Sooooooo question:

A priest in my diocese, (Fr. Kenneth Ellis) told me that he met a girl I talk to online. So I’m just assuming that it’s from Tumblr.

I’m horrible at knowing where my followers are from, but who was iiiiiiit? I think it’s super cool when I know people in real life that my Tumblr friends know. I have an inkling, but I don’t want to send someone a message and have them be like “Um, no. I live in Michigan.” or something like that hah.

So send me a message and let me know who you are! <3

Orthodox Tag!

Taken from OrthodoxProbs

 

1) How long have you been Orthodox?

2) What “kind” of Orthodox are you? (ex: Greek, Russian, Antiochian, etc)

3) What’s your favorite service?

4) What’s the hardest thing for you about being Orthodox?

5) How big is your parish?

6) What’s your favorite lenten food?

7) Every been to church camp?

8) What in Orthodoxy makes you happiest?

9) Describe the best retreat/church camp/conference you’ve been to

10) If you’re not married, would you marry someone who’s not Orthodox? If you are married, is your spouse Orthodox?

11) Patron Saint?

12) Are you a convert? If so, why did you decide to convert?

13) Where you live, roughly how many people are Orthodox?

14) Are you close to your godparents? 

15) Favorite service in Holy Week?

16) Favorite part of Pascha?

17) Favorite feast day?

18) Best thing about Orthodoxy?

19) What’s a good story that has something to do with church?

Eternal Memory + Fr Michael Rosco!

Early this morning, Fr. Michael Rosco passed into eternal life after complications from a car accident on Friday afternoon.

There is very little information available right now, but I want to thank all of you who kept Fr. Michael in your thoughts and prayers these past few days.

Please continue to think of Pani Susan, Vlad, and their family as they go through this trying time.

Eternal Memory!

Q:Thank you, that makes sense. I've been interested in converting for about a year now. There is one orthodox church in my area (Carpatho-Rusyn) but I have yet been able to visit it. I've tried to find as much as I can online, but a lot of what I find is confusing or not well explained, I just wish there was like a simple, straight-forward guide haha.

Anonymous

Awesome! If you don’t mind my asking, what state/general area of said state (east/west) are you in? (I won’t ask for more specific info because I figure there’s a reason you’re on anon). My dad is a priest in the Carptho-Rusyn diocese, so I’m familiar with most (but not all) of the priests.

Visiting an Orthodox church and talking to the priest can really do a lot for understanding the faith. I’ve always felt, and have heard from others, that the Orthodox Church is something that you really need to experience to understand.

It can be a bit tricky to find simple and reliable info online. If you want, I can see if I can dig up some sources for you and send you some info. You can send me another message if you’d like, and I’ll respond that way if you’re comfortable. But feel free to ask me any questions that you have. I’d love to help in any way I can :)

Q:Is there any major differences between the various denominations of Eastern Orthodoxy? (i.e.: Russian Orthodox, Greek Orthodox, etc..) Thanks! :)

Anonymous

There aren’t any MAJOR differences. And there aren’t any when it comes to theology.

The way I always learned about it had to do with Big T Tradition, and little t tradition. The Big T Traditions are those that all people of the Eastern Orthodox Faith share. These are theological ideas, dogmas, and other things to that effect.

The little t traditions are where we vary. Although we all celebrate the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, there are some Litanys that are taken in the Greek Orthodox Church that we don’t take regularly in my church (I’m Carpatho-Rusyn). We may use different Tones when it comes to our Liturgical chant and singing. Depending on the tradition, the church may use the Julian Calendar or the Gregorian Calendar to celebrate church holidays (actually, within my diocese, some of our churches are old calendar, and some are new). Those kinds of things may vary between Greek Orthodox, Carpatho-Rusyn Orthodox, Serbian Orthodoxy, Russian Orthodox, OCA, etc.

These little t traditions though, don’t change the fact that we’re Eastern Orthodox Christians and believe in the same things from a theological standpoint. It doesn’t matter that one church does services completely in English and one uses some Greek while another is totally in Serbian. At our core, the Eastern Orthodox Churches all believe in the same things. While the phrasing may vary slightly, we all say the same Nicene Creed each Sunday, professing our beliefs.

Is there any specific difference that you were wondering about, or was it more of a general wondering? Feel free to let me know if you have any more specific questions and I’ll do my best to answer them. And if I’m not sure, I have a priest at my disposal and will ask him! :)

God Bless! :)

Prayer Request - Update

I just got an update about Fr. Michael and unfortunately the prognosis is not good.

Today they discovered that Fr. Michael is bleeding internally and they now don’t think that it looks good. They called his son (who stayed in NJ to watch the house and the dog) to come out to Johnstown. They tried to remove him from his ventilator twice yesterday, but ended up putting him back on.

As of right now, we don’t know why he is bleeding internally all of a sudden, or where the bleeding is coming from. I would greatly appreciate your continued prayers for Fr. Michael and his family.

//EDIT: I received this e-mail from our diocesan chancellor:

“Today was not a good day for Fr. Rosco… in the early afternoon his oxygen levels and blood pressure plummeted. CPR was administered. In addition, a slow bleeding blood vessel was found in his chest cavity, and that is being addressed now. At any rate, thank God he has been stabilized once again. He is in extremely fragile condition.”

Please continue to keep Fr. Michael in your prayers!

Car Accident on Route 219 in Johnstown

This is the car that my family friend, Fr. Michael Rosco was driving on Friday. He is truly lucky and blessed to be alive after the accident. Reports are saying that he drove down the grassy area to enter Route 219, entered the southbound side, and his car struck another vehicle and then the median. The impact flipped his vehicle and he landed on the northbound side of Route 219.

One of my friends actually drove by the accident on her way home, but had no idea that Fr. Michael was the one driving the car.

He is still in the ICU at the hospital, though he is in stable condition. Surgery was performed this morning to stabilize the vertebrae in his back. In addition to broken vertebrae, he had a punctured lung and a concussion. Since arriving, his wife has not left the hospital.

I greatly appreciate anyone who has been keeping the Rosco family in your thoughts, and would greatly appreciate if you would continue to pray for Fr. Michael’s recovery, as well as for strength for their family.

Thank you all!

prayer request

Anyone out there who can spare some prayers or good vibes or whatever you think is best, I’d appreciate if you could direct them toward Fr. Michael Rosco. He was involved in a serious car accident while leaving Johnstown, PA to return home to NJ.
Please keep his family, Pani Susan and their son Vlad in your thoughts as well.
Thank you all!

Soooo, my room smells like myrrh.

And I have no idea why.

So I’m sitting at my computer looking something up and all of a sudden I’m hit with this wall of the scent of myrrh.

Let me back up a bit.

Earlier today, I went next door to the rectory of the Serbian Orthodox Church next door to talk to them about using their hall for the Bowling Tournament that we’re hosting next year. Papadiya and I got to talking, and we discussed how my mother is having surgery to remove a kidney stone tomorrow.

When Father came into the house, he gave me a bit of oil from the Myrrh Streaming Icon of the Mother of God from Hawaii and a paper duplicate of the icon to give to her, along with the assurance of his prayers.

So when I smelled it, I figured my dad was just anointing my mother in the next room. But when I walked there, I found her sitting alone on her bed rubbing unscented lotion into her hands.

I beckoned her out into the hallway in order to reassure that I wasn’t going crazy. As soon as she stepped into the hallway connecting our rooms she said, “Where is that smell coming from?”

Obviously, I had no idea, but the scent had very distinct lines of beginning and ending. We eventually called my brother and father out into the hall/my room as well to make sure we weren’t making it up.

There was this endearingly crazy moment where we were all standing in the hallway sniffing at the air, trying to figure out the source of the scent of myrrh.

I ended up smelling and touching every icon I knowingly have in my room, and found nothing out of the ordinary.

At one point I said to my father, “Well, maybe this is God’s way of telling me to clean my room.”

He looked up at the ceiling and said, “Thank you, God.”

So the smell still persists, but I’ll go to bed tonight knowing that God is near me.

And if you have any time, I’d appreciate you keeping my mother, Pani Eleanor in your prayers as she has surgery tomorrow to remove a 1 centimeter kidney stone (I really with that were a typo)

So this morning, Will informed me that he would have his phone off all day in accordance with some pact/bet/whatever with George. Sure, have fun!

TODAY. OF ALL DAYS. This WOULD be the day when he could have totally saved me so much trouble seeing as he GOES TO THE SEMINARY and would have access to the Seminary bookstore, thereby being able to provide me with a faxed copy of a blank Baptismal Certificate much sooner than I obtained one.

So I sent him a text that simply says this:

“GUESS WHAT I FOUND OUT TODAY?! I DON’T HAVE A BAPTISMAL CERTIFICATE. GUESS WHAT MY DAD DOESN’T HAVE IN THE HOUSE?! BLANK BAPTISMAL CERTIFICATES. GUESS WHAT I DID TODAY?! FORGED A BAPTISMAL CERTIFICATE.”

And sent him a Facebook message letting him know that today OF ALL DAYS was the worst day for him to have his phone off, as he could have saved me nearly 4 hours of stress and grief. He wants to know what caused me 4 hours of grief.

I told him he has to wait until he turns his phone back on and gets the single best text message that I have ever written (that was also sent in some variation to two other people) to find out what happened in my life.

I await his answer with anticipation. If it’s not an over the top reaction, I will be absolutely disappointed.

I spent most of the day having the weirdest, most PK-specific crisis ever.

So I’m applying for a scholarship from the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America.

In order to apply for said scholarship, I needed a copy of my Baptismal Certificate.

I told my dad this.

Oh, for anyone who doesn’t know, I’m cradle Orthodox, and my father is an Orthodox Priest.

Turns out, I DON’T HAVE A BAPTISMAL CERTIFICATE.

I was baptized and chrismated, and I’m listed in the metrics, but no one ever bothered to fill out a certificate.

I guess they just figured “Oh, she’s a PK, it’s okay that we don’t have one. We all know she was Baptized.”

WELL THE GREEKS DON’T KNOW THAT.

The priest who performed my baptism still lives in NJ only about 20 minutes away, so I figured I could have him fill out a new one. My dad was like “Yeah, I can do one for you.”

Well, my dad’s uncle passed away earlier this week, so he and my mom went out to Alquippa, PA last night. BEFORE HE FILLED OUT A CERTIFICATE.

So I spent the day putting everything together and then realized I didn’t have the certificate. I searched through my dad’s files, and couldn’t find a blank form ANYWHERE.

So I called my mom’s cell phone. No answer. I think I called her 5 times and didn’t get an answer.

I had to take my sister to work, so during the drive there I called the aforementioned priest that baptized me. No answer.

I stopped at this store, Just Jesus, thinking “Okay, maybe I can find something that can pass for an Orthodox Baptismal Certificate here.” Absolutely not. Everything either had a really weird picture of Jesus, a background of ocean waves, or some kind of non-Orthodox affirmation on it.

So I got in the car and called another priest at a church I could hit up on the way home.

No answer.

So my mom finally calls me back. My dad swears he has Baptismal Certificates.

I get home and look where he says. He has 17 million and 4 First Holy Communion/Confession certificates, and a pad of Marriage Certificates, but NO BAPTISMAL CERTIFICATES.

NONE.

So I searched online. Everything I could find had the name of the diocese on it, and seeing as I’m not a part of ROCOR, I had no use for them.

I even called the priest up at camp thinking that there were copies of Baptismal Certificates in the gift shop and maybe he could fax me a blank.

No answer.

So I went through files and found my brother’s baptismal certificate. Thinking to myself, “I’m just gonna have to make a copy, blank out some spaces, and do this myself.

As a last ditch effort, I called my Godfather, a priest in upstate New York.

FINALLY SOMEONE ANSWERED THE PHONE.

He had a blank copy that he faxed me and I filled out the form and got it signed. Then I drove up to the post office and put my scholarship application in the mail.

And that, ladies and gentleman, is the story of how I, a cradle Orthodox Christian PK, who has been president of our diocesan Jr. level organization (Jr. ACRY), worked at our summer camp for 4 years as a counselor, 1 as a head counselor, and will be back again for another summer as head counselor, and the current Vice President of the National Sr. ACRY who traveled to Texas for the Orthodox Youth Worker’s Conference discovered that she doesn’t have a legitimate Baptismal Certificate, had a meltdown, and finally got one at the age of 24.

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