St. Paul's Foundation, a monastic institute of the Orthodox Church, is part of the ministry left by St. Paul the Apostle who helped provide a foundation of faith. According to the Apostle, “as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Gal. 3:27-28). Church can be experienced by all members with one way of life which is both catholic and orthodox. No divisions exist in the Church. No Christians have different obligations. We were created by God in His image and likeness. We were meant to be gods by participation with God, as in Psalm 82, but after the Fall came the accusation, “I said you are gods, yet you die like men and fall like the princes.” Becoming god-like is the summit of the Christian path which starts with κάθαρσις (catharsis) or purification, continues with θεωρία (theoría) or illumination which allows a proper relationship with God and then ends in the transfiguration of man with θεοσις (theosis)which means deification or glorification. Every person has this potential. One soul is worth the whole world. All are called to personal holiness. Every honest work can be sanctified. Sanctifying our work means sanctifying the world and returning it to the pre-lapserian Garden.

Care of Souls

St. Paul’s is dedicated to the ‘care of souls.’ What does this mean? Care of souls is the use of those spiritual technologies given by Our Lord Jesus Christ to heal the spiritual and psychological traumas of our age. These technologies have three sources: first, the lived experience of God that we know to be true by the apostles and the saints up to the present day; second, the Holy Mysteries (often called “sacraments” in the West) which are actually spiritual technologies or arts (τέχνη) given to us by the Lord Himself to heal our fractured souls and hearts uniting creatures with their Creator; and finally, the truth of Holy Scripture. Orthodox Christianity is not “a church” or the “greatest of the churches” or “a religion” insomuch as it is that series of spiritual technologies which God gave his creatures in order to have a relationship with him the mark of which is grace. That grace is contained in these technologies which together form a kind of therapeutic protocol that heals the wounds of the mind and heart. Orthodox Christianity is a world where theology and dogma are medicine to straighten, grow and protect a soul. What does this mean? Come taste and see.