Fun with AM Radio, Peter Leithart and the "Protestant Metanarrative"

 

Earlier in the summer, I had occasion to rent a car while traveling over a long weekend in Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina.   Although I never do so at home, I always tune in the AM radio “preaching channels” when driving out of state.   I get a lot of entertainment out of listening to these small local stations where old-time preachers still go at it.  This perverse pleasure does me no credit--and my wife lectures me about it -- but I relish them in the same way as someone would enjoy a carnival sideshow.  Even here in the South, such broadcasts are relics of an earlier time.  That said, I am more at home in that world than I would be in the schmaltzy Christian praise music stations on the FM side of things.

Most of the broadcasting consists of recorded sermons from local congregations (invariably either Baptist or Pentecostal), itinerant small-time “radio preacher” segments, and recordings of evangelists with a national audience.  The local characters are the best—and the most revealing—but I soon realized that the syndicated national figures fill the largest segment of broadcast time.  And of this number, three in particular loom large:  Dr. Adrian Rogers, Dr. David Jeremiah and Dr. Tony Evans.

Dallas-based Dr. Evans is the best of the lot, and I heard several of his sermons back and forth on I-85.  Maybe I caught him on a particular tangent, but he surprised me a little with his repeated preaching on the wrath of God. 

I found Dr. Jeremiah, head of a California mega-church, to be the least credible.  He harped on “the Rapture” with planes falling out of skies as their pilots were taken, buses careening off highways as their drivers were taken, men coming home from work to find their wife had been taken, etc. , as if this was settled matter-of-fact theology.   Of course he hawked his upcoming Caribbean Cruise Conference, and later his Holy Land Tour--in other words, a religious huckster.  Several years ago, I had lunch with an old church friend from my previous life.   By that time I had long since “swam the Bosporus,” as they say, and was dried-off and comfortable on the other side.   He had  always been dissatisfied with our church and during the entire time of our acquaintance had either been halfway in or almost completely out, but not quite.  To my knowledge, that is his condition yet.  He turged me to listen to some tapes that would revolutionize my life, from a preacher that really, really had it together, etc.  Well, it turned out to be this Dr. Jeremiah guy.  Thanks, but no thanks. 

If you spend any time with these stations, you are going to hear a LOT of Dr. Adrian Rogers, the late Baptist minister of a Memphis mega-church.  Dr. Rogers was as smooth a preacher as I’ve ever heard—and I do not necessarily mean that as a compliment.  He spoke with an exaggerated accent that some Southern evangelists seem to prefer (Billy Graham, for one.)  Anyway, the sermon that caught my interest was one on the “infallible, inerrant, incontestable Bible.”  The talk was standard evangelical bibliolatry until Dr. Rogers dipped his toe into church history.  He referenced the persecutions under Diocletian, though in his telling it was the emperor’s “War on the Bible.”  He elaborated that Diocletian burned a Bible and then erected a monument above it declaring “Extincto nomini christianorum,” or for the Latin impaired, “The name of Christian is extinct.”    I googled the phrase and all that appears is the same little snippet on innumerable  Protestant websites, usually as an anecdote to flesh out a sermon--and never sourced.  Well, Diocletian may have very well burned some scriptures and erected such a monument--or it could just be an evangelical urban legend. 

It matters not, for Diocletian’s war was certainly not against the “Bible.”  Somehow, I expected more of Dr. Rogers than that.  Either he was grossly ignorant of how, and more particularly when the “Bible” came together, or he was being purposely disingenuous.  Close to ninety more years would have to pass before such a statement could be conceivably, if not practically, true.  Certainly Diocletian would have had the Christian scriptures destroyed given the opportunity—whether they be the letters assembled later into what became known as the New Testament, or other writings of the early church fathers.  But his "war,” if you will, was on Christians, based on who they were, what they did and what they would not do, rather than on their particular scriptures, much less a “Bible” that arrived much later on the scene.

Dr. Rogers was not content to leave it there, however.  He continued on--that the Council of Nicea in 325 AD declared the Bible to be “the infallible word of God.”  Here he proceeds from the twisting of history to outright fabrication.  I fear that in our broad American Christianist culture, that it is this sort of thing which passes for historical knowledge.  It reminds me of my own attempt in my old church to find anything approximating our view of “New Testament Christianity” between 100 AD and Alexander Campbell.  For a while, I latched on to the Paulicians, of all people, but dropped that before I embarrassed myself unduly.

All this came to mind when I recently read an article of Peter J. Leithart at the First Things site.  I am somewhat familiar with Dr. Leithart who is a Protestant of the Reformed persuasion, I believe.  I do not follow his writings, however, nor do I frequent the FT site.  Leithart begins as follows:

Once upon a time, everyone followed a simple, relaxed, guilt-free religion, uncluttered by rites and dogmas. Along came the greedy priests, who complicated and corrupted everything. They added ceremonies and demanded payment for their performance, elaborated precise doctrines, and persecuted deviants, and in all this perverted the God-and-me immediacy of true religion. It’s as predictable as gravity: From the beginning, every religion devolves from primitive purity to decadent ritualism.

Leithart agrees with John Milbank that this myth is the “liberal Protestant metanarrative” and that it “has had a remarkably long run.”  Realizing that many would be uncomfortable with his characterization as liberal, Leithart explains that it is so because “it treats religion as fundamentally an internal reality, regards ceremonies as expendable distractions, and advocates free expression and universal toleration.”

 Despite its age, the liberal Protestant metanarrative continues to influence not only religious studies but also…the social sciences of religion. Outside the academy, it continues to be a foundation myth for a large segment of Protestantism, and not only liberal Protestantism…[for] immediacy is the defining characteristic of Evangelicalism, and any Protestant who gives too central a place to liturgy and sacraments is driven from the camp. Evangelicals recoil when told they sound like liberals, but the underlying notion of religion is the same, and it suggests that the liberal Protestant metanarrative has become the Protestant metanarrative, pure and simple.

Leithart goes on to advocate a rooting-out or reformation, if you will, of this “metanarrative” for the future health of Protestantism.    But I do not see, Lutherans and Anglican notwithstanding, how can there be one without the other?

Georgian Chronicle (5)--When in Udabno

When in Udabno, discerning diners can be found at the Oasis Club Restaurant Bar, the town's finest establishment.

I couldn't resist a little travel guide silliness, but lunch in Udabno turned out to be one of the highlights of my recent time in the Republic of Georgia.

The day began at Mtskheta, visiting Svetitskhoveli Cathedral early on, planning to push on to Davit Gareja during the middle of the day and reach Sighnaghi before nightfall--an ambitious schedule given the general state of Georgian roads.  I have been to Davit Gareja monastery twice before, but was anxious to return again.

St. Davit, one of the thirteen Syrian Fathers, founded the monastic complex in the 6th-Century, and the institution has loomed large in Georgian history ever since.  In a country chock-a-block with holy sites, Davit Gareja occupies a special place.  On Pascha, in 1615, Shah Abbas of Persia ordered thousands of monks beheaded at Davit Gareja.  The Soviets shut it down in 1921 and were using it for target practice in 1987.  The authorities relented after widespread student demonstrations (as noted in a previous post, the modern story of Georgian Orthodoxy is largely that of the young.)  The Georgian government tried to do the same thing again in 1997, but were once more stopped by student protestors.  The site is an active monastic center today. 

The monastery perches on a ridge in the far southeastern corner of Georgia, actually on the Azeri border.  In my estimation, the landscape very much resembles eastern Wyoming or Montana--grasslands as far as one can see on these broad, rolling hills.  Hay is being baled in some of the fields, and other hillsides Georgian cowboys herd their cattle.  In the immediate vicinity of Davit Gareja, the countryside takes on an almost surreal look, with the hills suddenly peaking into jagged, rocky escarpments.  Going by bus, it takes about an hour and a half to reach the monastery once you turn off the main road at Sagarejo.

The first 70% of the distance can be covered in about half the time, as the road becomes more problematic past Udabno (which means, quite literally "desert".)  This is the only settlement between Sagarelo and Davit Gareja, and a more improbable one would be hard to imagine.

The residents of Udabno are ethnically Svan, from a village in the High Caucasus in the opposite corner of the country--a region as completely at variance with these wide open Kakhetian vistas as one could imagine.  Several decades ago, a landslide swept away a mountain village.  In true Soviet style, the authorities transported these villagers en masse across the country to this location.  Here the government did what the bureaucrats knew to do--they erected a model town, one concrete block house after another, located 20 kilometers past the middle of nowhere.

Udabno is a pretty dismal looking place.  Those who have had the wherewithal to go elsewhere have apparently done so.  The shells of abandoned houses litter the outskirts of  Udabno, resembling nothing so much as perhaps a movie set for Hollywood's latest post-apocalyptic thriller.

A young Polish couple, noting a steady stream of vehicles making the trek back and forth to Davit Gareja saw something else--opportunity.  The took one of the abandoned shells and slapped on a coat of white, green and blue paint.  That, plus a little electricity, a freezer, stove and beer tap, and  some crates and boxes for tables and chairs, and voila, the Oasis Club Restaurant Cafe. 

This was our fifth day into Georgia, and the food seemed to just get better and better the further we went.  All the staples were in place--bread, tomato and cucumber salad, eggplant dishes, khachapuri, the cheese plate, watermelon, tarragon soda, draft beer, more khachapuri, etc.  

 

Several additional items, however, launched this particular feast to the top of my list.  First, there was the Udabno cheese.  Georgia is known for its regional cheeses, and every meal contained a plate of three to four varieties.  The local Udabno cheese was the best of the lot.  I think I would return, if only for the cheese.  Next, there was the bowl of ratatouille (pictured here.)  Oh man, it was wonderful.  Then our hosts presented us with the kubdari, a Svan dish.  This looked like the ubiquitous khachapuri (cheese bread), but wonder of wonders, it was filled with meat!  Any traditional culture that is worth its salt will have a meat pie, and kubdari is the Georgian version.    

We finished off our feast by relaxing with some ice cream, as well as some lattes and iced coffees.  Soso found time for a game or two of backgammon in the inside dining room.  Cathleen worked on commandeering some of the special "Svantian salt."  I am no "foodie," but some meals stand out in my mind.  Sitting on a crate at the back of the Oasis Club Restaurant Cafe will not soon be forgotten.

At the time of our departure, the road was stacking-up with customers coming back from Davit Gareja.  Our hosts scurried around to tend to everyone, and suggested we stop on our return and settle-up then.  Try doing something like that in the good old USA. We did stop and pay our tab on the way back.  At that time, the electricity had gone out.  Perhaps a generator should be the next capital improvement at the Oasis Club Restaurant Cafe.  We wouldn't want the beer to go warm.

Georgian Chronicle (4)--The State of Orthodoxy in Georgia

Gelati Cathedral, near Kutaisi, Georgia

     Over the course of eleven days in Georgia, I visited twenty-two different Orthodox churches (as well as one synagogue.)  Only four  were in Tbilisi, the rest scattered all around the country.  Based on my observations, I will venture some tentative conclusions about the health of Georgian Orthodoxy.

     The nature of Orthodox worship makes it difficult to talk in terms of real numbers.  Hard figures are easier to come by in American Protestantism where membership rolls are generally maintained, and attendance taken during Sunday School and/or worship.  Orthodoxy just does not work that way, even in the U.S., much less traditional Orthodox countries.  Projected numbers in American Orthodox jurisdictions came in for some well-deserved criticism several years ago.  The OCA's figures proved especially egregious.    

     American Orthodox--perhaps looking for encouragement and validation from the Old World--sometimes view these traditional Orthodox cultures with rose-colored glasses.  And so, we should be clear-eyed about any claims of Orthodox ascendancy elsewhere.  Reports of the growing churches of sub-Saharan Africa, as well as the explosive growth among the Mayans of Guatemala and southern Mexico appear genuine (Guatemala is now the largest per capita Orthodox country in the Western Hemisphere.)  A recent headline proclaiming Orthodoxy the fastest-growing religion in Ireland, however, is easily shot down.  Yes, there are 45,000 Orthodox Christians in that country, four times the number in 2002.  That is good news, to be sure, but a break-down of the numbers reveal that 26% are Romanian, 12.6% are Latvian, etc.  Only 20% (9,000) are native-born.  And Muslims in Ireland number 49,000.  When native-born Orthodox Irish outnumber the Muslims, then that will be news.  Most everyone agrees that the Russian church has undergone a remarkable revival in the post-Communist years, yet the number of actual church-goers is paltry relative to the total population.  That observation holds for Balkan Orthodoxy, as well.

     Georgia is often touted (rightly, I believe) as the exception to this pattern.  Indeed, I would contend that the Georgian model is perhaps the most robust expression of the Faith today.   One should keep in mind that the Orthodox Church here has always been a bit different, and for lack of a better word, Georgia-centric.  The church venerates a host of saints representing 1,900 years of their Christian witness, who are largely unknown to the Orthodox outside of Georgia.  The church has never been just an extension of Constantinople or Moscow, but has instead looked to Jerusalem (and Syria.)  And it seems that Georgian Orthodoxy-even from its founding narratives-has maintained a fascinating connection with Judaism.

     The revival of Orthodoxy here is nothing short of remarkable.  In 1917, 2,455 working churches exised in the country.  By the latter Soviet years, only 80 survived.  Today there are 1,700 Georgian priests and new church construction is evident across the country.  Ilia II, the Patriarch since 1977, remains the most beloved and respected figure in the country.  And yet, a few cautionary words are in order.  Communism failed as an economic system, yet was very successful, over several generations, in changing the natural order of things.  Merab Mamardashvili wrote the following in 1995:

I used to think that, as the Georgians loved life, had a sense of humor, managed to preserve their heart and ancient chivalry and had thus remained individualists, sceptics etc, they could not be fully enslaved...I came back and found this was an illusion, that the process of mental, spiritual, verbal degradation had gone too far.

Hopefully Mamardashvili's gloomy prognostication from the dark days of 1995 has not proved to be absolutely correct.  But for those who were born and came of age during the Soviet years, any return to Orthodoxy has been more problematic.  For many, the icons may be back up upon the walls at home, but little more.  I am currently reading Donald Rayfield's excellent and much-needed history, Edge of Empires.  I scanned the ending chapters first--the short-lived Republic of 1918, the Soviet annexation, the years of occupation, and the troubled transition to "democracy."   This compelling account of 75 years of brutality and gangsterism leads one to wonder how much of anything survived at all (and it must be noted, that the violence was more often Georgian against Georgian, rather than Soviet Russian against Georgian.)   Within this context, the ambivalence of some older Georgians to the Church is understandable. 

     And admittedly, most of the Georgian churches I visited were pilgrimage destinations, the historic churches and monasteries that have great meaning to the country's history.  My impression of the state of the Faith would be more balanced, for example, if I I had visited a church out among the Soviet-era block apartments in the Tbilisi suburbs, rather than the great churches of the old city.  

    That said,  twenty-two churches later, I left Georgia with a clear and consistent image of Georgian Orthodoxy.  With perhaps one exception--Ikalto--every church we visited, no matter which day, was alive with people.  The churches there are not the empty museum pieces you find in western Europe (as well as in Italy, I am told).  Priests, monks, and/or nuns are in evidence throughout.  We never really had a church to ourselves, but were merely one more group in the stream of pilgrims and regular worshippers wherever we went.  The candles never went out.  For Vespers and Divine Liturgy, the churches often had to spill out into their courtyards--not only at Sioni in Tbilisi, but at Gelati in Kutaisi.  Now at first glance, those milling about the outside of the churches might not appear to be worshippers at all, given that they may be chatting or talking on their cellphones.  But watch them, and before long they will filter back into the church.  In some ways, Georgian worship appears a bit more casual natural than that to which we are accustomed, with more movement and general milling about.  As was explained to me, Georgians believes that whenever they are in the church they should be prayerful.  If they find themselves in not so prayerful a state of mind, they may step outside for a bit until they feel it is appropriate to return.  In Sioni on Sunday morning, the atmosphere could only be described as a crush of people.  The same applied for Anchiskhati and Sameba. 

     But here is the most important point that I have been building up to.  The churches were overwhelmingly comprised of young people--teenagers, twenty-somethings, thirty-somethings.  The priests, monks and nuns were equally youthful, it seemed to me.  Certainly there were the grandparents in attendance, but for the most part the Georgian Orthodox Church seems to be the church of the young.  Now, my contacts assure me that plenty of youth are not the least interested in religion at all, nor do I know the percentage of the total youth demographic that these worshippers represent.  But it really does not matter, for enough of a critical mass is in place to ensure a vigorous future.  A recent BBC article notes that while "over 80% of Georgia's 4.5 million people say they belong to the Georgian Orthodox Church...only about 15%-25% actively participate in rituals."  So, in one sense, Georgia is broadly culturally Orthodox, in the same manner as Greece, the Balkans and Russia.  But when you think about it--especially considering Georgia's three generations of Communism--the figure of 25% who "actively participate" is actually pretty darn good for the 21st-Century.

     One can hardly over-emphasize the role of His Holiness and Beatitude Ilia II in the revival of Georgian Orthodoxy.  He has wisely guided the Church through the minefield of late Soviet and post Soviet Georgian politics, generally avoiding public stances on contentious issues other than to encourage restraint and prayer.  One of our tour members knew a Georgian-American who knew someone who worked in the Patriarchate.  Through these connections, we received permission to visit the Patriarch on the last night of our stay.   The main building of the compound is a long three-story structure facing a busy street hugging the west shoreline of the Mhkvari River (the Patriarch lives in an apartment on the third floor, with the rest of the facility devoted to administration.)  A high stone wall wraps around the north, south and west sides of the property.  The narrow enclosure contains a large convent, an exquisite chapel and a lush, semi-tropical garden, complete with a peacock strolling within. 

     As dusk approached, our entrance into this world had an almost magical feel.  As one would imagine, the little Church of the Annunciation contained some of the best Georgian iconography, replete with Georgian saints and an interesting panel depicting the Prophet Jonah.  From the church, we were escorted to the Patriarch's third floor office, where we waited for some time.  At this time, a delegation of international scholars was just leaving the building after a meeting with the Patriarch. The walls of the office were filled with his artwork, secular and religious.  The Patriarch is devoted to David the Psalmist, and the icon he wrote of King David hangs on the wall (and is becoming a popular icon throughout Georgia.)  Several people from the Patriarchate came in and introduced themselves and waited with us.  They expressed pleasant surprise that we were American and Orthodox. 

     One of these was Tsisana, our liaison there.  Back during the Ahbkasian wars of the early 1990s, she came to the Patriarchate to help out with those who needed medical attention.  She now runs the free clinic there.  Georgian doctors donate their services for those who cannot afford regular medical care (and the subject of the excellent Georgian medical care without the insurance industry deserves a separate post.)  At that same time, the Patriarchate and the convent started a daily soup kitchen to help feed as many of the refugees as possible.  4,000 meals were served every day during the worst of the crisis.  Even today, 250 meals are served up on a daily basis.  After a while, one aide brought in a stack of books--hardbound copies of the Patriarch's homilies (in English), gifts to us from him.  

     In time, we were ushered back downstairs and out into the courtyard, underneath the stars.  From this point on, the exact order of events is jumbled in the mystical haze of my memory.  The Patriarch was there, sitting in a simple arm chair.  A few attendants hovered about, including a 6' 4" body-builder whom I assumed to be his bodyguard.  He waited on his charge as tenderly and as attentively as any nurse.  The Patriarch is now weighted-down in years, a frail little man whose voice is almost inaudible, who has trouble standing and whose hands shake with palsy.  And yet his eyes were alert and burned bright.  

     A priest received an emotional blessing.  John Graham squatted in front of the Patriarch and explained who we were.  Each of us advanced forward, among the others, and received a blessing.  Four of our number were choir members of the same parish in New Jersey.  They had purchased an icon--the original written by the Patriarch himself--as a gift to a Georgian Orthodox Church in their state, and he blessed it.  One of the nuns approached John with a request. The Patriarch has mentioned that he would enjoy hearing the four chant.  Nervously, they eased up to his side and chanted in church Slavonic. (they are from a heavily ethnic parish.) After that, he whispered something to John Graham, and they then chanted in English.  The Patriarch told John that he would rather they sing something in American.  Of course, they were all very honored to have this privilege. 

     We stood in the moonlight, around a 400-year old olive tree (a recent gift from an Jewish native of Georgia, now living in Israel), clutching our books of Homilies, and munching on the fresh apricots and cherries that were being passed around.  A trio of nuns gently sang Alleluia in the background.  They were all young, their faces joyous, if not radiant.  I knew this before going to Georgia, but there is just something about Orthodox nuns.  Tsisana told us that the Patriarch had these informal audiences every night, that they would go on until 2:00 in the morning, and then the new day would begin with morning prayers at 6:00 A.M.  We lingered as long as we could, reluctant to leave this blessed garden.  But we had to return to the hotel, as some of us were leaving for the airport in less than four hours.  Before doing so, we pressed money into Tsisana's hand, for use at the clinic.  With tearful eyes, she thanked us, but asked if she could give it to the soup kitchen instead, as the need was greater there.  How typical of Georgian generosity--you give them something and they are thinking of who might need it more.  (This to be a subject of another post.)  

     Earlier that day, I was in Sameba Cathedral in Tbilisi.  Truth be told, the behavior of some of the crowd that morning was not exactly spiritually edifying.  But one vignette stands out in my memory.  A Georgian woman, probably  within a few years either side of forty, dressed attractively but in a traditional manner, was escorting two young children--a skinny girl of about eight, and a boy still in shorts, aged about five.  They were making the rounds of the icons and the candle stands.  She was there with them, but neither child needed instructions on what to do.  The girl could reach the icons easily enough.  The boy, however, was still too short.  On his tiptoes, he could barely stretch to kiss the bottom of the frame.  But at every icon stand, he gave it everything he had.  This is the remembrance I carried home with me.  Orthodoxy will continue to blossom in these mellow Caucasian valleys.

     I never cease to be amazed at the level of American historio-geographic ignorance and indifference (or at least in my corner of the country.)  At a meeting, a young executive overheard where I had been.  "Wow," she said, "that's a real mission field."  The images of Georgia came flooding back, and I had a sudden flash of anger at this casual, uninformed arrogance.  I simply replied, "No.  They need to send missionaries to us."

    

In the Patriarchate

Georgian Chronicle (3)--At the Stalin Museum

     An unexpected highlight of our visit to Georgia came on our last night in the country. Through someone who knew someone who knew someone else, we received an invitation to a short audience with Patriarch Ilia II (of which more in a later post.) The Patriarchate is hidden behind high stone walls in the old city, very near the Mtkvari River.  The enclosure conceals a  narrow, lush garden--almost tropical in appearance--wedged between the administrative building, the convent and the back wall.  The Church of the Annunciation--a small gem of a chapel--is the focal point of the complex. 

     As would be expected, the iconography here  was exceptional, and quite moving, with much of the space devoted particularly to Georgian saints.  The north wall of the nave contained a row of the sainted monarchs--Vahktang Gorgosali, Archil and Luarsab, Mirian and Nana, Tamar, Demetre, David the Builder and Ketevan, among others.  This is uniquely Georgian.  No other Orthodox nations (not even Russia and Serbia) have canonized so many of their kings and queens.  Nor is this just hagiographic excess.  For many--including Archil, Luarsab, Demetre and Ketevan--were true martyrs, in every sense of the word. 

     Even so, the Georgian rulers were often a fractious lot, and were fully capable of producing monsters as well as saints.  The Khakhetian king Giorgi the Bad comes to mind, as well as his great-grandson, Constantine Khan, the apostate--each a practitioner of both fratricide and patricide.  Thus considered, perhaps the emergence and rise to power of Joseph Dzhugashvili is not such an anomaly.  We know him better as Joseph Stalin.

     A visit to the Stalin Museum does not immediately leap to mind when considering a "monastery tour" of Georgia.  Some expressed interest, however, and our wise leader worked it into our flexible itinerary.  My initial instincts failed me on this, as I was not at all curious to stop here.  I was mistaken.  The museum proved fascinating, though--as is often the case with me--in a perverse sort of way.

     Gori is a struggling town, suffering a good deal of shelling prior to its capture by the Russians during the 2008 war.  The city seems to have little going for it beyond the Stalin Museum.  Certainly, the institution dominates the municipality.  The Soviets erected the museum in the 1930s, with many blocks  being leveled to make room for the structure and the esplanade approaching it.  The attractive building predates the worst of Soviet architecture, having perhaps a bit of a Moorish feel to it.  A statue of Stalin once towered over the grounds, though in 2012 the Georgian government surreptitiously removed it in the middle of the night.  (Some Georgians tried to pay the Russians to blow it up during the 2008 occupation, but the soldiers were offended and refused to do so.)  A more modest statue remains.  In the park fronting the museum, Stalin's birthplace is preserved, though the neighborhood that once surrounded it is completely demolished.  The Soviets erected a temple-like structure, complete with inlaid hammer and sickles, over the cottage.  For all the attention Gori lavishes on Stalin, he seems to have not given his birthplace much thought one way or the other after his departure.

Stalin Museum in background, Stalin birthplace in foreground

     The inside of the museum is built on a grand scale, and would have been well-suited to showcase impressive galleries and exhibits.  Unfortunately, the interior received the classic Soviet treatment.  The walls were covered in a drab gray felt or flannel-board type material.  The exhibits consisted primarily of grainy black-and-white enlargements of old photographs, newspapers and correspondence, telling a very sanitized version of the life of Stalin.  If you were expecting any reference to purges, show-trials, gulags, the invasion of Poland, or that sort of thing, then you would be disappointed, and would need to look elsewhere.  Thankfully, many of the offerings contained English subtitles.  I would have enjoyed just wandering through the museum, taking it in at my own stride.  But in something of a holdover from the old days, we were forced to submit to an official tour, with a guide reciting a memorized speech in front of every exhibit.   As much as was possible, I pealed-off from the official narration.  The museum contained remarkably few actual artifacts of Stalin's, primarily just diplomatic gifts he received.  A bizarre lamp, with frilly lace on the top, and a homemade model of a Soviet tank for the base, was the showcased item in one gallery.  Tellingly, the museum did contain Stalin's copy of Darwin's On the Origin of Species.


     Outside of perhaps Gori itself, Georgians seem ambivalent at best about Stalin.  And Stalin-worship is certainly anachronistic to the image of the "new" Georgia that is being vigorously promoted.  Young people probably do not consider him at all.  Older Georgians may look back with a bit of longing for the security and favored status they enjoyed in the Soviet system, no doubt a legacy of Stalin.  But that is all.

     I was able to view the exhibits dispassionately, strictly on an intellectual level.  Others in our group may have interacted on a more visceral level.  One of our members is the daughter of a Russian father and a Greek mother.  Her grandfather worked in a factory in Soviet Russia during the 1920s and 1930s.  In 1937 (I believe) the authorities arrested him and declared him an enemy of the state.  In short order, her grandfather was executed and buried in a mass grave.  Her grandmother was dispatched to the Gulag.  Their two youngest children ended-up in orphanages, while the oldest was conscripted into the army.  He survived the Second World War, being captured by the Germans and interred in a prisoner-of-war camp.  At war's end, he instinctively knew that his future lay in jumping a boxcar that was headed west, rather than east.  He made his way to the U.S. and became a typical American success story.  Fairly late in life, he took an Old World wife (from Greece) and brought her to the U.S. as well.  Of course, none of this would have happened had not his father been murdered and the family broken up by the Soviets.  Still, I expect that his daughter's thoughts were bittersweet and she toured the museum and listened to the tributes to Joseph Stalin. 


     Anyone who visits the Stalin Museum should couple that with a visit to the Museum of the Soviet Occupation, on the third floor of the Georgian National Museum in Tbilisi.  The exhibit is extremely well done and quite compelling.  The very name of the museum itself clearly announces the particular narrative  that is to be promoted, i.e that the Georgian nation was under the heavy Soviet thumb for seventy years.  Even so, the exhibits were reinforced by hard statistics and data, and the tone was less overtly propagandistic than its counterpart in Gori.  A boxcar, riddled with bullet-holes (from each direction) greets visitors in the ante-room of the gallery.  A number of Georgian nationalists met their death here in 1923, as the Bolsheviks consolidated their control over the country. 

     As Tsarist Russia disintegrated in 1917, the peoples of the Caucasus quickly reasserted their independence.  Georgian nationalism had never disappeared after being subsumed into Russia in 1803, and the leaders were ready when the opportunity presented itself.  At first, a loose Trans-caucasus confederation emerged under the Menshiviks, but soon separated into its component parts of Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan.  On May 26, 1918, Georgia declared independence from Russia.  For two and one half years, an independent Georgian state survived.  But as the Soviets consolidated their hold on Russia, they began to address regaining their recently-lost territories.  First Azerbaijan fell, then Armenia, and finally Georgia in February of 1921.  The tactic was always the same.  A small uprising or disturbance would be funded, allowing the Soviets to move in and "restore order."  (A cynic might note that we have employed similar tactics through the years in Latin America and the Middle East.)

     The brief period of independence, a little over two and a half years, is pivotal in the Georgian self-perception.  Their Independence Day is May 26th, referencing not the events of 1991, but rather the declaration of 1918.  At the renewal of Georgian statehood upon the collapse of the Soviet Union, Georgian leaders specifically sought to restore the framework of the 1918 republic.  The museum contains rare newsreel footage of the events surrounding the early period of independence.     

     Between 1922 and 1952, the Soviets executed 101,000 Georgians and deported 330,000 out of a total population of only around 4,000,000.  When you do the math on that you realize that the odds were not all that good during the Stalinist era.  If you were middle class, or if you were considered part of the intelligentsia, or if you were a member of the old nobility (and in Georgia this did not necessarily imply wealth at all), or if you were a bishop, priest or monk, then you were marked.  The pictures of the executed--poets, authors, bishops among others--are especially poignant.  One picture records the demolishing of the Kutaisi Cathedral in 1924 by a crowd of Bolsheviks.  Bishop Nazar of Kutaisi (executed in 1924) stated, My soul belongs to God, my heart belongs to Georgia, do whatever you will with my body.   A unique feature of Georgian iconography is the depiction of St. George killing (symbolically) the Emperor Diocletian.  In a like manner, the sentiments of the New Martyr Nazar can be said to have slain the Emperor Stalin.                    

Georgian Chronicle (2)--Dodge or Die: A Reappraisal of the Georgian Driver

   

    I first experienced life on the Georgian road back in 2006, as I traveled from Tbilisi through Gori and Kutaisi and on to Zugdidi, then up into Svaneti--all in the back-seat of a beat-up Soviet-era Lada Niva.  An aggressive driver myself, I found the ride a bit hair-raising at first--the reckless and incessant passing, and the total disregard for staying within one's own lane, etc.--and concluded that Georgians had to be among the worst drivers in the world.

     I think differently now.  Georgian drivers do not ignore the white lines at all.  In fact, they use them for alignment:  two tires on the left side of the line and two tires on the right.  As oncoming traffic is doing much the same thing, driving can resemble a perpetual game of "Chicken."  If you need to pass, no problem.  By all means do so, whether on the right or the left.  If you are going around a curve, just go for it anyway.  Do not concern yourself with the oncoming traffic.  They will scoot over.  Or not. 

     This seems to be an unwritten rule of the Georgian road, something buried deep within the psyche of the Georgian male.  That the vehicle in front of you must be passed at all costs appears to be an unshakable conviction.  We arrived at Stepantsminda, deep in the high Caucasus, late in the day, and would not have time to hike up the mountain to Gergeti Sameba Church and Monastery and back before supper.  The site now receives more religious pilgrims than on my previous visit, as well as being a popular destination for the European backpacking and trekking set.  Enterprising Stepantsmindians have been quick to meet the needs of the touristas milling about the village square.  Mini-vans can tote seven passengers at a time, and little Nivas cart smaller parties.  And so, a steady stream of vehicles climb the rock-strewn goat-path of a road that switchbacks up the mountain.  We split up into three mini-vans and began the ascent-- still no easy task.  About half way up the mountain, I was surprised to hear a toot, and to see a little Lada Niva attempting to scramble past us on the left.  Apparently a fare awaited him at the summit, so our mini-van must be passed.

     Western visitors are also unaccustomed to another staple of Georgian driving, namely cows (and the occasional pigs) on the road.  Cattle roam free in Georgia and they particularly enjoy being on the roads.  Perhaps they are soothed by the wind generated from the wizzing cars and trucks.  The cows pay not the slightest attention to motorists.  A bus can miss a lazing bovine by inches and she will not bat an ear. 

     The best example we witnessed was the drive out of Kutaisi through the rich agricultural lands of Soso's native western Imereti.  The cows were out in force, and our driver, Archilko, maneuvered through them with seeming effortless ease.  One of our tour members voiced the simple question that we were all thinking, to-wit:  "What happens if you hit a cow?"

     John put the question to Archilko, and soon an animated conversation (in Georgian) ensued between him, John, Shergil and Soso.  The question was not as simple as we supposed, as their conversation went on for some length.  As last, John composed an answer for us.  Unless it occurs on a major highway (and really, there are really only one or two in the country,) then the driver is required to stop, locate the owner of the unfortunate cow and make restitution then and there before proceeding.  A good cow brings $750 to $1,000.  That is why the cattle were so nonchalant about traffic.  No Georgian driver ever wants to take the chance of clipping a cow, for the price is just too expensive.  The animated conversation between the Georgian-speakers continued on for some time, with Soso being simply convulsed with laughter.  We later learned that the conversation veered towards road-kill jokes, proving that gross-out humor knows no ethnic boundaries.

     And so now I realize that Georgian drivers are simply the best in the world, as they maneuver around cows, pigs, switchbacks, and potholes the size of small bedrooms, all with effortless aplomb.  Our driver, Archilko, proved to be the best of the best.  And finally, the best thing about the Georgian road is the fact that if you stay with it long enough, you are liable to end up at a place like this: 


     

      

Georgian Chronicle--(1) The place that sits on my heart

     Visitors to this site well know my enthusiasm for all things Georgian--not the Southern state, but the the small republic nestled on the south slopes of the Caucasus Mountains of Eurasia.  In my meager postings during the last sixth months or so, at least five or six concern Georgia.

     An initial 2006 visit was something of a fluke--tacked-on to a more extensive exploration of Turkey.  I returned in 2007 for a closer look around.  After that, I felt I should see other countries, though Georgia was never far from my imaginings.  For the last three years, business and financial concerns, coupled with an assortment of medical problems have kept me on these shores.  I am feeling better these days, and the wolf has now backed away from the door, his attention directed elsewhere, it seems.  That meant, of course, that it was time to return to Georgia.  The fact that my only child now lives in the country cinched the matter.

     I have also come to an important truth about travel. For many, traveling seems little more than a game, in which one checks-off as many destinations as possible. In a week at a Tbilisi hostel, my son was thrown together with a number of rootless (mostly European) travelers. From his perspective, their journeys appeared unfocused, a mere tagging of obscure destinations--two to three days in Tbilisi, so it must be time to move on to Uzbekistan, etc.

     I suggest, however, that travel reveals the places that stir our souls--or as a Georgian would say, that sits on your heart.  Once found, we should return there again and again, as often as possible. I fully appreciate the fact that discovering your touchstone on the other side of the world is a decidedly modern luxury (and perhaps a temporary one at that.) I do have other such locales a bit closer to home. But as health and finances permit, I will be returning to Georgia whenever possible.

     I have just spent eleven days in Georgia, still a bit overwhelmed by it all. I travelled with John Graham's annual "Monastery Tour," as I did in 2007. The group topped out at sixteen--six from New York City, six from New Jersey, a North Carolinian, one from Michigan, one from Illinois, and an outlier from Texas (me.) We formed a diverse but congenial group, ranging in age from four years old to the mid-70s, consisting of academics, successful entrepreneurs, small business-people, craftsmen and artisans--as well as two of the best-behaved children I have ever encountered.  Eight of us were Orthodox, the others Catholic, Protestant, Jewish and the non-croyant.  The group proved to be an intrepid lot, up for anything and everything, with nary a complaint to be heard.

     John is an outstanding guide, completely at home in his Georgian skin as he is his American, and wisely choosing Shergil Pirtskhelani and Soso Kopaleishvili to assist him on the tour.  All three are accomplished vocalists, musicians and musicologists, key players in the renaissance of traditional Georgian folk singing and chant. 

     Georgia's history is often tragic and desperate, sometimes grand and glorious, and occasionally rambunctious and fractious.  Georgians themselves are perhaps the most generous people on earth.  The thing that Georgia and Georgians are not, however, is dull.  I find them endlessly fascinating.  Over the following days and weeks I hope to submit a number of topical posts, in no particular order of importance.  I hope you enjoy these ruminations on Georgia.

[I will add that it will be a great pleasure to write for those who at least know where the country is located.  I must live in one of the most parochial and geographically illiterate regions of the U.S.  When I answer the question put to me of where I have been, the typical response is "Where's that?"  The easy answer is to reference the Black Sea, but then that would presuppose that they knew where they Black Sea is located, which they do not.  Some are vaguely aware of the demonstrations in Istanbul and the mass protests in Egypt, and usually ask "Weren't you afraid to be over there?"  I kid you not.  Apparently, over there is all the same.  I was enlightened to hear from one person, however, that Georgia started off as a penal colony.  Yes.  When you cannot distinguish between an ancient Eurasian kingdom on the Black Sea and the establishment of the British North American colony of Georgia in 1734, then perhaps all hope is indeed lost.]

 

A Forgotten American Hero

The more I learn, the more I realize how little I really know about American history.  Why had I never heard of this man--Richard F. Pettigrew (1848-1926)?  Truth be told, he was outspoken and radical for his times, and the role he played on the national stage is largely forgotten.

Pettigrew was a lawyer and land surveyor, two professions which dovetail nicely into real estate promotion and development.  He figured prominently in the growth of Sioux City, South Dakota.  As a young man, he involved himself in local Republican politics and upon statehood became South Dakota's first senator in Washington. 

Pettigrew soon soured on the crony capitalism he discovered in the nation's capital.  He bolted the Republican Party over the currency issue at the 1896 Convention.  He opposed McKinley on foreign policy, seeing in our pursuit of war with Spain the birth of an American Empire.  Pettigrew was still technically a Republican senator when he voted against the illegal annexation of Hawaii in 1898--the only one of his party to do so.  The GOP was glad to be rid of him when his term ended in 1900.  Pettigrew aligned himself with the Populists, then the Democrats (though he never trusted Woodrow Wilson,) and ultimately the Socialists. 

The defining moment of his career, however, came in 1917.   He opposed our entry into the First World War, seeing it as capitalist manipulation bent on enriching the wealthy elites.  He urged all young men to evade the draft.  Woodrow Wilson's adminstration brought a felony indictment against him for violating the Espionage Act of 1917.  Socialist leader Eugene V. Debs was already serving a ten-year prison sentence under the same charge.  Pettigrew was not without resources, however, and enlisted Clarence Darrow to lead his defense.  The charges against him were eventually dropped.

Jeff Taylor over at the Front Porch Republic (here) describes Wilson's Espionage Act as the "bad gift that keeps on giving...enshrining the principle that speech is free except when  the government deems it unhelpful."  (He also noted that Woodrow Wilson was our worst President ever.  I would qualify that judgment only slighty, for he is certainly among the bottom three.) 

In 1922, Pettigrew published Imperial Washington, with the inside blurb written by Lenin himself.  At his death in 1926, Pettigrew willed his home to the City of Sioux Falls for use as a museum, with the stipulation that the framed copy of his federal indictment must be prominently displayed next to his framed copy of the Declaration of Independence.

My NFIB Moment

My company has been a member of the NFIB—the National Federation of Independent Business—for 57 years.  My dad signed on back in 1956.  I never paid them much attention, but kept the membership up primarily because it had become something of a tradition.  For decades, the sales representative would call on us once a year—to give an update on their lobbying, and more importantly to try and coax a few more dollars out of us for our renewal.  The same woman called on us for close to twenty years.  She was a strange and eccentric sort, and her visits almost made the membership worthwhile.  But of course, that personal connection had to give way to an annual spiel from a phone bank in God knows where.  We substantially reduced our contribution beginning in 2009, but managed to hang on as members. 

For the most part, NFIB maintained a bi-partisan stance during those years.  In recent times, however, I detected more of an edge in their phone solicitations.  For example, I suppose they just assumed that all “bidnessmen” would be opposed to health care reform.  And then last October, the NFIB sent out pre-election special edition of the magazine they publish from time to time.  Any hint of bi-partisanship was out the window.  The slick publication might just as well been printed at the RNC or Romney Campaign headquarters.  They also included a special Texas insert, listing their recommendations for races here.  Our state representative had been defeated in the May primary.  This guy--a proud birther--was so extreme that he had begun to embarrass the powers that be in our district.  And mind you, we are the district that sends Louie Gohmert to Congress.  You might say we have a high threshold for embarrassment.  Anyway, his young challenger, just as extreme but a bit more nuanced in the proclamation of it, took his place on the November ballot.  The clueless NFIB listed the ousted representative as their recommendation, and gave him a 100% approval rating. 

My co-workers had a big laugh about my ranting over this.  I fired off an email to NFIB, but received no response.  So, I bided my time.  I knew that the NFIB would be making their phone solicitation sometime in the early summer.  That call came yesterday.  I cut the solicitor off in mid-spiel and told her I would not be renewing after 57 years.  I then told why, thanked her and hung up.

I know this is just a silly thing.  But I’m glad to be free of the NFIB, and in so doing striking a small blow for the old republic.

Orthodoxy Ten Years On

Rila Monastery, Bulgaria

       This month marks the tenth anniversary of my first exposure to the Orthodox faith.  A decade seems to be an appropriate milestone, I think, to reflect and take stock of any decision that has so altered the course of one’s life and relationships.  In the very early days of this blog, I felt a compulsion to talk about it all--and did do so to a limited degree.  Fortunately, this typical convert impulse usually fades with time.  In time, most who stick with Orthodoxy grow out of this need to incessantly talk about what they came out of and how--or at least that is the case with me and our mission parish.     Just shut up about yourself already and go to Vespers.  Beyond that, conversion stories often fall into a disappointing pattern, characterized by narcissism, banality, triumphalism, self-justification, etc.   And they are seldom as convincing or quite as applicable to everyone else as the writer imagines them to be.
       Now for the proverbial “That said,” as I attempt to tip-toe around the very thing I just argued should not be done.  I intend no Journey to Orthodoxy © story, for mine is a messy tale that would only serve as a cautionary note for anyone considering a similar decision.  I do propose, however, to revisit my initial exposure to Orthodoxy--the thing that attracted me to the Faith in the first place--those first impressions retained from a few days visit to Bulgaria in 2003.  And to the best of my ability, I also intend to place my spiritual perception--or lack thereof--in context.  What was it in my own background that rendered me so receptive to what was laid-out before me, while my traveling companion remained unaffected?  And so, if a conversion story is to be told, it should not be of my becoming Orthodoxy, but rather my joining myself to a distinctive Protestant sect at age twenty-three, which indeed set the stage for my receptivity to the older faith some twenty-five years later.

I do not pretend to have attained a high degree of self-awareness.  No doubt I present as false a face to the world as most anyone else.   But to see our own selves as God does is the very task set before us.  The natural inclination is for one to somewhat mentally rewrite the narrative of their life to better fit their contemporary circumstances.  And so, in this particular matter, I wonder if I had constructed a back story to justify my present situation.  Perhaps there is a little of that around the edges, but I think the truth of the basic narrative holds.  This is not just a subjective call on my part, for I actually took notes at the time.  Reviewing my 2003 journal for the first time in years, I found that my notes did indeed confirm my remembrance.  The main difference is that I previously focused on one particular experience, instead of a series of impressions spread out over three or four days.  I find that I am now better equipped to make sense of it all, but the back story is little changed.  My hope is that these observations have some value beyond the narcissistic replaying of this particular clip of my life. 
 

                                                                           THE WAY I WAS THEN

        Stories of American tourists venturing into eastern Europe and discovering Orthodoxy are a dime a dozen.  In that sense, my experience is typical.  But many of these narratives involve some sort of religious quest or “journey,” or at least a heightened attentiveness to spiritual matters.  Such was not the case with me.  I was disinclined to leave my church, and certainly was not in search of any Eastern religious exotica.   I went to Bulgaria with the only the most superficial notion of Orthodoxy, and certainly without any thought that it might appeal to me. 

I was raised nothing much at all:  my mother was the most nominal of nominal Baptists, and my father was a lapsed member of the Church of Christ.  We did not say Grace over our meals and we did not discuss religion in any manner at all, other than the gratuitous berating of religious hypocrites, who were always conveniently close at hand (a sister-in-law and a son-in-law provided endless examples.) 

My mother was not religious on any level, and had no faith heritage to pass down to the next generation.  Southerners will realize how thin a purely superficial Southern Baptist background can be.  I remember a family dinner when I was introducing my somewhat sheltered Church of Christ fiance to my family.  The table was spread with vegetables from our garden and beef from our pastures.  My father—sensitive to my wife’s background—asked my mother, “L*****, don’t you think someone needs to give thanks?”  My mother shot back, “Why?  We raised every bit of it ourselves.”  That was my mother—if she thought it, she said it, and thought it needed saying.  My mother did have a Bible.  It was safely preserved in the box it came in, behind the right headboard of her bed.  As a young child, I remember going in there when she was away from the house.  I would carefully remove the Bible from its box and look at each of the pictures.  If my mother was ever baptized, it was never mentioned.

A Church of Christ preacher baptized my teen aged father in the Lampasas River.  This was his mother's family faith, a seemingly odd fit for such a joyous, happy woman.  My granddad--a true gentleman--loved to argue religion, but studiously avoided accompanying his wife and children to the Campbellite gatherings.  
 I remember accompanying my parents to church a few times in my very early youth.  My dad would sit in the pew with his head down, his hands clasped with his index fingers forming a V.  He clearly would rather have been in the pasture.  But it was my father who was--and remains--my great example of how one should treat others.

I cannot ever remember a time when I did not believe.  Doubt has never been my problem (I have plenty of others.)  I have always believed in God, absolutely.  And after a certain age, I never tried to convince myself that I was somehow okay without faith. 
My dad had an office downtown, and many days I would hang out there and run errands until the first one of my parents went home.   The LDS church had a storefront outreach on the courthouse square.  I would walk slowly by and look at their exhibits in the window, but I never got up enough courage to go inside.  I picked up a free Book of Mormon at the Hemisfair in 1968.  I read it through as a thirteen year-old, but laid it down,  decidedly unconvinced.  A clunky adventure yarn does not a faith make.  I knew it was bunk, just as a few years later I instinctively knew that the Young Life craze of my high school peers was not the real deal either, or at least not for me. 
When I was maybe twelve or thirteen, I remember telling my dad that I wanted to be a member of a church.  He and I would talk on our way out to the farm to check on the cattle.  This was our everyday routine, after he came home from work.  He generally wanted to talk about cattle and I wanted to talk about anything but.  But we did have good conversations that would have been impossible if my mother or brother were included.  I remember that he told me that I could be any religion I wanted, except Catholic.  (Anti-papism was drilled-in early in the South, even in moderate souls such as my dad.)  He may have made some vague commitment to seeing that I was able to attend church, but I do not remember it.   But lest I be too critical of my dad, this simply would not have been anything he would have known how to do, exactly. 

My parents did send me to church with my much older sister and her husband, who were apparently trying to save me from being a heathen.  We went to their Baptist church.  My remembrances are of gluing cotton balls on the outline of a lamb in Vacation Bible School and later being taught against cults like the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Church of Christ (really) in Sunday School.  A well-meaning but sanctimonious old biddy scared me away from there when I was about thirteen or fourteen.  Years later--while off in college--I received a letter from my mother, regretting the fact that they had never taken me to church (it was the 70s and my hair was approaching shoulder-length.)   To my mother, church was something I should have been "taken to."  The idea that it would have any relevance beyond the hour or so in the pew was a foreign concept to her.  But I will say that my mother mellowed considerably in her last years of illness, and it is those memories I retain.  
And so, partially to appease her and partially to ease my own conscience, I tried out the University Baptist Church down Guadalupe Avenue.  Once was enough.  They had posters up advertising an upcoming service featuring Willie Nelson as speaker, depicted Jesus-like, in a white gown.  I did not know anything much at all, but I knew that a church that had Willie Nelson delivering a sermon was not one to be taken seriously.  (I actually like Willie Nelson, but in context.)  After graduation, I returned to my hometown, and my sister’s husband promptly insisted I visit their Baptist church, as they were having a special series on the “End Times” and prophecy.  I did so, and all those bad memories came flooding back.  At that point in my life, I had no idea what I would become, but I knew beyond a doubt that I would never, ever be a Southern Baptist.

At about that same time, a distant cousin on my mother’s side stopped by my house and invited me to attend a “gospel meeting” at her Church of Christ.  Her grandmother later called to do the same thing.  All I knew about the Church of Christ were the gentle jibes I heard at home (my great-grandmother had a way of saying THE Church.  And then there were my feuding great-aunts in central Texas.   The youngest son of one became a Baptist boy-preacher at age fifteen, shocking the other sister’s staunchly Church of Christ family.  The two stopped speaking.)  But I went to the “gospel meeting” anyway.  The straight-forward, logical preaching appealed to me, I thought offering a stark contrast to the emotionalism of the Baptist service.  I was clearly interested, but was embarrassed to pursue it in my small town.  A Church of Christ in the nearby city ran a telephone ministry, where people could dial in and listen to any number of short discourses on various subjects.  And so, I studied through this method, and eventually garnered enough courage to call the preacher and request baptism.  I was twenty-three.

In looking back now, I have to admit that there was some part of me that was attracted to the Church of Christ simply because it was the church of my father’s family (at least his maternal side.)  In fact, through this line I became the 7^th generation in his family to be so.  This is just one of a series of conscious decisions on my part to self-identify with the sane side of my family.  I know my dad was pleased when he found out what I had done.

For many people, the Churches of Christ are just another entrée in the broad smorgasbord of American evangelical Protestantism.  Those readers who hail from Texas or Tennessee know differently, however.  Like the Mormons, they are Restorationists and retain a unique self-perception.  Churches of Christ believe in a pristine First-Century-New-Testament-Christianity that quickly apostatized after the death of the Apostle John.  They neither identify with the Reformation nor believe they are connected with that movement in any way.  The Reformers were moving in the right direction, mind you, but according to Churches of Christ did not go nearly far enough. 
Their particular history began in early 19^th century frontier America during the religious ferment of the Second Great Awakening.  Alexander Campbell (and others) urged a return to New Testament simplicity, arguing that a sincere student of the Bible could know what God required by reading the “blueprint” of Scripture.  One simply had to free their minds of all preconceived religious prejudices and look at the Scriptures objectively and rationally.  Campbell believed he had done that very thing, and  he and his followers concluded that they were the first to ever really and truly do that, hence the “restored” church.  Other religionists who looked at Scripture and arrived at different conclusions were dismissed as insincere, still holding to the “traditions of men.”  These early Restorers were eager to debate this point with others, though their self-serving and circular reasoning was a bit like arguing with Calvinists about predestination.

These "New Testament Christians" proudly claim to be neither Protestant nor Catholic, but simply “the church.”  In fact, they are perhaps the most Protestant of any group, taking sola scriptura to all new levels.  A few beliefs and practices set the Church of Christ apart from their religious neighbors, to-wit:

1.        There is one body and denominationalism is a sin.  The “restored” Church of Christ is that one church.  They often use the phrase, the “Lord’s church,” meaning them alone.   (I never used it.) 
2.      The Lord’s Supper is to be taken every Sunday, though only as a memorial.
3.      Baptism is to be of believers, by immersion, and for the remission of sins.
4.      Each congregation is completely autonomous, ruled by a plurality of elders.
5.      Musical instruments in worship are forbidden (though this is changing.)
6.    Worship consists of five items:  Preaching, Praying, Singing, taking the Lord's Supper and Giving.
7.     A hermeneutic based on CENI (command, example and necessary inference.)  There are other differences, to be sure, but these were the main points.
Churches of Christ hold to a radical bibliolatry.  Scripture is very much a blueprint by which to reconstruct the church whenever necessary.  Old-timers compared Scripture to the game of baseball.  If the sport died out, and centuries later a baseball manual was discovered, then the game could be “restored.”  They posited that Scripture should be viewed in the same manner.  In Orthodoxy, whenever one sees the phrase “the word” in Scripture, it is Jesus Christ that comes to mind.  In the Church of Christ, the default position is the words on the page of the Bible itself.  A minority believed that the Holy Spirit has no role beyond the words of Scripture themselves.
 

I was attracted to the vision of the church's founders—one body, no denominationalism.  I did not comprehend that, while admirable, they were starting from the wrong place.  I also believed strongly in their position on baptism for the remission of sins.  I never really bought into many other aspects of the Church of Christ, however.  (After becoming Orthodox, I had a chance to visit with a former preacher of ours.  As he put it, I was “never a good fit.”)  For example, I always rejected that the Church of Christ constituted the entirety of the Kingdom.   (In fairness, that extreme position has sluffed-away, outside of a hard-core group of what I call the knot-headed congregations.  Most members of the Church of Christ freely admit that there could be others outside their number among the elect.  During my time in the church, the consensus seemed to be that some Baptists would make the cut.  I never heard anyone expand this thinking to include Methodists, however.)  In all my years in the Church of Christ, as Sunday School teacher, deacon and finally elder, I watched my language closely and never “talked the talk.”  I thought the vision was worth fighting for.  Attitudes were slow to change, but I thought it a fight worth making.  I was in it for the long haul. 

Two areas, however, continued  to frustrate me.  These days I can truly call myself a historian—I have the degree, I teach the classes, etc.  But historical research has always been my passion.  I studied our particular religious history in great detail.  Where I now have a wall of Orthodox books, I once had a wall of Church of Christ volumes.  I still have the complete works of Alexander Campbell, Barton W. Stone and Walter Scott (the evangelist, not the Scottish novelist.)  I knew our history inside and out.  I wrote my master’s thesis on the “Stoneite” wing of the Church of Christ in Texas, 1824-1865.   But outside of an occasional professor at our Texas, Tennessee or Alabama colleges, there was absolutely no interest in our history—or really anyone else’s for that matter.  I gave talks on the subject from time to time, and my congregation was polite, but uninterested.  The attitude bordered on active disinterest.  The reason is not hard to fathom.  The Bible is the “blueprint” and the Church of Christ is the “restored” church built on that plan.  This rendered history and the normal historical forces to be irrelevant, as at any time an individual could open their Bible and “restore” the church, regardless of their historical perspective (provided of course, they concluded as Campbell and his successors.)  I always knew this to be inane.  Writing these words makes this belief sound almost childish, but that was indeed the attitude.  History was unnecessary to the church.   I always knew better.
Churches of Christ imagines a 1st-Century church much along their own lines:  small autonomous congregations, each ruled by a plurality of elders, under the guidance of Scripture.  They hold that soon after 100 AD, the church started to apostatize in a big way--bishops, sacramental view of the Supper, infant baptism, etc.  Churches of Christ do not hold that the church began to go astray with the decrees of Constantine.  Rather, they believe that the rot had set long before, the Byzantine emperor's actions only confirmed what was already in place.   This is a pleasant enough story, but no more based in reality or real history than the fantasy of the Nephites and Lamanites created by their contemporary Restorationists.

Intellectualism is not always what it is cracked up to be, and I certainly do not consider myself to be an intellectual.  That said, I did tire of checking my brain at the foyer on Sunday.  Normal religious terminology was frowned upon if it was not found in Scripture.  I never heard the words “theology” (other than in derision) or “Trinity” used.  We were unaware of the Nicene Creed (other than we were against all creeds.)  We had no notion of how and when the New Testament came together, not realizing the tremendous gap in time and space between the death of the last apostle and the leather-bound King James Bible.  The worst aspect about this and other things is that there was no curiosity to learn—again, one of those “history things.”  A young preacher, fresh out of our most knot-headed preacher college in Tennessee, once taught the Young Adult Sunday School class that whenever wine was mentioned in the Bible, it was clearly unfermented since Jesus would not drink alcohol, and that if we ever took a drink it would be like the frog continually jumping half the distance to the wall.  Just as the frog would never actually get there, we would never truly be completely sober again. 

Even though I had great reservations on some issues, and resisted their cramped, narrow world view,  I was loyal to the Church of Christ, still believing in the vision.  I thought all the denominations were flawed, and believed our shortcomings were less egregious than others.  I never remotely considered Catholicism.  In short, I had decided that the Church of Christ was the best possible take on things. 

One thing I learned from my historical research was that what the Church of Christ was preaching and teaching in the late 2oth-century actually took shape in the 1920s, 30s and 40s.  This church bore scant resemblance to the church of the 1830s, 40s, and 50s.  And it was to that earlier church that I felt most attached.  

American Churches of Christ peaked at about 1.2 million in 1980.  That overall number has roughly held, with well over 25% in Texas alone.  Most of the rest can be found in Tennessee, Oklahoma and northern Alabama.  There are more members abroad (Nigeria, Ghana, India, etc.) than there are in this country, primarily due to the very successful World Bible School.  Congregations differ wildly.  Many large urban churches are only culturally Church of Christ.  Many young adherents are hard-pressed to explain why they do the things the way they do, other than that is just what Church of Christ people do.  In recent years, some preachers discovered Grace, and many Church of Christ sermons can be easily interchanged with those of any Evangelical whatever church (case in point:  while accompany my wife to a Church of Christ in Chattanooga, we were subjected to a clown riding a bicycle down the aisle to the stage where a skit ensued, advertising their upcoming VBS.)    Other--usually rural--congregations still hold to the “old paths” (of the 1920s.)  The local congregation here is actually doing quite well, after getting rid of me and a few other trouble-makers.   
       But back to the point I have been trying to make:  In 2003, I was an active leader in the Churches of Christ, hoping for constructive change and growth, but determined to work within the system, so to speak.  One other development affected my thinking quite a bit, contributing to a growing sense of disquietude.  This was the attacks of September 11, 2001.  To some degree, I was swept up in the tide of emotionalism much like everyone else.  But what gnawed at me was the understanding that--as reprehensible as it was--the attackers of that day truly believed in something.  I began to question what it was we truly believed in.  And then I looked at my church.  We had never been tested.   Despite success in some parts of the world, we could never quite shake our Southernness, our rural roots, and yes, our unacknowledged but all too obvious Protestantism.  Our congregation supported a mission in western Ukraine.  They tried to replicate exactly the way we did things here—the order of worship, Sunday School, Bible camp, etc.  Even from the other side of the globe, it seemed unnatural to me.  Global issues were forcing their way into our smug, comfortable lives.  Simply put, the cramped world-view of the Church of Christ seemed peculiarly ill-equipped to confront them.

My favorite aunt is a Jehovah’s Witness.  Her children have said that whoever had knocked on their door that day would have gotten her, whether they were the JWs, the Mormons, or the Hari Khrisnas.  I was certainly not in that extreme condition, but perhaps I was primed for something.  I do know that if I had remained in the states, I would have never made any move away from the Church of Christ.    On the other hand, I wonder if I would have been attracted to Orthodoxy if I had not been a member of the Churches of Christ.  That, in 3,600 words or so, is the best way I can describe my spiritual state on June 9, 2003.

 

                                                             WHAT I SAW:     SOFIA 

In June 2000, in a Paris metro station stairwell, my wife made a Scarlett O'Hara-ish pronouncement.  If it did not actually contain the preface of "As God is my witness," it certainly carried that much force.  She declared to the world that she "would never go overseas again."  And she hasn't.  I stewed for three years before launching off by myself, or with friends.   My buddy Bill and I opted for Bulgaria--cheap, a bit gritty, and exotic enough to provide ample stories for our friends at the coffee shop.   I knew Bulgaria to be traditionally Orthodox, but my understanding went no further than that.  As always, I researched extensively before our departure.  We would base ourselves  in Sofia and Veliko Turnovo, with excursions out into the countryside.  Five hundred years of severe Ottoman domination precluded development of the castles and palaces that dot other parts of Europe.  What Bulgaria does have, however, is monasteries--destroyed and re-built time and again over the centuries.  Unless you are going to the Black Sea beaches, monastery hopping is what one does in Bulgaria.  And so, that was our plan. 

,

The Aleksandr Nevsky Cathedral, the great landmark of Sofia, was completed in 1912, a gift from the Russian people.    We walked up the front steps of the church, past the beggar woman, and into the cavernous interior.  At first glance, the church appeared dark and gloomy, empty and lit by candles here and there.  As Bill and I positioned ourselves besides one of the enormous columns, I gradually began to realize these initial impressions were misleading.  Our eyes eventually adjusted to the dim lighting.  Almost magically, images began to appear on all the walls, columns and ceilings--indeed, the whole panoply of Heaven and Earth was laid out before me.  Nor was the church empty.  The size of the sanctuary was such that it would take several hundreds of people to make a noticeable crowd.  The church sits in the middle of a traffic circle in the very heart of the city, the noises of which sometimes break the silence inside. 
A steady stream of people entered and exited the sanctuary, as Bill and I stood by our column and observed.  I had never seen anything quite like this before.  I did not know that there were actually places that people went to pray.  A church was strictly utilitarian in my thinking--nothing special about it otherwise.  These Sofians, either going to work or to market, first stopped at a kiosk where they apparently purchased candles.  They would then light them and place in scattered candle stands, and later cross themselves and kiss one of the framed icons.  They might stop at several, or perhaps just one, and then they were on their way again.  If this was worship, it was different than any I had ever witnessed. 
I then began to notice one young man, twenty-something and dressed in jeans, standing almost at attention before a framed icon wreathed with flowers, located near the altar.  He was thin, not from working out and eating right as would be the case with Americans, but probably rather from not having enough to eat.  After he had stood there some time, the young man started crossing himself--slow, deliberate sweeps with his hand and then touching the floor.  He did this three times, stood a moment longer, bent down and kissed the icon and then walked off.  I eased up towards the front of the church and observed that he had been before an icon of the Virgin Mary.  I have contemplated this image for ten years.  Instinctively, I realized that I had witnessed something completely new--real, observable reverence. 
This was not a concept that found much practical traction in Churches of Christ--a nice-enough concept, to be sure, but with little relevance to actual worship.  Our demeanor, whether before church, between Sunday School and church, or after the service, could be characterized by chattiness, boisterousness, with perhaps a bit of Southern hoo-rawing.  This attitude characterized most every Church of Christ of my experience.  Our songs were usually either sickly-sweet sentimental--Love Lifted Me" or I'm in the Gloryland Way, or Farther Along, or Give Me the Bible, etc., or praise-worship silly--Days of Elijah (In fairness, there were a few that were of noble sentiment and theologically sound--Up from the Grave He Arose comes to mind.)  During the prayer before the Lord's Supper, we were supposed to be somber and think intently on the Cross, but if everyone else was like me then their mind was wandering 15 seconds after the prayer ended.  The preacher would often tell a few jokes or humorous anecdotes as the congregation settled-in to the twenty minutes of sermonizing.  But never in all this did I ever experience real reverence.  I just didn't.  I had a lot yet to learn and unlearn, but the Bulgarian youth that morning opened my eyes to a new understanding of what worship was all about.


                                                    WHAT I SAW:       RILA

 

Iconostasis at Rila Monastery

 

This part of my story has been told twice before, here and here.  So I may run through it a little quicker than I would otherwise.  As mentioned earlier, I  have tended to highlight my experiece here in Rila, whereas my impressions were actually formed over several days.   That said, what happened to me at Rila was pivotal.  In my own mind at least, I have divided my life at this point; what went before and what has come afterwards. 

Briefly put, Rila is the top attraction in the country, known as the "Jerusalem of Bulgaria."  The church itself is a jewel, nestled within a three-storied walled compound--half fortress--deep within the Rila Mountains.  We arrived at an opportune time, apparently between waves of pilgrims and tourists.  The compound was relatively quiet and empty, unlike the later two times I visited.  Before we entered the church, Bill and I inspected the exonarthex (porch to us at the time), unlike anything either of us had ever seen before.  Every inch--the walls and ceilings--were covered in bright, vivid iconography.  My favorite scenes were the Rich Man and Lazarus, the Archangel Michael, the Last Judgment (with Pharisees being pulled into the abyss) and a strange scene depicting black demons dancing in the air.   But in time, we ventured inside where new wonders awaited us. 

I was unprepared for what greeted me there.  Unlike the dark, sooty walls of Aleksandr Nevsky, Rila is awash in color.  I grew dizzy trying to follow the iconography upward, as it seemed to soar to heaven itself.  The immense, intricately carved iconostasis is--in a word--breathtaking, perhaps the best representation of the renown Bulgarian woodworking art.   Candles flickered everywhere.   My tourist-mode fell to the wayside, as I simply stood there barely within the sanctuary of the church.  I took a half-step forward and stopped again, as my senses were overwhelmed by what I was experiencing.  I was not simply moved by beauty, for I have seen many beautiful things, including churches.  I moved forward slowly, again by half-steps, a bit confused by the feelings I was experiencing.  A very good word--awesome--has been ruined in the popular American usage.  And yet, that was exactly my reaction--awe.  
I began to realize that I was standing in a truly Holy place.  Founded by St. John of Rila, the monastery has always been at the heart of the Bulgarian people, destroyed time and again by the Turks, only to be promptly rebuilt.  The floors of the church had quite literally been washed in the blood of the martyrs.  I was standing where prayers of the faithful had been offered up for over a thousand years.  I was in the presence of simple Holiness.   The idea of any "holy place" was anathema to my  church.  This particular intellectual construct of ours, however, was based upon something in which we had no experience.  This was the real thing. 
After some time, Bill and I stepped back onto the exo-narthex.  He commented favorably about the beauty of the quaint iconography, but was otherwise unaffected.  As I walked down the steps, I instinctively knew that--for myself at least--something else had happened, though I did not yet know what. 

 

                              WHAT I SAW:     PLAKOVO 

Outside of Rila, we visited all the other monasteries from our base at the Hotel Gurko in Veliko Turnovo, the historic capital of the second Bulgarian Empire.  A great number lie within driving distance, but we had time for four:  Dragalevtsi, Kilifarevo, Plakovo and Troyan.  Of this number, it was Plakovo, perhaps the least outwardly impressive, that provided the most memorable experience.  Bill considered our time at Plakovo was his most memorable experience in Bulgaria.  

Church of St. Prophet Iliya (Elijah), Plakovo Monastery

Plakovo is a bit hard to find and seemingly forgotten, out in the countryside at the end of a poorly-marked back road.  They probably receive few visitors.  The setting, however, is idyllic.  A small church sits in a meadow, with a two-storied ell-shaped building to the southwest.  The west end of this latter structure is anchored by an impressive bell-tower.  Plakovo, like Rila, was a touchstone in the long history of resistance against Ottoman oppression.  In later research, I learned that there is a secret tunnel into the woods, both out of the church and the kitchen.  The monastery's long history has been one of destruction and rebuilding.  A framed picture hanging on the porch of the building revealed that the church had once been surrounded by a two-storied walled compound, of which the present structure was merely the southwest corner.  The loss is not to be blamed on the Turks, however, but on a 1949 fire.

There were two monks in residence (if there were others, we did not see them.)  One was a lanky, younger man, thirtyish, his long hair gathered into a loose ponytail.  The other was an older man, heavily-bearded, and short, stocky and shirtless.  (The fact that he was so dressed has since caused me to conclude that he may have been simply a caretaker rather than a monastic.  But perhaps his dress had more to do with the specific work they were doing at the time.)  The two men were in the meadow between the church and other building, gathering freshly-cut hay onto large bedsheets, and then pulling it into the barn.  We had become accustomed to such sights in Bulgaria.  During Communism, individual farms gave way to massive collectivized operations.  There were only 900 farms in the entire country under Communism.  The rusting ruins of these endeavours--and the deserted towns that supported them--dot the countryside.  Meanwhile, agriculture had to begin anew, and from scratch.  All across the country, we witnessed small plots being farmed and harvested in the age old methods, without benefit of machinery.  The older man put on his shirt and greeted us, while the young monk continued with the gathering of the hay.

My friend Bill is an ever-vigilant student of languages and had picked up a Bulgarian-English dictionary in Sofia.  He tried a few words with the man, but without much success.   Bill could, however, speak Serbo-Croatian and he claimed that there was considerable overlap between that language and Bulgarian.  So, to the limited extent that we were able to make ourselves understood to one another, it was through Bill's knowledge of Croatian.  The man obviously surmised that we were there to see the church, and so he motioned for us to follow him.  

There was no outside iconography, other than one of St. Prophet Elijah over the doorway.  The church was much smaller than the ones we had visited heretofore, and the interior was modest as well.  Anything containing Bulgarian woodworking is impressive, and the iconostasis did not disappoint in this regard, though much less imposing than Rila and what we would later see at Troyan.  Lovely carved "standing-chairs" (my terminology) lined the walls.  Christ Pantocrator was in the dome, of course, but the rest of the walls were whitewashed.  A number of icon stands dotted the small sanctuary and framed icons hung on the walls.  One in particular drew my attention.  In all my subsequent Orthodox travels, I have only seen this in Bulgaria.  The image is similar to the  Christ Not Made by Hands icon.  The difference is that Christ's eyes are closed, and somewhat eerily, the icon has all the appearances of an actual photograph.  I wish I knew more about it, but like I say, I have seen it in no other country.  I left a few levas in the collection box, and we returned outside.

The man motioned for us to follow him to either his quarters, or the kitchen, in the south ell of the building.  As the Bulgarian was talking to us, Bill pretended to understand what he meant, but it become clear that he was offering us what hospitality he could.  We sat down at a table on the covered porch outside one of the rooms.  Soon our friend emerged with cups of coffee and cigarettes.  I do not remember if we smoked or not, though neither of us was averse to doing so (I have always held to the pleasant fiction that any smoking done overseas does not count, and generally that was my first purchase upon arriving anywhere.)  The coffee turned out to strong, but absolutely cold.  We smiled and thanked him profusely.  He went back into the room and came back with several framed pictures and newspaper clippings to share with us.  They all depicted the monastery in better days, before the Nazis, before the Communists, before the fire.     Although I cannot guess the occasion, one picture showed a large number (several dozen at least) of monks lined-up in front of the west wall of the then-complete compound, beneath the bell tower.  We both found it to be interesting.

But for the most part, Bill and I sat in the cool of the porch, sipped our cold coffee and returned smiles with our host.  Looking back now, the man did have hay on the ground that needed to be moved into the barn.  The more important thing to him, however, was to show hospitality to his guests.  I think we left another contribution on the table, thanked our host and started back towards the rental car.  Simple and genuine hospitality leaves a lasting impression.          

 

                                         WHAT I SAW:       TROYAN

Two options presented themselves to us as we contemplated our return to Sofia.  We could just return west down the highway we drove in on, or we could drive south, taking a twisting pass through the mountains which eventually intersected with a highway in the Valley of the Roses.  You do not have to know much about me to guess which route we took.  There are two passes through the mountain, the Troyan Pass and the Shipka Pass.  This time we chose the former (I drove the Shipka Pass on a later trip.)  The town of Troyan is also the site of the the third largest monastery in Bulgaria after Rila and Bachkovo.  Troyan Monastery is a popular destination for pilgrims and tourists.  The area outside of the large compound is primarily devoted to supplying food, souvenirs and trinkets to the visitors.  Once you wade past that, however, Troyan is a gem.  The church and the monastic buildings are built in the Bulgarian Renaissance style.  The outside of the church contains iconography and frescoes, though not to the degree of Rila Monastery.  And the church contains a miraculous icon, that of "the Three-Handed Holy Virgin."

Bill and I walked up the cobblestoned courtyard from the car park to the church.  Up ahead, we could see an old Bulgarian peasant woman making her way towards the church.  Her slow steps seemed painful, and she was bent with age.  The old grandmother may have been walking since early morning to make it there by that time.  The thought crossed my mind of the tumultuous times her life had witnessed.  We soon drew even with her and passed on towards the church.  Bill and I spent some time on the exo-narthex, observing the iconography, and then entered into what we discovered to be a fairly crowded sanctuary.  The iconostasis was impressive, even after having seen that of Rila, as were the icons.  We looked around a bit and generally started working our way to the back of the church.  I then noticed that the old peasant lady had finally made it into the church.  She was talking quietly to a youngish priest, who was bent down, holding her hands.  The old woman was looking up at him and I could not help but notice that she positively beamed with delight.   Stripped of the noisome pilgrims and tourists, there was at its heart a real community of Christians here, where the pastoral needs of the faithful were truly addressed.  The comparison is unfair, I know, but I never remembered anyone ever beaming with delight at any of our preachers, or our elders for that matter (and I can say this, for I was one.)  In short, I saw evidence of a type of relationship that existed on a plane heretofore unknown to me.


                                                          CONCLUSION

I returned home to my life and routine.  And while I did not forget these experiences, I was not yet launched off onto any new path.  The trigger for that would come in a couple of months.  And when it did, I had the context of my experience in Bulgarian Orthodoxy, characterized by reverence, holiness, hospitality and community.
Recently, I stumbled across an online survey for ex-members of the Churches of Christ.  The pollsters were analyzing the reasons why this fellowship is failing to keep their own.  (And in fairness, I have no doubt that there is a similar survey somewhere that addresses the former Orthodox.)  Just for kicks, I took the survey.  I remember one question in particular.  The pollster asked what would induce me to return to the Churches of Christ.  The question took me aback, and I realized that I was probably coming from a much different perspective than the average disgruntled ex-CoCer.  I concluded then that the poll was pointless and the pollsters did not grasp the real problem.  They were searching for ways to tweak or reform the church, to make it less objectionable to the dissatisfied.  But they did not consider that the basic premise itself was misguided.  For the Church of Christ did not do sola scriptura wrong.  If anything, they carried it to at least one of its logical conclusions.  I do not recall exactly how I answered the question, but I believe I said something about the Pearl of Great Price.