January | 2007 | presvlisa's Xanga Site

Month: January 2007

~Congratulations Nicholas!~

Nicholas won 2nd place in his 1st grade class for his recitation of “Animal Crackers”.
ANIMAL CRACKERS
by Christopher Morley (1890-1957)

Animal crackers, and cocoa to drink,
That is the finest of suppers, I think;
When I’m grown up and can have what I please
I think I shall always insist upon these.

What do you choose when you’re offered a treat?
When Mother says, “What would you like best to eat?”
Is it waffles and syrup, or cinnamon toast?
It’s cocoa and animals that I love the most!

The kitchen’s the coziest place that I know:
The kettle is singing, the stove is aglow,
And there in the twilight, how jolly to see
The cocoa and animals waiting for me.

Daddy and Mother dine later in state,
With Mary to cook for them, Susan to wait;
But they don’t have nearly as much fun as I
Who eat in the kitchen with Nurse standing by;
And Daddy once said he would like to be me
Having cocoa and animals once more for tea!

~The Three Hierarchs~

January 30

Today is the Feast Day of the Three Hierarchs; St. Basil the Great, St. Gregory the Theologian and St. John Chrysostom.

The Three Hierarchs are known as the Fathers of Orthodox Education and Literacy. They were St Basil The Great, St Gregory of Nanzianzou (Theologos) and St John Chrysostom.

They all helped to strengthen Christainity by promoting the teaching of love. From around the year 1100, the 30th January was celebrated as a day for Greek and Christian education, writings and teaching.

They lived in Byzantium, and were great teachers of the Holy Word and great philosophers. They fought the opponents of the day and won. St Basil created the first Philanthropic Society. They Built orphanages for abandoned children. They looked after widows and the poor. They built old peoples homes. They looked after and helped the imprisoned. They created a fund to buy back the freedom of prisoners. They built hospitals and sanctuaries for lepers. They believed that the Church’s wealth should be used for the benefit of the poor and those in need. St John built hospitals in Constantinople. St Gregory left all his money to the Church in Nanzianzou for the benefit of the poor.

St John Chrysostom said that if you had nothing you were not poor. You were poor if you desired much. You were not rich if you had a lot. You were rich if you desired nothing. St Basil believed that if you gained something through a bad deed, you had married unhappiness. They believed that God had made the Soul for work and that all occupations should be respected. St John believed that money was good if it was used to satisfy the hunger of your fellow man. Kindness and generosity was the heart of their teaching. To show kindness to your fellow man was greater than fasting and prayers and gifts to Churches and other such deeds.

We celebrate their day collectively on 30 January each year, but each has their own individual day on which we celebrate their life and works. St Basil has his day on January 1st, St Gregory on January 25th and St John on January 27th.

January 30: In 11th century Greece every conversation turned to the same controversy. Which of the three 4th-century

saints was the greatest of the Orthodox church? Was is St. Basil the Great, the beloved spiritual leader who created orphanages and hospitals? Was it St. Gregory the Theologian, whose leadership kept the church together during a time of crisis? Or was is St. John Chrysostom, the wonderful speaker who had “a mouth of gold”? In 1081, Bishop John of Galatia had a vision in which the three saints appeared to him telling him that they were equal in the eyes of God. The church set aside a day to commemorate their equality. Greek schools have celebrated this day as the Holiday of the Three Hierarchs ever since.

For more information click HERE.

Basil wrote this poem for school based on another poem they are studying. Basil was especially excited to write this poem and he asked me to post it on my blog. He has the most extraordinary third grade teachers and we are so grateful! Glory be to God!
The Snowflake Song
By Basil

Sing a song of snowflakes
When the snow storm rage;
A thousand little snowflakes
Dance around a stage.

Watch them till they hit the ground
Swirling to the top;
Watch them drop as little flakes
PLOP! PLOP! PLOP!

Sing a song of snowflakes
On the hill up high;
A thousand little snowflakes
Fly among the sky.
Through the shinning fields we see
How they skip and prance
To the music of the wind
DANCE! DANCE! DANCE!

Sing a song of snowflakes
In the sunlight;
A thousand little snowflakes
Rolled in winter white

Cool and happy hand and hand
Melting in the air;
Isn’t that a snowy day
To enjoy without a care?
~Look what just arrived in my in box~
We just had a thread, (How cool is this?) about this very topic on my message board, www.orthodoxchat.com . If anyone is interested I can put you in touch with the organizer. Sounds wonderful, I wish we could go!
Orthodox Christian Cruisers — Greetings!

Here is info I recently received from our agent as to what’s left for the cruise to Alaska, May 30 – June 6. She said the ship is near capacity.

There are 2 4A’s (inside cabins) at the original price which is $839/person. They are holding these two cabins for our group for about a week at this price. Then, it goes up! There are some 4C’s available at $999.00. Not bad since you don’t spend much time in the cabin anyway!

She said there is only one 6A (with an ocean view) is pricing $1,239. (This price is subject to change until time of booking.)

To fulfill the contract that we initially received, our group needs to sell at least ONE MORE CABIN!!! Please, help me do this! Do you know anyone (orthodox or not) who might like to join us for this week?

This needs to happen SOON. The discounted prices we were given and have been charged were on the contingency that we have a group with at least eight cabins sold. We have seven booked. If we do not sell at least ONE more cabin, we lose part of our original discount and will each be charged an additional $50/person.

This is offset somewhat by the fact that — with seven cabins sold — the first two people in each cabin will be given a $50 credit to spend on board at the time of the trip. That perk goes away (I don’t know why) if we sell more cabins. Nonetheless, we do NOT want to be charged another $50, especially since we were thrown a curve with the State of Alaska cruise tax being added on a couple of months ago.

So, GET THE WORD OUT! There must be a few others who would enjoy the trip with us! Let’s fill up the rest of the ship! Please reply with your thoughts.

ONLY 125 days TILL WE SAIL!
Or you can look at it as . . .
- 10,800,000 seconds
- 180,000 minutes
- 3000 hours
- 17 weeks (rounded down)
I love the story of St. Xenia (“fool for Christ”), her life’s story is so moving and such a great example to all of us. I also love St. Petersburg, it is truly one of the most beautiful cities I have ever seen. Fr. and I were blessed to visit the Church and grave of St. Xenia in the summer of 1992.
St. Xenia pray to God for us!

January 24
(February 6 on the old calendar)

Blessed Xenia of St Petersburg

Saint Xenia lived during the eighteenth century, but little is known of her life or of her family. She passed most of her life in Petersburg during the reigns of the empresses Elizabeth and Catherine II.

Xenia Grigorievna Petrova was the wife of an army officer, Major Andrew Petrov. After the wedding, the couple lived in St Petersburg. St Xenia became a widow at the age of twenty-six when her husband suddenly died at a party. She grieved for the loss of her husband, and especially because he died without Confession or Holy Communion.

Once her earthly happiness ended, she did not look for it again. From that time forward, Xenia lost interest in the things of this world, and followed the difficult path of foolishness for the sake of Christ. The basis for this strange way of life is to be found in the first Epistle to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 1:18-24, 1 Cor. 2:14, 1 Cor. 3:18-19). The Lord strengthened her and helped her to bear sorrow and misfortune patiently for the next forty-five years.

She started wearing her husband’s clothing, and insisted that she be addressed as “Andrew Feodorovich.” She told people that it was she, and not her husband, who had died. In a certain sense, this was perfectly true. She abandoned her former way of life and experienced a spiritual rebirth. When she gave away her house and possessions to the poor, her relatives complained to the authorities. After speaking to Xenia, the officials were convinced that she was in her right mind and was entitled to dispose of her property as she saw fit. Soon she had nothing left for herself, so she wandered through the poor section of Petersburg with no place to lay her head. She refused all assistance from her relatives, happy to be free of worldly attachments.

When her late husband’s red and green uniform wore out, she clothed herself in rags of those colors. After a while, Xenia left Petersburg for eight years. It is believed that she visited holy Elders and ascetics throughout Russia seeking instruction in the spiritual life. She may have visited St Theodore of Sanaxar (February 19), who had been a military man himself. His life changed dramatically when a young officer died at a drinking party. Perhaps this officer was St Xenia’s husband. In any case, she knew St Theodore and profited from his instructions.

St Xenia eventually returned to the poor section of Petersburg, where she was mocked and insulted because of her strange behavior. When she did accept money from people it was only small amounts, which she used to help the poor. She spent her nights praying without sleep in a field outside the city. Prayer strengthened her, and in her heart’s conversation with the Lord she found the support she needed on her difficult path.

When a new church was being built in the Smolensk cemetery, St Xenia brought bricks to the site. She did this in secret, during the night, so that no one would know.

Soon her great virtue and spiritual gifts began to be noticed. She prophesied future events affecting the citizens of Petersburg, and even the royal family. Against her will, she became known as someone pleasing to God, and nearly everyone loved her. They said, “Xenia does not belong to this world, she belongs to God.” People regarded her visits to their homes or shops as a great blessing. St Xenia loved children, and mothers rejoiced when the childless widow would stand and pray over a baby’s crib, or kiss a child. They believed that the blessed one’s kiss would bring that child good fortune.

St Xenia lived about forty-five years after the death of her husband, and departed to the Lord at the age of seventy-one. The exact date and circumstances of her death are not known, but it probably took place at the end of the eighteenth century. She was buried in the Smolensk cemetery.

By the 1820s, people flocked to her grave to pray for her soul, and to ask her to intercede with God for them. So many visitors took earth from her grave that it had to be replaced every year. Later, a chapel was built over her grave.

Those who turn to St Xenia in prayer receive healing from illness, and deliverance from their afflictions. She is also known for helping people who seek jobs.
~Celebrating and Remembering the Past~
Today was the start of the 100 year anniversary celebrations at the Church where my grandparents, on both sides, (immigrants to this country in the early 1900s) raised their children and my parents raised us. We had our first snow of the winter today too. Most of the local Churches were closed but I was looking forward to going to my childhood Church for the celebration. Fr. took Basil and Jonah to our parish and Nicholas, Maria~Angelica and I ventured out onto the snow covered highway to Holy-Trinity St. Nicholas. When I was a senior in high school we had a young , Holy Cross Seminary graduate, who came to our parish to serve as a lay assistant for two years, he is now a Bishop, Bishop Savas of Troas. His Grace was my Sunday School teacher my senior year of high school and when I was in college he led our local YAL. His Grace left our parish for studies in Oxford, England under the guidance of Bishop Kallistos (Timothy Ware). A few years later I landed in England for my own studies and it was nice to have someone I knew from home and that knew the Greek-American experience. Our entire community has such great memories of his time with us and today he visited us again to kick off the centennial celebrations. Last night Fr. and I were able to visit with him a bit, at a small party in his honor and today we were all together for the Philoptochos Vasilopita Luncheon. His Grace, Bishop Savas of Troas, was the guest of honor and keynote speaker. It is really amazing to see His Grace return to our Church as a Bishop, he was the best chanter and theologian our parish has ever known and we were all so very blessed to be his students. My childhood parish has the distinct honor of being the Greek Orthodox parish in the United States with the most Presvyteras (wife of the Priest) to come out of one community there are 9 now, I was number 8. We also have two nuns and two priests.
Glory be to God!

Here is the article I blogged about last month, it first appeared in “Christianity Today.” Thank you Kristyn for the link! There is a comment by Fr Constantin Alecse at the bottom and a link to his message board.

Will the 21st Be the Orthodox Century?

Fascination with the Great Tradition may signal deep changes for both evangelicals and the Orthodox.

An Orthodox nun lights candles during an Eve of the Nativity of Christ (Rozhdestvenskyi Sochelnik) ceremony in Riga January 6, 2007. Reuters

Jaroslav Pelikan, the late professor of history at Yale University, wrote of the Christian tradition on a scale that no one else attempted in the 20th century. Then after nearly a lifetime of studying the history of doctrine, Pelikan, a lifelong Lutheran, was received into the Orthodox Church, just a few years before he died last May at age 82. I haven’t merely thought about Orthodox and evangelical compatibility; for most of my life, I have lived it. I’m a Lebanese American who grew up in the Orthodox Church of Antioch and was transformed by Christ during my high school days in Wichita, Kansas, through the leading of evangelical friends. I did my doctoral studies under the late Orthodox theologian Fr. John Meyendorff. A portion of my scholarship over the past two decades has been devoted to introducing the Orthodox tradition to evangelical students and faculty in North America. I’ve also pioneered dialogues between Orthodox believers and evangelicals, and I have spoken on the subject at World Council of Churches meetings in Egypt and Germany.

Thus, I bring an intellectual and experiential knowledge of both communities, which is probably why I have a love/hate relationship with them. I’m not fully at peace with either one. Although I’m absolutely committed to the theological truth of the Orthodox church, I’m equally persuaded that we have not made that truth meaningful or accessible to our own parishioners or to those who peer inside our windows. And because of my Orthodoxy, I’m also committed to the evangelical faith.

The Rebirth of Orthodoxy

Scholars define the Great Tradition as the theological consensus of the first 500 to 1,000 years of Christian history (there is some disagreement on exact dates). This consensus encompasses the church’s universally agreed upon creeds, councils, fathers, worship, and spirituality. Some key teachings and figures include the Nicene Creed, the Chalcedonian Definition, the works of Athanasius, the Cappadocian Fathers (Basil the Great, Gregory of Nazianzus, and Gregory of Nyssa), the spiritual writings of monks like Anthony of Egypt, and certain biblical commentaries and pastoral works.

During the past two decades, mainline and evangelical scholars have rediscovered the creative relevance of the Christian East, with its insistence on the authority of the first 500 years of Christian teaching and practice. One recent sign of evangelical interest is Thomas Oden’s The Rebirth of Orthodoxy: Signs of New Life in Christianity (HarperSanFrancisco, 2002), in which Oden uses the lowercase o in order to embrace all Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox Christians who adhere to the first 500 years of the Great Tradition. Oden sets forth six layers of evidence to show that there is, indeed, a widespread rekindling of “the orthodox spirit” at the dawn of the 21st century. These layers include:

(1) Personal transformation stories. The lives of ordinary Christians and leading academics who have been dramatically changed by the testimony of the classic tradition, including Jaroslav Pelikan and Richard Swinburne, who became Eastern Orthodox, and Robert Wilken and Richard John Neuhaus, who joined the Catholic church.

(2) Faithful scriptural interpretation. Patristic methods of exegesis are receiving more attention now than at any time during the previous century. They are fast becoming a core concern of biblical studies, as evidenced by the growing number of ancient translations and commentaries being made widely available by publishing companies such as InterVarsity, Baker, and Eerdmans.

(3) The multicultural nature of orthodoxy. No modern multiculturalism is as deep or fertile as the ecumenical multiculturalism of antiquity. The cross-cultural richness of the early church is becoming increasingly evident today.

(4) Well-established doctrinal boundaries. After decades of uncritical permissiveness in the church, we are now witnessing a renewed energy for drawing boundaries around questions of religious truth. Thousands of the faithful are together relearning how to say no to heresy on behalf of a greater yes for the truth of classical orthodoxy.

(5) Ecumenical roots reclaimed. Confessing and renewing movements in Protestantism are changing local congregations and even entire denominations.

(6) Rise of a new ecumenism. Actually, what we’re seeing is a revival of the ancient ecumenical method of theological decision-making set forth by Vincent Lerins: “We hold to that which has been believed everywhere, always, and by all.” Laypeople can easily grasp this, and they are doing so.

Organically Connected

The problem with the usual Protestant approach to the Great Tradition, however, is the gaps and inconsistencies in retrieval efforts. To many, the Great Tradition is like a library, a place you go to pick out the books you find most helpful. You can discard the ones that no longer seem relevant, while choosing the ones that have proven to be of lasting value.

So what makes me think that this renewed interest in the Great Tradition may lead to more Christians joining Eastern Orthodoxy, or at least embracing its theological vision? Simply put, I think more and more people will recognize the vital relationship between the major movements and themes of Christian antiquity and the organic life of the Eastern Orthodox Church from whence these themes came.

In two areas, especially, the Orthodox church has maintained its unbroken succession with Christian antiquity, and these areas are particularly attractive to an increasing number of Christians.

Scripture. We all agree that the Spirit’s witness through the Bible is the main criterion of the church’s faith. Tradition simply witnesses to, safeguards, and corrects itself by the integrity of the biblical message. But it was the churches of the early centuries (both East and West) that decided, piecemeal, which texts constituted the canon of Scripture, by virtue of their apostolic origin and wide acceptance within the worshiping community. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that the Spirit embraced the believing community through the choosing of the canon, rather than that the church chose the canon. Still, the canon was composed within the context of the believing community by members of the church. Scripture was never “external” to the believing community. This does not mean that Scripture owes its authority to the church, but that the Spirit was inseparably united to the church and its sacred texts. The church functioned as the mediating authority that bore witness to the work of God within it.

So whether they are aware of it or not, every time evangelicals pick up their Bibles, they are relying on the historic church’s judgment on the colossal issue of canonicity! Without acknowledging it, evangelicals validate the authority of the Spirit-led tradition in determining canonicity. That same Spirit-led tradition has governed the Orthodox church over the centuries.

I believe an increasing number of people fascinated with the early church will see that the Spirit, the Bible, tradition, and real, historical, identifiable churches are inseparably united, then as now.

Historical continuity. I imagine that the deeper evangelicals delve into church history, the less they will confine the meaning of “orthodoxy” to the first 500 or 1,000 years. They will come to embrace the “whole story” of the faithful, not just the parts they personally like. They will discover that the fullness of Christian orthodoxy does not end with a date in the history books, but lives on in what Georges Florovsky called “the mind of the church” and what John Meyendorff described as the church’s “living tradition.” Evangelicals will see that the theological and institutional history of the Great Tradition is directly tied to the Great Church—namely, the contemporary Orthodox churches of the Middle East, Greece, Russia, Eastern Europe, and their children in the West. They will recognize that today’s “rebirth of orthodoxy” cannot do justice to classical Christian faith without keeping it connected to the church that most fully produced and inherited its achievements. Few will dispute the historical continuity between the modern Patriarchate of Antioch, for example, and the Book of Acts.

Of course, faithfulness to the truth of the Great Tradition, not organizational continuity, is what counts most. My point is simply that those who value classical faith will increasingly engage with Orthodox churches, which incarnate the Great Tradition day by day as a living tradition. I’m not arguing that the Great Tradition is the exclusive property of the Eastern Orthodox Church. It is not. Early church fathers, mothers, ascetics, councils, creeds, art, music, and spirituality are the rightful heritage of all orthodox Christians—Catholics, Protestants, and Orthodox alike. There is no room here for Orthodox triumphalism or romanticism. All orthodox believers share a common ecumenical heritage. But few historians would dispute the conclusion that in comparison to the 20,000 Protestant denominations in existence today, the Orthodox community can most justifiably claim to be the fullest heir apparent of the Great Tradition.

Evangelical Orthodoxy

At the same time, my evangelical passions prompt me to suggest that this renewed fascination with the Great Tradition may indirectly revive Orthodoxy. And if it doesn’t, it should. Little by little, our parishioners are being touched by evangelicals who are rediscovering the creative relevance of the Christian East and repackaging it far more attractively than we have been doing for ourselves.

But revival will not happen automatically. Dialogue at the local church level will help, even if evangelicals learn more from the Orthodox than the Orthodox are willing to learn from evangelicals. The time has come for us Orthodox to rediscover the evangelical character of our faith on its own terms, not defined by using some form of the model of evangelicalism. Because of our maximalist vision of theology, our evangelical identity will look and act very differently than yours. I wouldn’t exhort my Orthodox brethren to regain their evangelical focus as passionately as I do in lectures and articles if I didn’t think they would respond, and thankfully they are doing so in increasing numbers.

So I suggest that the Great Tradition of our Great Church cuts both ways, and we ourselves are judged by it! Even if the gospel is formally a part of the life of the Orthodox church, as we believe, that does not mean our people have understood and appropriated its message. “Catholicity” (i.e., “the whole and adequate” expression of the faith) must be discerned and applied if the church is to be spiritually viable in today’s world.

More and more Orthodox, as they study the Great Tradition, are admitting that our leaders and laity don’t have a mature grasp of their own faith. They recognize that the church isn’t free from ethnocentrism or religious bigotry, that it hasn’t contextualized its faith and liturgy in the modern world, and that it hasn’t figured out how to relate to unchurched people in North America (its converts consist mostly of disillusioned believers from other Christian traditions). More and more Orthodox, as they explore the early church afresh, see that there are parts of its ancient liturgies that seem to have no biblical justification and that we cannot simply regard the Reformation and the last millennium in the West as nothing more than a sideshow.

To be sure, there are countless cases of people whose spiritual lives are flourishing in vibrant Orthodox communities. Still, the most urgent need in world Orthodoxy is the need to engage in an aggressive “internal mission” of spiritual renewal and rededication of our priests and people to Jesus Christ. I know from experience that it’s possible to be “religious, but lost.” That’s why all of us Orthodox—bishops, priests, and people—need to make the gospel crystal clear and absolutely central in our lives and in our parishes. We must constantly recover the personal and relational aspects of God in every life-giving action of the church. Naturally, if this happens, it will lead to a revival within Orthodoxy, which will cause the church to blossom in unprecedented ways.

Yes, these predictions and exhortations are speculative; they may never come to fruition as I hope and imagine. And I admit that my commitment to an evangelical Orthodoxy predisposes me to hope like this. That being said, I still see signs that suggest that these two great expressions of the Christian faith, the evangelical and the Orthodox, are gradually coming together in vision, if not in worship, and that the 21st century may be known as the Orthodox century.

Bradley Nassif is associate professor of biblical and theological studies at North Park University and is currently writing the Westminster Handbook to Eastern Orthodox Theology (Westminster John Knox, 2009). He is a member of the Antiochian Orthodox Church. Source

Pelikan is just one of a growing number of people who are joining the Eastern Orthodox Church. It makes me wonder if the 21st century will be the century of the Orthodox. Will there be a rebirth of the church’s theological vision, if not its numerical growth? I’m not a prophet, nor do I want to evangelize evangelicals or reinvent Orthodox identity. But I would like to (a) offer a theological explanation for why I believe more and more Christians, especially evangelicals, may well be attracted to Orthodoxy in the 21st century, and (b) explain why more and more Orthodox need to become more evangelical.

~Fr Constantin Alecse

~Poetry~
Basil and Nicholas had judged recitations today, for the “Laurel Wreath” competition, I hope they did well. I was so excited for them, they both do a really good job, when they practice for me. It has been amazing to watch Basil grow from his first year in Classical and Christian education to his third. He really does a beautiful job of performing and telling the story of the “Landing of The Pilgrim Fathers”. Both Nicholas and Basil amaze me at their ability to memorize, they are only 7 and 9 and they are both becoming more confident public speakers. Nicholas is very cute and his poem, “Animal Crackers”, is so sweet. They had long Bible passage that they memorized and presented as well.
LANDING OF THE PILGRIM FATHERS
by: Felicia Dorothea Hemans (1793-1835)
HE breaking waves dashed high
On a stern and rock-bound coast,
And the woods against a stormy sky
Their giant branches tossed;

And the heavy night hung dark,
The hills and waters o’er,
When a band of exiles moored their bark
On the wild New England shore.

Not as the conqueror comes,
They, the true-hearted came;
Not with the roll of the stirring drums,
And the trumpet that sings of fame;

Not as the flying come,
In silence and in fear;
They shook the depths of the desert gloom
With their hymns of lofty cheer.

Amidst the storm they sang,
And the stars heard, and the sea;
And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang
To the anthem of the free.

The ocean eagle soared
From his nest by the white wave’s foam;
And the rocking pines of the forest roared–
This was their welcome home.

There were men with hoary hair
Amidst the pilgrim band:
Why had they come to wither there,
Away from their childhood’s land?

There was woman’s fearless eye,
Lit by her deep love’s truth;
There was manhood’s brow, serenely high,
And the fiery heart of youth.

What sought they thus afar?
Bright jewels of the mine?
The wealth of seas, the spoils of war?
They sought a faith’s pure shrine!

Ay, call it holy ground,
The soil where first they trod;
They have left unstained what there they found —
Freedom to whorship God.
                                              ANIMAL CRACKERS
by Christopher Morley (1890-1957)

Animal crackers, and cocoa to drink,
That is the finest of suppers, I think;
When I’m grown up and can have what I please
I think I shall always insist upon these.

What do you choose when you’re offered a treat?
When Mother says, “What would you like best to eat?”
Is it waffles and syrup, or cinnamon toast?
It’s cocoa and animals that I love the most!

The kitchen’s the coziest place that I know:
The kettle is singing, the stove is aglow,
And there in the twilight, how jolly to see
The cocoa and animals waiting for me.

Daddy and Mother dine later in state,
With Mary to cook for them, Susan to wait;
But they don’t have nearly as much fun as I
Who eat in the kitchen with Nurse standing by;
And Daddy once said he would like to be me
Having cocoa and animals once more for tea!
~Cool Testimony!~
David Hudson
Not long after I arrived in Romania as an evangelical missionary in 1993, a Baptist pastor with whom I was working said to me, “You think you came to Romania to do something for God, but perhaps He wants to do something for you”.
It was true that I was on a pilgrimage that had started when I was a child with an unusual thirst for spiritual things, but I really did not expect my searching to come to an end in Romania.
I was raised in the conservative Wesleyan movement, and baptized at the age of 8. Even as a child I was willing to stand alone for my religious convictions, and I strove to live a consistent Christian life. I learned to play the piano while in Junior High, and soon my whole identity was wrapped up in music ministry.
There was a very great emphasis on both inward and outward holiness in the churches of my youth, but I became disillusioned as a Bible College student, when I realized (1) that the “entire sanctification” we expected to receive instantaneously wasn’t working, not only in me, but even in church leaders I admired, and (2) that I was in a religious ghetto and needed to find the true Church. I found my way into the Reformed faith, which seemed to be the answer. No shortcuts, no superficial claims of sinlessness, lots of “Christian liberty”, and whatever couldn’t’t be explained otherwise was swept up into the mighty and mysterious sovereignty of God. The fact that it was a more intellectual faith also appealed to me at the time, as I was in the process of “upward mobilization”.
Through marriage, however, I became part of the leadership of an independent evangelical congregation where “my” theology was tolerated, as long as it didn’t get in the way of the mission of our growing church. Everything was subservient to evangelism, everything was user-friendly, the visitor was king, and our still conservative Christianity was effectively marketed to the upwardly mobile that we considered our “target group”. My music ministry took a secondary place as I took on more administrative responsibility, eventually serving as Executive Pastor.
All the activity and success with its unending pressure took a toll on our souls, and we felt that something was missing in all this. Going into midlife, we decided to break with this high paced, all-consuming ministry enterprise and to go for a second career in missions. I had dreamed of music ministry in Europe for a long time, and we decided this was the time. After a period of re-training and support raising, we were off to the university city of Cluj-Napoca, Romania: Mary and I, and our three daughters, Heidi, Heather, and Hannah.
Despite some difficult challenges, we adapted well and were thriving after a few years. We learned the language, the girls were in public schools, and we even bought an apartment with the intention of staying long term. We were working with Baptist churches in worship renewal, especially in the area of music, and even beginning to compose some well-received songs in Romanian.
Then our whole life was turned upside down by Orthodoxy, as devastating as any tornado that ever hit Kansas.
I had nothing against Orthodoxy when I came as an evangelical missionary to a mostly Orthodox country. I didn’t see myself as a threat or competition to the majority faith. I did believe that the Orthodox Church, like older churches in general, was mostly dead, but I wanted to believe that there was some life and renewal in it. With pluralistic openmindedness, I set about to find out what there was in Orthodoxy that was good, assuming that the roots of Romanian evangelicalism must be in Romanian Orthodoxy.
By coincidence, I had read “Becoming Orthodox” while in missionary training, and was impressed by what I read. But I didn’t see much in Romania that resembled Peter Gilquist’s glowing presentation. Orthodoxy seemed tired, stale, superficial, superstitious, frightfully formal, or, as one person commented, “feudal”. Compromise and corruption, and a museum-like fixation with the past, were the impressions I got from the non-Orthodox people I talked with. The services in the Cathedral were like an opera without a plot, and it didn’t seem to matter whether you could follow what was going on. It was light years from the overhead projectors and didactic emphasis of churches I had been involved in! In another downtown church, where I would duck in to pray occasionally, people just seemed to come and go all through the service — if you could call it that — much in the way that the priest appeared and disappeared all the time behind the curtain in the iconostasis. The chanter seemed somewhere between bored and distracted; it was routine to him. Why didn’t anyone seem to be interested in communicating anything to the visitor?
As one Romanian duhovnic recently said to me, it is truly a miracle that we became Orthodox in Romania. Absolutely no one did anything whatever to convert us.
Convinced that there had to be more to Orthodoxy, I kept wanting to get to the bottom of this mystery, even though I was too busy to give it a lot of time. The opportunity came at last to get to know a priest who was “evangelical”, just what I was looking for. He was young, still finishing seminary, and in his fourth year of pastoring way out in a tumble-down village. Fr. Iustinian had been raised in a pious Orthodox home and had taken a stand for his faith under communism as a teenager, and now was in the priesthood. Not nominal or superficial in his faith, he was convinced of the claims that I had read about in Gilquist (and now others). After some discussion, I asked him to celebrate a Divine Liturgy in such a way that I could understand it. He took me into the Holy Altar, explained as much as necessary, allowing me to watch every action and hear every prayer. That day, in early May of 1995, I was “smitten” with Orthodoxy. I knew I had come into contact with a grace and a power and a holiness that I had never experienced before. It was unexpected. It was compelling.
What to do? Our missionary career was just taking off, and our family was just feeling settled after the traumas of uprooting, relocating, enculturation, etc. We were fulfilled and excited about the future. I didn’t even dare to speak to my wife about it, as I knew this would mean an upheaval in our lives — one too many. Just at that time, we were scheduled for a summer furlough in the U.S. As we came back, I was haunted by Orthodoxy, and felt compelled to take steps to pursue it. And yet, everything we had worked for and suffered for as a family was on the line. When my wife started to catch on, she warned me that she didn’t think the girls could take this. But as she began to study and pray about it, she, too, began to see the reality of Orthodoxy.
After discussion with our mission society leadership, we decided that we must resign in order to pursue our newfound (and fragile) discovery. By mid-summer of 1995, we were embroiled in a heartrending conflict with loved ones, who felt betrayed and cheated. By the end of the summer, our “missionary career” was over and we were sidelined and stranded. Although at that time we came to the conclusion that we had been mistaken about Orthodoxy, trust had been destroyed and we were not able to resume our ministry.
We went into a year of “exile”, working low paying jobs to survive and trying to get our wits about us. What had happened? What went wrong? How could we have been derailed so easily after a lifetime of Christian teaching and active ministry? Orthodoxy had seemed so beautiful, so right. It had put a new perspective on the unresolved questions and unsatisfied hungers in our spiritual lives. It was a new paradigm in which, suddenly, everything fit into place with nothing left over and pushed out of the doctrinal grid, as is the case with the doctrinal systems we were familiar with. It had seemed so true, so real, so much more spiritual than anything we had known. Could it really be a fantasy, as some said, or an abomination, as others said?
We tried to pick up the pieces and get on with our lives. The girls were devastated, and their trust in us and others was deeply shaken. We felt paralyzed and lost. We had seen too much new light to go back to our former way of being Christians. We could not really be evangelicals anymore, and since we could not be Orthodox either, we tried to forge our own way, combining the best of both. It was a desperate attempt to make sense of things and to satisfy our frustrated thirst for Orthodoxy.
In that state of mind, we returned to Romania on our own after our “year in exile”. It seemed we had to, for several reasons. We had left our apartment, car, and belongings in limbo. We had left our friends and colleagues without good-byes or explanations. Our oldest daughter, Heidi, was going to enter the University of Cluj, and so we pulled ourselves together and mustered our fragile faith and headed back. Of course the main dangling question was Orthodoxy. We had to “return to the scene of the crime”, to convince ourselves one way or another. We were graciously accepted back into our former Baptist music ministry, and we tried to make a go of working in a Protestant environment with Orthodox ideals. Outwardly it was fairly successful, but inwardly it was not satisfying. We knew that we had to give Orthodoxy another chance, this time a real chance.
So in the summer of 1997, we took the plunge and started going to the Divine Liturgy on Sunday mornings. Through Fr. Gordon Walker of St. Ignatius Church in Franklin, Tennessee (whom we had met in 1995), we became friends with American converts who had also come to Cluj as missionaries. Craig and Victoria Goodwin introduced us to an Orthodox daily devotional publication, DYNAMIS, a ministry of their home church, St. George Cathedral in Wichita (see the web site at http://dynamis.cjb.net). Using DYNAMIS for our discipline of daily Bible study, things began to fall into place; questions began to be answered. We also began to overcome our intimidation and to meet more priests and lay people who impressed us with their truly Christian hearts and lives. The Archbishop of Cluj, BARTOLOMEU, granted us his blessing to begin translating DYNAMIS into Romanian and publishing it as a supplement to the Archdiocesan monthly. Through all this, no one made any effort to pressure us to convert, and even when we eventually requested to be received into the Church through Chrismation, no one was in a hurry. By that time, it was we who were impatient!
Mary, Heidi, and I were chrismated on Pascha, 1998, in the village where Fr. Iustinian now serves. What a peace settled over us when we finally got out of the stormy seas of pluralistic, idiosyncratic, and eclectic Christianity and into the ark of the historic, original, continuing life of the Church! Heather chose to remain active in the Baptist high school and church, and having faced such trauma together over our conversion, we felt she needed the freedom to come to Orthodoxy if and when she is ready herself. Hannah was baptized a few weeks after Pascha of this year, 1999, just before turning twelve. It was a beautiful service, and a wonderful testimony to share with many who had taken their baptism for granted. With this milestone, we feel we have come a step deeper into the peace of the Church and closed another chapter in our pilgrimage.
Conversion is not easy, either before or after Chrismation. There is so much to learn, and it is hard to go back to grammar school after a lifetime of leadership. In a way, it is like emigrating to a new country. You get your ticket and go; that is like being catechumens. Eventually you get your new citizenship; that is like Chrismation. But you still have to adapt to the new culture and find your place in it; that is like the ongoing process of working out your salvation once you are in the Church. Pat answers and instant solutions are not part of true Christianity. But there is a real opportunity for everyone who “strives for the prize” to attain the riches that our new Motherland offers us.
Does it mean that there are not stumbling blocks and snares in the Orthodox Church? No. There are obviously many citizens in this new land who languish in spiritual poverty and disease, who, while they have the citizenship, do not cultivate the characteristics and privileges it offers. But there are towering examples of “success” to point the way for us. Dying to everything that is false and unworthy, first of all in ourselves, we find ourselves reborn as more human, more real, more peaceful, more settled, more healed, more loving and forgiving, even while we remain sinners. This is what Orthodoxy is about. It offers us real holiness, regaining the lost likeness of God; and we are not just given theories, but also the wherewithal.
Fr. Rafail Noica, an eminent Romanian duhovnic and himself a convert to Orthodoxy, says that Orthodoxy is the true nature of man, “red, yellow, black, or white”. When we come home to Orthodoxy, we “come to” our senses, we become our true selves. Lord, where else could we go?
Now we know why the Lord brought us to Romania. Our mission was to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling, and in so doing, to become a few more candles shining in the Church for those who, even in an Orthodox country, do not yet understand what their faith is all about. And perhaps for others who, like we were, are searching for something but don’t expect to find it in Orthodoxy.
Taken from here.
Neat video on Classical Education. Click here to see it.