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Okay, Gurney. Thanks for letting me know about my shortcomings on the thread. For the record, I thought the general topics on this thread were relevant, and not as politics. Guess not. I'll do my best to vanish from TAW (and, ideally, CF) for at least the fast so as not to give scandal to...

Don't think anyone here needs to hear this, but here it is. I got interested in Christianity during a time of great fear and misery. I read a lot of starter information online, mostly about the Anglican Communion, the RCC, and the Orthodox Church. Everything seemed kind of inaccessible. To be...

Russia has severe psychological problems as a culture. Several times throughout the Soviet period, "generations" were deliberately destroyed. By "generation" I mean a mass of people roughly the same age likely to bond as a large group on the basis of shared experiences. Further, the natural...

Thank you, @Paidiske. You certainly did answer my question. Extremely clear and informative. Particularly the bit about the two kinds of objections. I was completely flabbergasted until I understood at least that much. It still sounds like a very difficult and painful situation, but not...

More a recommendation than an OP to initiate discussion. St. Sophrony's book "On Prayer" relates experiences that are way over my head, but at the same time, I'm glad I'm reading it. I get the impression that the author was far beyond me on his path to divinization, but at the same time that...

In Archbishop Dmitri's commentary on the Epistle of Saint James, he writes in his commentary on 1:13 Is the section in bold above the unambiguous Orthodox understanding of the "temptations" in the Gospels of Sts. Matthew, Mark, and Luke?

Thank you. I am very interested in hearing more about this, and honestly, I'm not sure how to google it.

How does it work to have a bishop overseeing priests if he doesn't believe some of them are priests? With the EO, all authority of a priest comes from the bishop. It is really the bishop's authority, delegated to the priest. So to me this makes zero sense, but maybe you don't do things that...

Definitely worth reading, and a little hard to take. Cultural practices really "pop" when they're not your own. I was shocked to read about some of the customs mentioned here.

Again, I should have been much clearer: I also don't think every influence outside the home is evil, but if it is understood as a condition of employment that you will be fired if your children show evidence of having been exposed to such influences...then the church has to pay you enough that...

Sorry about that, I know I can be kind of annoying and opinionated, and have a tendency to speak in unclear summaries. I just came back to this thread to clarify my remark about the "can of worms" you mentioned -- please let me say that I meant "IF those in ministry are formally expected to...

Not sure if I am allowed to participate here. For what it's worth... It is certainly true that there is an unbearable efficiency to "influence" on children these days (phones, peers with phones). That said, if someone in ministry with children is expected to have such superhuman protective...

Thanks for the interpretation. I found the text online, and now I see what you mean. Yeah, indeed, you in your hungry rambling said some of what I meant better that I did. I'm as Western and modern as they come, I know what a telephone is, I know who Spiderman is, and yet a relatively mobile...

Even if your motivations aren't perfect, that doesn't mean it's not beneficial to be interested.

All men in the RF now fear this, unless they've aged out, and that limit could change anytime. The "surprise forced conscription" events, effectively flash mobs of violence to get young men into vans and bus them off for their week of training before being sent to the front, are entirely real...

Thanks for explaining. For personal reasons, I admire when people have this kind of skill set. I am not about to interpret your communion melody for you, but if I heard this, I would be inclined to think it means "[even] in the caves, deserts, and mountains" -- that is, not exclusively there...

Orthodox-centric, but maybe somehow relevant: I think it was Fr. Alexander Schmemann who said that he thought (Orthodox) monasticism needed a bit of reining in with the various pieces of special clothing and this and that, and that pre-monastery formation should involve being a Christian...

If you feel like you're on a journey towards God, there's always more distance to go. If you feel like going to church is a static repetition...

What does working on the production crew involve, if you don't mind my asking?

There is a huge need for participation (in things other than mobbing and conspiracy theories) right now. Most of life used to be participatory. Now very little is. If I understood you right, you think Orthodoxy tends toward moral authoritarianism. There is definitely some of that in some...