The Ecclesiastical History of the English People was written in Latin by the Venerable Bede (673-735), a Benedictine monk living in Northumbria, an important Christian centre in the eighth century. It is a remarkable document, tracing, in general, early Anglo-Saxon history, and in particular, as the title proclaims, the growth and establishment of Christianity against the backdrop of the political life.

Christian tradition often seems to give only grudging approval to married life, particularly its sexual aspect. In these sermons of St John Chrysostom, we find an important corrective to this view.

This classic by St. Basil the Great (329-379) gives eloquent exposition of the doctrine of the Trinity, showing how there is distinction and yet communion among the divine Persons. Although not the Spirit "God", St. Basil demonstrates that he, like the Son, shares the same nature as the Father.

The audiobook version of this book on an approach to the world and life within it stems from the liturgical experience of the Orthodox Church. The author understands issues such as secularism and Christian culture from the perspective of the unbroken experience of the Church, as revealed and communicated in her worship, in her liturgy—the sacrament of the world, the sacrament of the Kingdom.

Many Christians today divide ancient Jewish and Christian literature into two categories: what is in the Bible and what is not. The Christian East, however, has traditionally described a third category considered beneficial for Christians to listen to in the home: “apocrypha.” These texts, from the centuries before and after the Incarnation of Jesus Christ—beyond even the larger canons of the Orthodox and Roman Catholic Old Testaments—reveal to us the religious world and theological framework of the apostles and early Church Fathers.

It is one of the great mysteries of life that in atmospheres of the harshest cruelty, a certain few not only survive, but emerge as beacons of light and life. Father Arseny, former scholar of church art, became Prisoner No. 18736 in the brutal "special sector" of the Soviet prison camp system.

Jacob of Serug was born at Curtem on the Euphrates, ca. 451. Very little is known of his life. He probably studied at the school of Edessa. He became a monk and priest. Early in life, he began writing, and is thought to have composed more than 700 homilies. Jacob, "flute of the Holy Spirit and harp of the faithful church," has a great love of the Mother of God. In this volume, four homilies have been chosen from the Syriac texts.

Saint Anthony of Egypt was a pioneer of the monastic tradition, who inspired the establishment of Christian monastic orders in Europe and beyond. An important event in St. Anthony's life was his encounter with demonic forces in the desert. This occurrence has been covered extensively in art and literature.

A Silent Patriarch is the first scholarly biography of the desert hermit who became a most unlikely patriarch. Until now, the details of his life have remained hidden. As patriarch, Kyrillos inherited a bleeding church, one confronted by political Islamism, an indifferent Muslim president, and the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood.

How do we acquire this mind of Christ and where is it to be found? For the Orthodox Christian, salvation is the acquisition of this mind of Christ which is to be found in the Church. This acquisition moves us from the image of God to the likeness of God; through our obedience to this call we begin to know God and this knowledge is eternal life (John 17:3). This small book hopes to begin to answer how acquiring the mind of Christ is possible and why it is necessary in our lives today.

This commentary on the Lord's prayer has been compiled from a series of broadcasts made by Father Alexander Schmemann on Radio Liberty to listeners in the Soviet Union. Because this single short prayer of Christ has everything that needs to be said about God, his kingdom, this life, and all of us, it is not an exaggeration to suggest that in this commentary, Father Schmemann provides us with a map for seeing anew the purpose and measure of our whole life.

If God is holy, then he can’t sin. If God can’t sin, then he can’t sin against you. If he can’t sin against you, shouldn’t that make him the most trustworthy being there is? Best-selling author Jackie Hill Perry, in her much anticipated follow-up to Gay Girl, Good God, helps us find the reason we don’t trust God - we misunderstand his holiness. In Holier Than Thou, Jackie walks us through Scripture, shaking the dust off of “holy” as we’ve come to know it and revealing it for what it really is: good news.

Since the advent of the internet, it has become increasingly obvious that our society suffers from a pornography problem—and Orthodox Christians are no exception. While many practical resources are available to help those who struggle with pornography use, these fail to address the problem at its deeper, spiritual root.

What does it mean to "think Orthodox"? What are the unspoken and unexplored premises and presumptions underlying what Christians believe? Orthodox Christianity is based on preserving the mind of the early Church, its phronema. Dr. Jeannie Constantinou brings her more than 40 years' experience as a professor, Bible teacher, and speaker to bear in explaining what the Orthodox phronema is, how it can be acquired, and how that phronema is expressed in true Orthodox theology.

These are the words or sayings (Apophthegmata), of various monks (the abbas, i.e. fathers) who lived in the deserts of Egypt between 250 A.D. and 400 A.D. They cover topics such as love, poverty, fasting, humility, and prayer, and there is usually a short story that gives the context of the sayings. These sayings are one of the few surviving records of the first monks such as St. Anthony the Great and St. Pachomius, who followed a strict way of life. Their sole aim was to draw closer to God through their labours.

Written between A.D. 413 and 426, The City of God is one of the great cornerstones in the history of Christian thought, a book which is vital to the understanding of modern Western society. Augustine originally intended it to be an apology for Christianity against the accusation that the Church was responsible for the decline of the Roman Empire, which had occurred just three years earlier. Indeed, Augustine produced a great amount of evidence to prove that paganism was responsible for this event. However, by the time the work was finished, the book had taken on a larger theme.

Doubt as to moral and spiritual truth is distilled through a score of channels. Our seats of learning are hotbeds of agnosticism. Our literature, with rare exceptions, makes light of God and jokes about sacred things. The newspapers, the radio broadcasts, public utterances, and private conversations are steadily but surely removing the foundations of righteousness and destroying what little faith in spiritual things still remain.

In AfterLife, Hank Hanegraaff, one of the most remarkable theological minds of our time, explains how life in the present intersects with life after life and, ultimately, life after life after life. With laser-sharp clarity, this surprisingly insightful audiobook demonstrates that death is not the end - in fact, it’s just the beginning. AfterLife will forever change the way you view your eternal destiny!

During a train trip from Chicago to Texas in the late 1940s, A.W. Tozer began to write The Pursuit of God. He wrote all night, and when the train arrived at his destination, the rough draft was done. The depth of this book has made it an enduring favorite.

The Confessions by Saint Augustine is considered an all-time number one Christian classic. Augustine undertook his greatest piece of writing with the conviction that God wanted him to make this confession. The Confessions is, in fact, an extended poetic, passionate, intimate prayer.

The leviathan is the vast unity of the State. But how are unity, peace, and security to be attained? Hobbes’ answer is sovereignty, but the resurgence of interest today in Leviathan is due less to its answers than its methods: Hobbes sees politics as a science capable of the same axiomatic approach as geometry.

Daily readings drawn from every century and every tradition of the Christian faith. Christianity through the ages... Ignatius, C.S. Lewis, John Calvin, Augustine, Catherine of Siena, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Thomas Aquinas, Martin Luther, Polycarp, John Wesley, Karl Barth, and Billy Sunday. These names, and so many others, fill the pages of church history. Yet they remain strangers to most of us. How Great Is Our God will introduce you to Christianity’s most influential thinkers from every century and every tradition—modernized for today’s reader.

How did the universe begin? How did the world get here? Where and how did the human race start? Patriarchs and Prophets is a book about beginnings. In fascinating, easy-to-understand language, it describes exactly how planet Earth, and the people who live on it, began.

For over four decades, Fulton Sheen was the face of Catholicism in America and literally received hundreds of thousands of letters from people around the world in search of truth, faith, salvation, and spiritual guidance. In this new reissue of one of Sheen's classic works, the Emmy Award-winning priest takes an intimate look at our sacred journey to God and answers some of life's most profound questions.

Most people have heard of Calvinism and Arminianism, and most know there are many problems with the extreme forms, hyper-Calvinism and hyper-Arminianism. But what did John Calvin really teach and where did his ideas come from? Learn the true Gnostic origins of Calvinism from the ancient church fathers and compare Scripture with Scripture to clearly see the trap Satan has set to divide Bible-believing Christians.

Published in 1651, Leviathan is considered to be one of the most important works of political philosophy and a major contribution to the modern idea of central government. In the mid-17th century, England was going through a turbulent time of change and unrest, which likely shaped Hobbes' ideas on strong government. Thomas Hobbes established the social contract theory. He believed that self-government did not create the ideal state due to the human tendency to be self-serving, something he believed would eventually lead to chaos.

Two celebrated scholars illustrate how the newly discovered Gospel of Judas provides a window into understanding how Jesus' followers understood his death, why Judas betrayed Jesus, and why God allowed it. Presented with the elegance, insight, and accessibility that has made Pagels and King the leading voices in this field, this is a book for academics and popular audiences alike.

The story of the church is important for Christians to know, for it contains rich and uplifting stories of God’s dealings with His people. Dr. Sinclair B. Ferguson takes the listener on a tour of the Christian history, featuring stories and songs to give believers a sense of their place in God’s kingdom and to encourage them in their walk.

In My Religion, Leo Tolstoy accuses the church of hiding the true meaning of Jesus, which is to be found in the Sermon on the Mount and the call to resist evil. For Tolstoy, it is this command that has been most damaged by ecclesiastical interpretation. Tolstoy had not always been possessed of the religious ideas set forth in My Religion. For 35 years of his life, he was, in the proper acceptation of the word, a nihilist - not a revolutionary socialist but a man who believed in nothing.

The Old Testament is one of the most carefully studied books in the world’s history. It is also one of the most misunderstood. This founding text of the world’s three largest religions is also, Erich Fromm argues, an impressive radical humanist text. He sees the stories of mankind’s transition from divided clans to united brotherhood as a tribute to the human power to overcome. Filled with hopeful symbolism, You Shall Be as Gods shows how the Old Testament and its tradition is an inspiring ode to human potential.

Nothing except the Resurrection of Jesus Christ is a greater miracle or wonder in human history. God becoming flesh in human history is the greatest marvel. Jesus of Nazareth was foretold in the Torah and the Prophets centuries before his appearance, and he was proved to be real and not a pretender due to his death and Resurrection. The early church grappled with all of this intellectually.

The last half of the 20th century saw the establishment of the reputation of St Maximus the Confessor as the greatest of all Byzantine theologians, with a wholeness of vision that speaks directly to many of our concerns today. Until very recently, however, little of his work has been available in English translation, save for some collections of brief reflections arranged in centuries and a few brief treatises, too easily classified as "spirituality."

The seven works in this volume (some translated for the first time) explore the great human mystery of death and the promise of eternal life. They present—along with On the Soul and the Resurrection (PPS 12)—a vision that is consistent, philosophically profound, and characteristic of Gregory’s wider theology.

St Gregory of Nyssa wrote the Catechetical Discourse as a handbook for his catechists, to help them defend and articulate the foundations of the faith, the Trinity, creation and the image of God, the fall and the nature of evil, the saving work of Christ, and the sacraments of baptism and the Eucharist. The Discourse draws upon the previous tradition—especially Origen, St Methodius of Olympus, and, above all, St Athanasius' On the Incarnation (PPS 44)—and influences later fathers like St John of Damascus in his On the Orthodox Faith (translation coming soon to SVS Press).

Christian tradition often seems to give only grudging approval to married life, particularly its sexual aspect. In these sermons of St John Chrysostom, we find an important corrective to this view.

Maximus' vision of the liturgy contemplates the interpenetrating relationships of all things with each other and with Christ, in whom all things cohere. The church building, the human being, and the cosmos are all mutually related and symbolically reflect each other. Further, in the liturgy, we enter into the mystery of Christ.

Saint Anthony of Egypt was a pioneer of the monastic tradition, who inspired the establishment of Christian monastic orders in Europe and beyond. An important event in St. Anthony's life was his encounter with demonic forces in the desert. This occurrence has been covered extensively in art and literature.

The Chapters on Theology is one of Maximus’ most eclectic writings. In this short piece, Maximus discusses many diverse themes, including God's relation to the cosmos, monastic discipline and life, scriptural difficulties, and his vision of the consummated universe in relation to the incarnate Word of God. The work is arranged into 200 “chapters,” which are often pithy pearls of wisdom that monks could learn from the respected figure of an elder or abbot. Chapters tend to address a range of issues monks would face in the course of their spiritual progress.

How do we acquire this mind of Christ and where is it to be found? For the Orthodox Christian, salvation is the acquisition of this mind of Christ which is to be found in the Church. This acquisition moves us from the image of God to the likeness of God; through our obedience to this call we begin to know God and this knowledge is eternal life (John 17:3). This small book hopes to begin to answer how acquiring the mind of Christ is possible and why it is necessary in our lives today.

Apostolic Tradition, as this text is best known, was identified in the early twentieth century as the work of Hippolytus, a Christian leader from third-century Rome. The text provides liturgical information of great antiquity, and as such has been massively influential on liturgical study and reform, especially in Western Churches. The second edition of this crucial liturgical document continues Fr Stewart's influential work of re-evaluating the evolution of church hierarchy in the early Church.