The conversation was something like this: me: “I want to go to church…someplace….on Easter.” him: “okay. where?” me: “doesn’t matter….this year.” him: “this year?” me: “next year it matters to me.” him: “will you be Orthodox then?” me: “yes.” him: “alright.” This is the hardest part of the journey so far, harder than the struggles in prayer and fasting, harder than figuring out how to parent my children during liturgy (which I…
Being a vegan may actually cure my vegetarianism. I’m not a strict vegetarian, mind you. I don’t keep to it because of lofty reasons or even purely health reasons. I usually avoid meat because frankly, I feel like crap after I eat beef and pork. So it’s been, I don’t know, like 5 years since I ate beef or pork. I generally do eat fish a few times a month and I’ll…
Today being the Feast of the Annunciation I attended Divine Liturgy. I ducked out early. Don’t tell my priest. It had little to do with the Liturgy and more to do with the fact that sneaking away while my 13 year old babysits on a “(home)school” day always gives me pause. As I drove away though I did feel some real loss. I wondered if I will ever get used to the…
So I need a sponsor. I’ve been thinking about this for a few weeks now, ever since I stumbled upon my original baptismal certificate while I was looking for a credit card I’d misplaced before my move. Isn’t that always the way, the metaphor…stumbling upon something while looking for something else? Or maybe it’s just me…stumbling through things, everything reminding me of something else, eventually it all gets done somehow. At any…
When my husband and I got married I was not attending church, at all, really. I didn’t feel a loss in this at the time. I still very much considered myself a Christian mainly because I still fully believed the Creed. I had an understanding with God, liked Him a whole lot, we talked every day, many times in fact. I believed in the reality of the Wonderful Counselor. I believed Jesus…
I’ve been avoiding His gaze. I treat Him as though He is just another picture on the wall. He is just above the Theotokos on my altar at home which makes it hard to avoid Him and yet I manage it somehow. The Theotokos of Vladimir gives great comfort, sweet mother. Sometimes when I walk by I focus in on her and even remove her from the altar for us to have…
It may be alright with me that I’ll always struggle. I may be the kind of person who needs to struggle. I look at my “category” list here on this blog and I realize the choices I’ve made there are deliberate, things that describe me and that frankly, I want to describe me. doctrine family fasting growing up catholic mystic practice struggle I want doctrine or at least I want a little…