The Catacomb Chronicles

Requirements for a Priest's wife

2012-02-10T09:44:00.000-08:00

H/T to Josephus

I can tell you right now the TW doesn't meet much of the requirements.

Todays Random Post 2/10/12

2012-02-10T09:26:00.000-08:00

I hope nobody is trying to email me through that one I have listed on Google. I never check it. It's a dummy account.

As I speak my Apple Cider is fermenting, and I'm about to move it to secondary fermenter. I used 5 gallons Sams Club apple juice, 2 lbs brown sugar, and White Labs English Cider yeast along with some nutrient and yeast booster. I'll post the results in a week.

The Obama regime is displaying some blatant anti-religous behavior as of late with the Obamacare contraception mandate. The USCCB is actually taking Obama to task. I just can't help but note the irony that they used to be all for Obamacare a year ago. To me it seems that the Catholic bishops want it both ways.

ROCOR canonized a martyr of the anti-nazi group the White Rose. St. Alexander pray for us!

Remember: it's SAINT Valentine's Day!

Serious Question: Altar wine

2012-02-02T19:46:00.000-08:00

Serious question for you folks. I'm about to make some cider but soon I also want to make some wine for my parish and the others I semi-regularly attend. I asked my main pastor what kind he uses and he showed me a bottle. It said "Angelica" and said he sometimes uses port but ideally it's wine from "the first fruits". I'm scouting for a suitable wine kit to ferment. I believe Deacon Joseph already posted about this but I lost it.

What kind of wine is most appropriate for Liturgical use?

Molotov to Newt Supporters: Are you serious?!

2012-02-01T11:41:00.001-08:00

My thoughts exactly!

Todays Random Post 2/1/12

2012-02-01T11:09:00.000-08:00

I'm selling some items on craigslist and waiting for the buyers to show up. Here's a few things on my mind

Yesterday I saw a bumper sticker that said "The Constitution is a shield not a sword" and also on the car was an Obama bumper sticker. I love how liberals are powerless to irony, especially their own.

The TW and I want to make some mead, cider and wine. I particularly want to make Altar Wine for the parishes I attend which include a Skete.

I back Ron Paul but fear we're going to get Obama lite instead. Dr. Paul is the only one I can vote for with a clear conscience. Look we can point out the personal flaws in the four remaining candidates all day. There is no perfect candidate. But I and other Paul supporters are at least excited about him and we know for what he stands. You can't really say that about the others. Their platform is that they're not Obama. Gee that'll work well as it did for John Kerry. Obama does what he was supposed to do: represent. You know what he represents. He represents evil, but he stands for something. So am I going to vote for Obama lite? I don't know. Nothing really changes and I'm tired of choosing between two big government loving statists.

I like Copts. Got a problem with that? I also like "Traditionalist" Catholics.

I got the list of songs I have to sing this weekend where I work. I thought we were supposed to do the Hours and Propers instead of the protestant four hymn sandwich? One of them is making me cringe: Eagle's Wings!

If Rep. Allen West is really a conservative and a patriot why did he vote to give Obama the power to lock up our citizens indefinitely?! Terrorism shmerrorism. What's to stop any POTUS from declaring Catholics or Orthodox "terrorists? Ever think about that? And when are we finally going to achieve "victory" in Afghanistan, the graveyard of empires? What is "victory" anyway? Why are we STILL in Japan and Germany?

Ike Eisenhower warned against letting the neocon sacred cow known as the Military Complex deciding foreign policy in his farewell address. Funny how those who say that now are called "unpatriotic" and accused of "hating America".

Rush Limbaugh and Jon Stewart are the same beast with different rhetoric.

Shut up Ann Coulter! I agree with you 90% of the time but shut yer pie hole for once.

Haven't heard if former communist gov't agent Met. Joseph of the Bulgarian Church has resigned yet. He should!

I need a better job, but there aren't any.

RIP Hieromonk Basilios Nassar

2012-01-26T19:50:00.000-08:00

On January 25, 2012 Greek Orthodox Hieromonk Basilios Nassar was shot by an armed terrorist group in Hama, Syria on the second day of heavy fighting there.

Fr. Basilios was at the Metropolis when he was informed by a phone call that a parishioner of his was shot and needed assistance. The Patriarchate of Antioch has reported that the 30-year-old priest was shot while giving medical aid to the wounded man who was previously shot. Fr. Basilios was shot in the chest and in the right armpit. Immediately another priest, Fr. Panteleimon Isa, who was with him dragged his bloody body to a nearby building to save him, but the martyr for Christ Father Vasilios was dead within 30 minutes from hemorrhaging.

His funeral took place today, January 26th, in the Church of Saint George in Hama. The blessed Father Basilios, known in the world as Mazin, was born in 1982 in the village of Kfarmpo in Hama and was a graduate of the Theological School of Balamand. He was also a teacher of Byzantine Music in the school Saint Kosmas the Melodist which he founded in the Metropolis.

See the original article and funeral pictures here. This is what the neo con "pre-emptive war" has wrought everywhere our Armed Forces were sent to "liberate" jihadists, most notably in Iraq. If this is what "bringing" democracy to the Middle East will do for Christians, I'd rather stick with the christian-friendly dictator they have now. 100 years of Western meddling in the Middle East has availed nothing but martyrs. That's why I back Ron Paul.

Shiner Pale Ale

2012-01-24T14:28:00.000-08:00

Good news for those of you down near Shiner, TX. A Wild Pale Ale.

Obama praises Roe vs. Wade

2012-01-23T11:22:00.000-08:00

This time I'm going to let Catholic Caveman Subvet take this one. Read here.

Lakefront Brewing production up

2012-01-19T10:44:00.000-08:00

If you are ever in Milwaukee on a Friday you MUST take the tour at Lakefront Brewery then eat at the German Fish Fry (they're a big thing in Milwaukee year round). It is SO much fun and the fish and beer are excellent...I think? I was really hammered because the Trophy Wife didn't drink at the time (I've taught her only craft beer) and we had to use up our tokens before the Fry. BTW baseball fans, they have the Chalet and Mug from Old Milwaukee County Stadium.

But you will have a chance to get their brew in the near future as their production is up.

VSO on Newt's 2nd ex-wife

2012-01-19T10:26:00.000-08:00

I've made my opinion of Newt Gingrich clear earlier in this blog. As for his 2nd ex-wife's recent claims he wanted an "open marriage" (which is exactly what witchy-poo wanted hence my leaving her and eventually finding the TW)? She could be lying. She has no right to be bitter though. Newt served his first wife divorce papers while she was being treated for cancer , in order to marry the woman who making these claims. She knows what she got into bed with. Her stance on wife #3 is "she stole what I rightfully stole." But it's ok now because NEWT'S CATHOLIC NOW and got those two previous marriages annulled. So no sympathy for wife #2. You lie down with a dog you're gonna get it's fleas.

NYC craft Beer festival

2012-01-18T10:33:00.000-08:00

I can't go but maybe you can. VIP Tix

Most Bulgarian bishops also comunist agents!

2012-01-17T12:03:00.000-08:00

This will come as no surprise to my Old Calendarist/True Orthodox friends but it does to me. H/T to Josephus

The other top clergy identified by the commission were metropolitans Galaktikon of Stara Zagora, Dometian of Vidin, Ignatii of Pleven, Yoanikii of Sliven, Grigorii of Veliko Turnovo, Yosif of the United States, Canada and Australia, Kaliniki of Vratsa, Nataniel Nevrokopski, Simeon of Western and Central Europe and Neofit of Rousse.

Galaktikon was agent Misho; Domitian, agent Dobrev; Ignatii, agent Penev; Yoanikii, agent Kirilevich; Grigorii, agent Vanyo; Yosif, agent Nikolov; Kalinik, agent Rilski; Kiril was a secret collaborator with the code name Kovachev and was an agent code-named Vladislav; Nataniel was a collaborator code-named Blagoev; Simeon of Western and Central Europe was a collaborator, as Toris, and an agent, code-named Hristov; Neofit's code name as an agent was Simeonov.

To think I once respected that man. He expels St. Isaac of Syria Skete and everyone who went there for some small indiscretion Fr. Simeon did in 1994 when with ROCOR (and disciplined for it then, but it takes two to tango) that he forgot to mention when he joined the Bulgarian Archdiocese assuming he was absolved of it, and all the while HE WAS A FORMER COMMUNIST SPY!!!!

Should St. Mary of Egypt have been arrested?

2012-01-17T11:48:00.000-08:00

That is the question posed by this article debating the efficacy of legislating morality and discussing the difference between morality vs. legality. It's a very good question. The Church never has and never will condone vice and sin, and it's the job of the Church to make people better. Is it the job of the State as well?

Western Orthodoxy, Bishops and Gravity

2012-01-12T19:59:00.000-08:00

I never understood why Bp. Peter of ROCOR-MP ran the Midwest Diocese when Vladyka Alypy is the Archbishop. But I finally asked. Abp. Alypy was pruning a tree and fell out of it and was hurt pretty bad. Bp. Peter is the diocean Vicar and that's he's been running it.

I've never met Bp. Peter and don't know him personally. But I do know those who know and serve under him. He's not said to be a nice guy or a good bishop. I've already posted about his disdain for Western Orthodoxy, and his potentially schismatic attitude towards the ROCOR WRITE clergy who are all under the Metropolitan and Bp. Jerome.

His pattern of behavior parallels an excommunicated-from-this-blog Metropolitan. I don't think Bp. Peter maintains a culture of corruption like the said excommunicate does. He's just a bully, and I know politcal ambition when I see it. I do however notice one significant difference: the AOANA fully supports Western Orthodoxy. Granted it's likely just to increase numbers and fill the coffers to pay for his entourage like his spiritual ancestor Rodrigo de Borgia, and the praxis in certain parishes are debatable as to whether they're truly pre-schism or too protestant like the Anglican Use (I'd rather Anglicans came to us instead of Rome, but Orthodox hierarchs aren't exactly welcoming them) but at least he knows where his bread is buttered, and has personally Consecrated Western Rite parishes and has repeatedly echoed St. John of Shanghai and San Francisco's attitude (whose relics I have visited at Holy Virgin Cathedral). Not so with Bp. Peter.

Met. Hilarion ran the WRITE in ROCOR back when he was Abp. of Australia and New Zealand in addition to his regular duties. I believe he and Bp. Jerome actually care, and have personally seen their eagerness regarding the growth of the WRITE Vicarite, which is unfortunately treated like second class citizens. I can identify with men who do the St. John Liturgy and hours one day and the Pope Gregory the next.

I'm considering excommunicating Bp. Peter too, though he hasn't gone quite to that level of deservedness as that excommunicate...yet. I don't know which other ROCOR bishops are hostile or supportive or indifferent to Western Orthodoxy. I'll take indifference over hostility any day. I don't know where Abp Alypy stands either, but he's not in the office. God knows if or when he'll ever return to full-time duties. Either way I pray for him to have a speedy and full recovery. In the meantime a new prayer is circulating in the Midwest diocese:

Priest: May God bless and keep our Bishop Peter.

People: Far away from us!

Where do I belong?

2012-01-09T12:16:00.000-08:00

I've been doing alot of reading over the last 5-6 years over all the differences and controversies in not just religion in general but specifically to Orthodoxy. The Non-Chalcedonians charge the Chalcedonians with innovations. Chalcedonians call the Copts "Monophysites" whereas the Copts cay they're "Miaphysites". Rome seems to be changing things every 50 years but never change things back. The Church of Istanbul tries to stake claims based on a dead empire. The Calendar controversy. The Moscow Church controversy. Orthodox, "True" Orthodox, Imperial Orthodox and Super Orthodox.

So folks I'm going to tell you where I stand, then you tell me which jurisdiction I should belong to. I'm sure the answers are going to vary, but so do my few readers.

I like Copts. I on occasion attend their services but sit in the back row and pray "for" them more than I pray "with" them. Even if they did invite me (which they never would unless I converted) I would not commune with them, or concelebrate with them if I was a priest/bishop.

I understand why we're not in communion with the Non-Chalcedonians, and think we should sit down and TALK to get them to agree with us instead of screaming "THEY'RE HERETICS!!!!"

I reject protestantism as heretical.

I reject every Roman dogma since 1054 as heretical (Supremacy, Infallibility, Immaculate Conception of Mary etc)

I DESPISE the novus ordo mass and the "Spirit of Vatican 2".

I prefer the Old Calendar, think all Orthodox should be using it until we all agree on the new one, but I don't condemn those who use the new one.

I think proper attire is suit and tie for men and modest dresses for women, and women should wear head coverings since they get to, but don't cringe if they don't.

I think only Orthodox Christians may commune in Orthodox Churches. Your spouse or mommy not Orthodox? Tough.

I think people who seek to preserve "greekness" or "russianess" at the expense of Orthodoxy are heretics at best and bigots at worst.

I don't mind hearing Greek/Arabic/Slavonic/Latin and encourage it's use, as long as everyone knows what is being said, and taught to know what is being said.

I don't care who you are, or what you are as long as you see to live the Faith.

I much prefer Western Orthodox Rites and call those opposed to them phyletists and heretics.

I condemn favoritism, cronyism, and the buying influence so prevalent in the Antiochian and Greek churches among others.

I condemn the World Council of Churches heretical, and think NO Orthodox church should involve itself with it.

I'm not comfortable with ROCOR being communion with the Moscow Church.

I don't trust the Moscow Church, but don't condemn the priests and people in it either.

I think "Ecumenical Patriarch" Bartholomew is a heretic.

I think any Orthodox bishop who concelebrates with schismatics (as opposed to merely attending and watching) is a schismatic.

I think any Orthodox Christian who calls Mohammed a prophet is a heretic.

I think any bishop who rewards pro-abortion politicians for being the "correct" ethnicity is a heretic.

I think anyone who shacks up, supports abortion, warmongering, regularly gambles or willfully lives a life contrary to Church teaching (as opposed to a single incidence of falling and Confessing, hey we all do) is a hypocite and a heretic.

I reject and condemn as heretical the notion that greeks belong to greek churches, Russians to Russian churches and "white converts" to OCA.

I doubt the sanctity and gracefullness of the "Greek" Patriarchates, particularly the Antiochian. I believe they may have been compromised.

I doubt if I am NOT a Donatist.

I don't believe belonging to the NCC or WCC, though they shouldn't, automatically makes one a heretic. It just makes them wrong.

I believe there may be grace in the MP and OCA sacraments and orders judging by some of the Martyrs like Fr. Nestor Sauvchuk.

I don't think using the New Calendar condemns one to Hell.

I really don't care for these "Super" Orthodox I've met online who claim things like I can't eat in a Chinese restaurant if there is a buddha staute in it, my wife has to stay home if she's menstrating, you can't brush your teeth before communion and that to be "True" Orthodox one has to grow a long beard, change their name to "Seraphim" or "Polycarp" do 500 prostrations a day, eat only roots and flax during Lent. I call them pharisees and heretics in the other direction.

I say HOCNA is a cult, and there is credible accusations of sodomite molestation therein.

I refuse to do anything with any bishop who would commune with a cult like HOCNA.

I am extremely leery of people who think ROCOR (current head Met. Hilarion) is too liberal!

I don't think any Orthodox church should use or encourage the Tridentine and Anglican Mass and should use encourage the older Latin and other Western forms used by the ROCOR or the Milan Synod. But I don't condemn those who do either.

I call any anti-Western Rite person a phyletist and a heretic.

I think any bishop who abuses their spiritual children should be defrocked.

If my only options were a Coptic church, a novus ordo church and GOA church, I'd probably go with the Copts unless Pope Shenouda rewarded a pro-baby-killer politician

If only options were protestantism or novus ordoism, I'd just stay home.

On the last two...maybe I'd attend but not join. I don't know.

It's none of my business why a married couple doesn't have children or if they are using birth control. It is my business if an unmarried woman flaunts herself being pregnant to me.

I believe the Holy Spirit may be in the Church of Rome due to people like Padre Pio.

I insist on being agnostic on the grace of Catholic sacraments, orders. I can't help but feel agnostic regarding the AOANA and GOA.

I on occasion visit a RCC that does the Tridentine Mass to get my latin fix when I can't get to the Sarum Rite Orthodox parish in the state area.

I like "Traditional" Catholics.

I like alot of the people in the "Canonical" churches.

I like some of the people in the "True" churches.

I don't understand why ANYONE is still in the AOANA.

I'm not sympathetic to "cradles" who remain in heresy just because it's their "family parish". All of us converts "betrayed" our families to join the True faith. Just ask Nathan.

I was told if during Lent if your unorthodox host offers meat, and if you're not a vegetarian or a monk, you have to eat it so as not to offend the hospitality of your host. I follow that.

I refuse to scream "HERETIC" at the unorthodox if they have no idea what Orthodoxy is. I will at OCINO's though (Orthodox Christians In Name Only)

I believe it's possible to be True Orthodox without being a jerk.

And finally, the Trophy Wife HATES the "Super" Orthodox or "Imperial" Orthodox. They were SO RUDE to her on orthodoxchristianity.net

So folks. Where do I fit in best? ROCOR-MP? Milan? OCA? ROCOR-Agafangel? ROCA-Valentine? Bulgarian Archdiocese? You be the judge.

Nativity 2012

2012-01-06T10:45:00.000-08:00

Today is Nativity Eve on the Old Calendar. It is the time when Orthodox Christians celebrating the our Lord's birthday for over 2,000 years and still do today. There will be no hastle, no commercialism, and nobody beating you up to get to an Xbox.

Cristus natus est

I feel blah

2012-01-04T18:13:00.000-08:00

All I can think of today is how down and lethargic I feel. Anybody else in the Great Lakes region feel the same?

Not Again!!! Fight at Holy Sepulchre

2011-12-28T09:15:00.000-08:00

Some Christmas Traditions should go away. Like this one.

Aw cute -polar bear cub

2011-12-28T09:08:00.000-08:00

There's a new "Knut the Bear" and the world is falling in love with new born cub Siku.

It doesn't matter what the Pope says

2011-12-25T13:16:00.000-08:00

I didn't say it. That statement conjures up many images in ones mind when they see or hear that. It also has greater meaning depending on who said it. In this case it was said by a "catholic".

I had an interesting exchange this morning before the Christmas Mass. A "paid" roman protestant in the choir approached me while I was seated in my seat in the choir and asked if he could talk to me in private. He didn't like two things from night before.

For all the people reading this who aren't novus ordites (that is, post-Vatican 2 catholics) in the new mass there is a part (stolen from the Copts I discovered) called the "Sign of Peace". There aren't any actual instructions on what to do and when Abp John Nienstadt of St. Paul/Minneapolis was asked about it by an Orthodox cavemen up there, he said "It's...a matter of interpretation." Therefore catholics do things from shaking hands, to practically groping people near them. I don't ride that way. I would just do a slight bow since it's up to interpretation. I don't shake hands for two reasons: 1) I know most people don't wash their hands after going to bathroom or cough into their hands; and 2) They didn't do that before Vatican 2 and I didn't see where in Vatican 2 it says to do that. (If you see it let me know)

Now this roman protestant didn't like how I was humming last night when I did my usual slight bow in the loft because he thought it was "distracting" (Nevermind the "catholic" soprano who was hugging everyone near her). He said it was ok if I just want to bow like I was doing or not do anything at all but he didn't like how I was humming, and that was the only time I did that btw.

I was wondering how it was any of his business since I have only two people to answer to: the music director and the priest. But it got better, and all the real Catholics will get a kick out of this.

He asked me not to chastise people when they applaud in church. He went on about how he knows it's not in "my Tradition" (how would he know?!) and started going on with the usual "spirit of Vatican 2" idiocy that we're all accustomed to hearing. I turned him out and the point, put what I was holding into my bag, looked back up and said, "So the Pope's wrong?" He tried changing tack about how I'm a hired musician but I cut him off. "It's not my opinion it's the Pope's. And it's every Pope's before him." He replied "It doesn't matter the Pope says. Look, the people want to just show their appreciation for the choir and Father (Censored) doesn't have a problem with it. He can worry about. Now as a hired musician will you just do that?" "So the Pope's wrong?" "Will you do that?" "So the Pope's wrong?" "Will you do that?" *blank stare from me* "Yes."

He didn't see that he was contradicting his argument on several levels. First he was exposing himself as a heretic according to his own Church. The Pope is infallible and Christ on Earth. All must obey him. Vatican 1 makes that absolutely clear. Second, his logic was that "If the priest doesn't say anything and/or allows it, it's ok." Well the priest didn't say anything about me "humming" or chastising people for clapping in church. Therefore according to his own logic, it's ok. And following the logic, why was it any of his business? Continuing that logic, the priest never ever condemned bestiality, pedophilia or necrophilia either. Intelligent people would realize that it goes without saying those things are sick and evil, even if it weren't condemned in the Bible.

Was I surprised? No. What would I expect from a steer other than beef? Such attitudes are almost the status quo in the Church of Rome. They're called "Catholics in Name Only" or CINO's (chee nos). Well, it reminds us why we're not Catholic.

Fr. Augustine proves All Western Rites are useful

2011-12-23T19:34:00.000-08:00

Fr. Augustine along with Deacon Joseph get more respect from me every day. They tell it like it is and teach me something new every time I read their blogs. It's just too bad their message and that of the True Orthodox synods fall on deaf ears in the "Canonical" hierarchy. Here's some highlights:

"...The Western Orthodox uses don't appeal to me from an 'antiquarian' idea of being interested in liturgical development, etc, etc., or from a 'nostalgic' feeling of what was in the 1960s (if 'liturgical scholarship' has taught me anything, it is that the Tridentine Mass had reached a low state, only to followed much lower by the Roman Catholic Novus Ordo), but, they appeal to me because those were the prayers I was baptised with, or the priest used to baptise me, and the same to Chrismate me, and the same to give me Communion, and to hear my confession, and to give me the monastic habit, or to give me Holy Orders. It was all I knew, and the Eastern Liturgy was something I remembered from my heterodox past as something used by modernist/ecumenist World 'Orthodox', but, also, something I knew was widely used by the True Orthodox as well (though, since I rarely left the monastery, I had seen it only a few times since then, so, it became a very 'theoretical' subject for me)."

"...Years ago, a Russian bishop who had initially been very favourable to the Western rite, was turned off against it, because a priest made an horrible mess (which is to say things lightly). The Bishop came to the conclusion that no one was mature enough to do things properly, and that until the decades or centuries had passed when they were, they could then begin to do so. So, one priest messes things up, and the whole Western 'rite' is blamed? One priest proves to used a bad translation, is incompetent, is immoral, and destroys his congregation or people, or whatever, and the whole use is castigated as unable to attract people.

How many people were upset at Met. John because he was 'wasting' all his time translating these some odd 100 prefaces for the 'Sarum' Mass, as well as the other mass of material that took 30 years to put together (tropes, etc)? People also said, 'This is too complicated, no one is going to be attracted to it. We should just stick with a modified Tridentine Mass, and make a few modifications. That's all. No one is going to be interested in this Old Roman Usage. It's got to much variability, and is too dificult for people and priest to use."
Well, those critics have been silenced by the progress and force of history and experience. It didn't prove difficult, even though it had more variability than the Byzantine Liturgy. I think the same can be said for any opponents of the Hispanic Rite, or Gallican Use, or whatever. 'Let's just have these folks use the Sarum, because it's close enough to the Tridentine Mass, they'll only have to make a few modification. We had some bad priest years ago who messed up because he didn't do the Hispanic/Gallican/etc, properly. Therefore we know that it wont attract. Therefore, they must only use the SArum, and that must be the only one encouraged, because the Hispanic/Gallican, etc, is too complicated. It's got too much variability, and is too difficult for people and priest to use.'"

I'm under Met. Hilarion (ROCOR-MP) and I believe both he and Bishop Jerome are aware of all of this. It's going to take time to get it right, but we're on our way. I myself don't have the tones down yet. I was never taught them, but I'm working on them.

VSO's Christmas Wish 2011

2011-12-23T11:03:00.001-08:00

Even though I'll be observing it on the Julian Calendar (January 7 on the "normal" one) I'll be busy at that RC parish where I work. We're doing a latin chant Magnificat (part Proper Tone and part amalgamated choir) and an incomplete Schubert "Gloria" by which I mean it leaves out the following:

Dómine Deus, Agnus Dei, Fílius Patris,
qui tollis peccáta mundi, miserére nobis;
qui tollis peccáta mundi, súscipe deprecatiónem nostram.
Qui sedes ad déxteram Patris, miserére nobis.
Quóniam tu solus Sanctus, tu solus Dóminus, tu solus Altíssimus,
Iesu Christe, cum Sancto Spíritu: in glória Dei Patris. Amen.

In English means:

Lord God, Lamb of God, Son of the Father,
you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us;
you take away the sins of the world, receive our prayer.
you are seated at the right hand of the Father, have mercy on us.
For you alone are the Holy One, you alone are the Lord, you alone are the Most High, Jesus Christ, with the Holy Spirit, in the glory of God the Father. Amen

We're also doing some protestant crap. I'll never understand why Catholics try to be the very thing they're supposed to be against. I just don't even wonder about it anymore and try to do my job.

Anyway, to my Christmas wish:

Pastor vs. Iman

2011-12-22T11:28:00.000-08:00

I was clued into this. I'm surprised by how honest the Iman was about the religion of peace, and how they let the pastor talk uninterrupted for five minutes. Liberals never do that! Being Orthodox I consider both of these men heretics (it's just that the pastor is less heretical) but hey, when he's right he right! This is something sorely lacking in Official Orthodoxy ESPECIALLY the Greek patriarchates. I bet leaders of those said Greek churches will condemn the pastor and not the Iman who promised "more 9/11's".

St. Nicholas Day

2011-12-19T13:12:00.001-08:00

Today on the Old Calendar we observe the Feast of St. Nicholas the Wonder Worker...and chastiser of heretics. See Sophocles' entry here.

Christmas Caroling with Rowdy Roddy Piper

2011-12-19T13:02:00.000-08:00

The toughest fast

2011-12-18T15:47:00.000-08:00

Most unOrthodox think that Lent is tough because you have to go ONE DAY out of the week without eating meat. Pssh! Try going 60. The Orthodox know that there are many Lents throughout the year. The two toughest IMHO are Great Lent and Nativity. The longest is the former, the toughest to keep is the latter.

During Great Lent the unOrthodox have their menial half-assed attepmt at Lent, the extent of which is Filet o' fish on Friday. During that period I don't have unOrthodox offering me meat. Not so with Nativity Lent. During Nativity Lent there are numerous Holiday parties with a variety of fast inappropriate foods and I'm surrounded by unOrthodox who have no clue about Orthodoxy. They bring meat therefore I'm supposed to eat it, or try to stick to the vegetarian options...if there are any. That's why I have yet to go an entire Nativity Fast without meat. It's not till new Christmas when I'm left alone to prepare for the traditional Nativity date.

Video of Fr. Schmemann

2011-12-16T10:09:00.000-08:00

Fr. Alexander Schmemann was the highly influential and respected Dean of St. Vladimir's Orthodox Seminary until his death in 1983. This video is a very curious time capsule featuring many bishops and clergy and provides prophetic moments like watching WWII movies. I refer to two bishops who are interviewed who disgraced the Church with their cultures of corruption. One is banned from mention in this blog, the other almost ruined OCA. It's just chilling listening to these two speak of a great priest like Fr. Schmemann. But I digress, it's a half hour long but worth it.

Question of Ethics: How to deal with double parking

2011-12-16T09:24:00.000-08:00

I get very irritated, as I'm sure you do, when I see people taking up two parking spots. I don't mean with a semi or a winnebago, I mean with a Chevy Lumina. In some places parking is at a premium, and if you are like me, you follow the rules and occupy only one spot. You do so because it's not only the law, but courtesy.

The Trophy Wife knows a person who keys the cars she sees double-parked. We can't really condone that, but we sure do understand. Which reminds me of a "My Name is Earl" episode where Earl & friends are trying to resurrect a popular hot dog stand that Earl had stolen because he was paid by a chain-restaurant (specializing in hot dogs) paid him and a buddy to do so. For those who have never seen MNIE, Earl is a former nogoodnik who after winning the lottery and getting ran over by an old granny has an epiphany: that karma has repaid him for all his evil. Therefore he makes a list of all the bad things he's done and tries to make amends for all of them. First Earl does all the usual legal and civil means of dealing with the chain manager-Earl doesn't go to the cops because it'd mean he'd go back to jail...again- even infiltrates the company HQ and talks to the CEO about it, only to get told that sometimes in business they have to do shady things. So Earl sees that the only way to combat crooks is by out crooking them, and reassembles his gang to steal stuff from the HQ. The plan backfired and long story short Earl's exwife plants severed toe in her current husband's hot dog (unbeknownst to him) and they use the settlement money to rebuild the old hot dog stand. But that's not the point.

So how to combat double-parkers? The cops are never around, and will have better things to do. It's not right to damage the property of another, unless it's necessary to save their life or such. You know as well as I do that we have to do things in our jobs that aren't very Orthodox. Things to keep us ahead of our competition, and to keep us employed. Yet when I came home last night, someone was double-parked in the parking lot. There were plenty of other spots available so I took one. But I looked at that rusty piece of junk and thought about keying it, but it wouldn't show much since the owner obviously hit someone. Then I thought about taking my sledgehammer to it like Alex Karras in "Porky's" and leaving a note saying "Next time don't double park." It was dark and 9:30pm, so the likelihood of me getting caught was low. But God was watching. Can two wrongs make a right?

No I didn't hit the car.

VSO on Western Rite haters

2011-12-15T10:55:00.000-08:00

Hello True Believers. As you may know from reading this blog, I am a big supporter of not only Orthodoxy but Western Orthodoxy. I support Western Orthodox because 1) I am Orthodox and 2) I am Western. Being of European descent I hold dear to me Saints like Patrick, Bridgid, Martin, Boniface, Kevin, Finbar, Cuthbert, Aidan, Augustine of Canterbury, Gregory the Great and Benedict etc. My ancestors were likely converted to the Faith by these people or other Orthodox saints of the time. These people were Orthodox Christians of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Faith. Therefore I support and prefer the methods of prayer and worship they use, to which I mean the Western Rites. My attitude is shared by Saints Patriarch Tikhon who wanted to evangelize America with Western Rites and John of Shanghai and San Francisco who not only served the Gallican Litugy on occasion but shepherded Western Orthodoxy along with his native Russian Orthodoxy, ergo a patron saint of both.

Which is why I get really irritated and PO'ed by some people in the Church who look down their nose at Western Orthodoxy. There are many whom I can't name right now but one person in particular I'd like to discuss is Bishop Peter of ROCOR which ironically has now the largest Western Rite Vicarite, with Antioch second (and Milan also a great supporter though not in communion with the two formers). I've never met him, but by reputation is not a nice man. I'm referring to him specifically because he's the only one I can name right now. I'm sure there are others, even on the ROCOR Synod, but this goes for ALL WR haters out there.

Bishop Peter (like these other people whose names escape me) doesn't want you to use the Western Rites. Not the Latin Rite, not the Sarum Rite, not the Hispanic Rite, not any of them. He believes that the Byzantine Rite is the only valid one and that ALL Orthodox Christians must use only it. He considers Western Orthodoxy inferior and "obsolete" and "unnecessary" and the usual lame, petty accusations. He is one of those bishops who believe themselves to be on pedastal high above the people he rules, in other words a mini-emperor, which has been far too frequent in recent years.

But the excrement storm came when Abp. Hilarion was elected First Hierarch of ROCOR. Before his election he was the Episcopal Vicar of ROCOR WVR in addition to being Archbishop of Australia and New Zealand, and after his election made it an official part of the office he now holds thus making all Western Rite parishes and monstaries "Stavropeglial" meaning they are all under his protection.(AXIOS! AD MULTOS ANNOS!) He along with Bishop Jerome of Manhattan govern the WRV and want to see it grow, and what bishop wouldn't? Bishop Peter among others that's who. The Fraternity of St Gregory joined ROCOR, thus making it the largest WRV. But it also brought in parishes and clergy under "Bishop Peter's" territory which didn't please him the least. Then Met. Hilarion and Bishop Jerome decided to ordain a former Catholic monk then Anglican clergyman to the Orthodox priesthood (he had been an Orthodox Christian for eight years by this point) and turned his home into an Oratory in St. Paul, MN.

This bit of news sent Bishop Peter to the moon. He wasn't consulted because it's none of his business, it's the Metropolitan's. He tried to block it but couldn't because he can't give the Metropolitan and the Synod orders (other way around). So in a big episcopal style hissy fit, he forbade all the WRV clergy from celebrating in "his" churches.

Well Vladyka Peter and all other Western Rite haters, I'm a supporter of the WRV as are Bishop Jerome and Met. Hilarion (who presides over the Synod of which you are a member FYI) and alot of other Orthodox Christians are WRV supporters too, like Met. Isaiah of GOA, and the AOANA. And we don't particularly care to have people, especially in hierarchal positions looking down their nose at us and our Traditions-all of which are older than the Russian Church! And how ironic that a former college history professor doesn't know his history. Since when has there been uniformity in Rites and Feast days? We have every right to worship in Orthodox Liturgies written by Western Saints without your harassment and interference. In my book, insistence that only the Byzantine Liturgy be used is the heresy of phyletism. If the Non-Chalcedonians and/or Catholics were to return, would you really demand that the use only the Byzantine Liturgy you use? The Western Hours and Liturgies are older than YOURS!

If you were ever elected Metropolitan would you really disband the WRV? To do so would be a sin and a heresy, and make you a spiritual descendant of Catholic archbishop John Ireland who drove St. Alexis Toth and his faithful into our arms. Ireland's reasons are the same as yours: he looked down Eastern Rite the way you do ours. Forbidding ROCOR clergy from "your" churches is in my book a schismatic act. For shame.I thank God for men like Met. Hilarion, Isaiah, Bishop Jerome and the bishops of the AOANA! Even that one excommunicated from this blog supports the WRV! I don't insult your Rite, don't insult mine!

I get really sick and tired having to remind everyone of what St. John of Shanghai and San Francisco said: "Never, never, never let anyone tell you that, in order to be Orthodox, you must also be Eastern. The West was Orthodox for a thousand years, and her venerable liturgy is far older than any of Her heresies.”

I'm VSO, and that's my opinion

How I deal with "opinions"

2011-12-15T10:28:00.000-08:00

My good buddy and fellow Orthodox Caveman Nathan just reminded me why I stay anonymous: the same reason Bruce Wayne dresses up like a bat. He shares a recent internet exchange with a "Orthodox" who took issue with something he wrote. Hey, it's HIS BLOG!

I have "The Code of the Catacombs" for a reason: I have neither the time nor the patience to argue, reason or validate what I think. I work for a living unlike those "occupiers" therefore I have only so much time to write my thoughts. I do it to share information on things I like (beer, martial arts, celtic stuff and ESPECIALLY Western Orthodoxy) and things I hate (leftism, statism, church politics and corruption etc). This blog is about what I think.
No one is forcing you to read it. Comment or don't. I don't care.

As for Nathan's detractors who are trying to "save" him from True Orthodoxy, calling him names and accusing him of things only reminds him why he and his family left, AND I AGREE WITH THEIR REASONS! Trying "saving" your own church first from the men who are corrupting it (Black Bart et al) before throwing stones at his.

What really going on in Syria?

2011-12-14T13:17:00.000-08:00

This is old news but what the filioque? Wanting to see if the Media is providing an accurate portrayal of things in Syria, an AOANA delegation went there to see for themselves.

Sure they could've been shown a "Potemkin Village" type of propaganda, but Fr. Reardon wrote what he saw, and said he felt safer there than in Detroit. You be the judge.

The Christmas Grinch Revisited by Burt Prelutsky

2011-12-14T12:57:00.000-08:00

Nothing I have ever written has provoked as huge a response as a piece I wrote some years ago called "The Jewish Grinch That Stole Christmas."

In the article, which brought me roughly 10 times as much e-mail as I'm accustomed to receiving, I suggested that my fellow secular Jews (aka atheists and agnostics) were at the forefront in waging war on the values and traditions of Christian Americans.

Predictably enough, the response from gentiles was uniformly positive. The feedback from Jews was somewhat less favorable, roughly split between those who admired my courage while questioning the legitimacy of my birth and those who accused me of being a turncoat. What I found most telling was that those who damned me didn't, as a rule, refute what I had written; they were merely angry that a Jew had written the piece. They accused me of lending aid and comfort to bigots.

Because I make it a rule to write back to anyone who writes me, and because I assume that those who took the time and trouble to write were representative of many more who didn't, I'd like to share some of my responses.

The term that nearly every Jew used in condemning me was "a self-hating anti-Semite." A few accused me of not really being a Jew. That didn't mean they thought I was a Catholic or a Baptist flying under false colors; no, they meant that my sole claim to being Jewish was that my ancestors were Jewish. The fact is they're right.

As I have written on other occasions, I am not a religious man. I do not keep kosher. I do not help make up the morning minyan at the local synagogue. I do not even attend High Holiday services. So what? I'm Jewish because I say I'm Jewish. And because, quite frankly, with my face, who would believe me if I bothered to deny it? Furthermore, most Jews in America are not orthodox and cannot read Hebrew or even speak Yiddish. For the most part, American Jews are circumcised, have a bar mitzvah, attend a reformed or conservative temple once or twice a year, frequent delis and Chinese restaurants, and vote the straight Democratic ticket.

Also, I say I'm Jewish because I don't wish to offend the memory of my parents by denying their religion and the religion of their parents.

Finally, I say I'm Jewish because Hitler would have said I was Jewish, and then sent me off to Auschwitz, if I hadn't been fortunate enough to have been born in America.

That was my whole point. I was lucky to have been born to a Jewish family in a Christian nation. It was, in the main, Christian soldiers who liberated the Nazi death camps. Even if I'm not as Jewish as some of my critics would like, I still believe it behooves us to be openly grateful to our Christian neighbors – not because we fear future pogroms – but because it's the decent thing to do.

One of the very few points for which I was specifically taken to task was for referring to America as a Christian nation. To those people, I pointed out that I wasn't claiming this nation is a theocracy, but Christians of one denomination or another compose nearly 90 percent of America's population. That is 10 percent higher than the percentage of Jews in Israel, but I am willing to wager that none of my critics would deny that Israel is a Jewish state.

As one of my respondents put it, "An anti-Semite used to be someone who hated Jews, but it's become someone whom Jews hate." The problem with that truism is that Jews, in the great majority, don't hate gentiles. Sometimes it just seems that way. In fact, most of us are well aware that Israel has no more devoted allies in the world than America's most devout Christians. What's more, the reason that atheists and agnostics are able to wage their anti-religious crusade is because they can safely do so, and the only reason they can is because millions of Christians fought and died to protect this freedom. Unfortunately, as happens, for instance, when freedom of speech leads to obscenity and pornography, this precious freedom has been corrupted and turned into a license to bully Christians.

Sadly, as is so often the case with black Americans, those who are high-profile and get most of the media attention are the knee-jerk radicals and the anything-for-a-buck rabble-rousers.

When my critics accused me of promoting anti-Semitism, I pleaded not guilty. I asked them if they thought that gentiles were so stupid that, until I wrote my piece, they didn't recognize that there is a secular jihad under way in this country to remove Christ from Christmas, which, by the way, happens to be a national holiday, unlike Hanukkah, Kwanzaa and my birthday.

Finally, the problem is that if Christians complain that a minority is trying to bully the majority, they stand condemned as bigots. If I, a Jew, suggest that Christians should be free to celebrate one of their holier holidays in any fashion they like, and not have to feel guilty about it, I'm accused of being a self-hating anti-Semite. In short, nobody is allowed to be critical of Jews. Well, it so happens that while we Jews may be the Chosen People, that doesn't make us the perfect people. And, believe me, I'm not just talking about my relatives.

Many of us, Jews and Christians alike, have been annoyed with American Muslims because they seem to spend an inordinate amount of time whining about racial profiling, instead of condemning the worldwide butchery committed by jihadists in the name of their religion. Well, to me, the silence of American Jews when it comes to Christian-bashing has been equally deafening.

Frankly, I'm relieved that Lincoln Chafee, the oafish governor of Rhode Island, a proponent of same-sex marriage, who recently declared that Rhode Island Christmas trees would be called holiday trees, is an Episcopalian. It's bad enough that we Jews are stuck with the likes of Henry Waxman, Barbara Boxer, Bernie Sanders, Brad Sherman and Debbie Wasserman-Schultz.

What truly astonishes me is the patience and good grace with which Christians have dealt with this attack on so many things they hold sacred.

It is, I think, a tribute to their religion.

Rep. Kelly tells it like it is

2011-12-14T12:54:00.000-08:00

AMEN!!!!

Auxiliary Bishop, Archbishop or both?

2011-12-13T12:29:00.000-08:00

I was alerted to the news of the Antiochian church in a addition to consecrating three more glorified priests to serve an anathematized hierarch (from this blog anyway, and all mentions of said person will be promptly deleted) that Bishop Joseph was made an "Archbishop" while still an auxiliary. Or is he?

I'm not saying that he isn't worthy of such a title and honor, he is. He WAS after all the Enthroned, ruling Diocean Bishop of the AOANA's Western Diocese (and said to be a fine one to boot) that is until he was unceremoniously and uncanonically therefore illegally stripped of his Diocese along with the others (then again he did sign it over unlike Bishops Mark, Basil and Alexander).

The title "Archbishop" implies that he rules an ARCHDIOCESE. He however does not. It has been made clear that someone else alone rules America. So my question is: How can he be an Archbishop when he is an auxiliary? Is this more double-speak from Syria? Why not elevate Bishops Basil and Antoun to that title as well if there is indeed precedent for an Archbishop to be also an auxiliary?

This is making my head hurt.

Bigots vandalize Skete in Poland

2011-12-10T15:38:00.000-08:00

Get the story here.

I guess I should pray for whoever did this?

Fr. Augustine explains a Dry Mass

2011-12-10T09:31:00.000-08:00

Read his article here.

Fr. Augustine compares English and Hispanic Western Rites

2011-12-10T09:28:00.000-08:00

You can read his article here.

Teaching Latin to Catholics

2011-12-09T11:41:00.000-08:00

Judging by that title alone, you'd think it an oxymoron like teaching Greek to Greeks. But this is the novus ordo church we're talking about and specifically the one where I work. I try to keep the kvetching to a minimum and follow the advice of St. Isaac of Syria and other Desert Fathers to take it in stride, but boy does singing for novus ordites present challenges to one with Orthodox formation like me.

I really do look forward to the day when I can quit that job. It has never been fun. To think I spent all those years and thousands of dollars in the voice studio and University only to get paired up with no-talent rank-amateur hacks who never had a singing lesson and underemployed. Every week I count the heresies and abuses and keep telling myself "I just work here." But you know, everytime I think it can't get any worse, it does.

For Christmas were doing a bunch of pieces before the Mass begins. One is some Gospel number acapella that makes you imagine James Brown in that scene from the Blues Brothers. I said to my fellow proessionally trained section member, "OK so WHY can't we ever do chant acapella?" Which brings us to my next point.

We're also doing a Schubert "Gloria" but not for the actual "Gloria" even though it's considerably shorter than the English one we're actually doing. Then again the version we have is incomplete. The long and short of it is these fellas are trying to tell me that there is no "Oh" sound in Church Latin so it'd be "Glaria" instead of "Gloria".

I refer you to Pope Pius XII

and to another performance of the "Gloria". I hear "Oh"!

Lord GET ME OUT OF HERE!!!

Back on the set

2011-12-06T11:26:00.000-08:00

I do miss being on the set, and being paid for it. Not too many opportunities since the Depression hit Hollyweird. Well this time I'm in a regional commercial along with other football fans in an outdoor stadium. Got paid a whole day for half day's work.

I don't miss freezing.

Celestial Hierachies and List of Archangels

2011-12-03T14:24:00.000-08:00

Here is a link to Celestial Hierarchies by Dionysius the Aeropagite.

I also saw this on line and had to include it. I never knew the other Archangels.

In Orthodox Tradition, we know (at least) that the Seven Spirits before the Throne of God (Revelation), are the Seven Archangels. We also know that they are seraph; actually they are the leaders of the seraph (who are more than seven). The Seven Archangels should not be mistaken for the rank of Archangels which is immediately above the rank of Guardian Angels. I'll quote below the role of the Seven Archangels:

"Michael in the Hebrew language means "Who is like unto God?" or "Who is equal to God?" St. Michael has been depicted from earliest Christian times as a commander, who holds in his right hand a spear with which he attacks Lucifer/Satan, and in his left hand a green palm branch. At the top of the spear there is a linen ribbon with a red cross. The Archangel Michael is especially considered to be the Guardian of the Orthodox Faith and a fighter against heresies.

Gabriel means "Man of God" or "Might of God." He is the herald of the mysteries of God, especially the Incarnation of God and all other mysteries related to it. He is depicted as follows: In his right hand, he holds a lantern with a lighted taper inside, and in his left hand, a mirror of green jasper. The mirror signifies the wisdom of God as a hidden mystery.

Raphael means "God's healing" or "God the Healer" (Tobit 3:17, 12:15). Raphael is depicted leading Tobit (who is carrying a fish caught in the Tigris) with his right hand, and holding a physician's alabaster jar in his left hand.

Uriel means "Fire of God," or "Light of God" (III Esdras 3:1, 5:20). He is depicted holding a sword against the Persians in his right hand, and a flame in his left.

Sealtiel means "Intercessor of God" (III Esdras 5:16). He is depicted with his face and eyes lowered, holding his hands on his bosom in prayer.

Jegudiel means "Glorifier of God." He is depicted bearing a golden wreath in his right hand and a triple-thonged whip in his left hand.

Barachiel means "Blessing of God." He is depicted holding a white rose in his hand against his breast."

There is a wonderful book called 'The Holy Angels" by Mother Alexandra (queen Ileana of Romania). Haven't read it yet, but it is a very comprehensive Orthodox book in the realm of Angelology.

My Jewish friends are going to hate this

2011-12-02T15:43:00.000-08:00

Meet Brother Nathaniel of ROCOR, a former jew now Orthodox Monk. His website is http://brothernathanaelfoundation.org/ and his other is http://www.realzionistnews.com/?p=516. Look at his other youtube videos. This creates a dilemma for me on who to believe. I applaud his zeal for Orthodoxy and glad that he accepted the True Faith, on the other hand he is raging against his former religion...then again so do most Orthodox converts. I can just imagine the hate mail he gets.

You be the judge.

Muppet song from Porn?!

2011-12-02T12:51:00.001-08:00

When I think "Muppets" and "porn" in the same sentence I immediately think of this guy called "Trekkie Monster".

But apparently Jim Henson, or someone who worked with Jim Henson watched porn and decided to use that tune. Wow. Then again everything on HBO is porn.

Newt Gingrich: Serial Hypocrisy

2011-12-02T09:58:00.000-08:00

VSO endorses Ron Paul. He is the only true Constitutionalist, Conservative and the only one who would bring real change. The DC elite know this which is why they want him out.

How do you spell "chutzpah'?

2011-12-01T09:58:00.000-08:00

"Someone needs to pay for all my kids...Someone needs to be held accountable."

15 kids by 3 men. No husband. *sigh* Just watch

Orthodox Celts

2011-12-01T09:38:00.000-08:00

I don't mean Saints Patrick, Brigid, Kevin, Cronan, Kiernan and yours truly (though I'm also german by descent). This group is from Belgrade, Serbia and perform Celtic music.

Adam Corolla Assess the OWS

2011-12-01T09:28:00.000-08:00

I've been trying to get rid of the profanity since I have clergy regularly reading this crappy blog. My Spiritual Father keeps reminding me that profanity is unbecoming of an Orthodox Christian for we receive our Lord in the form of bread and wine in our mouth, and one should not defile it with language. Then again, what do you call an Irish person who doesn't swear? A mute.

Former "Manshow" co-host and co-creator Adam Corolla sums up the OWS movement and what led to it and what is destroying America. WARNING HARSH LANGUAGE ALERT!!!! WARNING PROFANITY ALERT!!!!

St. John the Wonderworker Orthodox Church-IA

2011-11-30T18:56:00.000-08:00

A reader asked me where the Gallican Rite parish in Iowa is. It is here:

St. John the Wonderworker Orthodox Church- Des Moines, Iowa

I SO look forward to participating in the Divine Liturgy of St. Germanus of Paris someday and seeing either Vladykas Hilarion or Jerome there. God grant them many years!

I want this shirt!

2011-11-30T18:40:00.000-08:00

http://www.cafepress.com/+kickin_it_old_school_jersey,85304294

Football rivalries or How to hold a grudge

2011-11-30T13:48:00.001-08:00

Former Canadian Football League players, Joe Kapp (former B.C. Lions' and also Minnesota Vikings quarterback, actor, Cal head coach and B.C. GM) and
Angelo Mosca (former Hamilton Tiger-Cats' defensive tackle and professional wrestler) got into a fight (both 73 years of age). Walking cane was swung and then came punches and more at the CFL Alumni Legends Luncheon in Vancouver on Friday, Nov. 25, just days before the Grey Cup. Apparently the feud started when Mosca made a questionable hit on Kapp and 50 years later they still haven't forgotten or forgiven.

Tim Tebow: picked on or overrated?

2011-11-30T13:33:00.000-08:00

Hello True Believers, I'm going to comment on something I usually don't care about: football. My friend/boss and I were out doing our thing at bars and he writes for a Fantasy Football magazine so he was chatting up with a manager at one location who is into fantasy football. The TV was and they were watching ESPN while we were working and the subject of Tim Tebow came up. I only knew of him from College Football and him being an Evangelical. I asked what was wrong with Tim Tebow.

They said that he's an awful quarterback, rather "a fullback posing as a quarterback". They said he can run very well but can't throw. He doesn't have an arm like Brett Favre, heck he doesn't even have an arm like Tavaris Jackson. On top on that the offense is collegiate style and "wildcat". The worst according to them is that Denver keeps winning due to their coach and the Defensive line. His stats at the last game were 9 for 18 attempts, which is BAD. They also said he prays after every single play, and that if he was black nobody would care about him. The manager also doesn't believe Tim Tebow is a virgin, due to him having been the star at a football college and would've had co-eds throwing themselves after him, and college girls have as much resistance to sex as the French do to military invasions.

So is Tim Tebow over-rated or just being picked on? Denver plays Minnesota this weekend. I may have to watch and see.

Advent Fast-What and how in the West

2011-11-26T16:15:00.000-08:00

Here's the scoop from a blog I just discovered and started to follow: western-orthodox.info Catholics and Protestants wont like the blog, but it is an Orthodox blog after all, as is this one.

Archbishop vist...on invitation of Muslims?

2011-11-25T20:06:00.000-08:00

I was alerted to news from this parish regarding a visit of His Eminence Theodosius Hanna, Archbishop of Sebaste. Sounds good right? What could be wrong about that? Well, look at why he's going to be there.

Our church will be privileged to host Theodosius (Atallah) Hanna, Archbishop of Sebaste. The highly respected Archbishop will serve the Arabic Liturgy, Thursday, December 1, 6:30 PM. He speaks English and we will ask that he give the sermon in English. I encourage all our members to be present for this service. The Archbishop has been invited by the Muslim community in the Twin Cities to speak on Christians in the Holy Land. His invitation was made by the American Muslims for Palestine.

The last bishop from the Middle East to be a guest there was Patriarch Ignatius of the Greek Antiochian Church (as opposed to the Non-Chalcedonian Church and the Catholics). Only he was invited to the Twin Cities by St. John's University, a Catholic (at least in name) University best known for all-time wins leader for a football coach in any division John Gagliardi. The University wanted to thank Pat. Ignatius for his helping them acquire ancient documents in muslim controlled lands. Which brings us to the reason for Abp. Theodosius going there.

Unless you've been living under a rock, or getting all of your information from the mainscream, drive-by liberal media; the plight of Christians under the religion of peace has been like that of a battered wife. Therefore an Orthodox bishop being invited by a muslim group makes me question the motives.

A search of the AMP led to their official website with their mission statement: "The mission of the American Muslims for Palestine is to educate the public about the just cause of Palestine and the rights of self-determination, liberty and justice. Through providing information, training and networking with like-minded individuals and organizations that support peace, AMP will raise awareness of the issues pertaining to Palestine and its rich cultural heritage." As of Friday, November 25 the main page shows Abp. Theodosius himself speaking at an AMP event in Chicago! From AMP website,

"Archbishop Hanna, who earlier had spoken about Christian and Muslims unity in Palestine, returned to the podium at the end of the ceremony to give a special gift to AMP and his co-speakers. Unfurling panoramic photographs of Jerusalem that included Al Aqsa mosque compound and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the Archbishop said, 'This is a gift from the people of Palestine to those who dedicate their lives to the cause of Palestine in the United States.'

But wait there's more! The Anti-Defemation League, a known left-wing watchdog group that criticizes anything they consider anti-semitic (whether real or perceived to be real) has a report on them, to which AMP has a response.

So what else would we expect from "Zionist infidels"? Well here's another report that demonstrates the true intentions of the AMP and it's ties to Hamas, a terrorist group. Here's another. Naturally all the muslim media speak highly of the AMP, and CAIR and Hamas, and the Muslim wing of the Nazi party the Muslim Brotherhood.

But wait there's more! Abp. Theodosius also had a problem with the Pope visiting Jerusalem
. something about appeasing Jews.

I wish I could say that I was shocked that an Orthodox hierarch would endorse such a group, but this reminds me why I left the Antiochian "Orthodox" Church. It is run but not only useful idiots, but a bunch of corrupt money-grubbing dhimmis. Now I do not endorse Israel. They are a socialist state that redistributes wealth. They can fight their own battles. The true Israel is the Orthodox Church, that is the official Church teaching if I'm not mistaken. However when you dance with Mohammed, Mohammed leads. These people are appeasers, and appeasers are those who push their friends in the path of a crocodile hoping that it eat will them last. "First the Saturday people, then the Sunday people." Asking muslims to fight oppression and bigotry is like asking the same of Nazis.

You can tell the parish what you think about it at info@saintgeorge-church.org. I guarantee complaining to Englewood will avail you nothing. Or if you will be in the area you can tell them in person.

In unrealted news, I see that the parish has four priests, including Fr. Paul Hodge who was the pastor of the parish in Sioux City, Iowa until he bankrupted it, hence his no longer being there. Sure there's problems in every church, but World Orthodoxy seems to have the lion's share of it among the Orthodox. Anybody still wonder why I left for ROCOR and why the Lewis' left for True Orthodox bishops?

Lord Have Mercy

My Thanksgiving 2011

2011-11-25T12:01:00.001-08:00

With the Trophy Wife at her mother's, and with us having no children yet; and with my family being full of adulteress', fornicators, and dysfunctional abusive heretics; and with me having no money; I stayed home.

I had peace and quiet. I watched the Dog Show (the winner was an English Terrier I think) being a great lover of mans best friend. Which is one of thousands of reason I hate the religion of peace: no dogs. I wish I knew what to look for in each breed. I'll need to study up on that.

I practiced my guitar with this:

Practiced some kata:

I started with Kobayashi Shorin Ryu (pronounced "sure in roo")but now am Matsubayashi Shorin Ryu which what so see here. Ok I'll show you the Kobayashi version of this kata:

and I made myself a Hormel turkey dinner with some mashed potatoes, stuffing, carrots and corn. I haven't bottled my beer yet.

Fellow Orthodox Caveman "Steve the Builder" went to a casino to eat. You know Casinos have GREAT food as part of the attraction for people to sin away their money. Gambling is a sin. But is it a sin just to eat at a casino? I would never take a bishop to a casino (that'd be stupid) but I've gone to eat and watch shows which how I know they have GREAT food. I am a sinner just like everyone else, so am I committing a sin when I go to a casino to eat or watch a show? Hmmmmmmmm. I'll have to ask my Spiritual Father about that one.

Now what am I going to eat tonight being it's Friday and therefore no meat?

MP Orthodox/Catholic dialogue yada yada

2011-11-25T11:28:00.000-08:00

Once again the Moscow Church and the Rome Church are talking about talking again. It's the usual Rome talking to Official Orthodoxy with all the usual empty but polite platitudes. These kinds of "talks" always leaving wonder.

I wonder why Pope Benedict will allow heretics to openly pray to their false gods in Catholic Cathedrals (like recently at Assisi) -ok maybe he wasn't aware of what that shaman was doing and/or was not trying to create "a scene" and later wondered why that happened. I've remained silent on things I've seen in Orthodox parishes that I knew were inappropriate too. Like I wonder why so-called "Orthodox" christians talk loudly in the Sanctuary. Anyway back to my point-will sing the praises of Christ deniers and meet with "Official" Orthodox hierarchs like Black Bart and Pat. Kirill but not with... You know I was going to say with Old Calendarist hierarchs but then I just remembered that most of them wont on the grounds that he leads a Church that has core teachings antithetical to Orthodoxy and will only meet with him if he wants to repent. I realize now that this paragraph makes no sense.

I just saw at Josephus' blog how one commenter wishes for a speedy return of Rome to the fold. I mean no disrepect to my Catholic Cavebuddies and Rad Trad friends, but the question I posed was: "Why would I want that?" Why would I want that protestant mass known as Novus Ordo, that terrible music of Haugen and Haas, and all the sacrilege that came with it (applause, altar girls, lay ministers, stadium masses, etc) and the heresies of ecumenism all in the name of "getting along" not to forget all the other things we condemn (Papal Supremacy, Infallibility, the sinlessness of Mary) IN MY CHURCH?

Really. I am an Orthodox Christian because am what the first Christians were. I believe what the first Christians believed. I DO NOT have the right to change anything, and in the Orthodox Church we only change things when WE ALL AGREE to change things. I've already commented about this "Unity" topic here. I DON'T WANT THAT STUFF IN MY CHURCH! Neither do my Catholic Cavebuddies, some of whom have had enough and fled to the SSPX and I DON'T BLAME THEM! I've sung for a Catholic parish for five years now and every time I'm there I feel nothing but pity for them. This mentality is starting to take root in World Orthodoxy too as evidenced by Black Bart, the Moscow Church and their participation in the pan-heretical World Council of Churches.

I think we could work out something with the SSPX, on the other hand they're not known for being nice, and are known for harboring conspiracy theorists. Then again, so have some of us. At least in SSPX chapels and other parishes with the TLM they look, sound and act like us.

Nevertheless, what kind of communion would we be joining?

Happy Thanksgiving 2011

2011-11-23T18:30:00.000-08:00

To all those reading this, have a Happy Thanksgiving

Keeping Tabs on OWS

2011-11-18T09:46:00.000-08:00

And while we're at it let's expose them. Aaron Klein is doing just that at Expose Occupy

These FLEA baggers are truly class acts as the site will demonstrate.

Tea Party-Hell OWS-"That's Life"

2011-11-17T13:09:00.000-08:00

This should clearly demonstrate the level of moral confusion in so many liberals, but Maxine Waters in particular.

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) thinks the Tea Party can go "straight to Hell." But when asked about the crime and violence at Occupy Wall Street camps, she said, “that’s life and it happens.”

“That’s a distraction from the goals of the protesters," she told CNS News.

“Let me just say this," she said, adding, "Anytime you have a gathering, homeless people are going to show up."

“They will find some comfort in having some other people out on the streets with them. They’re looking for food. Often times, the criminal element will invade. That’s life and it happens, whether it’s with protesters or other efforts that go on in this country."

Is this woman serious?! Yes she is. Read on.

But those types of activities do not take place at Tea Party rallies.

In early October, Tea Party activist Deneen Borelli wrote on the comparison.

"Doing a Google search of “tea party activist” and “arrest” brings up nothing of merit," she wrote. "On the first page, I found three articles about people described as tea party activists, but the arrests were unrelated to rallies."

She added:

And I want to make this extra clear:

Another article, about the demonstrations outside the U.S. Capitol Building on the weekend of the Obamacare vote in the House, reports one man — one single person — was detained after being accused of spitting on a congressman. But that person was immediately released, and no one has come forward to legitimize the claim and collect conservative Andrew Breitbart’s $100,000 reward for providing proof.

I googled "tea party rape" and "tea party murder" and basically got only stuff about false accusations against the Tea Party and rebuttals, and redirections to the Occutards and their REAL crimes. Next I googled "occupy wall street anti-semitism" and came up with ALOT of legit CAUGHT ON CAMERA calls for another 9/11, wiping out the Jews and what have, and some liberal at the Auburn Journal trying a lame attempt to deny it.

"Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter." Isaias (Isaiah) 5:20

Support Military Families...

2011-11-17T09:47:00.000-08:00

...by drinking beer. I haven't tasted it yet, but there is a new Brewery called Founding Fathers Brewing Co. whose donates half of it's profits to Military families. I can't think of a better reason to drink than charity.

Pope Shenouda-40 years

2011-11-16T09:09:00.000-08:00

This is a Coptic friendly blog, even though they're not in Communion with me. Congratulations to Pope Shenouda on the 40th Anniversary of his Pontificate.

My thoughts exactly on Western Orthodoxy

2011-11-13T19:38:00.000-08:00

Deacon Joseph shares his thoughts on Western Orthodoxy, and I had the same ones.

St. Martin of Tours and todays Veterans

2011-11-11T12:07:00.000-08:00

Thank you Veterans living and dead, including you saints.

My personal address to Occutards

2011-11-10T19:55:00.000-08:00

At first I was taken by the irony of these trustfund babies, professional malcontents and Obama youth protesting capitalism with their smart phones and laptops. I'm not the only one who noticed the irony either and normally mild-mannered people are getting quite fed up with these disease spreading, raping, murdering malcontents who never learned that in life they keep score and you don't get an award just for showing up.

So I'd like to address all you Occutards, speaking for me will be Eric Cartman.

PROFANITY ALERT! HARSH LANGUAGE ALERT!

RIP OCANews.org

2011-11-09T09:41:00.000-08:00

OCANews.org editor and Met. Jonah Derangement syndrome sufferer Mark Stokoe has announced that he is shutting down citing Ecclesiastes that it has run it's course. Also likely because Bishop Matthias has ordered him to do so.

On one hand he was instrumental in bringing to light the scandals of both OCA and the AOANA, and all True Believers owe him gratitude. On the other he turned it into a jihad against Met. Jonah because the Metropolitan publicly reiterated God's laws about sodomy, which Stokoe didn't like because it deals with him. His stance was "it isn't a sin and sick and immoral if I say it isn't" and called for "dialogue". There can be no dialogue regarding sin, there can only be debate. God's laws are not up for either discussion or debate. It was around this point where he lost credibility with me and many others, but he kept up his attacks on Met. Jonah nonetheless. They ended when one of Bishop Matthias' first acts was silencing him (he also moved his own son into the pastorship of a large church just because he could thus angering the people there, as well as some other jerk moves. But that's another story).

So I guess what I'm saying is, "Thank you Mr. Stokoe for exposing the corruption in World Orthodoxy. Don't let the door hit ya where God split ya."

Homebrewing Demonstration

2011-11-05T11:01:00.000-07:00

Hello True Believers! As those who read this sucky blog know I'm a beer nut. I'm also am a homebrewer who belongs to the Homebrewing association in my state. Our group has different types, so yes I have to deal with liberals, but politics are rarely discussed and then it's only about beer "So VSO," you ask. "How do you do it?" Well my friend here is one helpful video to get you started. You really don't need much equipment. I myself still use malt extracts because it's easier, shorter, and nobody can really tell the difference between beers made from extracts or all-grain. If I can do it in our tiny apartment with an electric range over, so can you. Wine is even easier to make! So is cider. If you can make Kool-Aid, you can make wine with kits. Now making it all from scratch involves alot more steps. Here is the video:

Catholic-Orthodox dialogue blah blah blah

2011-11-04T09:59:00.000-07:00

H/T to Josephus Flavius

My Catholic Cavebuddies usually have as many good things to say about the USCCB as I do Black Bart and the other pseudodox for the same reasons. Well they're meeting again over the usual things much ado about nothing, and will produce the usual much outcry with no outcome. Well, this time they agree that Christians in the Middle East getting slaughtered by the religion of peace is bad, but no ideas on what to do about it.

Read it here.

I see it's almost nothing but GOA representing "us". Here's an idea: next time replace all these lukewarm OCINOs with Met Hilarion and Bishop Jerome of ROCOR and other ROCOR clergy ESPECIALLY from the Western Rite Vicarite, and insist they discuss why Catholic bishops think nothing of altar girls, lay people distributing communion, applause, a protestant service, hippie music, abstaining for A WHOLE HOUR before communion (the horror!) and facing the people the whole time, and why SPPX is getting the cold shoulder. Have a REAL discussion for once. Maybe then we'll stop pussy-footing around and get some real results.

Some blog changes

2011-11-03T10:09:00.000-07:00

Hello True Believers! I've made some long overdue changes to the blog. First and foremost is my list of breweries and beer related events. I will add more later but I did not list a brewery whose product I have never tried. That's why I go to beer festivals, and not to just get drunk. A beer festival is actually a bad place to do that because it completely defeats the purpose, and is expensive.

You've probably noticed that I've trying to cut down on the profanity too. The monks I hang around with frown on that, even though they don't know I have a blog. If I do I will try to make warnings so that I don't have to mention another thing at Confession.

Even though it doesn't look right, I've added a "Favorite posts" list. They're not my favorites but they're the most viewed. I didn't think my sucky blog was that important, but some folks seem to like what I think.

I need to take inventory of my "Alfred's" who are people who know who I really am. Some Orthodox, Some Catholic. (And for those who are reading this blog for the first time, I mean people who reject the neo-protestantism and Iconoclasm that came after "Vatican 2" and still promote the Divine Liturgy of Pope Gregory the Great aka the Tridentine Latin Mass and at least LOOK Orthodox.) I thought about coming out and if it's really necessary since I'm not in show business anymore and was never famous. Then again, the forces of evil are gearing up and there's a reason Bruce Wayne puts on a mask.

In any rate I'll still write about things that interest me: Orthodoxy -ESPECIALLY Western Orthodoxy, Beer, Martial Arts, Wrestling, Ghosts and Celtic Music to name a few. Oh, this blog now has a mascot. The Trophy Wife said I am this because I "don't give a ****."

PROFANITY ALERT BUT FREAKIN HILLARIOUS!!!!

Beer Festivals: where to find them

2011-11-03T09:38:00.000-07:00

This is becoming less of an Orthodox blog and more of a Beer blog, well I'm an Orthodox who loves beer so it figures. One thing I love to do more than drink and brew beer is to go to Festivals thereof.

"So VSO, where can I find one other than googling?"

You can find about all of them at http://www.beerfestivals.org

Kyklos Cafe!

2011-11-02T10:59:00.000-07:00

I know that not alot of people read this sucky blog of mine, but I just got to plug my the business of my good buddy and fellow Orthodox Caveman Sophocles and one of my "Alfred's" (whose blog is the excellent resource on the Saints "A..Sinner" where I always go to research a Saint).

Here Sophocles himself presents part one of his Youtbe series about the cafe, and MMMMMMMM do I want to take a trip to Vegas!! That looks YUMMY!!

Real Men of Orthodoxy: Two stories from the GOA

2011-11-02T10:01:00.000-07:00

Today's report covers two disturbing events brought to us once again by that staunch champion of Tradition and defenders of Orthodoxy the GOA. The same jurisdiction that rewards pro-abortion politicians just for being Greek and mass murdering tyrants like Castro.

The first is GOA is going to tonsure women as Readers, a man's position. I've seen this before in the Church where I work. First they put cassocks on them, then there's altar girls, then lay people distributing communion, then a "new liturgy" to promote "more active participation" then the Poncho lady movement will take full root, and then we will no longer be the Orthodox Church. For shame!

Speaking of GOA readers, the second story is why converts shouldn't ever write books for at least twenty years after they've joined the Church and after going through seminary. Charles Shingledecker was written a tome of drivel about how us "Traditionalists" are "ruining the Church". I'll let others more qualified in Theology and Canons than I rip this apart. The mere existence offends me. I'm not taking any instruction on Orthodoxy from a jurisdiction that has Black Bart as it's leader, and that has it's First Hierarch sucking up to rabid pro-baby-killing politicians.

To Mr. Shingledecker and like-minded people, heed this warning from my good buddy Nathan because it pertains directly to you.

Happy Halloween!

2011-11-01T12:05:00.000-07:00

Yeah it was yesterday but I didn't have time to blog. I am of the school that says Halloween is a Christian holiday to commemorate the dead, and all the goofy stuff like horror films, haunted hayrides and pumpkin beer, pumpkin bread, pumpkin pie and candy are fun. It all evolved from Harvest Festivals. So to all you True Believers I say HAPPY HALLOWEEN AND DAY OF THE DEAD!!!

Pumpkin beers

2011-10-28T20:20:00.000-07:00

Because who needs pie? Link

Todays Random Post 10/27/11

2011-10-27T14:55:00.000-07:00

You never truly know how much you use a computer until it breaks down. In this case it was my power pc Imac G5 which worked great for years until the last two months when something went wrong in the motherboard and video card. At it's age it made no sense economically to repair (no parts anymore anyway) and rather to just get another. Since I'm perpetually penniless we got a cheap pc laptop and a same model Imac for the price of an Intel G5. That said I'm back.

I hate corporate greed and crony capitalism, but do you remember us Tea Partiers defecating on cop cars, raping women, destroying property and calling for the expulsion of the jews? I don't.

I'm not going to go out of my way to get Surly Darkness this year. There are so many stouts that are just a good, and cheaper. Like Old Rasputin, Yeti and Obsedian to name a few.

I just finished the autobiography of Eldrige Wayne Coleman, better known as "Superstar Billy Graham" the most influential and copied wrestler of all time. Wow. He's a straight-edge liver transplant receiver now, but during the last 30 years, he's been friends and training partners with Arnold, a junkie and steroid abuser who while being a so-called re-re-reborn-again Christian and has been married 5 TIMES! He also admits to lying about Vince McMahon and the WWE (aka WWWF and WWF) making him a junkie. Though at the end of the book is a big picture of the 26 year-old woman and single mother who died in a car accident leaving him her liver, which I thought was very touching. Ever see the movie "The Wrestler"? It could've been based on him. Next on the list are the autobiographies of "Sheik" Adnan Al Kasie and Animal&Hawk-the Road Warriors.

I'm now a full-time job seeker. I haven't been this poor since I was 19. I'm back where I started, just now with a wife and a worthless degree.

Teaching Catholics their new Mass translation

2011-10-22T10:22:00.000-07:00

Hello True Belivers,

I've been hampered by economicwoes and my computer breaking down, so that's why I haven't been around. Before I begin, on Beer News front, today in Brooklyn Park, MN at Surly Brewing is "Darkness Day" which is a mini-festival for their Russian Imperial stout called "Darkness". Surly is more of a cult than a brewery and people literally camp out in line to get bottles and kegs of darkness and other limited releases. I'm not

I cantored the 8am Mass and joined the choir for the 10:30. Before each I usually make announcements (and when it's not me it's someone else). This time I reminded them, "Today we start using the new corrected translation of the Roman Missal." We are phasing in the new responses week by week, and this week the only change for the laity was thus: Priest-"The Lord be with you." Laity-"And with your spirit."

I had heard that it didn't go over too well at the 5pm Mass on Saturday (for you Orthodox, for some reason Catholics do not hold Vespers, the have liturgy instead. I've been tol d it was accomodate the drunks who couldn't be bothered to get up Sundays) so I parked by my microphone to remind them. The response went OK, but the other ones not so much.

10:30 comes around and I again remind the attendents that we say "And with your spirit" five times. Then I ran up to join the choir where we had practiced saying "And with your spirit" several times and were a tad overly enthusiastic.

It's a step in the right direction. Next they need to can the novus ordo all together and just do the Latin Mass in the vernacular like we do. Heck they should even do the Sarum, Hispanic or Gallican rites. Anything but that protestant mass.

Burt: Occupying Wall Street and my brain

2011-10-11T19:36:00.000-07:00

I know you are shocked, SHOCKED that I have a low opinion of those dirty, smelly, lazy leftists who are being paid from unemployment checks, welfare checks and trust funds, and now rich white capitalists Star Wars Emperor incarnate George Soros and rich, fat, white guy Michael Moore along with Big Labor and the usual leftist suspects. As Rush said if a Tea Partier crapped on a police car you'd never hear the end of it.

The Great Burt Prelutsky gives a similar assessment of the Great Unwashed.

Pumkin Beer

2011-10-10T09:51:00.000-07:00

Tis the season. Most are ales but a few are lagers. For those who don't know the difference, ales are fermented with yeast that sits at the top of the unfermented beer (called "wort") at warmer temperatures and lagers (german for "to store") are fermented with yeast that sits at the bottom at cold temperatures. Ales are thus easier to make while lagers taste crisper.

Go try one. Try these names, "Ichabod", Pumpking", and "Mummy Train" to try a few.

Unless you hate pumpkin, in which case don't bother.

Western Rite Conference

2011-10-09T19:19:00.000-07:00

I refuse to use the term "canonical" because I do not define that term by merely being in communion with Black Bart. I also impeach the bishops of the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch.

HOWEVER a great event took place between ROCOR and AOANA Western Rite clergy in North America. Much to my delight the Gallican Rite is served in Iowa, the ROCOR parish in Iowa. If I'm ever in Des Moines I'll be sure to stop by.

Read the details of the Conference here.

Swing Dancing

2011-10-08T12:46:00.001-07:00

The TW and I have been adding Swing Dancing to our repetoire. We've learned East Coast, Hustle, Foxtrot, and two=step. He want to add these tricks but are going to go to an open gym first. They have padded floors. She goes up like a lead balloon.

I am the 53%

2011-10-07T12:00:00.000-07:00

My addition to this. The 53% is those of us who work to support lazy commie asshats like those "Occupiers".

I was always poor. I never had a loving family, don't even know what it was like till I met the TW and my Skete. It stills feels foreign to me. My parents were the best actors on Earth. They played the perfect parents in public, but in private were hypocritical blasphemers and abused their children. They treated strangers like family and family like strangers. My father was an IRS accountant and worked for the Gov't Workers Union and supported Democrats no matter what. My mother was an abusive heretic who told my next older sister that she "should've had an abortion."

I worked two jobs since I was sixteen. I worked my way through college and am still paying it off. I got saddled by a lot of debt when I made the mistake of getting involved with a psychotic, pagan, bi-sexual swinger I call "Witchy Poo" which forced to me to take on another job to pay the rent with which I was saddled.

I lost my hospital job when I was charged with a bullcrap assault charge just for defending myself. That same year we were evicted by the Apartment complex who was responsible for it all, and both of us got laid off from our respective jobs (I got another to replace the hospital job, but was laid off after two months). I've worked two-fours jobs ever since and I have not had a day off from any job in six years and I still can't find more than 30 hours a week right now. i apply for jobs every day and praying to God and St. Xenia I'll get the one I just applied for. I went to trade school to learn a trade, that went under so I'm trying again.

I've went through bankruptcy three years ago and dragged the TW down with me from the fallout from the bullcrap charge. I should've filed for Chapter 7 after Witchy Poo. I still don't have health insurance, I'm technically "self-employed" therefore I pay my own taxes. My rent went up and I went out of business in one field. I've lost everything twice. It could happen again. I work my own way out of it. I've never had a gov't handout and I never will. Get this: we weren't poor enough! We also don't have kids. We can't afford them. We don't have a credit card any more. We had to borrow her mother's to pay for repairs on her car. We are paying off my car loan too. All I have is my health and what intelligence I have. My life has been very hard, but nothing worth doing isn't.

I don't blame Wall Street. I blame all the leftists and Statists who took away my freedom and my money to give to those dirty, lazy, hacky-sack playing, bongo playing, pot-smoking communists. I blame Unions, ESPECIALLY the one that was supposed to be defending me. I want leftists and the government to get the feck out of my way!

I work to support me and my wife, not so you can sit on your arse and protest anything and everything at MY expense. You "Occupiers" don't speak for me!

I am the 53%

RIP Charles Napier

2011-10-06T10:45:00.000-07:00

A long-time acting great Charles Napier reposes at age 75. You've seen him in something, most famously in Blues Brothers, Rambo and the Austin Powers movies.

RIP Steve Jobs

2011-10-05T18:32:00.000-07:00

The man who along with Steve Wozniak changed the world, for the better, and led a revolution of innovation has succumbed to cancer. I'm a mac user and have much gratitude to him, though I would never wanted to have worked for him. he was known to be a real harsh boss and I would've decked him. Bill Gates was a real sonofabitch and yet he still lives. Go figure.

Nevertheless, I hope Steve Jobs sought the Kingdom of Heaven in his final days. Thank you Mr. Jobs.

How to make enemies at the Parish

2011-10-02T16:27:00.000-07:00

When approaching subjects of a delicate nature, discretion calls for leaving out details in order to protect the innocent and falsely accused. I will do so here.

At a certain Antiochian parish, some person went to alot of trouble to write an elaborate PDF that maliciously attacked the pastor, his family, and converts. This PDF was emailed to many of the parishioners. The author made false accusations against the pastor, and accused him and all converts of diluting their ethnic traditions. In other words, the author is a phyletist and therefore a heretic. That PDF was forwarded to me by a parishioner.

If those of you who know my secret identity wish to see this PDF, contact me via our secret channels.

As you can expect there is much outrage at this author. I will list some of the mass responses from the same email lists, I omitted the names.

"Dear John Johns

Here is the truth.. In venting your heart out on a computer screen, you do not know how much damage you created... by doing so you made all of us victims without a cause, and created great sense of unease among us all to the point that I was being accused of writing this letter!

I am [censored and not [censored] and I am not afraid of saying what is on my mind... As I have expressed it many times. I have expressed my grievances and displeasure about something but everyone know who I was and why I said what I said.... then I go and pray and forgive and forget. But one thing remain, that is my love to this church and its people

I have been on the council many times and served with my brothers and sisters in Christ’s many years (in good time and bad). I served my church as it is my lord's home and mine too.

I accepted the responsibility of this position to serve with God witness the best of my ability to protect this church and its people and its assets.

I am sorry that you have written it, I wish that you could stop by and talked to me....All the church finances are written in black and white..

I am sorry that you feel the way you do...

Regarding the Arabic liturgy; it is one of our outreach missions for the church to those who have difficulty understanding the English. The Bishop [Mark for the record] has mandated to be self sufficient which I believe so far it has been. so the congregation does not have to carry more of the burden. I have made sure that this mission will stay in black and maintain it that way.

I came to this church not speaking English and the church (with the people) opened its heart to me...This is the house of God and we welcome all believers into it.. Our Christianity and our belief is universal and who ever believes in it he/she is welcome. I was borne into Christianity but the covert believed in it and choose to adapt... God Bless them...

I have strong believed in our priest honesty and commitment to our church. I wish you should have approached him with your issue.

It is going to be very hard to overcome the damages your letter created.

I am not sure what to say about all of the things you wrote. So far I have seen three or four letters condemning you and your action and one directed to me accusing me of writing it.

I have only one thing to say to you I forgive you for all of the trouble you have created for me...

My God forgive you"

"To: John Johns aka proclaimingthetruth@gmail.com

I commend you for pulling together such a beautiful presentation. You obviously spent a lot of time and resources creating this document; not to mention the thought that went into it. I especially enjoyed the nice picture of the dance team. The iconostasis was nice too; a good opening. I did, however, notice a few misspellings and grammatical errors within the body of the text, but I don't want to be petty.

I am, nevertheless, shocked with the effort you put forth in providing this information to the recipients of this email, and perceive it to be malicious, underhanded, and a poor attempt at polarizing our church community and harming the image of the leadership of our church. Perhaps, you have too much idle time on your hands to be festering over the issues you have cited in your presentation. I recommend you consult with one of your three priests, and voice your concerns, particularly the financial concerns if they matter enough to put together this kind of propaganda. I'm sure you can find comfort with one of them. I, too, am at times ethnocentric, and I can have a tendency to make mountains out of molehills, but I pray for you to open your mind and heart just a bit. Talking to a priest. and prayer, work for me when my mind begins to "magnify". I'm far from perfect, but am progressing. I know hate personally, and do everything in my power to overcome it - I find peace and love at [parish]!

I agree that [late pastor] was one of the greatest men placed upon this earth. Not only was he our priest and true friend, but also an extension of every family at [parish]. It took him years to build the extreme love we had for him. One of the reasons we loved him so much is that he was incredibly tolerant of everyone, no matter what their background or ethnicity. In regard to the priests following [late pastor], they are rule followers - "by the book" priests. That is what they were taught when they converted and then ordained Orthodox priests. I have noticed little or no difference in the content of the Divine Liturgy, except that it takes a bit longer for the newer priests to make communion, and they omit nothing when it comes to the prayers that are part of the liturgy. I respect and admire their obedience. The only real change I see is the era in which we live. We live in a more global society. Two hours every Sunday is nothing to get your shorts in a bunch over. Let it go!

These so-called "converts" come to our church and not only participate in, but truly embrace, our Middle Eastern heritage. The "new" Antiochian Orthodox Christians have done nothing short of seeing the true light and worshiping the undivided trinity. I have also seen many new faces and now active members at [parish] who are orthodox christians, but from other churches and ethnic backgrounds. They sing in our choir, bake bread on Sunday, and eagerly seek to become more active in our church. We see our newest converted brothers and sisters every week- every week - without fail, early for services, and always eager to assimilate into our traditional St. George culture and values. It is my honor and privilege to share my faith with anyone who wants it. Being a true orthodox christian requires both faith and work.

I cannot say how I feel about the financial issues raised in your pdf, but I personally see a stronger than ever [parish], mostly because of the efforts of our beloved priest [parish]. In my opinion, we are a faith community, led by a proactive, concerned, and outstanding priest! [pastor] is an inspiration to me, a friend and adviser, and has raised the bar of orthodox christianity for me and many others. [pastor] can be seen at bible study on Wednesday nights at 7 pm in the church hall. He assists the bible study through facilitation.

Perception is meaning and truth. My truth is different than yours."

"Dear Mr. Johns:

I've read your treatise. I was not going to respond because usually I ignore writings like yours because they are insignificant and spiteful. Since you were not concerned about those you have written about in your treatise, I will reciprocate.

What you have written should not have been sent out in an email to all of the members of [parish]. Who do you think you are? Your merciless deriding of [pastor] and his family is your opinion only. If you have anything to say about [pastor], have the courage to say it to him personally. The only reason you emailed this appears to be malicious.

As a professed Orthodox Christian, you have emailed to the congregation questioning [pastor] humility, honesty and referred to him to Bishop [censored] as "who and what we have as a priest." What makes you so sanctimonious? Better look into your own heart before you call others names.

Question: Does your animosity toward [pastor] and his family result from the fact that he is a convert? (That certainly is an underlying theme in your writings.)

Your statements:
'More and more we are losing our Middle Eastern Heritage that our founding fathers brought with them when they came to America."
You are only comfortable with "an Arabic service or when we have one of our beloved Arabic Bishop's here.'
'I say enough is enough; these converts have been coming here and changing our ways of life/heritage long enough. Since when do we have a new "convert hold Bible study?'
'We all need to stand up and take action'; 'If we continue to hold back, our church that we grew up with will be no more.' '...they [the dreaded converts] will take our church as well.'

'ENOUGH OF THIS ONE FAITH, ONE FAMILY. IT'S OUR FAITH, OUR CHURCH!!!'

My husband and I are converts (30 years). You know nothing about me; nothing about my background; my education. Are you better than I. Perhaps you need to look into your heart. [parish] may not be the place for you.

My husband could give you a run for your money since he is reads Greek and Hebrew and is a biblical scholar but unfortunately he is dying of bladder cancer. He did look at your treatise, laughed and shook his head."

That last one made me want to cry. A dead man walking having to deal with this crap. Here are some others.

"I agree with [another parishioner]...shame on you for promoting half truths and lies and not having the courage to sign your name. I hope that some of the rumors and myths will be dispelled at the annual meeting. I am not sure how the church's constitution reads, but I do believe that the council is authorized to use the dedicated funds as needed without bringing it before the general congregation. That is something that can be brought forth at the annual meeting. Also, I am offended by the references to 'converts' as though they are spies or worse. A large portion of the dedicated volunteers that have helped build the church are 'converts', either through marriage or by actually studying the Orthodox religion and choosing it over all others. They weren't born in to it....they actually chose it on their own! As far as [pastor] and the story about refusal of baptism....I am quite certain that he takes his direction from the rules as set forth by the Antiochian Orthodox archdiocese and doesn't bend or break them to garner favor. Good for him! He has a backbone. This type of subversive gossip will do more to destroy a church than anything a convert or a priest could ever do."

Parishioners of [parish],

Many of us recently received an email entitled, "Proclaiming the Truth." It was presented almost as if it were an official church publication.

We did not receive this email directly; we read it only after it was forwarded to us The contents are personal and destructive. It certainly is not a Christian act.

It is our opinion that no one at [parish] should allow this email to influence them in any way. Especially in a negative way. It is not all right to say, "well, I agree with some of the things in the email." It is not all right to even let the smallest seed of negativity to enter our mind because of the content of this email.

This email is the worst form of character assassination. It must be seen as such. Christ taught us to go to anyone we have a problem with, and try to rectify the situation.

The Holy Scripture is the guide: Matt. 5: 21-24. “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder, and whoever murders will be in danger of the judgment.’ But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And whoever says to his brother, ‘Raca!’ shall be in danger of the council. But whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall be in danger of hell fire. 23 Therefore if you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.”

Therefore, if this person has a problem with the Priest or the Council that was duly elected by the entire Parish, he, she or they, need first to go to the Priest and Council and ask the "tough questions" there first. But to stir up the entire congregation with an inflammatory letter does not help the Church--even if the accusations are true or half true. Remember, as we have been instructed by our spiritual advisors, Satan is the author of half truths...
The fact is that [parish] is NOT the same it was in the 1970s! It is much larger and has more obligations than it did at that time. Nothing stays the same. In fact the Church has grown and become stronger.

People must stop this "behind the scenes" politics and bring it to the proper forum; [pastor] personally, and the Council.
..., this kind of thing cannot be for the Good of the Body of Christ! No anonymous letter should receive any credibility.

Let us add one more verse:

Matthew 7:1-5

“Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you. Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.
We must forgive whoever wrote and distributed this email, for it is destructive. But, we must also ignore it and not let it influence us and our opinions in any way.

We certainly should not discuss it at the annual meeting. To do so would give it legitimacy and credibility it does not deserve.

As parishioners of an Orthodox Christian Church, we must resist any temptation to give this email any importance.

We must also allow this situation/experience to make us better Christians. We must overcome negativity and come together and work harder to make our [parish] parish even stronger."

Unbelievable. I regret to say that in my experience that the attitude reflected in that PDF is typical among many of the arab "cradles" at my original parish. To the author, you are anathema and may God have mercy on you. For good reading consult my good buddy Nathan and his story.

Lord have mercy.

Hope is gone and it's George Bush's fault

2011-09-27T16:48:00.000-07:00

Not even a bear named Hope can survive under the Obama regime. I really don't what the filoque is with people that they have to shoot every living thing that moves. Shoot a deer or elk! Shooting a research bear is like shooting someone's pet, ESPECIALLY with the cowardly and lazy "baiting" method. I saw liberals already blaming Republicans and "people like me" for this.

Todays Paleolithic comment about Islam

2011-09-25T18:51:00.000-07:00

I have settings against Paleolithic commenting, which means no responding to old posts. This one has me busting a gut laughing:

Slave of God said...

Islam a Christ-hating religion?
You either simply don't know what Muslims believe, or are making things up as you go along. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you're innocently ignorant.

No Muslim is a Muslim if he doesn't believe in Jesus Christ. They also believe that he was born of a virgin mother - the blessed Marry who was one of the purest women in history.
That he performed miracles such as healing the blind and bringing life back to the dead - all performed through God.

Just because you disagree with Muslims on what Jesus Christ was, (i.e God or man) doesn't mean that you disagree with them on the loving of Jesus. Fact is both Muslims and Christians love Jesus and believe that he was the Messiah, the awaited Christ. The Quran speaks highly of Jesus and his blessed mother and confirms that he was the Messiah. As a matter of fact there's an entire chapter dedicated to Marry and is named after her.

So please widen your vision and open your mind brother. Wishing you the best - God bless.

Oh Really? REALLY? First of all "Slave of God" the True God doesn't desire "slaves" only faithful who are free to reject or accept him. The God of Judaism and Orthodox Christianity is of love. The god of Islam (which means "submission") demands submission and allows non-muslims only three choices: conversion, subjugation or death.We've seen it throughout history time and time again and still unto this day. Ergo your moniker is incompatible with Orthodox Christianity.

Let's compare the lives of Mohammed and Jesus shall we?

Now let's look at some of my favorite quote from the Quran:

Quran 4:89: "They (infidels) desire that you should disbelieve as they have disbelieved, so that you might be (all) alike; therefore take not from among them friends until they fly (their homes) in Allah's way; but if they turn back, then seize them and kill them wherever you find them, and take not from among them a friend or a helper."
Quran 8:12: "Instill terror into the hearts of the unbelievers;"
Quran 2:191: "... kill the disbelievers wherever we find them …"
Quran 22:19-22: "… for them (the unbelievers) garments of fire shall be cut and there shall be poured over their heads boiling water whereby whatever is in their bowels and skin shall be dissolved and they will be punished with hooked iron rods."
Quran 8:12: "Your Lord inspired the angels with the message: 'I will terrorize the unbelievers. Therefore smite them on their necks and every joint and incapacitate them. Strike off their heads and cut off each of their fingers and toes.'"
Quran 8:7: "Allah wished to confirm the truth by His words: 'Wipe the infidels out to the last.'"
Quran 8:59: "The infidels should not think that they can get away from us. Prepare against them whatever arms and weaponry you can muster so that you may terrorize them. They are your enemy and Allah's enemy."
Quran 8:60: "Prepare against them whatever arms and cavalry you can muster that you may strike terror in the enemies of Allah, and others besides them not known to you."
Quran 9.29" "Fight those who do not believe in Allah, nor in the latter day, nor do they prohibit what Allah and His Apostle have prohibited, nor follow the religion of truth, out of those who have been given the Book, until they pay the tax in acknowledgment of superiority and they are in a state of subjection."
Quran 47:4: "Strike off the heads of the disbelievers" and, after making a "wide slaughter among them, carefully tie up the remaining captives."
Hadith Sahih Muslim (41:6985): "Abu Huraira reported Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: 'The last hour would not come unless the Muslims will fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them until the Jews would hide themselves behind a stone or a tree and a stone or a tree would say: Muslim, the servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him; but the tree Gharqad would not say, for it is the tree of the Jews.'"
Quran 9:5: "When the sacred forbidden months for fighting are past, fight and kill the disbelievers wherever you find them, take them captive, torture them, and lie in wait and ambush them using every stratagem of war."
Sura 3:151: "Soon shall We cast terror into the hearts of the unbelievers for that they joined companions with Allah for which He had sent no authority: their abode will be the fire; and evil is the home of the wrong-doers!"
Sura 8:60: "Against them make ready your strength to the utmost of your power including steeds of war to strike terror into (the hearts of) the enemies of Allah and your enemies and others besides whom ye may not know but whom Allah doth know. Whatever ye shall spend in the cause of Allah shall be repaid unto you and ye shall not be treated unjustly."
Tabari IX:113: "Allah permits you to shut them (women) in separate rooms and to beat them, but not severely. If they abstain, they have the right to food and clothing. Treat women well for they are like domestic animals and they possess nothing themselves. Allah has made the enjoyment of their bodies lawful in his Quran."
Tabari I:280: "Allah said, 'It is My obligation to make Eve bleed once every month as she made this tree bleed. I must also make Eve stupid, although I created her intelligent.' Because Allah afflicted Eve, all of the women of this world menstruate and are stupid."
Ishaq:327: "Allah said, 'A prophet must slaughter before collecting captives. A slaughtered enemy is driven from the land. Muhammad, you craved the desires of this world, its goods and the ransom captives would bring. But Allah desires killing them to manifest the religion.'"

Mohammed also broke treaties, had sex with dozens of women including children like Aisha, and his god "Allah" (unlike mine) changed his mind and allowed muslims to le to advance Islam as opposed to "Thou shalt not bear false witness." The truth is that Mohammed hijacked a pagan god that had been around for a few centuries and combined a heresy called "Nestorianism" with his own pagan religion.

Also unlike Orthodox Christianity, Islam demands death to those who leave it, teaches that women are literally are worth half a man, forbids believers from being friends with us "infidels", requires constant "jihad" with non-muslims, demands death to those who try to convert muslims, those who remotely "offend" Islam like South Park, that beautiful creatures like Golden Retrievers are "unclean, that Jews are "pigs" and no beer (BIG problem with me here) and racism and sexism run through it like a river.

Yeah, muslims love Jesus so much that they murder his followers, sack his churches like the Cathedral marking his birthplace and the Hagia Sophia, and teach such crap like he was killed on a spike and not a cross contradicting not only the Gospels but the secular government. George Bush liberated muslims, and they started killing Iraqi Christians. Now 2,000 year-old communities in Iraq are all but extinct. Half of all Orthodox martyrs were made so by muslims. And what were the muslim hordes doing in Vienna and Lepanto? SIGHT-SEEING?!

You are not dealing with some naive guilt-ridden white liberal useful idiot or some grandstanding ecumenist like Black Bart or Glorious Brother. I hate Islam because I KNOW Islam. There is NO difference between al queda and the early muslims. "Well I'm/my friends are muslims are they aren't terrorists." Don't make me laugh. That's a strawman argument that is now a cliché.

I could go on all day! You Wake Up! Refute www.jihadwatch.org and all the others.

So whom am I going to believe? You or my lying eyes? I believe my lying eyes.

Being a Christian gets you detention

2011-09-23T09:39:00.000-07:00

The gaystapo WILL NOT TOLERATE dissent! We saw this coming. A High School student in Texas suspends a student for merely saying he thinks sodomy is wrong. Read the story here.

St. John of SF vs. Ingrates and heretics

2011-09-18T16:22:00.001-07:00

Get the whole story of how the russians of San Fran made life a living Hell for St. John here. I'm in good company because they were rude to me too not too long ago when I was there.

Deacon Joseph vs. Sedevacantists

2011-09-18T16:03:00.000-07:00

Deacon Joseph of Reredos takes on Sedevacatists known as the Diamond Brothers.

Deacon Joseph the mythbuster: True Orthodox non-communion

2011-09-18T15:18:00.000-07:00

Deacon Joseph at Reredos busts the myth that the True Orthodox aren't in communion with each other. He also speaks of the Hispanic Rite in another post.

A soldiers funeral motorcade

2011-09-15T11:22:00.000-07:00

This isn't news really. On the way home after servicing bars, I found myself in the middle of a motorcade on the freeway. I instantly recognized the motorcade had little "Funeral" flags and I saw the cop on a motorcycle leading the charge. I managed to get into the left left and pass them by.

As I got to the front I saw a casket in the back of the Hearse draped with an American Flag. This meant that at some point of this person's life, they served their country. I don't know who the body once belonged to or if they died young or old. It doesn't matter. As I passed the Hearse by, I gave the fallen veteran a proper salute. All our veterans deserve that.

Into paradise may the angels lead thee:
At thy coming may the Martyrs receive thee,
And bring thee into the holy city Jerusalem.
May the Choir of Angels receive thee,
And with Lazarus, once poor, mayest thou have eternal rest.

MP to Rome: You're stealing what we rightfully stole

2011-09-13T12:12:00.000-07:00

By the immortal words of Oliver Hardy, "Well this is another fine mess you've gotten us into." As reported by Reuters the MP wants the Church of Rome to meet some conditions for Patriarch Kirill (known as KGB Kirill in some circles) to meet with Pope Bendict. First there's the issue of Catholic priests sniping souls away from the Church, a charge Rome denies (they did) but the other demand I have to admit is filed under the irony file.

Stalin stole church property from Uniates (Catholics who pray like us Orthodox) and gave it to the MP, which he founded (or "allowed" if you side with the Sergianites). With the fall of the Soviet Union, the Uniates took them back. Sounds right? NO! The MP wants those properties back! They want Rome (more specifically the Ukrainian Catholic Eparchy which Pope Benedict heads as "Vicar of Christ"-a title and position we anathematized) to give back the properties that Stalin stole from the UCC in the first place. The MP wants the Uniates to give back the properties that Stalin stole from the Uniates and gave to the MP. Uh?

This isn't the first time the MP had the chutzpah to do that. They also stole rebuilt churches from the Catacomb Churches, those Orthodox who want nothing to do with the MP. As a condition for Communion with the MP, ROCOR (then under Met. Laurus) got it in writing their demands to remain independent and keep their properties, like the Kursk-Root Icon). It was a gutsy move for Met. Laurus who avoided politics like the plague, but I think it was hasty. It will take a LONG time to get all the KGB out of the MP, and the Church abroad can certainly influence. However as we see, it's all about the money, and property that the MP never rightfully had...unless you count the time before when the Uniates were bribed to abandon the Faith. Even that is a stretch.

I side with the truth and right, and Rome is in the right this time.

10 years today 9-11-01

2011-09-11T19:51:00.000-07:00

Memory Eternal!

SSPX, Rome and the Orthodoxy Church...wishful thinking

2011-09-09T12:46:00.000-07:00

Today I may alienate a few of my readers. Scratch that, I will alienate some of them because they wont like what I'm about to write. Being that I work for a typical novus ordo parish (in other words a modernist allegedly Catholic church and not yet a "community") I follow a few blogs thereof and of like-minded Catholics, most notably the Catholic Cavemen. Lately there have been a few posts here and there on other RCC blogs about the cooling in talks with the "Traditionalist" Catholic group the SSPX and the novus ordo church led by Benedict XVI.

For those who don't know, the SSPX was founded by Catholic Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre who took the stance of St. Maximos the Confessor and fought the iconoclasm of the heretically inspired "Spirit of Vatican 2" which replaced the Divine Liturgy of Pope Gregory the Great (aka the TLM) with the "Novus Ordo" which is a protestant style service with gutted prayers and rubrics so loose one can drive a train through it. The SSPX are Roman Catholics who still pray the same way people in the Roman Rite have for centuries, and many of them are also jerks. Pope Benedict, the so-called "Pope of Christian unity" lifted the excommunications of the SSPX bishops and now they're talking trying to get them to accept the heresies of Vatican 2 like altar girls, lay people distributing communion, dancing, handshaking and all the other monotonous stuff that came with the novus ordo.

What prompts my response are two articles. This one by a layman in Minneapolis and this one by Catholic priest "Fr. Z" who writes

Indeed, there must be conditions. Let's start with submission to the authority of the Vicar of Christ.

Fr Z also refers to Benedict XVI, as do many RCC promoters like that Catholic channel as the "Pope of Christian Unity." WISHFUL THINKING.

So why do I care what schismatics and heretics do in their services? I don't. I do however try to be supportive of like-minded people, and the SSPX are like-minded. Lefebvrists hold on to the other Roman innovations that the Orthodox Church declared anathema, however I don't have to explain to them "what's wrong" with protestantism, and that heretical pseudo-christian neo-paganism that I often encounter in typical RCC parishes. I don't have to explain to them why Pope John Paul II will never be a saint in my Church and why his Pontificate was anything but a disaster. Go look online for all the iconoclasm he was responsible for, like half-naked Africans in the Mass.

We call the "Traditional" Catholics "so-called" because from our perspective they are not real Traditionalists. They use a Mass from 1962, and they follow all the anathemas and heresies from 1054-1965 and they were ALWAYS changing things. However the stances of the SSPX are those of the Orthodox Church differences notwithstanding. They fight Iconoclasm and preserve Tradition. This may not sit well with Black Bart and all the world orthodox who care more about photo ops than preserving the Faith, but True Orthodox fought against the world rather than seeking its approval.

"Submission to the Pope of Rome"? No Orthodox bishop ever made such a demand of another! Bishops submit only to a Synod. Synods make bishops. No bishop ever consecrates himself. It is anathema to suggest otherwise. A bishops first loyalty is to God and protecting his Church. IMHO that Church that Benedict XVI presides over is a protestant church. It is not the Catholic Church. That is why I will never have anything to do with it. St. Maximos the Confessor took such a stand, and so can I and so can the SSPX. Frankly, I think the SSPX is wasting their time. I have worked for a novus ordo parish for five years now and THERE ISN'T A DIME'S WORTH OF DIFFERENCE BEWTEEN NOVUS ORDO CATHOLICS AND PROTESTANTS. The SSPX should be talking to us instead...but they never will.

Orthodox Cats

2011-09-04T18:52:00.000-07:00

It's not a subject that comes up often in Orthodox blogopshere. Cats were the subject of worship by ancient Egyptians and are a symbol of many things in pre-Christian cultures. But here are a few things that came up in Google.

This one is comically lewd: Orthodox Spring-Kitten Huffing

The Holy Monastery of St. Nicholas of the Cats

Orthodoxy and Animals A little website by apparently an Orthodox who loves animals.

An Orthodox Pet Cemetery?

Sister Seraphim's Cat Shelter

and for those of you on Facebook: The Cats of Fr. Phillip of the Oratory of Saints Cuthbert and Aidan. (ROCOR)

I bet one could easily make a website dedicated to Orthodox cats. I know a few clergy and Sketes that have cats.

Hope and Cash

2011-09-03T08:17:00.000-07:00

Love it!

VSO and the New ICEL

2011-09-02T10:29:00.000-07:00

I just started up my church job again after a month furlough. The local bishop has decided that we are implementing the new translation of the protestant inspired novus ordo gradually over the next few months rather than ramrodding it through like the heretics did with the "spirit of Vatican 2".

For those of you who aren't Catholic (and I'm using that word loosely) the Church of Rome is enforcing a new translation that more accurately fits the "original" latin novus ordo, which is that protestant service they have been using since 1965. Why did they start using a different liturgy? Hell you got me!

What this means is that what wasn't thrown away from the Pope Gregory Mass is going to be back. For example when the priest says "The Lord be with you" the old/new response is "And with thy/your spirit." Also after the Consecration, the actually words of the Centurion will be used, "Lord I am not worthy that thou should enter under my roof..."It also means ONLY appropriate texts will be used and no more loop hole for those old hippies to read poetry and other crap.

So what do I think? Well, it's a step in the right direction. Next they need to start using ALL of the rubrics of the Pope Gregory Mass (aka the TLM), and then just S-can the novus ordo all together. But this is the Roman Church we're talking about. They always change things but they never change it back. Case in point the "filioque". New hymnals are coming so hopefully I'll never have to sing that Haugen/Haas crap again. But I'm not holding my breath. Ultimately I STILL just work there and I get real Western Orthodoxy in my own Church...which I now only get to see once a month.

Burt: The Left's many gods

2011-08-31T08:48:00.000-07:00

Burt's latest gem.

Here's a great excerpt: "The most fascinating aspect of the left's intolerance of Christianity and Judaism is the fact that the same crowd goes berserk when the religious practices of Satanists, jihadists and those freaks and oddballs whose gods require the sacrifice of small animals or the ingesting of illegal drugs are not respected by one and all."

Gaystapo goes after Stacy

2011-08-29T20:13:00.000-07:00

H/T to Subvet.

Stacy of at Accepting Abundance is feeling the full extent of liberal civility. So far 546 comments.

On behalf of Stacy, all you queers and enablers can bugger off.

When the Church gets in bed with Caesar

2011-08-28T19:22:00.000-07:00

H/T to Nathan for his "Useful Idiots" post.

Look what Moscow Government Church Patriarch Kirill has to say to Mass Murderer, Communist thug and liberal sacred cow Fidel Castro:

Patriarch Kirill’s congratulatory message to Fidel Castro on the occasion of his 85th birthday

His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia has sent the following congratulatory message to Fidel Castro on the occasion of his 85th birthday:

Dear Comandante,

On the day of your 85th birthday, kindly accept my most cordial congratulations and wishes of good health. You life journey is a vivid example of selfless service of the Motherland. You have won the highest possible authority among the Cuban people and enjoyed their sincere love. With your direct participation, warm relations of trust were established between our peoples to bear the test of time and trials.

The Russian Orthodox Church will always remember with gratitude your personal contribution to the cause of building a Russian church in Havana and the sincere concern you showed for the community of our Russian compatriots. Inspired by your personal example, the Cuban people have always been cordial to the faithful of the Russian Orthodox Church and have taken interest in our spiritual traditions.

I have warm memories of our meetings.

I wish you and your loved ones good health, physical strength and long life.

With profound respect,

Source

First Black Bart now KGB Kirill. Since WHEN do Orthodox bishops wish long life and health to evil tyrants? I'm sending this to Met. Hilarion and ask him why ROCOR is in communion with such people?

Well? Any of you want to defend or excuse this?

Todays Random Post 8-26-11

2011-08-26T11:21:00.000-07:00

16 people now have nothing better to do with their time than to read my crappy blog. How sad.

Those of you in the path of Hurricane Irene, TAKE COVER!!!

Earthquake rocks the East Coast causing damage in DC and NY. Meh, it's nothing compared to the damage caused by the politicians on a daily basis.

I can almost play Black Sabbath's Children of the Sea on guitar.

Festivals all over. Go find one. Especially the beer drinking kind.

Yesterday I had to explain to some lady what the Orthodox Church is. I said the usual: Original Christian Church, Jesus founded it, it wrote the New testament, is much harder, Tradition etc. She mentioned that the other "denominations" were so different. I said it was because they're all man-made. She said "but all religions are man-made." "Not if you believe the Bible" says the TW. I think it was easier for the original Orthodox missionaries to convert pagans than for us to convert protestants. Ancient pagans had no preconceived notions of Christianity is supposed to be.

I noticed that alot of Orthodox support Ron Paul. And why not? He is the only clearly different choice and the only anti-establishment candidate.

I look forward to trying out those jars that I scored for beer and mead.

There was an Unction Service for Abp. Dmitri.

The NWO fight song

2011-08-23T19:04:00.000-07:00

Sung to the tune of the "Marine Corps Fight song" (I think) and composed by fellow Orthodox Timothy Holcombe and posted originally on the Facebook group "Orthodoxy and American Politics."

From the walls of Martha's Vineyard
To the shores of Tripoli
We defy our constitution
And ignore your sovereignty

First we build a terror strawman
As we build some FEMA cribs
Wave Old Glory in your faces
So you can't see through our fibs

We reject Dwight David's warning
And expand with no restraint
Invade nation after nation
Using red debt as war paint

And we laugh at your naivete
As your liberty is lost
Knowing you prefer security
And don't care about the cost.

"The greatest [calamity] which could befall [us would be] submission to a government of unlimited powers."

-- Thomas Jefferson, Declaration and Protest of Virginia, [1825]

SCORE!! Finding carboys

2011-08-23T18:53:00.000-07:00

The TW found me some old 5 gallon water jugs that will make good carboys. That means I'll using them to ferment beer, wine and mead. It was a great find on her part and saved us beacoup bucks, which due to our being perpetually impecunious is a epic SCORE!!