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  1. rusmeister

    Taking stock

    There are times when a man, a weak, ordinary man, needs a little more than that. Times when such quotes come across as unintentionally condescending, as spoken to suffering people by those who have not truly suffered. At such times, quotes even from Scripture are not enough.
  2. rusmeister

    St. Euphrosynos Taverna and Ouzeri (another one!)

    I was there when the beards were outlawed. It was January 1, 1985. It really hurt the petty officer in charge of our electrical division that I was in. He looked imposing with it, and without it, he looked like a big nobody.
  3. rusmeister

    Prayer requests post here!

    There’s a verb in Russian, “osirotet’”, “to be orphaned”, which is used when one’s parents have died. Already there, and I feel for you, Fr Matt. My own loss was catastrophic, and heralded the end of having a close person who understood me well that I could open my heart to. She was the last...
  4. rusmeister

    Prayer requests post here!

    Memory eternal!!
  5. rusmeister

    Taking stock

    Well, I’ve been Orthodox for over twenty years. Coming in as a middle-aged adult, I was humble enough but excited to join a Church where people maintained the same shared beliefs since the foundation of the Church. For the first new years, as a new convert, learning what was what, how we ought...
  6. rusmeister

    Modernism vs Traditionalism in Orthodoxy

    It’s a side quest, but there is a counterpoint to the issue of ancient languages versus modern vernacular. While it is obvious to all that people need to basically understand what is being said in worship, it is also important that the language be older, higher, and more formal, then the slang...
  7. rusmeister

    Fr Tom Hopko and Darwin

    Your first sentence here seems reasonable, but I don’t think that what you described to be the problem is accurate. It certainly doesn’t describe how people like father Tom understood things. Where you may be right is on the issue of synthesis or attempt to synthesize knowledge, belief and...
  8. rusmeister

    Fr Tom Hopko and Darwin

    Well, priests do dress, when they dress as priests, according to a given tradition, and don’t merely wear whatever comes to mind. I would ask why any Orthodox priest would wear the tab collar, myself. It’s nowhere in our Tradition. It was a heterodox invention of the 19th century, the Catholics...
  9. rusmeister

    Modernism vs Traditionalism in Orthodoxy

    And in running from liberalism, many in the Russian Church have run to the other extreme, that of a willingness to embrace totalitarianism, and even Stalinism, in order to suppress the excessively liberal elements. I experienced that quite personally in the run-up to my flight from Russia. And...
  10. rusmeister

    St. Euphrosynos Taverna and Ouzeri (another one!)

    Hope it’s going well for you!
  11. rusmeister

    Metropolitan Kallistos, David Bentley Hart, Universalism, and the Church of the East

    On the first observation only: But if a person comes in here openly denying established dogma of the faith, insisting that Christ is not the Son of God, or whatever, we have to “call them out” and assert that their claims or teaching is not Orthodox. We’ve been around this tree before. There are...
  12. rusmeister

    The Russian Church

    Florida or Texas? I think the main problem I mentioned probably still holds true - the private sector, where I could teach as I think best, doesn’t pay beans. The public schools are high turnover jobs, with bureaucracy attached. I don’t really want to go through that again. I’m an old dog, and...
  13. rusmeister

    The Russian Church

    One of the issues is that my wife has a support group of friends here and it functions as a kind of central hub which people can fairly easily get to from Russia, from Europe, and even from America. Since her brothers are in the US, she has a couple of friends, and two of our young adult...
  14. rusmeister

    The Russian Church

    It is sinking in that we have nowhere to return to, that we literally can’t go home. Indefinite exile. We are not going to be able to take this for long. It was hope of returning that kept us going. We’ve lost our legal basis to stay where we are, counting on fines and bribes to survive.
  15. rusmeister

    Russia: Orthodox priest faces expulsion for not asking God for Russian victory

    I have never seen that second part “ "And for our armed forces stationed around the world that they might have victory over all enemies let us pray to the Lord".” in any liturgical text. it is vital to make it a distinction between praying for a country’s leaders, and praying for a victory in...
  16. rusmeister

    The Russian Church

    Uminsky has fled the country and been defrocked in absentia. A man who worked with the sick, in hospices, ran a film club for teens to engage them in the Church (including my own kids) and much more. Defrocked for praying for peace. That’s it. But it gets worse. Our old 2nd priest is being...
  17. rusmeister

    Seats in European Parliament for Russia and Ukraine

    That is one of the things that really burns me. I remember the 1990’s and 2000’s, when Russia was dying to be treated as part of the West, Europe, and Christendom, and our foreign policy always made sure that they were deliberately excluded; those controlling it wanted to keep Russia as a...
  18. rusmeister

    The Russian Church

    Uminsky has been summoned to an ecclesiastical court at the main cathedral in Moscow as part of the process of removing him. Our own priest, the one who humbly played 2nd fiddle for the nearly two decades that I knew him while our archpriest was still alive, has also been summoned to a local...
  19. rusmeister

    The Russian Church

    Well, that’s a friendly reminder that a lot of strangers can read what I write, and comment with little or no knowledge of my situation or context, who I am or what has happened in my life. Still, welcome to TAW, stranger! Come in, man, and know us better!