Introduction

With this being the beginning of this blog, untitled as of now, I feel the need to start writing about some things that are causing me great discomfort and are stirring emotions in me that are making me restless. It is early Saturday morning in the beginning of the Nativity Fast in the Eastern Orthodox Church which started last Tuesday into Wednesday, and my meager efforts at participating in the Fast already have my attention. Having been Orthodox for 7 or 8 years now, I have made many attempts to participate in Fasting periods, only to find my lack of will power, lack of a strong support basis at home, and my effort to approach the Fast from merely a legalistic direction of restricting my eating resulting in failure and quitting within a few days of starting. Not good I know, but this time is different, and that is what is leading me to write.

I am 61 years old, self-employed in a physical occupation that I perform not out of pleasure or desire, but out of a sense of gratitude that God has provided me a way to earn a living for my family doing something that I have been blessed with the skills and work ethic to do successfully. If I had my way, I would be doing other things more desirous, but that is not where God has me right now, so I carry-on, giving thanks to God daily. I am 16 years into my second marriage, with a teenage daughter from this marriage, and two more children in their early thirties from a previous marriage. I give you this bit of personal background to make the point that for most of my life, I haven’t done things smartly or correctly according to my opinion, and I have some issues that I am attempting to deal with on a continuing basis. I don’t have any high regard for my current situation in life, or the level of my maturity in my Christian walk, and again, back to where I started with my current discomfort.

My inner spirit is at a place of extreme discomfort right now and has been for a while now. I have a very strong feeling that I need to do something, but I am not sure what it is. I have interests that resemble what I think my feelings might be pointing to, but I have unsuccessfully attempted to pursue them before, so I take pause in trying to re-kindle old efforts. Still, there is a yearning that is causing me great discomfort and I don’t know what to do with it.

Enter this Nativity Fast!

I have describe my previous efforts at fasting with the Orthodox calendar, but this time I had a strong desire to give it another go, but this time, with a more thorough understanding of the two primary sides of fasting, the legalistic abstinence side, and the spiritual, more active study, prayer, and seeking more of God side, and I have placed my focus on the latter, which surprisingly has made the legalistic side more easier. Yes, I’m only a couple of days in, but I am feeling different things that I have before.

I have always had an interest in the history of the Orthodox faith, and monasticism in particular, so for the last week or so, I have been watching YouTube videos, mostly produced by Trisagion Films, about the lives of some of the Saints of our church. I have also found a couple of Monk Priests whose podcasts I have been listening to, and the combination of these videos and podcasts have stirred my spirit tremendously. I don’t really know how to describe my feelings or emotions but, they have left me with realizations of how far removed I am spiritually from where I need to be, and at the same time thinking I could never accomplish the level of spiritual closeness to God that they had and have, but, then again, at the same time, wondering if I could! I know I truly want to be able to attain a close relationship with God, but at the same time, I don’t want it as a status thing. I understand and have a strong interest in learning humility as a way of life, and I must chastise myself often for wanting to achieve things for the wrong reasons, so I don’t want that in relation to this topic, but I am feeling things differently than I have before.

I don’t know if it is possible to become saintly and must live in the world as I do, with my life, family, work, and numerous other strife-filled responsibilities that others have placed on me. My emotions run the gauntlet from happy to sad, at peace to angry, and everywhere in between each day, so I don’t really know where saintly fits into all that. I don’t know that it is possible amid all this worldly mess that I wade through constantly. I don’t have the answers yet!

One thing I have heard that was stated by more than one of the Saints in the videos I have watched, that has sunk deep into my mind and heart, was how in their last comments, they asked for prayer or prayed themselves for God’s forgiveness that they had not achieved what God had planned for them, or that they were not even sure if they had achieved the qualifications of even being called a monk. Such humility on display, and I desire that!

            I don’t know where tomorrow leads, but I feel obliged to write about the things I am feeling and going through on my journey toward wherever God has in mind that I go. I know there must be others experiencing some of the same things, and maybe my words will help them understand that they are not alone, and that their journey is being trod by others as well. Maybe we can pray for each other for strength to continue the journey towards and to Theosis, or the process toward and union with God. There it is! That will be the title of this blog. ‘Theosis – Along the Path’.