We are honored that you have taken some time to check out our project. Crown Them With Glory is an effort taken on by a number of Orthodox clergy and laity across the United States. We have accumulated resources on a variety of mediums to offer timeless Christian teaching on the married and consecrated celibate/monastic life.

Today, we are bombarded with men’s ideas attempting to constantly redefine foundational principles that make up our personhood, family life, and relationship with God and others. Our celibate and married laity and clergy are living out their faith in these trying times, and we have sought to gather some wisdom from our brethren to offer some specific ways that God’s people are upholding an Orthodox moral life. The saints and the faithful of today have a voice, and they have much hope and beauty to share. Our struggles are mutual, as we strive together unto the perfect man in Christ Jesus. We hope that this interview series will encourage others to want to live out a faithful Christian life, to seek out and strike up conversations with their brothers and sisters and fathers and mothers in Christ on Sundays during coffee hour, at the parish picnic, or during pilgrimages to our local monasteries to encourage one another in our common struggles. It is meet and right that we build one another up in the faith.

You might be wondering … what’s with the title of your project ... well … “Crown Them With Glory” is a priestly phrase taken from the service of the Mystery of Marriage between one man and one woman. There, we see that Christ is the true celebrant of the new union, Himself blessing this physical, spiritual, and mystical union of the husband and wife that they might become “one flesh.” He bestows on the newly weds crowns of victory over the sinful passions through their love for one another and mutual pursuit of Christ; crowns of martyrdom as they begin the process of giving up their own wants and desires for the sake of their spouse and children. Physical crowns are placed on their heads in the marriage service, which we pray will become eternal crowns of glory as they move through the spiritual arena together in their lifetimes. 

But this is not the only place crowns are mentioned in our services. In baptism, we become little Christs, having entered into the baptism, death, and resurrection of the Lord. In that liturgical service, we hear the priest pray: “Keep him (the newly illumined and baptized one) ever a warrior invincible in every attack of those who assail him and us; and make us all victors, even unto the end, through Thy  crown incorruptible.”  The Christian life itself is one of struggle, of combat, of competition. St Paul uses the image of a race or wrestling match to convey this idea. The victor of this Christian competition receives a crown of glory, that is, the glory of eternal life with Christ.  This crown of glory is to be revealed through our lives as Christians whether we are married or not.  The life of the monastic is also a pursuit of this “crown of glory”.  It is to this mutual pursuit of all Christians, that this website is dedicated.