Orthodixie

As we prepare to enter “Cheese Week” progressing toward the Great Fast of the Church, here follows a repost from years past to aid in the struggle.

Here’s some items that can help stock a Lenten Pantry …

+ dried fruits (raisins, currants, apples, cranberries, apricots, prunes, coconut flakes)
+ fresh fruits and vegetables
+ candied peels, mixed
+ dried beans (black beans, soy beans, navy beans, red kidney beans, great northern beans, mung beans, etc)
+ dried legumes (red lentils, green lentils, brown lentils, chick peas, black eyed peas, split peas, etc)
+ seeds (pumpkin, sesame, sunflower, poppy)
+ nuts (almonds, cashews, peanuts, pecans, pine nuts, pistachios, walnuts)
+ herbs & spices (peppercorns, old bay seasoning, mint, others to your taste)
+ herbal teas
+ flavored coffees
+ frozen juice concentrates
+ carob (chips, chunks and powder)
+ nondairy creamers (liquid & dry)
+ nondairy whipped topping
+ rose water
+ baking cocoa
+ lenten flavored baking chips
+ non-alcoholic wines & sparkling waters
+ canned fruits and vegetables
+ tomato juice, sauce, paste (& V-8)
+ canned beans & legumes
+ a variety of pastas (check labels for content)
+ lenten breads (purchased or homemade)
+ soy products (soy milk, tofu, tempeh, soy sauce, etc)
+ lenten bouillon cubes (vegetable, mushroom, onion, etc)
+ vegetarian gravy mixes
+ curry powder
+ ketchup, mustards, pickles, relishes, chutneys
+ lenten mayonnaise (no eggs, no whey)
+ asian sauces (black bean, garlic, peanut, etc)
+ taco sauces and relishes
+ lenten margarine (no milk, no whey)
+ egg replacer (no whites!)
+ tahini (sesame seed paste), peanut butter
+ flavored vinegars (apple cider instead of alcohol)
+ vegetable oils (sunflower, soy, peanut, sesame, walnut, etc)
+ honeys, jams, maple syrups, corn syrup
+ barley, cornmeal, oats, wheat germ, wheat
+ rices (brown, cracked, whole, wild, etc)
+ flours (rice, bleached, wheat, all-purpose, etc)
+ vegetarian chili (canned)

Lenten Ingredient Concerns

Noodles … Be careful of packaged noodles, most have part of egg or milk in them. Replace noodles with pastas or vegan noodles.

Mayonnaise … Most brands have milk, egg, or both.

Margarines … If you really want to fast, check your margarines for whey products. A soy margarine is always free of whey. Some vegetable oil margarines are also lacto-free.

Eggs … If absolutely necessary, use an egg substitute. It tends to make recipes more difficult; you may wish to just get a better recipe rather than determine how much egg substitute it takes to make your recipe work.

Cheeses … Placing a small bowl of shredded cheese on the table for the [pre-fasting aged] children is an acceptable way to make their meals more appealing to them; as well as adding to the lack of calcium that a vegan diet inherently has.

Broths … Meat broths can be replaced with vegetable broths. If you use bouillon cubes, remember not to add any salt to your recipes, as the cubes are very salty.

Gelatin, Jello & Marshmallows … While these products were once considered animal, the process to create these removes the finished product so far from the animal make-up that Orthodox Rabbi’s consider it Kosher for non-meat uses. This seems good enough for most Orthodox Christians. (Vegetable based gelatins are also available.)

Peanut Butter & Tahini … what can I say?

Chocolate … is really Milk Chocolate and can be replaced with Cocoa or Carob (chocolate chips can be replaced with carob chips).

Alcohol … Apple Cider is a great substitute for white wine, and sometimes sherry or red wine.

Desserts … As a host during lent, remember that many people give up desserts and sweets. So keep fresh fruit in a decorative bowl or basket on your table for your guests. The diabetic guests will also appreciate this.

Lenten Breakfast Items
+ fruit kabobs
+ lenten waffles with jam or syrup
+ peanut butter & honey on bagels
+ fruit salad
+ applesauce cake
+ tahini & honey on toast
+ lenten pancakes
+ lenten muffins
+ fresh fruits
+ baked apples
+ baked grapefruit
+ cereal & vanilla soy milk
+ cinnamon toast
+ good morning cake
+ kasha (or, of course, Grits)
+ granola with applesauce
+ granola with pie filling
+ oatmeal with raisins & syrup or jam

Believe it or not, applesauce works great as a milk substitute on cereals … and, equally hard to believe, OJ sometimes works just fine. (Really.)

Most all of the above suggestions come from St Mary Antiochian Orthodox Church, Wichita, Kansas.

Due to our annual diocesan pre-lenten Clergy Retreat with His Grace, Bishop BASIL in Wichita, I shall be away from the computer until Friday evening, February 9th; no blog updates or comment approval until that time. This year’s retreat, “The Hidden Man of the Heart,” is being led by Archimandrite Zacharias Zacharou of the Stavropegic Monastery of St John the Baptist in Tolleshunt Knights-by-Maldon, Essex, England.

(Click on the above diocesan link and scroll down for the schedule.)

I covet your prayers.

Speaking of which, here’s St Ephraim the Syrian:

ON PRAYER

Not to sin is truly blessed; but those who sin should not despair, but grieve over the sins they have committed, so that, through grief they may again attain blessedness. It is good, then, to pray always and not to lose heart, as the Lord says, And again the Apostle says, ‘Pray without ceasing’, that is by night and by day and at every hour, and not only when coming into the church, and not bothering at other times. But whether you are working, lying down to sleep, traveling, eating, drinking, sitting at table, do not interrupt your prayer, for you do not know when he who demands your soul is coming. Do not wait for Sunday or a feast day, or a different place, but, as the Prophet David says, ‘in every place of his dominion’.

Whether you are in church, or in your house, or in the country; whether you are guarding sheep, or constructing buildings, or present at drinking parties, do not stop praying. When you are able, bend your knees, when you cannot, make intercession in your mind, ‘at evening and at morning and at midday’. If prayer precedes your work and if, when you rise from your bed, your first movements are accompanied by prayer, sin can find no entrance to attack your soul.

Prayer is a guard of prudence, control of wrath, restraint of pride, cleansing of malice, destruction of envy, righting of impiety. Prayer is strength of bodies, prosperity of a household, good order of a city, might of a kingdom, trophy of war, assurance of peace. Prayer is a seal of virginity, fidelity in marriage, weapon of travelers, guardian of sleepers, courage of the wakeful, abundance for farmers, safety of those who sail. Prayer is an advocate for those being judged, remission for the bound, consolation for the grieving, gladness for the joyful, comfort for mourners, a feast on birthdays, a crown for the married, a shroud for the dying. Prayer is converse with God, equal honor with the Angels, progress in good things, averting of evils, righting of sinners. Prayer made the whale a house for Jonas, brought Ezechias back to life from the gates of death, turned the flame to wind of moisture for the Youths in Babylon. Through prayer Elias bound the heaven not to rain for three years and six months.

See, brethren, what strength prayer has. There is no possession more precious than prayer in the whole of human life. Never be parted from it; never abandon it. But, as our Lord said, let us pray that out toil may not be for nothing, ‘When you stand in prayer, forgive if you have anything against anyone, that your heavenly Father may forgive you your faults’.

Do you not see, brethren, that we toil for nothing when we pray, if we have enmity against someone? And again the Lord says, ‘If you offer your gift at the altar, and there you remember that someone has something against you, leave your gift before the altar, and go first and be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift’. Therefore, it is clear that if you do not do this first, all that you offer will be unacceptable, but if you do the Master’s bidding, then implore the Lord with boldness, saying, ‘Forgive me my debts, Master, as I have forgiven my brother, so fulfilling your commandment. I, weak though I am, have forgiven’. For the Lover of mankind will answer, ‘If you have forgiven, I too will forgive. If you have pardoned, I too will pardon your sins. For I have authority on earth to forgive sins. Forgive and you will be forgiven’.
See God’s unfathomable love for humankind. See God’s unbounded goodness. Hear instant salvation of your souls.

Translated by Archimandrite Ephrem Lash

Joseph the Visionary was born into a Zoroastrian family some time around 710. As a child of seven he was taken captive during a raid, to be sold first to an Arab, and then to a Christian in the region of mount Qardu (north Iraq). Impressed by the example of some local monks, he sought baptism, and when his owner subsequently liberated him, Joseph became a monk himself. For two separate periods in his monastic life he lived as a solitary, but he also twice served as abbot of a community. Joseph has left a considerable number of writings.

PRAYERS

To You BE PRAISE
First-born of Being,
exalted and full of awe,
for, by the sacrifice of your body,
you have effected salvation for the world.

O Christ, Son from the Holy Father,
to you do I pray in awe at this time;
of you, Lord, do I ask your will
and beseech your compassion,
that my whole person may be made holy
through your grace,
and that the enemy’s constraint upon me
may be rendered ineffective.

Purify my understanding
in your compassion,
so that my hands may stretch out in purity
to receive your holy and fearful Body and Blood.

Cleanse my hidden mind
with the hyssop of your grace,
for I draw near
to the Holy of Holies of your Mysteries.

Wash from me all understanding
that belongs to the flesh,
and may an understanding which belongs to your Spirit
be mingled within my soul.

Cause to reside in me
a faith that beholds your Mysteries.

— Prayers of Joseph the Visionary, in, “The Syriac Fathers On Prayer And The Spiritual Life,” translated from the original Syriac-Aramaic by Sebastian Brock, Cistercian Publications.

Taken from a Mysticism e-list.

It was high noon when Doreta Peppa, a woman with long, dark locks and owlish eyes, entered the Sanctuary of Olympian Zeus. At first, tourists visiting the Athenian temple thought they had stumbled on to a film set. It wasn’t just that Peppa cut a dramatic figure with her flowing robes and garlanded hair. Or that she seemed to be in a state of near euphoria. Or even that the group of men and women accompanying her – dressed as warriors and nymphets in kitsch ancient garb – appeared to have stepped straight out of the city’s Golden Age.

To the astonishment of onlookers, Peppa also began babbling Orphic hymns, before thrusting her arms upwards into the Attic skies and proceeding, somewhat deliriously, to warble her love for the gods of Mount Olympus …

Here’s the whole story.

Ninety-eight per cent of the population may officially be Orthodox Christian, but in many ways Greeks remain bonded to their pagan past. “OK, the ancients had hubris, but the concept of sin was totally unknown to them, as indeed it is in modern Greece,” Dimou says. “Greeks today don’t observe many of the 10 commandments. Their outlook on life and values are much nearer to pagan ideas than those of the austere Judaeo-Christian faith.”

Last night, the Adult Fellowship of St John the Divine hosted their annual Country Western Dance and BBQ at St George, Houston. Here’s some pics — AND, down at the bottom of this post, you’ll also find a music video (apologies to Buck Owens and the whole Hee Haw Gang).

Believe it or not, this man’s a cradle Orthodox (Texan).

These guys (Bob Macey, Fr John Salem, and yours truly) are not real performers (though they play the role on YouTube).

Be very afraid!

Future Cowgirls of America!

A has been cowboy (as in pillow case stuffed, painted on face)! Let’s call him Earl.

Earl’s buddy Pee Dab.

Earl’s family A.E., O.U., and Sometimes-Y.

Another Cradle Orthodox Cowgirl!

You don’t have to be good lookin’ to be a member here. (It just comes naturally!)

Only in Texas!
This year, by popular request, I got a bigger hat than last year.

It’s called steppin’. Watch me now!

For some reason, everyone was in red!

You gotta wear your hats, Cowboys!

Red, red, red.

“Put me in coach! I’m ready to … dance!”

“I’m not too sure about this, Dad.”

As you might’ve guessed: It’s about time for the Rodeo in these parts. If you’ve made it to this point … you might as well watch a video. The three previously identified “performers” are joined by the omnipresent & multitalented Alvaro! Pardon the quality — spur of the moment on a little Kodak camera. (Not sure that explains the singing!)