“When believers enter an Orthodox Church, they are passing from this  world of sickness, strife, and death into a realm of spiritual health, peace, and life. In a consecrated Orthodox Church, the Kingdom of God is at hand and the King of all is in their midst. Believers can feel the  presence of the Godman through the life-giving, uncreated divine energies that are especially concentrated in a Holy Orthodox temple.  These energies purify, illumine, and even deify the believer according  to the receptivity of each. The sacred icons are not only windows to  heaven, but a meeting place between the believer and the saint, a place of comfort, a place of healing, and a place of life. When believers  venerate an icon with faith, they not only touch the Saint depicted, the depicted Saint also touches them. And when they partake of Holy Communion, receiving the most precious, most pure, most holy, Body and  Blood of our Lord, God, and Savior Jesus Christ, they receive the Good Physician into their heart, cleansing it of all impurity.”

~Bishop Alexis

Archangel Michael through Art History

Goats crossing over a sea-arch on a tiny island in Roaring Water Bay, South-West Ireland. Image: Beth Cradick