majority of interviews were conducted in the field; at the homes, workplaces, and favorite hang-outs of their subjects (instead of waiting for guests to come to the station) and many of the stories were edited as simple two-way interviews with life in Southern California picked up as ambient, background noise. After all, a show called Off-Ramp had better be ready to brave some LA traffic.

At this juncture, John feels free to say what he has always wanted to, but hasn't for fear of self-aggrandizement: "I think we were trendsetters. I think Marketplace and NPR heard the stuff we were doing, and started doing stuff like it." Once again, Kim chalks it up to being in the right place at the right time technologically, and the two person team's willingness to break out of the old-school, public radio way writing a story: with a very clear sonic difference between studio narration and field audio.

Of course, it wasn't just Marantz recorders and minimal rewriting that gave Off-Ramp its flavor. There was a whole lot of weird spewing up out of Los Angeles during the show's formative years and Kim's tenure (2006-2010). She recalls covering a ten-theremin orchestra at Disney Hall, and the excitement of working on a show that let her (and the listeners, vicariously) do things she always wanted to do. "It was almost like having a free pass to the city."

In order to capture what was new and exciting, John and Queena both agree that it was absolutely vital to abandon the reporter's instinct for safely packaging the story ahead of time. John cites his editor at Minnesota Public Radio's philosophy, Mike Edgerly; "Go find what the story is, go out and explore and figure out what the story is. Don't figure it out at your desk first." The collaboration between John's ideas and Kim's sense of logistics formed a dialectic relationship, valuing the "third, better idea" over either of their original perspectives. In light of that, John says Queena Kim was the perfect person with whom to start Off-Ramp. 

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Many Catawba County residents will be able to recycle more items beginning November 4.

Ella Washington, an organizational psychologist at Georgetown University, argues that private sector American organizations have a big role to play in sustaining the fight for racial justice that has gained such momentum in recent weeks. She says that widespread protests should mark a shift in how companies and their leaders push for government policy change, think about diversity and inclusion in their own workplaces, and strive to combat bias and inequality in U.S. society. It not enough for CEOs to release statements and continue on with business as usual. To promote real change, they need to work on these issues each and every day. Washington is the coauthor of the HBR article "U.S. Businesses Must Take Meaningful Action Against Racism."