Archimandrite George of St. Gregorios: Moral perfection is not enough

 Moral perfection is not enough for man. It is not enough for us simply to become better than before, simply to perform moral deeds. We have as our final aim to unite with holy God Himself. This is the purpose of the creation of the universe. This is what we desire. This is our joy, our happiness, and our fulfillment...

Each of us is an image of God, and God is our prototype. The image seeks the prototype, and only when it finds it does it find rest.

+Archimandrite George of St. Gregorios, from Theosis, The True Purpose of Human Life

Archimandrite George of St. Gregorios: We owe so much to Panaghia

We owe so much to Panaghia.¹ This is why the Church honors and venerates the Theotokos so much, so that Gregory Palamas, summarizing Patristic theology, says that our Panaghia holds the second place after the Holy Trinity; that she is god after God, the boundary between the created and the uncreated.

+Archimandrite George of St. Gregorios, from Theosis The True Purpose of Human Life, The Contribution of the Theotokos to the Theosis of Man.
¹Panaghia: "All Holy", a title for the Theotokos Mary, the mother of God.

St. Gregory of Nyssa: Do our thoughts, words, and deeds look to Christ?

 What, then, is it necessary to do to be worthy of the name of Christ? What else than to distinguish in one's self the proper thoughts and words and deeds, asking whether they look to Christ or are at odds with Christ. Making the distinction is very easy. For whatever is done or thought or said through passion has no agreement with Christ, but bears the character of the adversary, who smears the pearl of the soul with the mud of the passions and dims the luster of the precious stone. What is free from every passionate inclination looks to the source of passionlessness, who is Christ.

+St. Gregory of Nyssa, from Ascetic Works, On Perfection

Elder Aimilianos of Simonopetra: The Jesus Prayer as our Deification

 The prayer of Jesus is not an occasional petition that we direct to God. It is in fact our own deification. There would be no reason to stay all day in conversation with God if it were simply a matter of addressing words to him. God hears very well, even to the noises of our bowels. There would be no need to pray day and night. Rather, the prayer consists before all in feeding upon Christ, the Lamb of God, and of drinking the Savior Himself, by the invocation of His Holy Name. It is an intoxicating beverage, one that carries man into the heavens. It is the whole Christ whom we then absorb, and we become thus participants in God, reflecting - as Christ Himself - the divine attributes. We share in God and subsequently act, we too, mysteriously as gods.

+Elder Aimilianos of Simonopetra, from The Living Witness of the Holy Mountain, Mount Athos: Sacred Vessel of the Prayer of Jesus

Archimandrite George of St. Gregorios: The Church as the place of Theosis

 The world has fine institutions, fine organizations, fine establishments and other fine things, but our Orthodox Church is the unrepeatable, the sole place for the communion of God with man, for the Theosis of man. Only within the Church can man become a god, and nowhere else; not in universities; not in social services; not in any of the fine and good things that the world has. None of these are able to offer what the Church offers, however good they may be.

+Archimandrite George of St. Gregorios, from Theosis, The True Purpose of Human Life, The Church: The Place of Man's Theosis

Archimandrite George of St. Gregorios: Theosis in the Church

Those who wish to unite with Jesus Christ, and, through Christ, with God the Father, recognise that this union is realised in the body of Christ, which is our Holy Orthodox Church. Of course, this Union is not with the Divine essence, but with the deified human nature of Christ. But this union with Christ is not external, nor is it simply moral.
We are not followers of Christ in the way that one might perhaps follow a philosopher or a teacher. We are members of Christ's body, the Church. The Church is the body of Christ, the real body, not a moral one, as some mistaken theologians have written, not having looked deeply enough into the spirit of the Holy Church. Despite our unworthiness and sinfulness, Christ takes us Christians and incorporates us into His body. He makes us members of Himself. We become real members of Christ, not just followers of a code of morality. As the Apostle Paul puts it, "We are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones" (Ephesians 5:30).
+Archimandrite George of St. Gregorios, from Theosis: The True Purpose of Human Life, The Church: The Place of Man's Theosis

St. Nicholas Cabasilas: How great are the Mysteries!

O how great are the Mysteries [i.e., the Sacraments]! What a thing it is for Christ's mind to be mingled with ours, our will to be blended with His, our body with His Body and our blood with His Blood! What is our mind when the divine mind obtains control? What is our will when that blessed will has overcome it? What is our dust when it has been overpowered by His fire?
That these things are so Paul shows when he claims that he has neither his own mind nor will nor life, but that all these have become Christ's for him. He states, "we have the mind of Christ" (2 Cor 2:16), and "you desire proof that Christ is speaking in me" (2 Cor 13:3), and "I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus" (Phil 1:18). From this it is clear that he has the same will as Christ. To sum it all up, "it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me" (Gal 2:20).
+ St. Nicholas Cabasilas, from The Life in Christ, fourth book, #2