From the Third Story

From someone else's mind

2012-03-02T12:50:00.000-08:00

The Church welcomes the lenten spring with a spirit of exultation. She greets the time of repentance with the expectancy and enthusiasm of a child entering into a new and exciting experience. The tone of the church services is one of brightness and light...There is nothing gloomy here, nothing dark or remorseful, masochistic or morbid, anxious or hysterical, pietistic or sentimental. The lenten spirit in the Church is one of splendor and delight...

How sad that people misunderstand the significance of the lenten spring. How distressing that so many take this time "given by God, our Crucified Christ" as a season for sentimental devotions, anxious introspections and pietistic pseudo-sufferings "together with Jesus". And how depressing that others naturalize and rationalize the time spent with tepid explanations about the psychosomatic benefits of abstinence with arguments drawn from one or another therapeutic theory. And how totally tragic that still others reject the whole affair, often with good reason because of its distortion, as a barbarous hangover from the dark ages to be radically rejected in these liberated and modern times.

~The Lenten Spring: Readings for Great Lent by Thomas Hopko

Some clarification

2012-02-24T12:39:00.000-08:00

When I use terms like “sundered ones” from my previous post (and probably in the next post to come) I am not repeating ideas from anyone’s mind but my own. These days I don’t attend seminars and lectures (not that there’s anything wrong with those). I’m learning on a different sort of track than I used to, but that’s just where I happen to be.

I’m reading. Books are helpful. Here are a few I’ve finished or am in the midst of: The Orthodox Study Bible; Surprised by Joy by C.S. Lewis; The Lost Gospel of Mary by Frederica Mathewes-Green; His Life Is Mine by Archimandrite Sophrony; and On the Incarnation by St. Athanasius (there is a new Greek and English version of this volume, that wouldn’t do me much good, but I linked to it).

Mostly what I’m doing is going to church and absorbing. Before I was of any mind to do this, as some of you who know me may remember, I surmised things about Eastern Orthodoxy, like when I had the thought that it and a certain church were to my daughter and me, regarding faith, as our different genre preferences were, regarding stories. Or authors. Or something. It’s interesting now to go back in my blog-past and read myself wrestling with what might be real and true. (Only an iceberg tip, compared to what went on in my journals and notebooks, without me really noticing.)

So. Now you know. I’m not, today, regurgitating anybody else’s reflections of what might be true. At least I don’t think so.

It is difficult to know myself. Well nigh impossible to understand others, because the experiences we different ones come from are just that — so different. The amazing thing is we communicate. Sometimes very well. Sometimes after only finding some time for clarification.

Organic as spring rain and soil

2012-02-22T10:18:00.000-08:00

Now I think I see the benefit in the influence of the Church.

None of us Protestants have been under it. There were lingering Church influences on the way churches did things — as I’m learning, I see them more and more — and it is rather amazing how much truth held on over the centuries. Probably the remnants of worship of the true Messiah that had been handed down from his first disciples were kept by individuals and gatherings that, compared to their rulers, were powerless to stop the sunderings from the living Tradition, and yet they understood enough to maintain all that they were able. They had received grace, and in their flawed ways they passed it on. But cultural changes always seep into our souls and affect our practices. We Protestants had lost much of the means toward spiritual healing, beginning back when we became Roman Catholics, and of course long before that people were rebellious, unrepentant. They were that way during the days of Peter and Paul.

The Holy Spirit’s work may indeed look as organic as spring rain and soil, the paradigm into which seeds try to grow. Like Jesus’s parable and any peek at the garden will show, there are various scenarios possible; there are no guarantees of fruitfulness in any one instance. There is, however, always good soil, because the sower made things that way. There is always belief in right doctrine, belief in the Creator. There is always “all truth” that the Spirit was sent to lead us into.

The Church’s tradition covers everything, addresses everything, that we Protestants have brought up over the millennia as we sundered ones tried to rewrite things from scratch. We simply need to see the actual history and to repent of our screw-ups. We need to submit to the Spirit and, receiving grace, begin to receive the healing.

Choice toward personhood

2012-02-19T18:25:00.000-08:00

Every other human being, according to the ancient church, shares the same nature I do. But we are each persons — or, at least, we are each on our way to becoming persons. We are now individuals, subject to human nature. The distinction for and of Saints is they are those who have crossed a particular barrier/threshold, they are those who have become persons. These have moved somewhere beyond human nature, or at least beyond fallen human nature. Not that they share God’s unique nature, but they share his energies, and so then, as the Apostle Peter said, they share in the divine nature. Which, according to the Church, involves personhood as sovereign, as supreme. Which moves (in an organic motion) into life in all its fullness. Ultimate life.

Death (destruction) of the individual that is me — the nascent person if you will — is a formidable enemy. In the second epistle of Peter, the apostle is perhaps saying something along these lines. (And he says that Paul wrote about the “same things”, and that Paul’s writings are hard to understand and can be twisted by those “untaught” as well as by those “unstable”. Not that I am stable; don’t take my word for things; take Peter’s, take Paul’s.)

The idea I may be working with, then, is that I am not my worst enemy. I am a creature whose destiny can be personhood, which is life. By making rebellious, awful choices I am an enemy to myself, because I turn away from life, my best destiny. Nonpersonhood, it seems obvious, would be death, destruction. My ultimate foe. Maybe God's powerful, ultimate wrath is/will actually be seen toward ultimate death, the thing individuals can ultimately choose, being free, being creatures, not the Creator, who "has life in himself" and who "can't deny himself."

What does the pro-life movement base itself on, after all? Their message is that through abortion we are denying personhood. Or at least we are denying existence under the sun to those who are made such that they can become persons.

I suppose that in the pro-abortion movement might lurk the correct understanding that a little human who gets to be born is still not a full person. In the sense of the Church, maybe, then, the abortionist, who is denying that little human life here and now, is also still not a full person, because none of us is. And we are given the real option to deny ourselves the journey toward full personhood (maybe by aborting babies; maybe by gossiping, maybe by clinging to ideas that are outside of the truth and bring death).

The tragedy in abortion is not deepest for the baby, although an injustice occurs for that individual. The tragedy is deepest for the individuals who bring about that abortion of the process of living under the sun. The act of abortion is sin. As does every transgression, it moves toward the ultimate death, the second death. Thank heaven God is merciful toward me and every other sinner.

The choice toward ultimate life or toward ultimate death continues throughout our existences under the sun. This is a thought that pauses me. But while it is a fearful thought, it is not a despairing one. I remain one who has not made myself and has not created reality. The Creator, who is good, has done this and has provided the one good choice that can only be rejected; it will not be taken away. And I can be comforted by those who have gone before and have remained, abided, in the choice for ultimate life. Their choice is a Person in whom from the beginning was Life, and the Life was the light of men. They have become, at least more fully, persons. Saints.

Release and the Tree

2012-02-14T16:22:00.000-08:00

Some days I spend hours in church. In gathering, in the building where we gather. I suppose the rest of my days may involve a process of “churching” begun recently — or did it begin long, long ago?

This past summer Timothy and I went to several early liturgies, as newly-ordained Fr. Daniel “served” his first forty times at St. John’s. People from the church community came to support Daniel when they could. During those lagging mornings, tiredness dragged at me, the exhaustion borne of battle within my mind.

I was torn in two.

On one side, voices raged, forces pushed, arguments spoke tirelessly. Their refrains, from deep inside me, were familiar, ceaseless, and yet at the same moment they were curious things. They suggested in the strongest terms that I was not supposed to be doing what I was doing. Liturgy was wrong; the Church was wrong. The Church, after all, did not exist (hadn't I believed this many long seasons?), and I should have no part in practices that would influence me toward what must be rejecting the Messiah’s teachings.

All the while this din was raised, however, a gentle, joyful, tender yet solidly resilient theme capered in the air, in curly-cues of incense smoke rising through sunbeams. I didn’t know exactly all it was saying/singing/waltzing, but I did see in every instance of the battle trying to be joined with it by the raging voices in my mind that it carefully refused to take any bait. Wise, it neither rushed to trot out irrational retaliations nor subjected me to academic rationality (rationalizations?).

It simply was. The theme existed without a problem: the theme presented my heart’s desire. The only thing necessary. Mary has chosen that which shall never be taken from her.

For years in the past, I got close to that essentiality and joyed greatly in doing so. I believed the gospel which Jesus came to present was the thing. I would carry and share it forever.

But back then I was plucking a ripe plum from the branch and missing the reality of the tree. The Tree. The Man. Branches lifted for me to climb toward my desireful destination. The Man who is God. Back then I ate the plum while believing the encouragement to disbelieve in the Tree. Mary sat at his feet, listening to him speak. Mary loved him with all her being; Martha got something of this love but was distracted from it. I was somewhere in between, caught in folds of reality by philosophy’s shiny grasp.

I am allowed now, the theme that capers and kisses reminds me, to climb. To grow. Interactive to the ten-thousandth degree, the Tree will grow into me, as I into it; its energies will come and make their abode with me, as it has with the frail yet faithful. From the beginning. From generation to generation.

Choosing the unique Son

2012-02-10T12:15:00.000-08:00

An end-of-week perspective on Christianity, by one still processing.

Those who choose the Son have chosen the Father. They have received/will receive the Holy Spirit. This choice, then, of the only begotten, unique, Son of God is the only choice, really, toward eternity, the only choice worth looking into. Looking into this most important choice entails what?

What did the Son, Jesus, say about doing this work of choosing, which must be the ultimate good work, or the foundational good work?

Some of the things he said:

    Follow him,

    come to him,

    believe in him.

    Repent and sin no more.

    Do good to others.

    Keep his word, his message.

    Watch for his return.

    Tell others about him.

Did Jesus provide a context other than our homes, workplaces, and families for choosing him? What is the context Jesus gave to us for choosing him?

Jesus asked his disciples who they said he was. After Peter confessed Jesus as the Christ, Messiah, the Son of the Living God, Jesus said that on this rock he would build his church. Upon the solid base of the confession Peter gave, Jesus would build his gathering, or his assembly (as "ecclesia" or “church” can also be translated) of those who followed, came, believed, repented, did good to others, kept his word, watched for his return, and spread the news about him.

Against this context for choosing, this Church, the gates of Hades would not stand. Since Hades (Gehenna) was the word in that time for the place of the dead, this perhaps meant something along these lines: the place of the dead would be dismantled by the Church that Jesus would build.

A story of people from Campus Crusade for Christ, who undertook a journey toward discovery of what the Church might be (if it existed at all), is found in a book called Becoming Orthodox. It’s not a tract telling you how you really should become Orthodox. It’s a book about one group’s journey (and now, in the latest version, about where they are today).

Regarding nature/essence

2012-02-06T16:26:00.000-08:00

Those times when Jesus prayed all night to the Father, did he bring a list of things to be addressed? Or did he pray from the Scriptures? Was it a combination? Was he talking to himself, as some insist (with tongue in cheek)? Or was he speaking as God to God, as others insist? Or is there a way at all to explain what Jesus did when he prayed?

Was the experience one of rest? Ordinary? Or was he in particular turmoil? Well, we know of one time he was in agony. In Gethsemane, he requested release from the burden of his task while remaining committed to doing the Father’s will rather than his own of the moment.

How could someone who may perfectly represent a Person who is the only Person perfectly, at every moment, ask to be released and do his own will?

The answer, in the Christian group I’m from that I’m calling ultra-Protestant, is that Jesus was scripted to do so, to give us the perfect example of laying down one’s own desires before God, even the desire for saving one’s own life.

The answer, for Orthodox Christians, is… Similar, I think, in that Jesus gave us the perfect example of humility before God — he practiced a process of laying down the desire even for life before God. Organically, genuinely, Jesus expressed the reality of his situation to his Father. His free will and choices as a Person have ever been free. Was he demonstrating perfect freedom, yet perfect unity and concert with the Father with whom he is one? I and my Father are one.

In Orthodox theology, Jesus is a Person of the single essence of God, one of Three Who have been revealed to us. Personhood is sovereign to nature. We of the single nature or essence of humanity are individuals first, on the road to becoming persons in the light of God’s single essence and reality. This concept, to me, has become more than a narrative, more than a good book.

I love a good book, don’t get me wrong. But I rise from the sofa where I’ve been fully engaged with reading — observing the world of the mind who created the story — and I go and do and exist and move and have my being. The book travels with me, as elements of the story remain. There are many, many wonderful stories. But I can’t live a story. I must live all dimensions of reality that are given to me.

I am more than:

    A character in a book

    A Gentile dog

    A creature who is my own worst enemy

I do, perhaps, fit all of the above descriptions, but I am more than those things.

God does more than:

    Compose a narrative

    Create good and evil characters

    Choose for every moment of time what will happen

He does, perhaps, do all of the above, but he has revealed himself doing more than we can begin to imagine. His ways are completely beyond our ways. We may find helpful analogies for his activities, but we are charged to learn from him, from Himself.

I have been charged to learn from God’s essence. The Father is who I’m referring to when I say God; if I get this, the Eastern Orthodox are understanding that throughout Old Testament times the title God referred to the Father. But “He” and “God” can also refer to the Trinity of Persons, the nature of the triune Creator/Deity, whose actions are always one and never separated. Therefore, the Trinity came to earth; in fact, the Trinity has always been interacting with the creation.

Still, as Jesus said, no one has seen the Father. The Father is the Source of everything, including the the Son and the Holy Spirit. Perhaps this implies the Father’s complete “otherness” and dominion over all else, as well as, or alternatively, describing us as unable to “see” what the Father is, because he is so other, so beyond. We would die, we are just not and can’t be in the realm of the Father. And this can lend possibility to the thought that the Father/Source could produce/has always produced other Persons to share his same essence (perhaps the “otherness”). And maybe this “production” was different from our “creation”, our creation having started at a point in the beginning (of time; of whatever began; this that began we experience in part and someday will fully know; we won’t ever know God’s own, non-beginning, Personal doings unless he desires to and can reveal them to us without our being exterminated).

In John’s gospel Jesus says, “I and my Father are one,” and, “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father.” Regarding this relationship, there is a choice between two compelling teachings I have received, between two realities:

1. hearing this as Jesus saying “I, a created being, represent the Father perfectly, while being a man like any man (except for God’s choice and determination) and replaceable by any other man” (this is one ultra-Protestant understanding as I have received it); and

2. hearing this as Jesus saying “I represent the Father perfectly — you can begin to recognize this, in part because I’m telling you no one knows who the Father is except the Son and those to whom the Son reveals the Father. As the Son I am, as well, completely unique from any other — you can begin to recognize this, in part because I’m telling you that no one knows who the Son is except the Father” (see Matt. 11:27 and Luke 10:22).

The choice between these two options remains critical, a very live one for me.

Considering His action

2012-02-02T08:51:00.000-08:00

The way I’m thinking these days, I have for now dubbed Protestantism (including Roman Catholicism) the religious “behavioral spectrum”. At one end of the spectrum is this idea: As long as you behave like us, we don’t care what you think. At the other end is this: As long as you think like us, we don’t care how you behave. In both instances, there is a separation I’m seeing between individuals that is artificial when compared with reality as Christ modeled reality. At both ends of the spectrum pride can receive free reign.

This is a concern, because throughout the Bible we find this exhortation: turn away from pride and embrace humility. It was a project necessary from the beginning of our humanity, I expect. At least it became the necessary thing for Adam and Eve to do, once they had chosen pride before God in the aftermath of their transgression.

I need to work every moment on this project; it is the reason, I think, that I find myself in the Church. I’m grateful and happy to do this, to work out this project’s details for the rest of my days.

The reason there is joy in the prospect of working on the project is that in every way Christ modeled for us the path of humility. He who did not rebel once, he who, as the Church teaches, became an infant while remaining “very God” did not harm his human mother in any way while being born.

All other human babies make a violent entrance into the stream of humanity. This can’t be helped. I didn’t know, growing in my mom’s uterus, that I was making the situation impossible for her to keep me there, to avoid suffering. All I must have understood during the birth process was my own confusion, suffocation, amazement at bursting out into space and white lights in my eyes, with blood and tissue the river around my naked self.

The Church teaches that Jesus, coming as a baby and being truly human, at the same time was able to keep Mary his mother from losing her virginity. I hadn’t considered just how it might feel to give birth as a virgin. The thing was hard enough for me who'd had years of womanly experience. I can only imagine the suffering of one who “never having known a man” must now be stretched, in a sense mutilated, in order to provide passage to her baby. This historical moment of Jesus’s birth was certainly before Caesarian sections were widely practiced. Maybe if Mary had been in Rome, and royal, someone could have experimented on her; even then the results might well have been disaster.

But we are presented, Protestant as well as Orthodox Christians, with a miracle. The promised Messiah enters the womb of the Virgin by means of the Holy Spirit. No male involved; no sexual union. And in the Church’s tradition the understanding remains that after Messiah’s birth those closest to the event found evidence that Mary remained a virgin, unharmed.

For me, this realization dawning brings the greatest glimpse of humility I have received. God breaking into human reality without doing any violence. Taking whatever pains needed to accomplish this. The Father, having always planned to send the Son, never made the requirements for our reception harmful or painful in the manner of our way of bloodshed. This must have almost made it hurt worse (spiritually speaking): to have him arrive so very humbly.

Compare his birth, then, with the manner of death he took on for our sakes. It happened in the same fashion: when the time came, God’s only begotten (unique) Son died, so that whoever believes in him might live. The violence of his death wasn’t directed by God toward men; it went the other way around. Jesus took it on. He suffered all the pain in his completion of a startling change to our reality, sparing us as he had done when he entered into our reality.

This act by Christ wasn’t a behavior; it was so much more than a performance. It was an action most organic, most real.

Thoughts on Redemption

2012-01-29T15:21:00.000-08:00

In the view I grew up with, our goal or God’s goal for us was to bring us back to the garden of Eden. This meant, symbolized, etc., coming back into the perfect, mature fellowship Man had with God before the Fall.

The original or Eastern understanding appears to have been similar yet different. Transgression by Adam and Eve was a real thing, before which they had dwelt innocently, in direct communication with God. The difference may have to do with a question: were the first people, or was Man in Paradise, perfect (as in complete, wise, fulfilled, and so on)? Or were they immature, nascent, just beginning their journey toward relating to God as they were designed to in the future?

I’ve read somewhere in Orthodox literature that God determined to send His Son before the foundation of what we know as reality was laid. And the Son was always intended to bring Man into union with God. It didn’t matter what Man might choose to do; God’s determination stood, stands, outside of time and reality as we know it. If Man hadn’t transgressed, therefore, the Son would still have come, in the fulness of time. Christ wasn’t sent as an afterthought, defense against Satan, or Plan B.

Man was completely free to choose. God, I would imagine, knew Man would choose transgression at some point. This was revealed in a test, a commandment: Do not eat the fruit of this one tree.

Man ate the fruit. Okay, there’s your transgression. Now what would he do? In innocence, immaturity, and rebellion, Man made excuses. Blamed others. Stood before God, unrepentant. God cursed Man as punishment.

In the understandings I grew up with, God got angry with Man, because Man did a bad thing. All these centuries, God has been waiting for Man to return to the Garden, to Paradise, to what was going on before — no clothes, animals all newish, and so on.

Here’s another question: what if the Curse has been something instructive, and when its effects are ended, the good, righteous (dikaios) process for Man continues on? What if the Son’s coming into reality as we know it, as was always foreordained, included instruction about the Curse Man had chosen, and began (or completed) the dissolution of that Curse, while including, as was predetermined, Messiah’s active union with Man, so that Man can continue his journey, his growth, once again rather than still doing so as Man might have remained if he had immediately repented?

What if Redemption means going forward rather than going back? This would eliminate nostalgia; Man’s longing for Paradise would be, rather than a wish for the good old days, a sober, joyful continuation toward maturity in the household of his Father.

Time

2012-01-25T14:05:00.000-08:00

Evidence and passages and workings-out and many, varied reactions have fed into my process since the first night I went to an Eastern Orthodox Vigil service with a view to serious consideration.

Questions, always. How can they say...? Aren't we never supposed to think...? Doesn't the Bible mean this over here, rather than that over there they are emphasizing...hm, oh...wait...? What if...what if...?

All my life I’ve been used to one person (99% of the time a male person) standing in front of a group at church and teaching. The services I've known centered around this time of speaking, or sermonizing, which can include very wonderful teaching, but might not. Orthodox services often contain a homily (though not always), but this is not the main focus. And yet I have been richly taught in every service I've attended. Taught by persons from over the course of recorded time. Both men and women have contributed to the tapestry which is remembered expression of what’s been given.

One thing that has dawned on me (many things dawn as time continues) is that this “remembered expression” is what could naturally have happened, if people preserved, both in written forms and by committing to memory, what was done from the beginning. The stories of the actions taken by God the Father, by the Holy Spirit, by Jesus Christ are the stories I want to sink my teeth into. Since the day I made the decision to be a Christian, this is what I have wanted.

The worries which are natural for Christians in the West are the worries I struggled with. Heartily, meatily, I struggled for months. Glad I am that my past Christian training was done by faithful people who weren’t out to brainwash me, make money for themselves, or other such hogwash as is repudiated in Scripture. Because of my Protestant teachers’ high standards, I have for years been able to discern some things (I’m neither a scholar nor anywhere near flawless, but I can think for myself).

And so I have delved (and am still delving) into questions, such as: 1) Why allow only Church members to receive communion?; 2) Why call Mary the Mother of God? Is this worshiping her?; 3) Why have pictures (icons) of people in the churches? Why are they dubbed Saints?; 4) Why repeat phrases? Is this a behavior meant to be done enough times to win God’s approval?; and 5) For that matter, why make ritualistic motions, such as the sign of the cross over oneself? Isn’t this another attempt to “look good” to God and others, which would be in a biblical sense “fearing” man instead of fearing God?

If I were anything like a theologian or philosopher or rationalist, I might go on from here to systematically answer these questions. I’m none of those things, and if I were, I wouldn’t know enough yet to do so, but I do know something. The same action can be done by two different people for two different reasons — by any number of people for any number of complex reasons. This fact doesn’t eliminate the possibility of real, historical, organic truth being present in the meaning behind the action. I have been testing out answers to the questions above by participating, by tasting and seeing. By living in the Church.

An aspect I love of the prophetic, teaching writings in the Bible is their theme of leaving artifice behind and turning again and again toward truth. What was stated by people in the Bible had to be tested by the passage of time, lots of time. Their biblical theme, Christians believe, has so far stood the test.

May we each keep turning toward truth, and may what I share here be in that direction. Please weigh in at those points where it sounds to you like I’m rebuilding an artifice and so living the life of a transgressor.

Turn

2012-01-21T13:59:00.000-08:00

What do you do when God tells you to do something? I know. This is crazy talk — God speaking and such stuff; doesn’t happen anymore, and those to whom it does happen are completely irrational. I don’t blame you for thinking, I can see why this woman stood in an Orthodox service “seeing” things; she’d already gone way round the twist.

All I can say for the moment is I believed I had been told to consider seriously the things of the Eastern church and to do so humbly. I knew it was God who “told” me this, even though I didn’t hear a voice, even though the message was rather complex (as well as simply pointed in one moment) and had been building up for a long while out of my assessment of reality as it was being presented to my mind and heart.

If you can read further after such a statement, I’ll set us back in the midst of the service known as Vigil. I hadn’t learned yet that the service’s name meant (among other things) there was a Vespers and a Matins included. I wondered at one point why the candles were blown out and a man moved near the front to read from the Psalms.

The Bible I know. The words of David are dearly familiar. I’m with him, when he writes so poetically of despair and of hope, of pain and of trust in the Lord his God. Gratefully I listened.

Then the candles were relit and the choir resumed chanting. And every time I thought we might have come to a natural stopping place, the service continued. My feet grew sore afraid this would be their last stand. All the while, though, I heard strains of stories, weavings in and out of pieces I knew from Scripture.

I didn’t stand up the whole time, just most of it. I noticed some men across the aisle sitting for a lot of the service. I think I felt self-conscious and wanted to show I could sort of participate, as I understood participating right then — also I knew Timothy and Nina were standing with the choir. I wasn’t yet aware of the reality in Orthodox services. As C.S. Lewis once described it, “the beauty of [attending an Orthodox Liturgy] was that nobody took the slightest notice of what anyone else was doing.”

The feel of hiking, I decided at last, was the same sort of feel of this experience. Not knowing what was around each new bend, pressing myself to keep going — not through fear or anxiety, because (who’d have believed it?) I was drawn into the “terrain”, the “view”. I was hearing about the prodigal son (as the choir continued their chanted stories) and then would come a strain about “children” who were cast into a furnace yet weren’t burned. I recognized both those tales. Like a mountain peak mirrored in still pools, the acquisition of beauties came upon me. I had been as a midwesterner who’d never embarked from a wilderness trailhead, following others, amazed at the details of an adventure impossible with camera to fully capture.

Unlike my dad, who after his first youthful day fishing up the McKenzie was forever hooked, I remained in standby position regarding the Orthodox “chorus” and its possible implications for my universe. I had a lot of thinking to do. I should say, I had more possibilities to consider inside my little self than a bee who bumbles upon an alpine meadow in full bloom.

Told

2012-01-16T15:04:00.000-08:00

I went to my first real experience of the Eastern Orthodox church with a very tight-squeezed mind. I guess what I mean by that is I had a mind chock full of wondermental ideas. The best of what I enjoyed about belief was jammed in there, and so it ought to have been a very joyful space. To some degree it was.

I had spent minutes upon hours upon days, weeks, and years reviewing what I learned in my experience of being a Protestant Christian to the max. Waking at night, I would “meditate on” the things I read and studied in the Bible and on their implications for everything in my life (and in everyone else’s life). I loved doing this, don’t get me wrong. I read, wrote, and blogged about my view of God. I aspired to be a philosopher of the Bible.

This aspiration came from a good place. I don’t wish to sound ungrateful for the amazing teaching I received during my final Protestant years, or for the friends in the community I studied with. More than ever, I thank God for their contribution to my education, for all the hard work of the teachers there. Thanks to my time spent along life’s road with them, I was in quite an interesting position that Saturday evening when I attended my first Vigil, with a nascent interest and my tight-squeezed mind.

Until that night, my steps inside the doors of Orthodoxy had been reluctant at best. At worst they were nearly footfalls of rage. I didn’t understand why my daughter, Victoria, and my husband, Timothy, kept returning here, doing whatever it was they did on “Nativity”, “Theophany”, and “Pascha”. I had stood through a sampling of the weekly services. I had spent an afternoon talking with Victoria’s “spiritual father”. (He obviously didn’t get where I was coming from, but he had been direct and nonthreatening; I felt he was a kindly sort, though theologically muddled.) I had endured Victoria’s receiving of the Orthodox name “Nina” and her baptism — and I should say that although the latter felt endure-ful due to its length and the repetition of some phrases, it had looked like a joyful time for the people participating; I had visualized some glimmers in Nina’s baptismal liturgy of what could be called gospel truth.

But, oh my gosh, these Orthodox liked to go on forever. As the Vigil service got underway, I could see tonight would be no exception. The only, slightest difference wasn’t to be found in the chanting choir, the incense wafting, or the faces looking out from candle-lit icons.

The difference was inside me. I had been told to be here.

Tight

2012-01-11T08:30:00.000-08:00

A friend of mine articulated well the problem she and I each fled from not long before we met. In differing circumstances, both of us left one corner of existence as Protestants in America, the corner known as Evangelical Christian culture. We didn't hate the people we farewelled; we didn't condemn them to eternal damnation or anything. We simply had had enough, inside ourselves within that culture, of taking on certain behaviors in order to win God's favor.

Speaking for myself, this had been a troublesome issue for more than a decade. After giving birth to my daughter, I recognized a need to raise her within a faith context. In a genuine way, I think, I had decided to follow Jesus, but for a couple years Timothy and I didn't make an attempt to "fellowship" anywhere. Then, in the late 80s, we found a very nice, family-friendly congregation where a dear, white-haired preacher taught simply from the Bible. Maybe if all things had remained equal we would still be attending there, our kids raised and our world cycling in an idyllic routine toward retirement.

But we moved away. The next years brought my first tastes of volunteerism, political action, women's ministries, homeschooling. I watched my husband baptize our kids. I wrote for Christian magazines. I was determined to reach "success" in a way that would give Christ glory, in a manner that would please God.

I was behaving.

Not that any of those things are necessarily wrong to do. It's just that my attitude, my heart, was aimed squarely at myself. God would surely reward me. I had filled in the blanks correctly on my application.

Interestingly, inside myself I lived with tremendous turmoil. It came out at home -- scrubbing sudsy dishes at the sink, troweling stubborn backyard weeds, reacting to requests from Timothy. Life isn't fair! my turmoil shouted. God shouldn't treat me this way. When will someone notice my goodness?

The gift I received back then, about a dozen years ago now, was permission to see my assumptions and my presumption before God. I began a journey toward the Scriptures in a deeper way, released from the burden of Evangelical trappings I'd got trapped in. I relaxed. I started to let God be sovereign, even if it meant I was truly a little critter (which I was/am) needing mercy that by definition could not be won, could only be received with gratefulness and a sort of fearful joy.

I began practicing.

Probably if all things had remained equal I would still be practicing the way of non-church, non-ritual. But the problem there, for me, became a continuing depression. I was reaching toward God and Life with my mind, on the basis of ideas regarding Jesus Christ, via a brilliant methodology for Bible study. I was seeking to grasp the scriptural authors' original intentions. It was invigorating, in our present time so far from New Testament days. But I'm beginning to understand only now that, after a certain point, I once again was behaving certain ways. Following the rules, and, yes, keeping them, but having run into a wall, into a theological corner.

My mind was squeezed very tight.

Beauty in the tragic

2012-01-09T10:31:00.000-08:00

The picture of David is the picture of Adam, when it comes to sin. Each was a believing-in-God person, and each was living rightly before God every day. Until. Afterward, each deepened the sin by delaying repentance. Each made things worse for himself and those around him. Each hid from what he knew so well he must do, in relationship with his creator. Each needed to reveal himself in front of God, and each chose not to.

This is my story, too.

The hiding is the grasping (what feels like revelation to myself) of an idea that I am God. Or at least I should be, and I should make this happen in accord with my present needs. Reality must bend to my wishes. My desire for this becomes so strong that I don’t even feel it as a desire out of harmony with what’s real. This is why in each story we find present temptation (the serpent, lust) — which is the grasping, the ducking out of bounds and off the grid. I no longer desire harmony, accord, concert. I want to do it my way, but what that ultimately means is I want to die. I didn’t ask to be created in the first place; I’ll take this in hand and end it here, thanks anyway.

God lets us go that way, if we want it badly enough.

The beauty in the tragic stories of Adam and then David is the part when repentance does happen. Genesis doesn’t specifically show Adam’s moment, but the implication is there, in the lineage which passes to righteous Seth, that repentance took place. Tradition expresses Adam’s longing for Paradise lost, in the bowing to the East where lay the Garden of Eden’s barred entrance. David’s moment, by biblical contrast, is vivid, technicolored. He, as anointed King most powerful, knew it was against God only that he had sinned. His sackcloth, his ashes, were inexhaustible, and yet they were sprinkled with wisdom.

These men went down to dust before God, in figurative and literal ways. It didn’t matter, though, that death would claim them. Repenting and confessing, they had set their hearts back on the real path.

They, with all the power God bestows, had chosen.

They would live.

The Flowers and the Forest -- a guest post

2011-12-26T22:14:00.000-08:00

This year for the first time, I'm experiencing Christmas in a two-fold manner. For one thing, I'm in a Serbian church, where the old-calendar Nativity day has yet to happen. Eagerly I await it, even while enjoying our traditional doings with dear family and friends.

For another thing, life continues bringing me something I can best describe, in the words of a new family friend, as "light-giving." In 2009 this friend, Alex Titus, wrote the story below. He has graciously agreed to let me share it with you.

The Flowers and the Forest

There was a man who lived in the city. For a long time he had heard stories of wonderful flowers which grew in the forest, flowers which would beautify anyone in their proximity and grant them happiness and contentment. One day, the man decided to enter the forest in search of these flowers. It was not long until he discovered several of them scattered about the forest, each lovely in its own way, with its own unique shape and scent. He adored all of them equally.

However, the forest was frightening to him. It required him to endure hardships such as cold and hunger, necessitating the building of shelters and the hunting for food. Life in the city had of course not accustomed him to these trials. Therefore, deep in his heart he grew to hate the forest, and soon decided to go about plucking each of the flowers so that he might return with them and enjoy their beauty within the comforts of the city. Yet as he was about to do this, he gradually noticed that there were actually people living in the forest, some of them in tents and cabins, in small villages as well as individually; none of them were ever very far away from a flower. He also noticed that at the base of each of the flowers a spring welled up, from which the people drank. It seemed to provide them with a kind of inner light, the likes of which he had never seen within the city.

As this was happening, a village elder approached him and said, "Hello, stranger. You are welcome to bask in our flower's scent, drink from our spring, and stay in our shelters for the duration of your visit. However, please do not remove the flowers or the spring water from their resting places." At this, the man became angry, and in spite of their hospitality was filled with hatred for these people, not at all unlike his hatred for the forest in general. "Simpletons!" he thought to himself, "How could they be so selfish as to keep all of this power and wonder to themselves? I will take these flowers back to the city and allow everyone to benefit from their gifts!" So, disobeying the elder's words and with his heart full of resentment, the man quickly went about the forest gathering up each of the light-giving flowers, remaining under the cover of nightfall so as to avoid detection.

Upon his return to the city, everyone marveled at the beauty of the flowers. Their perfume was so pleasing to the nostrils and their colors so charming to the eyes, they were unlike anything the city-folk had ever experienced, especially compared to the dull concrete and poisonous smog of their normal lives. The man then agreed to put the flowers in public places so that everyone could bask in their awesomeness, and the people became happy and content, their inner turmoil and pain washing way from them like snow melting from a rooftop. The city soon became more beautiful than anyone could remember.

After a short while, however, the flowers began to wilt and lose their colors. Their scent was no longer as strong, and the people were no longer happy from seeing and smelling them. Eventually, all of the flowers turned black and died, and the city once again returned to the way it was formerly. In their disappointment, the people asked the man to return to the forest and see if he could bring back replacements for the flowers which had until recently beautified their city. Agreeing, the man did return to the forest, although thinking that the flowers would no longer be there, not to mention fearing how the forest-dwellers would react to his presence after what he had done.

When he arrived back in the forest, he was amazed to see that each of the flowers he plucked had grown back to its original state, and the people went about their lives the same way they had before. Even more surprising though was that upon seeing him, the village elders did not try to harm him or drive him away. Suddenly overwhelmed by a sense of biting shame, the man fell to his knees and asked their forgiveness. At this point one of the elders took him by the hand and said, "Please tell me what happened." The man then divulged his story, that is, how he wanted to use the flowers to beautify the city, but how the flowers he plucked had eventually wilted and died.

Sighing, the elder said, "You see, the flower requires the forest to survive; when you cut a living thing off from its roots, it dies soon after. As you have seen, we need the flowers as much as the flowers need the forest. That is why, although it seems strange to you, we have chosen to live here. In fact, there was a time when the whole world was covered by forests. However, a portion of mankind eventually took what they thought to be the easier life, and cut down the forest to make room for these great walled cities, not unlike the one from which you yourself have come; as you can see, in forsaking the forest, they have also forsaken the flower, and the flower is the lifeblood of all humanity. Please, come and live with us for a while, for it is difficult for me to explain to you things which you have only experienced peripherally." Beginning to understand, the man accepted the elder's offer.

At first, life was difficult; the man learned quickly that having to chop wood, make clothes, and hunt for food were all part of forest life. At the same time, however, he was also permitted to smell the local village flower, drink from its spring, and otherwise bask in its radiance. After a while, he felt the spirit growing within him, and life in the forest no longer seemed so difficult; in fact, he came to rather enjoy it. After more and more time had passed, he grew fuller in light and wisdom than he had ever been before. Eventually, he himself went on to become a village elder and acted as a guide for his community. He never again returned to live in the city, but only visited there on occasion, simply to inform the people what they had lost, and where it could be found again.

Icons and the space alien robot

2011-12-01T17:42:00.001-08:00

My gloved fingers tapped the open commentary, my pen ready beside my Moleskine. I sipped hot water, hunched over the table. The coffee maker burbled on the counter and the books and icons kept quiet in their spaces.

This chilly morning I volunteered at Pilgrim’s Way, the bookstore in our church, as I have most Thursdays since sometime this summer. Soon after starting to attend St. John’s I asked if I might help there, seeing as reading is my favorite way to learn. Besides, there’s a bunch of icon faces to become acquainted with. I figured I could discover my own pace in greeting these folk, these new/old stories.

Icons, I’ve noticed, look sort of like cartoons. Maybe you could call them graphic pictorials, in the way we speak of graphic novels. But that would be a misleading term. And I’m an ignorant Protestant, still, even though I have joined the Church (which I also call the ancient church and Orthodoxy). What I’m coming to see, perhaps, is that through an icon I gaze intently at one aspect of reality — a significant aspect, in this case, because I was unaware of it before in my experience.

This unawareness applies as well to many aspects within and around the Church. Because I believe in this manner — that this organism is something real, but that I had no knowledge of it previously — I peruse my inner landscape and come up with analogies. Recently I thought about the body. It’s perhaps a good term, seeing as St. Paul used it, but I’m not exactly going where his analogy did. From my 21st century, abundant-information vantage point, I think about trying to describe a living human body to someone who had never encountered one. I would need to conscript a space alien life form, from a robot-ruled planet, so that she would only be familiar with what we call artificial intelligence, artificial movement, artificial life.

I suppose I’d need to be an alien robot, as well, for this to work, so say I was one. How would I give a clue to my fellow alien robot friend what I now see in reality, what I now believe? That creatures exist (okay, she already knows that); that they have arms, legs, facial features (in this analogy she and I do, too, so that’s not new); but that they have an inner design (perhaps I’d call it an inner orientation) that is like what we’re aware of but yet is so very different. My friend would rightly be skeptical.

They bleed, I would tell her. Huh? she would reply. Well, I would continue. They have this stuff they call blood that oozes from beneath their skin when it’s pierced. This blood comes from veins and arteries (don’t ask me to explain those, I’d tell her; I can’t). Inside these “more real” bodies, this blood circulates around organs that, if you were to cut the body open to examine it, would gush out into a globulous mess. But when they are inside the functioning person, the body is more than the sum of its members.

My alien robot friend’s face would contort into the expression I would well know means I’m crazy, and she would go back to her synthetic cocktail, and I would wish I could show her these beings, this organic thing that goes on with them.

Say that, in this alien robot culture, we believe in God. My friend certainly wouldn’t get why or how I think God made these other beings who are “more real” and who (somewhere in the lost annals of our past) actually “made” us and sent us off to planet Gizmo.

Icon of the Prodigal Son

Lest you think I’ve drifted from my intention with this blog post (I actually have), I will return now to icons, to the element in the Church I wasn’t aware of a year ago except as old pictures, old artwork. To me they were nothing, really, seeing as I don’t care (as much as I should, at least) for art. Today, nine months after I got the nudge to take Orthodoxy seriously, I believe that these pictures called icons are an organic element within the Body, if you will, and that they have their function within it that they were divinely designed for. Slicing the Church open (i.e., reading an Internet article or getting descriptions from just one Orthodox person) doesn’t help much in apprehending how the Body truly functions. How it might be an organic creation somehow “more real” than others we know.

At Pilgrim’s Way one warm Thursday this summer, I was dusting icons when I looked up, startled, to see a young guy staring. He looked past me at the wall of icons; his eyes held a glassy expression. I suppose he meant to look mystical. “This artwork’s wonderful,” he said. “So sacred.”

The other Orthodox people in the shop were polite to this young man (who, it turns out, was on his way with friends to the Country Fair, was a college student, was carrying plenty of money for trinkets in our store). They were courteous. But they also rolled their eyes after he left. I see these folks from the Church give sacrificially to people in the neighborhood all the time. They literally feed the hungry. But they’re not impressed by a monied person stopping in to get his sacred groove on so he can feel good about himself and go party.

If I get anything, what I’m seeing is Church people learning from the example of those whose faces gaze out from the icons on the walls. Far from being the Synthetic Way with which I’m familiar, this organic structure appears to bleed something more real.

David's example and the Church (a journaling post)

2011-11-21T08:24:00.000-08:00

Most of my friends don’t see the Church. But I've been struck by one of the new things I now believe I see — the Church does not condemn. The teaching is to pray for others. To take time for that.

Of course there are individuals within the Church, individuals like me, who condemn others. That is where I start to go. I am one who begins to lash out, to shrink inside, to prepare my defenses and my battles.

The Church follows King David’s example. He, sinner that he was, faulty, refused to condemn his predecessor, King Saul. David wasn’t naive, either, he saw when the time came to run away from Saul and wasn’t above having Jonathan cover his tracks and save his life.

In the Church, we read David’s repentant Psalm every morning. This is a cleansing, healing time for me.
I wish to conform my life to this kind of example.

My heritage is that of people cut off from the Church. Not cut off from Christ, because history shows His name spreading throughout the earth. This is quite something. The Church, however, as I’m seeing things now, has often in many ways been kept hidden. But always the Body is connected to the Name. Ever the prayers of the faithful (those keeping the faith once delivered) arise with incense, morning and evening, sometimes more often, for the whole world. Condemnation is markedly absent from the services I've witnessed. This is amazing.

And yet those outside the Church fear condemnation and see it as inevitable. How do I know this? I have lived it. I dismissed, I feared, I ridiculed that which I didn’t know. I refused to understand the Church in context. I didn’t know there was a context to understand. I was raised in psuedo-churches.

It's no wonder people everywhere, but markedly those in the West, come up with twisted versions of sacraments (perhaps they’re just hollow versions, lacking the true substance which is Christ). The abandoning of the Church, the hiding, was done by those with so-called power, but the keeping, as if behind a rock while Jonathan spoke to the boy who shot his arrows, has been accomplished through people, by the Holy Spirit.

Take not thy Holy Spirit from me.

Grace is another word, I think, for the lacking component. We in the West don’t offer it to each other. It is fairly foreign in the churches, and that estrangement carries over more and more into the culture. Who is willing to be misunderstood? Who will suffer in prayer for others? Who offers a cup of cold water to another who travels in the name of Christ and longs to be His disciple? Who simply gives without agenda? Who can begin to be a little child loving others? Who fears God and not men?

Some individuals do. But striving for these righteous graces, they believe, must be done outside the Body, because they (we as Protestants) see no Body. In a sense, it was stolen away.

Only by grace from the Holy Spirit may the sacraments be received. The holy mysteries are, as is everything from God, for our benefit. For my benefit. Yet I derided them, becoming more defensive all the time, eager to show up error in this intrusion of a thing called Orthodoxy.

I was right; Orthodoxy was wrong. There was no wrestling to reach that conclusion. It was my starting point. This also happened way back in history. People rushed forward, assuming they carried the Church into their own selfish, condemning territory. They didn’t leave Christ behind — His name can never be sidelined — but they forsook His Body, His Way. That is my heritage.

Even so, I have no excuse. I remained stubbornly blind and asleep. Yet at the same time I am able to be released, to live in the light of the Church’s kindness and freedom. She never condemned me. And I must work with all I’ve got to refrain from condemnation of those who are just like me. I wish to follow David and the Church into grace, into sacramental love.

Brits, books, & bravery (a smidge)

2011-11-09T15:20:00.000-08:00

What a place the Internet is. Just since yesterday I have watched John Cleese explain spiritual behavior (quite humorously, as he does so well) and I have read about Prince Charles's interest in the Orthodox Church.

My little presence at this blog has intentionally fallen off. After my start, I scared myself into backpedaling. I did what I often do when fear intrudes -- I thought up an idea.

I know, I thought, I'll start writing a book!

If I got a dollar for each time over the years I've squinted at problems and decided becoming a book author (soon, sooner, soonest) would solve them, well, you know, I wouldn't ever need to write or do other stuff for a living.

So while a published book may or may not be in my future, a smattering of blog posts is likely to follow this one. I return, gingerly perhaps, to the subject I started with: my Orthodox journey. I like that I'm in a category with British royalty and book authors. As I find at the little parish I'm involved with, there are individuals from all sorts of life categories taking part.

This aspect doesn't scare me, though at first it did, a little. It also doesn't make me wish to sell you on what I'm doing. Promise me you'll just hold to what you're doing, learning, experiencing.

The organic, natural aspects in each of our lives ought to lead and awaken us. These can be easy to resist. Artifice feels like it will lead to comfort, and I know I often wish to be comfortable. I wish not to have to rethink my conceptions of others; I wish to find shortcuts to joy.

A new day here at my Third Story starts with a commitment to long, slow processes. Like a prince who may or may not become a king, I wish to remain contentedly engaged, courageously living. You too?

Sixth sense

2011-10-28T13:52:00.000-07:00

When we begin a work of art, a certain drive develops. Inside one is on fire, but it is a "fire of peace," reflected in the mind as openness and in the body as an absence of speed.
The sacred is still, not lazy. ~ Gail Sher, The Intuitive Writer

At my computer this morning it seems I receive what Gail Sher expresses -- both fire and stillness. (Paper and pencil can provide the same.) My brain feels as though it changes shape, conforming to a corner of my body that usually rests unfettered. In this challenging space, what has been found within seeks to flow out into language. A pale yellow butterfly attempts to emerge.

The sense I'm trying to describe differs from the "call" I imposed on myself a few years ago to make writing a job. (This isn't to say people aren't truly called, or that people don't legitimately work a job called "writer" in many and various ways. They are and do.)

What really happened within me back then was a panic-induced decision. I wanted to force reality into my imaginary mold. I didn't know what else to do. I wanted a certain gift to be given to me.

As weird as it sounds, the depressed spaces I entered after not receiving a writing job helped me awaken. Darkness aided my enlightenment about what was going on. I had fought to "stay awake" after Timothy challenged me to bring home some income. I had charged into "sleep" in my flailing, in my rush toward manufacturing the type of literary work that, to be fruitful, requires cultivation and stillness. Through the sorts of miscalculations common to mankind, I had in one sense fallen out a window and crashed and died. But this sort of death (or any sort, I believe) is not the end.

Another name for "awakening" might be "seeing more clearly." Or even "seeing with different lenses." That's what my glasses help myopic me do early every morning, so I can work on writing. These days I do so before I get ready for my part-time job or for volunteering at our church. Things have lined up a little better for me, so that now I earn our needed extra money. Before this happened, though, I had to sit in the shadows, with fuzzy vision, and recognize that's where I was. Not knowing the next step. Becoming more okay with the real.

This post is the sixth installment in one of several tales I might share about being awakened again. Does it make sense? I would love to hear if anything resonates. If you have a memory of

a stressful launch,
a painful landing,
a gratitude for shadows you've awakened into,

feel free to share your own.

Something's going on

2011-10-19T10:20:00.001-07:00

On a bike path recently, next to the wide, sparkling Willamette, I watched a friend rescue caterpillars.

They're clueless critters, of course, making their fuzzy, undulating journey along the cement, likely after having been blown off a leafy good lunch above. They don't recognize their peril. Swift bicycles thread between foot-goers like giant pizza cutters, and they are mini-sausages.

My friend is amazing, because she shudders at the feel of creeping creatures, and yet whenever she sees a caterpillar she must stoop and gently scoop it toward rescue on the river bank. Her ministrations brought a memory of ages ago in Oklahoma, where I spied a caterpillar beneath the monkey bars at school and brought it home. I set it up in a jar on my dresser to watch its metamorphosis. I recall all but forgetting the cocoon (it hung so long doing nothing), and then, finally, one afternoon there was a pale yellow butterfly, looking dazed, perhaps, but rested. Ready for me to bring outside so I could watch it flit away.

Caterpillars fit somehow with life's shadowy stages. They're the weirdest little things; no wonder the feel of their bottle-brush feet creeps out my friend. All they can do is eat and get blown around and hope to avoid squishage.

Do you avoid them? Rescue them? Perhaps (gently) embrace them?

If one of these little ones survives, then it's on the path to somewhere. Even though it looks less than ever like this is so when hanging in its cocoon, something's going on, there in the spaces those outside can't see.

Company in the dark

2011-10-17T06:22:00.000-07:00

Longings arrive for me in shadowy places. In the cleft where sadness embraces joy, I breathe purer air. Times that bring confusion, pain, even anger have often allowed the depth of me to discover something essential.

As highlighted in previous posts, I slipped into a tense, dark season a few years back. From today's vantage, I can see that my dear Timothy hadn't meant for me to brood over not having an income. He worried about our retirement years -- he still worries; it's part of his makeup -- but he continued seeking creative solutions. And he trusted God.

At the same time, I moved in and out of depression/anxiety. Not in a clinical sense. At least, I didn't feel "bad enough" to seek counseling. Anyway, where would we get the money if I did? Not from my non-income.

I received help by exploring Ecclesiastes (of all books). The passages spoke with strength and comfort. I reread it several times. The futility, or vanity, of life "under the sun," as Solomon put it ages ago, was my experience. I wasn't alone.

The light is sweet,
And it is good for the eyes
To behold the sun.
For if a man lives many years
And rejoices in them all,
Yet let him remember the days of darkness,
For they shall be many.
All that comes is vanity.

My company from the depth of centuries consisted of many creative people. Writers and other types of artists. In a sense all were poets.

Today, I'm reading G.K. Chesterton's Orthodoxy. It's not about the Eastern Orthodox church, seeing as Chesterton was an Anglican who converted to Roman Catholicism. (Perhaps he was on the path to Eastern Orthodoxy...but that's a thought for another post.) I think it's his attempt to picture what is true in reality -- what always has been "right" in that sense of truth.

Not far into the book yet, I find the witty, paradoxical Chesterton asserting, "Imagination does not breed insanity...Poets do not go mad...The poet only asks to get his head into the heavens."

Are there authors, Scriptural books, or practices that help you get your head into the heavens?

Sitting with life's realities, awakened anew to pain and yet to beauty, can be wearying and feel dangerous. With the heavens arrive risks. Maybe those discovered can lead to a chance of going sane.

Reality checks in

2011-10-14T08:00:00.000-07:00

The year after my happy dance in literary recognition land, with zero additional monies pocketed, I watched the economy take one of its somewhiles-disastrous nosedives.

This can't affect me; I'm sure all will still be well. With such phrases I tried to reassure my brain while listening to gloom-sprinkled newscasts.

A distinctively dark finger of death aimed at the publishing industry. The literary journal that had awarded me money struggled just to make another issue. Our daughter, newly graduated, moved home, taking back my office for her bedroom. Our son experienced anxiety attacks. Timothy's mother's health began to fail.

Oh, and our daughter was stepping with deliberation and joy toward joining the Eastern Orthodox church (where the heck did that come from?).

As might be expected, the stress-waves between Timothy and me increased. It looked like the energy I had poured into a hopeful memoir manuscript would be wasted.

I found myself trying to justify my existence. Even while believing this life, this existence under the sun, is a mere prelude to the most real thing.

I still had to get up every day in this existence, which had started to squeeze the depression-tending bellow in my psyche.

Determination to keep believing in God's goodness occupied me in my little spaces. Beauty amid the insignificant (compared to many others') pain gave comfort. I wished, though, for security. With Timothy. In finances. Regarding our children. My enthusiasm, such as it had been, sagged dramatically.

Is this how it goes, sometimes, for most people?

It's life in the tangled traces of a sparsely-planted garden, needing attention, at the back of a yard, beneath chilled October downpours.

All figured out, right

2011-10-12T05:48:00.000-07:00

The refrigerator's hum stilled. My fingers brushed a page. For an hour I had bent over the familiar writing, taking in, turning over implications. Portents. I sighed and scribbled more in the margin.

I was re-reading my journals. My style of recording life has remained whimsical and on-the-fly (far from an everyday thing), keeping my journal volumes somewhat manageable. Once in the mood, I will lug them to the sofa and spend an afternoon.

The year I launched my piratey foray into writing as a job, I tried to glean insight and inspiration from my journaled past. It looked to me like my situation was ideal. After all:

Seven years earlier, I had "discovered" an amazing bunch of Christians. Their take on the Bible made actual sense, giving me a deeper grasp of myself as sinful creature and God as Creator most merciful. All I needed to do now was meditate on that amazing truth, keep believing it, keep wanting it.
For decades, with God's merciful help, Timothy and I had worked at creating and recreating our marriage. Things were not bad between us.
Our daughter was grown and off at college, yet still close by.
Our son was nearing the end of his homeschool high school years.
All of our parents had moved to Eugene, where we lived, and they were all in fairly good health.
We couldn't yet afford home improvement projects, one thing Timothy and I both hoped we could soon save for, but on the other hand, I wasn't existing in the midst of home improvement projects.
We had been graced by a few close friendships.
I had grown fairly adept at using the Internet to make my writing connections. Now I was finding, through my blog, several people connections, as well. And, well, people read books. Now all I needed was a book for them to read.

I began my writerly quest. Soon an essay I'd sent to a Christian literary journal was accepted, published, and awarded recognition. In cash, even. Yippety-skip, to use the fun phrase of a friend.

My expectations grew. If my initial, modest earnings would only double each year following, in five years I could be bringing in my family's elusive couple hundred a month. In a decade we could pay off any debt incurred while I built my writing business.

The day I got to record in my journal my payment from the literary journal was a bright one. Spring had returned. I perched with a grin on my own little mountain. Ever been there?

Yet the view after climbing, even when it's pretty like Oregon's painted hills, lends a picture without much option. Either a higher peak to scale must present itself behind me, or I'm going to start heading back down. My stomach sensed it that spring. The way forward might just lead into wilderness.

Pirate time

2011-10-10T06:35:00.000-07:00

Last post I mentioned I am grateful these days. Swathed in a sense of healing, I travel well enough through beginning, soupy mornings of Western Oregon rain. A while ago, I wasn't heading into autumn so well-bolstered. A few winters were pretty tough, though not in ways that deleted all mirth.

On a rare, bright day of snow a few years back, Timothy and I went over our finances. Neither of us expected the impact, I guess, of that frosty afternoon.

He noted we had come out a couple hundred short, per month, for more than a year. I countered that our daughter was in college. He suggested ("entreated boldly" might better describe it) I get a job. "Two hundred a month," became his mantra. "Only two hundred a month. How hard is that to earn?"

While I'd done many small jobs when our kids were small, I hadn't gone out into worker land for a long time. I had back and neck issues. And of course you don't walk into an establishment dictating your wish to do for them up to $200 worth of service per month, and no more.

Here's the main thing: I wanted to write. During homeschool years with our children, I had dabbled in writing but hoped to really do it in our future empty nest. I knew it would take a while for an amount like the needed couple hundred to materialize from my creative efforts (and it might not ever happen).

Timothy's concern challenged me. It caused a reaction inside a lot like, "Arggh!" That sounded piratey, so I went for the Black Pearl theme. I sprang forth into writing with gusto. Brandishing my sword. Trying to have fun, while stress grasped at my innards like the cold fingers of Davy Jones.

Today, I'm mulling over the effects of my decision back then. When life brings these sorts of "hurry-ups" it is easy to over-react. Calm and control would help. But the process of over-reacting, like other life stuff, can teach me. Despite me.

Have you been through your own pirate season?

Though I felt highly wakeful then, now I think my "ship's launch" may have lulled me into slumber and precipitated unhealthiness.

Aye, a weird thought. Never fear, Mateys, I'll explore it further soon.

Soberly grateful; sorrowful joy

2011-09-27T13:20:00.000-07:00

These days, as wavelengths pulse and one season bows to its cousin, my mind finds a groove, a theme.

I am grateful. Very grateful.

I wish to express thanks and know only barely on the surface whom to share with. How did this benefit come to me? These benefits, I should say; there are many. Centuries march down from the places whence my gratitude springs. Yet those places and people are mingling with me. Their legacies journey on within the church services and throughout the church writings, those more and less significant, each pointing to the One to whom we pray, as individuals, together.

Unless, of course, I'm imagining everything. As I venture into writing about this road fork, this new (old) Way I now travel, I am not necessarily being helpful.

People don't just dismiss me, as I'm used to regarding other sensitive topics. Some friends read my words these days and are traumatized. While I understand the feeling completely, I tend to expect it only within myself. My melodrama, my issues.

Easily I forget I'm not the center of universal meaning, with others rotating about, shooting their missiles or bouquets my direction. For forgetting this, for not remembering even that I'm laboring to see differently in reality, I am sorry.

A rather worse problem, though, is that some friends read my processings and are inspired.

To carry anybody anywhere in connection with apprehending the spiritual is too enormous a burden. Maybe it has become real important for me to have to begin understanding this concept. Not that I'm saying thousands of readers discover me and are captivated. There've probably not been five, more likely not one. But one would be too many, to get into a mood from what I've written and go join a particular congregation.

Someone I know once described seeking to understand God through the Scriptures as a life of sober joy. I have heard that the Orthodox journey involves a joy-bearing sorrow. I don't think it's a downer to recognize how constant must be my vigilance, my repentance. I think this is the reason God wishes and provides (hence my gratitude) for me to ever keep coming back to receive His nurture.

In this healing space I can rest, and I can spring into exploration. Some days I do a bit of both.

Through the fire

2011-09-12T17:38:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago my daughter visited a monastery near Goldendale, Washington. She rode with two other young women, and they brought back stories of attending several services and helping the nuns a bit with chores.

Little did we know that this place, St. John the Forerunner Greek Orthodox Monastery, would soon receive nationwide attention.

The fire started when a big-rig truck's exhaust spewed sparks. The driver used his fire extinguisher, but the blaze got away. It crossed the highway. Soon the nuns had to evacuate, but not before they worked alongside firefighters to put out flames.

Their picture became a good news lead here. Broadcast people enjoy finding not-your-everyday subjects to deal with.

As I continue processing life in Orthodoxy, I meet plenty of not-your-everyday subjects. May I be willing if I possibly can to deal with them straightforwardly, reasonably, and humbly.

May God's great kindness in rescuing us from runaway fires engage our full attention.

What I did

2011-09-01T22:26:00.000-07:00

You wouldn't think the wedding of my husband's aunt, in which I didn't play a significant role, could make me so nervous. But at the end of June, in a Lutheran church near Denver, I stood waiting for the service with sweaty palms.

I was about to light candles alongside a dear cousin of Timothy's. She and I joked about standing straight, etc., but that wasn't what gave me jitters. The "big" thing in my mind was something I had decided not to do.

I was about to refuse to partake of communion.

Now, how in the world does a very old, very new (to me) church tradition that claims to be loving ask its adherents not to participate in a deeply loved ritual with other family members?

That was my question to Timothy, months earlier. This husband of mine who found Orthodoxy to his liking long before I imagined joining had easily agreed not to receive communion (a.k.a. the Eucharist) with any non-Orthodox body of believers. At first I told him that tradition had to be crazy. Especially for the two of us, fiftysomething children of two retired Protestant ministers with many church-going relatives. How, I wondered, could we hope to avoid conflict taking that stance?

I am a big believer in avoiding conflict.

More importantly, how could any church hold staunchly to something so exclusive? What was the truth behind this practice? I planned to study what I could and ask somebody at St. John's about it. Before I had a chance, though, Timothy's aunt emailed, in May, to ask if each of us could do particular things during her wedding service. Would I light candles, and would Timothy help serve communion? Oh, and the way the communion would happen was each person would come forward to kneel and receive it.

Great.

Next chance I got, I talked to Father David. He's the priest at St. John's who baptized Timothy and me in April. He's a kindly man. I poured out my story and my deep concern about hurting Timothy's aunt's feelings. I said I simply couldn't see a solution to this situation; I surely didn't wish to drag this wedding into mucky territory between faithful people.

Fr. David said, "It's wonderful Timothy's aunt is starting her marriage with communion."

Phew, I thought. He's going to add that we're off the hook.

"Pray about it," Fr. David said, in his kindly way. He then explained that, from an Orthodox perspective, to receive communion from others is to confuse one's own soul and the souls of others.

Hm. I said I would pray and think. I wanted to be honest with everyone. I still didn't know what I thought of there being two different types of communion, as Fr. David seemed to imply.

The next week Timothy email his aunt, explaining that we would both be happy to help in the wedding and that we wouldn't be taking communion, because we'd just become Orthodox. He suggested she and her fiance convert and have an Orthodox wedding, so we all could do things together (he's good at adding levity). His dear aunt replied that he only needed to hold a basket; in other words, all was well in her mind, whatever we did.

I love Timothy's relatives.

Still, waiting for the wedding to begin, I had sweaty palms. I knew no one could or would stop me from making my final choice. I could still go forward at the indicated time and "do" communion. Or I could slip out to the bathroom just before that part of the service...

I ended up remaining in my seat, folding my hands and bowing my head when the ushers came by, as Timothy's aunt had instructed me. There were others who declined the communion railing. I supposed they might not believe in God.

Of course, someone looking at me may have thought I am someone who doesn't believe in God.

What struck me, besides the graciousness of the Lutherans I met that weekend, was the fact that for once I was expressing a disagreement with other Christians honestly. Even though I didn't quite get the disagreement yet (I'm sure I'll blog more about it later, as I think I understand better now), I did have a fledgling trust in the Orthodox way of living, and most of all I had made a commitment to engage with and follow its precepts. This certainly wasn't the first time I attended a church service where the things done were not what I agreed with. I've handled such times before by complying with my present surroundings, acting as though I loved the one I was with.

Say I had attended this same wedding last year, before becoming Orthodox. I would have blended in perfectly, on the outside, "doing" communion with the rest of the wedding guests. Inside of myself, though, I would have been yawning, not feeling this ritual was necessary. Not engaging at all, which maybe isn't bad. The bad part is my attitude would have been one of superiority.

That's exactly the opposite of how I felt at the wedding. I was humbled. Which is interesting, because I had come to see I needed to join Orthodoxy out of a strong sense that God was pointing to a pride problem in my heart.

Before this year I considered Orthodox practices prideful; I thought some of them weren't even Christian. But looking at the outside only is the way assumptions are made. I think that's my lesson from the Denver wedding, and I'm glad now I chose the way I did.