Orthodixie

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My Man, Esolen!
“Women domesticate men. Men civilize men.”

It is as if, says he, we had been binging on a forty-year Fat Tuesday, reveling in putting a drunken “bishop” on an ass and turning everything upside down.

You’ll have to go here to read it all.

Two knees, two bar stools, three kids & an old man … it don’t get much better.

On second thought, it would if the cameraman was able to be in the picture.

Alas, her work is never done!

Esolen on “Invisible Men” …

It is painful enough to compare Jackie Robinson with the run of should-be convicts that shatter the boards of the NBA.

More H E R E.

BTW … MereComments now allows … comments!

Heterosexuals are responsible for “same sex marriage” …

The reason it is so difficult to convince Christian Harry and Mary that same-sex marriage is wrong is that we rely on Christian radio to inform Mary about the issue while she is rushing from her second job to pick up little Jimmy from the day-care center for church soccer league while Harry’s on the golf course with the guys. What we don’t stop to ask is whether “same-sex marriage” is all we’ve ever known for a long, long time.

Read the whole thing H E R E.

The ever-vigilant Dawn on the latest PP nonsense. Here, a kid asks a question and receives an answer:

In other words, it’s not enough for Planned Parenthood’s “experts” to say, “Yes, masturbation is physically safe, and we believe it’s healthy.” They have to reach into the realm of religion and fully dispense with any faith-based qualms a 14-year-old child might have about the activity. Yet, Planned Parenthood is the first to raise church-and-state arguments whenever there are attempts to teach abstinence in public schools.

Go H E R E.

The End of Time, the VIDEO GAME!

Left Behind:

Eternal Forces is a new computer game which creators claim is “morally just and family-friendly.” Players enter the scene after the Rapture when Satan’s forces are slowly taking over the world. As part of the rebel Tribulation Forces, players fight apocalyptic battles in New York City.

Blogging pastor Paul McCain isn’t impressed:

I can’t think of a more appropriate use of the “Left Behind” novels and genre than in the form of a fictional game. Since the entire premise of the books, the millenialistic distortion of our Lord’s second coming, is itself a fiction.

If you M U S T.

Rich Lowery is just now catching up on what used to be called “Celebrity Gossip” (now known as “News“) …

I still have much to learn. The cover of Celebrity Living Weekly declares “Kirsten & Jake ready to wed!” All I can think is: OK, great! Who are Kirsten & Jake? As far as I can tell, celebrities are always either ecstatically happy or desperately anguished, about to break up or get together, gaining weight or losing dangerous amounts of it. They apparently have time for little else.

It’s all H E R E.
Thx: News Forum

Back when I was an adolescent, thinking myself a chosen man of God, I had a disagreement with my Southern Baptist minister. It was the 70’s. I was a teen. He was a square. But that’s not the reason. The problem revolved around another cooler, hipper, preacher. The latter we’ll refer to as Reverend Green.

Though he didn’t pastor a church, Rev. Green was a dynamic evangelist. I’d heard him preach a couple times at youth rallies, prayer breakfasts and such. Boy, was he ever hot! Green really held my attention and I thought: “Cool! I want him to be my preacher!” He had a gift. He was vibrant and on fire for the Lord. He was the man!

Right?

During a Youth Meeting I suggested inviting him to preach at our church. Our request was submitted to the pastor and, you guessed it, the answer was “No”. Fuddy. Duddy. We didn’t understand and, as it turns out, the pastor wouldn’t give us teens the real reasons. In fact, it got to the point where we — I should say “I” — demanded a meeting. He heard me out; still refused. He wasn’t cool. He just didn’t understand. He was … Arrgh! I thought, “He’s got to go.” If memory serves, I believe I even sent him a letter asking him to do just that: Leave.

Years later I learned that the happ’nin Rev Green was happ’nin in places he shouldn’t have been. You are correct dear reader, he ran off with a church secretary, another man’s wife. Or was it the organist? I can’t remember. But, I remember the lesson. That is, we ought not make a habit of throwing stones at clergy because, often, we don’t know the whole story. The pastor may not even have all the details. And it’s very likely the he wouldn’t — couldn’t — tell parisioners if he did.

It is the same in Orthodoxy, even more so.

Many times, the priest or bishop is unable to be totally forthcoming about certain matters because they are confidential and/or would cause greater scandal if all told.

Over the years I’ve come to have great respect for the clergy who are able to keep their mouth shut and carry on serving God and Man with love and joy. Believe me, it would be much easier to become resentful, bitter, and mean. Even worse, the priest could become an old gossip — letting junk just fall out of his mouth with ease. The temptations are always there.

The first time I expressed interest in holy orders to a priest, he told me of his inaugural conversation with his bishop. The crusty old man looked him straight in the eye and said, “Boy, do you pray?”

“Why yes, I pray every day …”

“Pray to God you don’t have this curse!” said the bishop.

I think the old man had let the vocation get the better of him. It happens.

Or, as one priest said: “I wanted to be a priest out of arrogance; God allows me to be one as a penance.”

Once, at a Diocesan Convention in Atlanta, Bishop Basil delivered a homily about priests. Not just any priests, but the ones that were seated right in front of His Grace and 2,000 worshippers. He talked of their struggles, their crosses, the sacrifices that they — and their families — make in order to serve. He encouraged the faithful to pray for their priest and to lovingly support him and his family. I was a “baby priest” at the time and couldn’t fully appreciate or understand why so many of the men around me were weeping. Sobbing. Priests. Crying their eyes out.

Ten years later, I know now.

I no longer judge fellow priests, or any pastor, as harshly as I used to. Not that I agree with them all the time, like their practices — or even like them. Nope. But being hard-headed and a slow learner, I think my temperance (what little there is of it, and God knows I need it) is a direct result of my own battle scars. Trust me, a man who has served the Lord’s altar for many years has seen, heard, and experienced just about every temptation Satan can come up with. They, the elder clergy, inspire me.

Don’t misunderstand. There are bad apples (e.g., Rev. Green above and all those situations the media loves to report). I’ve met a few of them in Orthodoxy. But the sacrificial nature of the vocation has a way of purging and honing even the roughest of edges. By and large, parishioners are patient and God is merciful.

The pastor’s real struggle, as with everyone, is the day-to-day struggle of sin and salvation. For the pastor that means not only his own salvation and that of his family, but also that of his flock.

You think you have sleepless nights worrying about your children? So does the pastor, worrying about his flock.

Do your children break your heart by the things they say and do? Pastor, flock.

Do you pray for your children and weep over them when they’re not looking? Pastor, flock.

Do you sometimes look at your children and think, “Huh?” Pastor, flock.

Do your children sometimes give you dirty looks when you correct them? Pastor, flock. 🙂

No matter how many times they break your heart, are you always there for them? Pastor, flock.

Do you know things about yourself and other people that you don’t share with your children so as to, for as long as able, preserve their innocence and not be a temptation to them? Pastor, flock.

Do you know things about your children that you refuse to make common knowledge? Pastor, flock.

Etc.

Most of all, do you love & delight in your children? Pastor, flock.

Over the years I’ve been shocked when clergy actually DO divulge stuff. I’m not talking about things said in Confession, God forbid. Rather, scandal eventually hits all parishes and the priest tries mightily to protect his children, the flock. But often are the times when folks — human nature, we all do it — try to put a self-helping spin on their failings. Mixing in a good bit of sin can tempt one to find someone to blame. Anyone. Like, for instance, the priest! That’s it! The priest is to blame!

Sometimes he is.

Most times, most priests, ain’t.

I remember once when a parishioner suddenly quit the parish. There were a few who thought, “Father ran him off!” Such talk usually dies down as the grieving process proceeds, but this went on for some time. Having divulged the true reason for the man’s departure (truly scandalous) to the bishop, he said, “If it’s affecting someone’s salvation and they just won’t stop talking about it — tell them.” And I did. Thank God, those times have been few. Mature Christians know better. Oftentimes they know better than the priest and help to remind him that “God prunes His Church”.

After a while, the priest gets used to it. Never likes it. Suffers for it. But reaches an understanding with himself that, for sanity’s sake, and that of his family and his flock, he’s just going to keep struggling toward the Kingdom the best he’s able.

Why?

I remember a candid clergy gathering, the topic was “Antagonists in the Church”, where an experienced priest told of an early trial in his ministry. Someone in his parish had started a rumour about his wife. It became a scandal. Like all such devilry, it snowballed. At one point the wife asked her priest-husband, “Why?” Why keep on? Why not leave and go to another parish? Why not give up the nonsense and get a “real job”? Etc. The priest, with tears in his eyes, told the rest of us what he had told his wife, “Honey, you don’t understand. I get to stand at the altar of the Most High and touch the precious Body of our Lord at every Liturgy.”

We all understood.

Standing before the altar and celebrating the Mysteries of the Church is an experience incomparable to any other this side of the grave. No man should ever take it lightly. Few are they who remain unchanged by this awesome and sacred duty. For lack of better wording, it makes it all worth it.

Our imperfect world — outside Paradise, ruled by the Enemy — has taught us to question all authority, and has denigrated fatherhood. But as Christians, we know that all fatherhood flows from the Father. It is His Fatherhood that should be the model, the ideal, for earthly fathers. We should not judge fatherhood according to the ways of the world. Rather, the changeless Fatherhood of God is known through the Church.

St Cyprian of Carthage wrote:
“No one can have God as Father who does not have the Church as Mother.”

And somewhere along the line, God willing, we children all fit in.

Most of the time your priest is just a man struggling toward salvation, bowed a little lower each year with the weight of his sins, the burden of “parenting”, and the glory of the Cross. Standing at the altar, it’s all worth it. All of it. Worth it.

Pray for your pastor.

(Even if he is a square.)

Russian Orthodoxy disavows Soviet-era document in step toward reunion with foreign church

MOSCOW (AP) – The Russian Orthodox Church has disavowed a Soviet-era declaration of loyalty to the Communist government, a step that could help bring reunion with an emigre church that has been separate since 1920. The New York-based Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia severed contacts with the Moscow-based church after Patriarch Sergiy issued the loyalty declaration in 1927. The Moscow Patriarchate has said Sergiy did this to save the church from ruin, but a new document on its Web site says the declaration was among documents that “do not express the true voice of the Church of Christ (and) are deemed no longer valid.”

The Web site presented several documents drafted by delegates of the Moscow Patriarchate and the foreign church and approved by their respective synods. The two churches set up working groups on reunification issues after a 2003 visit to Russia by three archbishops of the foreign church and a 2004 visit by its head, Metropolitan Laurus. The documents went further than ever before toward apology by the Moscow Patriarchate for Soviet-era compromises with the state.

“Some clergymen and laypersons, trampling upon divine truth, facilitated the persecutors in their actions directed toward the destruction of the church,” said a posted document. “Such actions cannot under any circumstances be permitted and justified: they deserve all condemnation.”

It was on this day, the 1st of July 1863, the Battle of Gettysburg began. General Robert E. Lee brought his army of Northern Virginia up north after their victory at Chancellorsville. 75,000 Confederate soldiers and about 95,000 Union soldiers met at Gettysburg on this morning in 1863. It was the largest battle in North American history. It went on for three days.

On the third day, General Lee tried to break the battle line at the center, sending a column of troops led by General George Pickett across the valley. The attack was disastrous. More than half the Confederate soldiers in the charge were killed. Over the course of the battle, the Confederates lost about 28,000 soldiers, the Union Army lost about 20,000.

After the battle, a Union general said to a captured Confederate major, “With a few more men you would have gained your independence right here.”

Stolen from The Writer’s Almanac. To subscribe, click H E R E.