The Present Day As the Last Day of Our Life | St John Climacus | Skull with Red Orthodox Cross | Memento Mori | Christian Art PosterIt is impossible, someone says, impossible to spend the present day devoutly unless we regard it as the last of our whole life. And it is truly astonishing how even the pagans have said something of the sort, since they define philosophy as meditation on death. + St John Climacus, The Ladder of Divine Ascent, Step 6: On the Remembrance of Death, section 24 +++ Even the Pagans Meditated on Death An Example of "Logos Spermatikos" The Phaedo of Plato

and went his way

who would later father Jacob (Israel)

the Virgin Theotokos

I shall become God’s

The Chi Rho itself points to Christ-as-Sun more specifically: both St Justin the Martyr and the Didache refer to its X shape as pointing to the line of the ecliptic (the pattern drawn across the sky by the sun over the course of a year) where it intersects the horizon

And the first beast was like a lion

He went down and bound the strong one in the waters

“In vain does every mortal trouble himself

- The Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom

salvation is of the Lord

The Cross is the Guardian of the Whole World

you have many goods laid up for many years