Reflections

What does the voice tell you?

March 1, 2015

If you tell someone that you hear voices, they will probably want to call the nearest mental health facility in order to have you medically evaluated, admitted and treated. While it may be a favorite symptom of those pleading insanity in a defense trial featured on the TV series “Law and Order”, hearing voices, possibly telling someone to commit a crime or harm oneself, should never be taken lightly. This particular psychiatric disorder, auditory hallucination, is one of the most common mental disorders. With the care of medical professionals, medicine, therapy and support, many people suffering from the hearing of voices can live fairly normal, productive lives. Disregard the medical advice and the person, others, and even society, might suffer the consequences. (more…)

A priest who gets it, but as a voice crying in the wilderness

February 8, 2015

Rainer Maria Rilke, the early twentieth century Bohemian-Austrian author, captured the age of intense anxiety in many of his works. Perhaps most famous is a collection of letters, Letters to a Young Poet, published posthumously in 1929, some three years after Rilke’s death. The letters were written to a 19 year old military cadet, Franz Xaver Kappus, who wanted the more famous Rilke’s opinion on his own poetry. The young man was contemplating his future and deciding if to pursue a career as a writer or begin training for the officer corp. In one of the most famous and often quoted letters, written in 1903, Rilke writes the following words to young Franz:

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given to you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.[1] (more…)

Finding Love, how lucky and blessed

January 25, 2015

In the PBS television series “Call the Midwife,” there is a wonderful line spoken by one of the characters, Jenny: “If we are lucky, we find love. If we are blessed, we understand its meaning.” This line struck me on many levels. Many of us have been lucky in life to have or have had parents who loved us. Perhaps only later in life are we blessed enough to understand the hardships they endured and the sacrifices that they made for us, because they loved us. An even greater blessing is if our parents loved us unconditionally, and if we returned that same level of love. (more…)

Hidden Gifts and Hidden Talents

August 25, 2014

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Purging the Faithful

July 14, 2014

Do people use Rolodexes anymore? How many people under the age of 30 even know what a Rolodex is? Pictured here, it is, according to Wikipedia, “a rotating file device used to store business contact information.” The word was created from the words “rolling” and “index”. I imagine that most people, these days, store contacts on their smart phones, eliminating the need for rolodexes and “telephone books”. As a parish priest, my Rolodex was perhaps the most important thing in my office. Each and every parishioner had a separate card with their name, address, phone number and other important information relevant to their relationship to the parish. (more…)

How Do I Know God Made Me Gay?

June 22, 2014,

My mother kept a scrapbook for each one of her children. Perhaps because I am the oldest, mine is the fullest. Lovingly glued to each page is a host of memories. First year birthday cards, are next to an envelope with locks of my hair from a first haircut, congratulatory telegrams from relatives in England when I was born, are pasted next to some of the first “art” that I created.

One of the more telling pieces in the scrapbook is an “essay” that I wrote in third grade. The assignment was to write about “what do you want be when you grow up?” At the age of eight, I wrote that I wanted to be a priest. (more…)

Christ Is Risen!  April 19, 2014 On this glorious day, and in this triumphant season, we greet all of our readers with the exuberant words of “Christ is Risen!” Many…

Love During a Revolution

March 26, 2014

Ukraine has the world’s attention. The largest country within the borders of Europe, with a population of some 44 million, recently went through a significant revolution. The protesters forced a change of government following a particularly volatile protest staged by civilians against a pro-Russian government. The world’s leading powers are still trading threats and punitive actions over the forceful Russian annexation of the Crimean peninsula. Certainly this battle for Ukraine is not over as it has become the center in a struggle between the power and values of West vs. East. A new Cold War era might be upon us. (more…)

Acceptance Comes Before Revelation

February 9, 2014

What would it take for the Orthodox Church to officially recognize that God created some people with same-sex attractions?

What would it take for the Orthodox Church to officially recognize that gay people fall in love and desire to live in loving, sanctified relationships?

What would it take for the Orthodox Church to officially recognize that gay people in life-long relationships sincerely believe that God led them to be with their particular spouse?

What would it take for the Orthodox Church to officially accept same-sex relationships and celebrate the commitments made by the couple with the mystery of crowning, in the midst of a church community? (more…)

Is Silence the Enemy

January 12, 2014

Martin Luther King Jr., the great African-American civil rights leader, delivered a sermon in 1957 in Montgomery, Alabama where he spoke the following words: “in the end we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” These words ring true for many people, not the least for members of the LGBTQ community. While we have unfortunately come to expect hatred and vile speech from members of the extreme political right, religious fundamentalists and the ignorant[1], we are particularly confused and hurt when our friends and allies in the straight world are silent, and do not defend our civil rights in the face of injustice and bigotry. (more…)