A little secret you may already know.

Parish life can be mundane.

Of course, when you start exploring the Faith the sights, sounds, and even the smells can be very intoxicating. If the parish has an accomplished choir even better still. You learn, you grow, everything is new and so very different. You jump in headfirst.

And yet after a time those initial feelings, like in a marriage, begin to “glow” less than they used to. Things become familiar, routine. The same Priest’s sermons. The very real people you see each Sunday. The faults in others one could easy cover up in the honeymoon now become naggingly persistent. The Chrism has dried, hard.

So, the search for that “zing” begins. Perhaps you may think it will come back by delving into theological obscurities. Maybe a hunger for elaborate ceremonial starts to grow. As always, the internet beckons with sermons carefully edited for “hems” and “haws” and production values never found in an ordinary parish. You can hide in its anonymity and learn from someone who’ll never know you in person, knowledge without community, information without the possibility of being actually challenged, and no one, ever, to say “You are the man…” in accountability. There’s also no dishes to be done or floors to sweep at St. Internet parish.

It can become like a kind of porn where people, bored of their parish like they may sometimes be of their spouse, seek the shelter of impersonal spiritual oxytocin in a make-believe world. Real people in a real parish can be hard and even dull sometimes but a good fight on the internet or a pseudo relationship with a fantasy Priest can be just the thing for filling a bored and empty soul.

Except it doesn’t work that way. Never has and never will. The reality of our Faith will always and ever be worked out in a community of people more like us than we want to admit, human, sometimes struggling mightily, and often inconvenient to our American expectation of instant spirituality.

Father “So and So” in your local parish probably won’t be as polished as the guy who gets to edit out his mistakes in pre-production. The person next to you at worship will, unlike the avatar on the web, actually demand something from you, your presence, your prayers, your work, and your love. The everyday services may not be as spectacular as the special ones on video and the arguments you may have are different when the person you want to critique is right there in front of you rather than half a continent away.

Yet it’s in this every day give and take and relationship where iron truly sharpens iron, where good deeds can be done in a personal way, and people still love you and try to help even when they can smell your spiritual farts and you theirs. And it’s there where the worship, even if it stumbles sometimes, is real, actual voices joined together in time and space sharing a glimpse of eternity.

And we need that very human, sometimes unpolished, local and real life because it’s just that; not some fantasy, not some scripted production but you and I and all our joys and struggles coming together in the real, smelly, analog world that Jesus came to lift back to heaven.

Without that reality our Faith is just a philosophy. With it we become the Church and find salvation in the best sense of that word.

Monasticism is a venerable part of our Orthodox Tradition and for centuries people have both visited monasteries and prayerfully considered taking on a monastic vocation. It would be a great joy if one day our parish would produce men and women who took on the “angelic life” as their calling and I encourage people to take occasional visits to monastic communities for retreat and spiritual refreshment.

Please note, though, some piece of advice that might be helpful in your traveling to, and relationship with, a monastic community.

The first thing I would like you to understand is that holiness and deep observance of our Orthodox Faith are not limited to monastic communities. While monastic life is different from the “regular” world it’s not “better” than your life at home and work, rather it’s another path. Consecration in single life in the world, the life of marriage and family, and the monastic life are all equally valid options, and each has its own challenges and opportunities for theosis. Our Lord was raised in a devout home with holy parents and the routine of life, work, and worship while also taking time to visit the wilderness to pray and reflect thereby showing us that both are acceptable ways of life.

The second thing you need to know is there are differences in the life and work of a monastery and your local parish. It is the monastics “job” to give themselves to routines of prayer, worship, work, and study in a way that will elude most of us with children, jobs, and the multiple commitments of daily life. People who aren’t monastics may feel guilty about what they perceive to be a lack of their own spiritual life as compared to a monastic or attempt to pursue the monastic rigor in a way of life not designed to accommodate it and thereby fall into despair. This is not necessary.

While routines of prayer and spiritual practice are certainly part of an Orthodox life, please know your raising of children in the Faith, your attempts to be Christian at school, work, and in the larger culture are your personal ascetic effort and count as much as the extended prayer and worship cycles of a monastery. After all, every monastic in the world came from a family and so did every Saint on the icons on our parish walls. What is common to both monastic and laity is the desire to purse this Christian life to the best of their ability with God giving them the strength. In the end that, by grace, will be enough whether you live in a monastery or just down the street.

Please also know that while it can be wise to seek the practical advice of people dedicated to a life of prayer you, as a member of a local parish, are not obligated to take on the obedience required of a monastic nor should they ask you to do so. In questions of theology or practice it is the rule (canon) that the teaching office of the Church resides in the Bishops, and that questions related to the expression of our Faith or sacramental issues are theirs for discussion and decision as even monasteries, like parishes, should be under the direction of their local Bishop or Synod.

Finally, do consider that the closest monastery may not necessarily be the best option as there are other factors to be included in your decision to visit and take part in a monastic world. New monasteries may need to “season” a bit to develop a life and flow before they take on visitors. Some monasteries may have a rigor that is suited to those living in them but not applicable to the world outside their walls. As you test the spirits (1 John 4:1) in your own life be open to enjoying the blessings that can come from visiting a monastery but also be wise to see the practical fruits produced by their communal life over the years.

My own recommendation for people to visit St. Tikhon’s in Pennsylvania, for example, is rooted in their being over a century old, home to five actual Saints, and possessing of a well-established pan-Orthodox reputation for both zeal and wisdom. There are other places like this, and we can speak of them if you wish to consider taking the time to find not just “any” monastery but the one that may be most well rounded and beneficial to your growth in Christ.

Someday we will also, as Antiochian Orthodox, have a well-developed and thriving monastic life in this country. We have a small monastic community in Tennessee in its infancy, and, by God’s grace, we look forward to an expansion of monasticism here in the United States. It would be my joy to have one of our family at St. Ignatius take on the monastic life and, if you wish, please feel free to speak to me about options for visiting and supporting monasteries even as you, living in the world, make your own heart a monastery wherever you are.

Even though its been a practice since the dawn of humanity, public executions are really a kind of “death porn” designed to simultaneously shock, pacify, and make a spectacle of someone’s killing for the benefit of power and revenge. We Orthodox Christians have been on the receiving end of such things since the time of the Apostles and I have no interest in joining the “virtual” mob by watching. Whatever your thoughts about the death penalty may be, and I have great apprehensions about it, I hope you consider at least not watching the potential live stream from the virtual coliseum and please pray for this man asking the intercessions of St. Dismas.

I admire the continuity, at least on an official basis, of the Anabaptists when it comes to war and peace.

They are overwhelmingly pacifists, some won’t even wear buttons on their clothing so they won’t be mistaken for soldiers. This is historic for them, an expression of their Christian beliefs. Following how they see Jesus’ words they refuse to bear arms against their fellow humans and that includes “popular” wars like WW2. If they have to they’ll go to jail and often suffer the slings and arrows of public opinion for their stand.

This they do no matter who is President, no matter which political party has power, and whether public opinion is for or against them. They ask for no cameras to record them. They do this with no anger or manufactured rancor. Although it has political implications the motivations are from a living faith and not a partisan posturing. This they believe and thus they act, or refuse to act, and accept the consequences. No pinch of incense to Mars and if suffer they must they will.

Too many of their fellow American Christians, in contrast, seem to have an overarching political understanding to which they add or subtract various aspects of faith as proof texts for a pose or a partisan end. They’re for the wars “their” people start, or at least silent about them, but against those of another. They cry for “justice” against a leader with whom they disagree while conveniently ignoring the same things done when their party was in power. They take to the streets claiming to stand for Jesus but only, it seems, when Jesus appears to agree with them. It makes for great TV but like making a shirt from pieces and not the whole cloth the nakedness is quickly exposed. Worse yet they imagine their hurt feelings as a kind of martyrdom.

Across the spectrum we Americans have often sold ourselves out, not to God but to a party or ideology and then attempt to make God our passenger and not our pilot on the journey. We want the show, the crowd, the catharsis, but not the day to day quiet but determined conviction required of people of faith. We want to rule and if Jesus is agreeable, well, He can come along with us on our path to power but few want to serve, to be anonymous, to be humble and be willing to take on the life of actual and not emotional martyrs. Carrying a sign is easy. Washing the Samaritans wounds is hard.

It would be good to return to consistency, to doing everything we do including speaking truth to power not rooted in a “Jesus added” philosophy but rather “Jesus first.” His works our works. His methodology our plan. His suffering ours. His servanthood our power. And if there is glory then it will be His as well. Then, no matter what the waves of history bring, we’ll be something more than just another movement across time.

We’ll be sons and daughters of the Most High and in the end that’s really the only thing for a Christian that matters.

Dear Mr. President,

I was looking at the news this morning after church services and an idea came to me which is the inspiration for this letter.

A second person has been shot and killed in Minneapolis and it appears that two sides have entrenched themselves even deeper. Protesters and Law Enforcement are stressed and it feels like there’s no end in sight. This seems to becoming more than just about protest or enforcing the laws. It seems things have become personal, political, and somehow like the situation has become a prop for larger agendas on both sides.

You’ve traveled the world to make diplomatic forays and solve conflicts. Consider, perhaps, sitting down not with leaders of hostile nations but with the Governor of Minnesota and finding a way to make the peace not in some distant land but here at home. You both have interests, of course. You were opponents in the recent election. Hard words have been said yet if you can find ways to communicate with leaders of nuclear powers surely there’s a chance to speak with a state official?

Beyond the activists and the officers there are people struggling to make sense of the current events, people of good will wondering “Why?” and looking at the situation and thinking “This isn’t right.” They belong to neither camp but are deeply concerned. Who speaks for them? Who listens to their quiet discomfort about these things even as they look for leaders not to join the combatants but to find a way out. Consider being that kind of leader.

As always, we Orthodox Christians pray for our country, its civil authorities, and all of our Armed Forces. This will continue even as we search for some ray of hope, of softening egos, and consideration for all the rest of us who’ll have to live with the consequences of these days long after the TV cameras leave.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Fr John Chagnon

Dear Mr. President,

As usual you continue to be in my prayers as we Orthodox Christians pray for every civil authority and our Armed Forces. May God grant you wisdom to lead us all to that which is right, good, and decent.

Please consider the times we live in and help us all find common ground. Emotions are frayed, people are weary of soul, and a kind of sadness has begun to creep across our country. Shouters and antagonists are having their wishes fulfilled but the many of us who want to find peace, concord, compromise, and unity are hardly ever heard above the din. Those who wish to live in honor of the law but also in mercy and basic concord with those around us are being shouted down and it seems as if there is no one to speak for us.

I understand and respect that you took an oath but please don’t forget the Law higher even than the Constitution and the Judge greater than the Supreme Court and as you consider what to do and how to act remember all of our accountability to that jurisdiction as well. I encourage you to take the time in your busy schedule not just for planning the next steps or coming pieces of legislation but also for reflection in the presence of God and the reality of things eternal and not just the temporal.

I say these things out of great respect for your office but also with the hope you will find in our Lord Jesus Christ that which wealth, success, or earthly honors can never match, namely grace, peace, and salvation. Your legacy may matter for a short time, but your soul endures forever and please also consider that in how you serve us all as President.

Thank you for your time and consideration. I presume these letters never actually find your personal desk, but my prayer is that somehow the message will still find a way. My encouragement for you to be just and good in an eternal sense of that word also comes with an assurance that you will be in my prayers and that in the swirl of history you will find both grace and the Giver.

In Christ,

Fr John Chagnon