We want to be all fighting for some sort of justice. Fighting for those who are oppressed, whether it be because of race, culture, sexual abuse, the list goes on. We want to  fight for the victim. Our passions and anger rile each other up as we see the ones without a voice get beaten and unfairly treated. We want to be that voice. We want to be that hero.

Yes, the struggle in this life is real. The pain is real. Racism is real. Sexual abuse is real. Your hurt is real. My sin is real.

In all this, what is it that we are truly fighting for? Are we fighting to release victims from their prisons, that they may live outside of the four walls that held them captive? They will also pass away like you and I, and then what?

Are we fighting for justice (earthly consequences), Justice (heavenly), salvation?

Has our fight become solely an earthly fight?  Has it become a battle that really has no victory in the Divine realm? Are we fighting for Freedom or deeper entanglement?

Our Saviour asks us to fight for the Kingdom.  To fight for the Truth.

We have turned our current social events into a fight against humanity rather than a fight against THE oppressor. The one whose name literally means divider. He, the devil, is the real enemy. The real oppressor. Each of us is his victim.

We treat the oppressor in an unjust way yet we fight for justice. Are we truly fighting for justice if we long to see the villain punished? We are all in need of healing, we are all in need of salvation and we are all certainly in need of Justice.

We throw around nice quotes and verses that we have read but don’t really understand or have any intention of living. We say that we love all people and accept all people of every race and nation. We post inspirational speeches and feel empowered about our cause. But what are we really living for? Who are we loving, and who are we fighting for  besides our own ego?

What is justice? What is God’s justice?

“…justice is for God to help us through His Grace to rectify that which truly wronged us. It is exactly at the core of our being, ontologically speaking, that we have been wronged, through the Fall…Our estrangement from our Divine nature.”

Father Maximos of Cyprus

Justice is to make things right. God’s Justice is to make all men to be made right.

God’s Justice without His Mercy is death for every one of us. Glory to God that He “desires not the death of a sinner but rather that he returns and lives.” We must not forget this, we must drop our stones that we eagerly desire to throw, and seek true healing for the hurt, the sinner, the child of God (we are each every single one.)

Justice is that every man, made in the image of God, grows into the likeness of Christ. This  is true Justice. And if this is not what we are fighting, for then we fight for nothing and no one.

This earthly world that we fight for will all pass away, none of this will remain.

To say that repentance is the solution to all our current problems is NOT  cliché and to say that it is indicates that we have not experienced true repentance. Perhaps if we recognized those who modeled the life of repentance around us (heavenly and earthly), our desire to live a life of holiness would not easily wane. Repentance is not an action or a ‘sorry’ that is said or done in a single moment. No, repentance is an act that rises above time and place. And because it’s above time, it affects everything and everyone. From one person’s repentance, all is changed. Nothing can be the same.

“Acquire the Spirit of Peace and a thousand souls around you will be saved.” Fr Seraphim of Sarov

Repentance can save the world. Repentance is the beauty of this world because it leads us to the True Beauty. It allows our hearts to be channels of grace, a home for the homeless, a love for the unwanted and a hospital for the wounded. And this is Church.

St. Isaac the Syrian testifies to the power of repentance;

“He who has been able to see himself has accomplished more than one who has seen the angels.”

“One who apprehends his sin is better than one who through his prayers raises the dead.”

I pray the Lord leads us all to a life of repentance that we may heal one another.

May we seek God’s Justice for each other.

This is God’s Justice. This is Church.

Picture Credit: Nikolay Yanakiev

Yet knowing that Santa is not real, we still get excited. Why?

Because Santa is real.

Let me explain.

We as humans love a good story. There is nothing that sounds better than cuddling by the fire with a hot drink and listening to an epic story. A story that transports you, not just to a distant land, but transports you out of this world.

There is nothing better than when you walk out of the movie theater feeling like you can conquer the world as you have just watched a superhero movie ready to pull out your sword and defeat the bad guys.

We love a good story.

Why?

Because beauty speaks to our soul. And these stories are just that. Beauty.

Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things.

Good stories awaken in us the desire to want to be part of something bigger, the longing to belong to something that is outside of ourselves.

Good stories almost speak life into us. They tell us of hope, of victory over the darkness. They tell us that the good people always win and that I just need to believe in something beyond myself. Good stories show me virtues that I deeply desire, sacrifice, walking with friends in dark places. These are stories of heroes and friends.

And these stories are true and they are real.

They are real because they point to something beyond. They are full of enchantment because we live in an enchanted world whether we recoginse it or not. Our world is full of mystery because there is a world beyond the material in which we see with our eyes. This world was made by the Divine and by default it can only be enchanted, mysterious and mythological.

Yes, I used the word mythological.

I believe myths to be true and not false.

Myths point to something that is real. They point to a world outside of us, they point to Christ. Human myths all originate from the One True Story because from the dawn of creation, humans have been made in the image of the Triune God. Therefore naturally the stories we imagine and create from the depths of our hearts come from this Divine imprint.

In one of C. S. Lewis’ essays he explains the need to dress the Gospel in fairy tales in order for us to see and know Truth. Fairy tales are able to pass the watchful dragons that prevent us from seeing Reality. In a way myths are incarnational as they conceal the Truth in order to reveal the Truth to mankind in our own language and culture. God was incarnate, the Divine put on Man in order to reveal the Father. He came in the form of man in order to be relatable to mankind.

No wonder myths speak of pure greatness, of great hope and ultimate victory. They tell us we are not alone in this world and that real friends exist and are willing to know us and love us. Myths lift us up from our dark despair and they shine a light and scream at us of the great hope and joy that belongs to us. They draw us into a world that has meaning and depth, they draw us into a real Mystery.

“Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.” G K Chesterton

Yes, I can defeat those nasty dragons in my life, I can finally defeat Thanos, I do have the power to destroy the Ring.

And all this is true. Real truth.

Because; “Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.” Romans 8:37

The Victory is ours through the Incarnation, Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension of our Lord.

Hope is ours and it isn’t wishful thinking because Aslan is coming back and all will be made well.

The Church provides a real and true ‘mythical’ experience for us in the Liturgy. In the Liturgy Reality is Revealed to us through the enactment of symbols; symbols meaning the real presence of and not just a mere sign. The Real Heaven is here present in the Liturgy. It is presented to us in a mythic way that it may be more understood and accessible to us. The Liturgy portrays to us glimpses of the Reality of the Kingdom the same way myths do but how much more the Liturgy which was given to us by Christ Himself.

All that is good and beautiful in the world symbolises, shows the real presence of, our Lord and Saviour. When stories are told of a loyal and faithful friend, revealing the ultimate Friend. The hero who sacrifices and lays down his life for his city, revealing the Lamb Who was slain.  The marriage that withstood all its trials, revealing Love. Or just the ordinary guy struggling through life, revealing our Conqueror.

We may not experience what is true, noble, just, pure and lovely but they still remain real in this world. These stories show us what we could experience, what we could become, what we could be and ultimately what we are.

Let’s read and tell good stories and watch good movies as we all long for the Kingdom.

Besides the abnormal six hour length of the in-person phase, what struck me was their preoccupation with consistently asking me about what they call their leadership principles. Amazon’s ranking as the most valuable company currently oscillates anywhere in the top five so there must be something to these principles that they are so fond of. As I became familiar with them I realized that these principles are already found in our mother, the Church, in a much more deep and meaningful way.

Let us therefore walk through the principles one by one and make sure that we become the following type of leader in our own local parish:

Customer Obsession

Leaders start with the customer and work backwards. They work vigorously to earn and keep customer trust. Although leaders pay attention to competitors, they obsess over customers.

In the Church, who is our “customer”?

It’s probably not the first thing that comes to your mind. It is NOT the congregant; it is not the people who gather. Rather it is the One whom we gather to worship. He is our goal and aim. He is the One whom we seek to please.

“do I seek to please men? For if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ.” (Galatians 1:10)

It is not about us. It is about Him. Worship doesn’t have to feel good or provide you with some experience. Rather, it is an encounter with the One True God.

Also, we do pay attention to our “competitors,” the demons who seek to shame us. Although we are not ignorant of the devil’s devices, our one true focus is Christ, the King of glory.

Ownership

Leaders are owners. They think long term and don’t sacrifice long-term value for short-term results. They act on behalf of the entire company, beyond just their own team. They never say “that’s not my job.”

Sacrificing future glory for the present indulgence is not a good investment. That’s what we do when we gratify our carnal desires instead of pursuing something to offer our Maker: “…giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love.” (2 Peter 1:5-7). And what is it said of he who lacks these things? He is shortsighted, even to blindness. Good leaders are not shortsighted; they think long term.

Furthermore, my sin affects my brother, my community. That is why in the early Church they would publicly confess their sins, and even to this day when someone confesses to a priest they are being reconciled with the whole body of Christ. There is no such thing as a victim-less crime.

Invent and Simplify

Leaders expect and require innovation and invention from their teams and always find ways to simplify. They are externally aware, look for new ideas from everywhere, and are not limited by “not invented here.” As we do new things, we accept that we may be misunderstood for long periods of time.

I want view this one from the paradigm of serving in the diaspora. In the Council of Jerusalem, a dispute arose over whether new believers should be circumcised. The conclusion was “we should not trouble those from among the Gentiles who are turning to God, but that we write to them to abstain from things polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from things strangled, and from blood.” (Acts 15:19-20)

In a new culture, Christians will have to adapt and do things in different ways so that the message of the Gospel can be preached in a way the hearer can receive. Also, some traditions need to be done away with entirely as superfluous. Here I am talking about the traditions of men, and not paradosis.

Are Right, A Lot

Leaders are right a lot. They have strong judgment and good instincts. They seek diverse perspectives and work to disconfirm their beliefs.

It would be arrogant for anyone to think they are always right, even right a lot like this particular principle is suggesting. That’s why we have the consensus of the fathers, councils of bishops, and the collective lives of the saints to learn from. Never one, always together. However there is One who is always right, and if wholeheartedly united to Him you will be too:

Stratonicos, a wise and eloquent monk, full of his intelligence, has nothing to say when Silouan, in all simplicity, asks him how the perfect speak: he suddenly realizes that he does not know the first thing about perfect speech. But his inability to speak allows him to hear, and into his humbled silence Silouan plants the message that ‘The perfect never say anything of themselves. . . . They only say what the Spirit inspires them to say.’

Source

If you are truly speaking as He inspires and walking according to the Spirit of God, you will be right in your words and deeds. However be careful of thinking, ‘you know what God is telling you’ and everyone around you is wrong. Remember, never one, always together.

Learn and Be Curious

Leaders are never done learning and always seek to improve themselves. They are curious about new possibilities and act to explore them.

This one is pretty straightforward. Our Church has such richness and depth. There is an endless amount of things to learn until we come to “the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.” We should not be afraid to be exposed to new ideas which we can critically examine in the Light of the Truth of Christ.

“Let books be your dining table and you shall find delight. Let them be your mattress and you will sleep restful nights.” (St. Ephraim the Syrian)

Hire and Develop the Best

Leaders raise the performance bar with every hire and promotion. They recognize exceptional talent, and willingly move them throughout the organization. Leaders develop leaders and take seriously their role in coaching others. We work on behalf of our people to invent mechanisms for development like Career Choice.

The Church has something better than Career Choice. She has discipleship. Too many church leaders are overburdened by the load they have to carry because the work is not delegated well to the rest of the people:

So the Lord said to Moses: “Gather to Me seventy men of the elders of Israel, whom you know to be the elders of the people and officers over them; bring them to the tabernacle of meeting, that they may stand there with you. Then I will come down and talk with you there. I will take of the Spirit that is upon you and will put the same upon them; and they shall bear the burden of the people with you, that you may not bear it yourself alone. (Numbers 11:16-17)

Good leaders empower others to make change. A sign of good leadership is the birth of strong, willing, and capable leaders.

Insist on the Highest Standards

Leaders have relentlessly high standards — many people may think these standards are unreasonably high. Leaders are continually raising the bar and drive their teams to deliver high quality products, services, and processes. Leaders ensure that defects do not get sent down the line and that problems are fixed so they stay fixed.

As Christians, holiness is our standard. True church leaders spurn others on to repent, not just by preaching about it but by modeling it in their own lives. If we break the chain of sin in our lives, those around us and those who come after us will be better off for it. We never lower our standard of holiness knowing that we are called to be holy as He is holy and even called to be perfect as our Father in heaven is perfect.

Pursue … holiness, without which no one will see the Lord (Hebrews 12:14).

Let us encourage one another to serve one another with love and humility, with Christ as the head and the goal.

Stay tuned for Part II coming next week!

In the current generation each of us is encountering and experiencing the disease of this age: busyness. It has become the norm; if one is not busy then something is wrong with them … they must be lazy or intellectually deficient.

We are constantly running around from one thing to the next and when we look back on our day or week it’s all a blur. We feel less and less satisfied and fulfilled.

Since having grown up most of my life in a slow-paced country and then moving to a much faster paced lifestyle, it has been and continues to be a huge struggle for me to adjust.

I have been reading a book this Lent that has really enlightened me about this struggle.

The book talks about despondency and our relationship to time. Despondency is given the definition of the failure to care about things that matter, for example our spiritual life and the care of our neighbor.

Despondency happens as a result of our busyness. We lose our desire to grow and be, our desire to dream and wonder, and our desire for deep intimacy. We as humans choose a busy life to escape the reality of our pain and suffering. Our minds as a result abandons the pain of caring. We lose the capacity to focus, to encounter and love which in turn provokes a toxic kind of emptiness – a vacuum that attracts all manner of distraction, restlessness, rumination, anxiety, fear and lethargy.

Despondency causes us to move from living to existing.

The root of despondency is the broken relationship we have with and our perception of time. We have confined our notions of time to fleeting moments throughout our life. We despise time as we always complain we don’t have enough of it as it is constantly ‘flying by.’

Through the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, Christ has sanctified time. Time is no longer a ticking bomb counting down to our final moment. Without Christ, time enslaves us whereas in Christ time is liberating and time, most importantly, is relational.

Yes we live in chronological time but through the incarnation, where the One who is out of time came in time, made time eternal. Despondency traps us in chronological time where there is only despair and it makes us constantly want to escape from the present moment. The mind prefers thinking about either the past or the future as they are both the constructs of the mind’s own doing and our mind can control them. The present moment is outside of the mind’s control and therefore is completely ignored.

We desire to be ‘anywhere but here; any moment but now.’ We have become dissatisfied with our present. In that way time has become our enemy, a prison in which we find ourselves locked up in leading to our own self-destruction.

Man now has the ability to live in the present moment, where Christ is. Christ is in the now. Eternity is now.

Only in the present moment can I meet with Christ and only the in the present moment can I dine with my fellow brethren. Christ is not in my past ruminations and He is certainly not in my future fantasies. We have given our minds so much control that we can no longer tolerate being present. Our minds have become the author of our stories of despair and as a result our negative fantasies become more attractive to us.

We become so focused on getting to the next big thing… the next holiday, the next event, next weekend, our next meal. We no longer know or want to be present and focused with the task at hand, we no long focus on the person in front of us or enjoy the magnificent experience before us.

The here and now is not about the duration of time but about my state of being. The present moment is not measured by clocks or determined by the mind but it is experienced by the heart. In the present moment we are transformed, we become more watchful, attentive and sober.

We are able to experience.

We are able to enjoy every moment that has been presented to us, no matter where we are or who we are with. Because every time we are present we meet with Christ regardless.

One of the fruits of despondency is lukewarm prayers because we lack the ability to be present. We then question why prayer seems like I am talking to a brick wall and why I haven’t experienced the joy and transformative life of prayer.

Unfortunately our society is so good at deceptively allowing despondency to creep into our lives with the bombardment of technology and work.

Fortunately for those in Christ and in the Church, the Church continually calls us all who are wandering back into Life, back into the present moment. One beautiful way She has done this is through the Divine Liturgy. In Liturgy we experience, if we are present, the eternal now. Christ meets us where we are as heaven and earth are united.

Liturgy has no longer become the center of our worship but the center of our inconvenience as we want to get Liturgy ‘out of the way,’ so we can socialize or get to Sunday school etc. We gaze up during Liturgy thinking about what we will eat after or where we will go.

Liturgy is the pinnacle of the present moment but we despise it, as we cannot stand the present moment.

Thank God for this season of Lent where the Church gives us things to practice living in the present moment. It’s a time to slow down, to attend liturgies, and to wait on God in prayer.

To paraphrase Kallistos Ware, the most important time you are in is now, the most important place you are is the one you are in now and the most important person there is, is the one you are with now.

Let’s be in the now to meet Christ and to meet each other where healing and transformation may abound for all.

I challenge you today to practice being present in the remaining time of Lent and hopefully beyond.

Quiet down your mind about thinking about tomorrow while you are present with the one sitting in front of you today.

Be present in whichever task you are doing now and if you have the urge to escape by pick up your phone for example, then wait a few minutes, don’t act on impulse and wait for the urge to pass. 

Let’s switch off our fantasies and ruminations and instead switch on our hearts and be attentive to the here and now.

The present is not an emptiness but a Fullness.

This post will show the idea that God designed gender because of the fall and that gender itself tells the story of redemption.

Please Note: We can only explore this concept with a Christian lens because the purpose is to tackle this issue within our Church. Outside the Church is a different perspective altogether.

The problem is that we have allowed the mystery of our faith to leave our local churches all the while replacing it with scholastic theology. Saying that gender is by design is not enough in this day and age. Why? Because humans are becoming the ones who are deciding what Truth is all the while neglecting the Person of Truth. Gender is our identity, it is a part of who we are, and it points to the fact that it is God who designs us. Gender tells the story of redemption, the story of restoration, the story of unity.

What is Gender?

Gender is defined these days as a ‘social construct.’ The problem with this definition is that society dictates how we should be, rather than recognizing who we actually are. In other words, how we were designed to be by the One who made us.

“It’s okay for me to be me, whatever that is,” has become this generations motto for absolutely everything.

In order to define gender, we must look at the relationship between God and man, as therein lies the context for which we see the male-female relationship.

Fr. Thomas Hopko affirms that as humans, we are the revelation of the Trinity, we are made male and female in order to grasp and attain the divine life we were made for.

According to St. Gregory of Nyssa, the male-female distinction was made according to the foreknowledge of God, knowing that man would fall. It can be concluded from St. Gregory’s work that sexuality is not part of the image of God that was given to man in creation; rather sexuality has a salvific function. This function is oneness with God.

This poses the question: does the image of God refer to gender? The image of God refers to how man has the capability of interacting with the Divine, in order to achieve his full potential.

This illustrates that the image of God, as designed, does not include gender.

Archbishop Lazar Puhalo emphasizes the idea that sexuality was made for the fall of man, when he explains that the intention for gender was prophesy. Gender bears in itself a revelation of what man’s life is and his relationship to God.

Many times in the Old Testament, there is reference made that man’s relationship with God is of a marital relationship. He uses the example of Hosea and Gomer to illustrate His covenant between Himself and Israel. It is through Hosea that He reveals to Israel His desire to redeem and restore man. Ultimately, God is revealing to man the relationship between God and His Church.

God, from the inception of creation, placed the mystery of human gender as a revelation and prophecy. It is in this mystery that we find the core of our redemption in Christ, through our distinct male and female roles. Christ, our husband, is faithful to his wife, the Church, and continues to pursue her in order to redeem her. Marriage, in the context of male and female is the design in which God chose to redeem humanity. This was a belief from the early Church when Clement of Rome wrote: “God made the human person, male and female. The male is Christ, and the female is the Church.”

“Shall I tell you how marriage is also a mystery of the Church? Christ came into the Church, and She was made of Him and He united with Her in spiritual intercourse… So marriage is a type of the presence of Christ.
-St. John Chrysostom

In this way, male is a type of Christ, while female is a type of the Church.

God’s design was male and female. This was to echo and reveal the prophecy between Christ and His Church. The prophecy was the redemption of humanity, the Church, being joined with its Creator. The only reason for this design is the fall of man, being separated by sin from God.

In the resurrection, St. Paul teaches that there is no difference between male and female.This is the case because the prophecy has been fulfilled; Christ is united with His bride, the Church. Human gender, which had a prophetic role, has been fulfilled.

Gender Roles

The role of gender is very specific in the Church compared to other roles in our lives. Since the role of gender is prophetic, this role should be played out in the liturgical life of the Church, as opposed to in politics or our workplace, which, are not part of the redemption of man.

This perspective follows on, as we have discussed, the role of man and woman is to reveal the relationship between Christ and His Church. Therefore, once man has reached his heavenly destination, the role of male will cease as Christ the visible is present. The same is found with the role of women, which prophetically reveals the Church.

In terms of the Church, if man and woman are not fulfilling their roles then we are essentially perverting the Gospel and the revelation of who Christ is.

When we use terms that have not been given to us by God, or when we identify ourselves in ways God never revealed, then we are distorting the story of our salvation.

When gender becomes a fluid concept that is no longer definitive, then Christ cannot be revealed through the male gender and the Church cannot be revealed through the female gender.

Therefore, since Christ is our redeemer, this fluidity will pervert the Gospel’s message. The Gospel’s message is the redemption of God’s people, the unification of Christ and His Bride.

From before the foundation of the Earth, the Church was there, in the eternal will of the Father. The Church then became existent spiritually when the creation of angels occurred. With the creation of Adam and Eve, the Church was established on earth. The Incarnation of Christ was foretold through the creation of man, therefore as mentioned previously, Adam and Eve were a revelation of Christ and His Church. Through the Father’s foreknowledge of the Fall, He revealed His plan of salvation through the creation of male and female.

Let’s live out our vocation as one body, male and female, that we may see the Risen and Ascended Christ in our daily lives.

The question instigated an inner dialogue with my younger self and I wondered if there was a pattern that I could trace; something that could give me a lead to the million dollar question in my teenage life, a question I remember having been repeatedly asked from the ages of nine to nineteen; why are most of your friends girls?

Though I am uncertain of how many of you will resonate with my words in this post, I am convicted to open up my heart, representing those sailing/ who have sailed similar waters to me, and to start a discussion with those interested.

Please note that the sole purpose of this post is to firstly, aid all of us, as the Body of Christ, to understand one another better by sharing a singular perspective on friendship that you may not have experienced “so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other” 1 Corinthians 12:25, and secondly to encourage us to dig deep, confronting our long-forsaken past insecurities that may be hindering us from moving forward in our present, “Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed…” Jeremiah 17:14.

Let me start by asking you;

Are most of your friends the same sex as you or the opposite sex?

Mine, for the majority of my life, have predominantly been of the opposite sex. I think it’ll be helpful to give you a background into why I think that has been the case; hopefully some of you will share similar experiences and relate to my story.

Throughout primary school I was mostly friends with other boys out of circumstance, not choice; I have no sisters and wasn’t surrounded by any young female relatives. I attended an all boys primary school and living in Cairo at the time, had very little exposure to girls at church. I do have distinct memories however, of eight year old me purposely avoiding to cross paths with specific boys due to a lack of relatibility. I vividly remember a sleepover with a church friend that left me feeling very ‘different’ to say the least; it was our tradition to play the Lion King PC game, but that evening my friend deemed it a “girls’ game” and we played, what was to me, a boring generic car-racing game instead. Little did I know that this was a glimpse into what I was going to encounter for the next ten or so years of my life.

Migrating to the UK aged 9 highlighted my disinterest in the majority of toys/ activities targeting my age/ sex demographic from the get-go; I could not care less about sports or cars and I certainly preferred drawing in my sketchbook or playing Pokemon Sapphire on my GameBoy Advance SP, than GTA with my brother on ‘our’ PS2. Befriending other males throughout secondary school became an intricate process of elimination; I deeply cherished the few that made me feel understood.

Though my social skills flourished in my teens, I began to embrace my introversion more and more – needing an intimate environment to feel safe. Naturally preferring and seeking long lasting one-on-one friendships, the false ‘revelation’ that I would not receive the intimacy I desired out of a friendship with another guy, was one I quickly believed. Without overly generalizing, I believe that young men struggle with emotional expression due to the hyper-masculine social construct they are born into from the get-go. Large male-dominated friendship groups are preferred over singular brotherhoods at that age as they provide a safety net from raw emotional expression, by masking a boy’s brokenness with quality banter and social hierarchy. In my case, the few male friendships I did harbor, disintegrated as quickly as they were formed.

Insecurity in Masculinity:

Having little in common with the males around me while growing up began to plant a seed of thought that I am not “man enough” for, what I perceived were, masculine tasks/ interests. The words “you’re just different from the other boys” that I had heard oh so often, began to seep into my skin and I had begun to base my entire identity on who I was not, rather than who I was.

Befriending females thus became very simple; since I was not like the other guys, and neither were they (being females themselves), we met on common grounds. I grew tired of the constant feeling of being “less manly” than the company surrounding me. I grew tired of proving my masculinity by faking my interest in subjects and banter that did not stimulate me. I grew tired of it all.

“The more one experiences pressures to “show oneself” and demonstrate masculine competency, the greater the hypervulnerability. The reason is that “showing off” one’s manhood is an emotionally immature process. This manhood is insecure and is based on what one does rather than who one is. Insecure masculinity comprises a set of behaviours driven by fear to prove to the world that one’s manhood isn’t weak, yet these same behaviours can inadvertently increase the feelings of fear they are intended to eradicate.”

– Niobe Way, Adolescent Boys – Exploring Diverse Cultures of Boyhood 

In an oestragen concentrated environment, testosterone is very easy to spot.

And that felt good.

It fed my ego when I was asked questions to understand the perspective of a guy by my female friends. I no longer sought masculine validation from other guys as it was affirmed by the multitude of girls around me. This insecurity in my masculinity grew deeper, cocooning me in a dangerous comfort zone around females, that neither challenged me as a man nor helped me to feel represented.

Though healing low self-esteem/ self-confidence, particularly targeting fragile masculinity as in my case, is a life-long journey, The Lord eases it by His grace.

“…the rising sun will come to us from heaven to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace.” Luke 1:78(b)-79

Though His luminosity exposes our innermost insecurities, instead of condemning us as the world does, The Lord uses His light to illuminate the road of healing for us to walk through, in order to achieve perfect peace with who we are. By exposing our insecurities to our Creator, we learn to humble ourselves in His presence and confess that though we do not posses the power to rid ourselves of our demons, He, the Alpha and Omega, surely does.

“The sick one who is acquainted with his sickness is easily to be cured; and he who confesses that he is in pain is near to health. Many are the pains of the hard heart; and when the sick one resists the physician, his torments will be augmented.”

– St. Isaac the Syrian

Truth rooted in The Word affirms who I am in Christ, rather than who I am not in the world. I begin to comprehend the intensity of The Father’s love for me; how He created my inmost being and knit me together in my mother’s womb (Ps 139:13). Trivial validations for masculinity or femininity from others in our worlds pale in comparison to a God-rooted self-confidence in our identities in Christ.

Embracing my identity in Christ and consequently my masculinity, however it manifests itself in my world, liberates me from trying to box what manhood means according to other people, in their worlds.

Embracing The Spectrum:

The healing process is radical. It not only frees you of your chains, but opens your eyes to your fellow man’s needs so that you are moved to minister to those you once deemed unworthy.

I spent my adolescent years wrongfully believing that the boys who had made me feel isolated growing up, were unworthy; of my friendship, my time, or even my concern. “They had had it easy”. They fit “the norm”, so any struggle they encountered I deemed insignificant compared to mine.

Once healing began, The Holy Spirit gave me a crash course on statistics to open my eyes as to how the Body of Christ functions. If you’re not familiar with the term ‘normal distribution’, it is a function that represents the distribution of many random variables. It’s normally represented in a ‘bell curve’, as shown in the diagram below;

I won’t bore you with the stats talk, trust me – I hated maths at school, but this perfectly illustrates the point that I want to make. (If you’re a maths genius, please bare with me as I butcher this concept). In this diagram, you can see that most variables fall in the centre at 34.1%, and as you move to either sides of the curve, the percentage decreases. The data is representing the distribution of the same variables; the majority is at the centre, but there are still plenty that don’t fall in the dark blue region.

Once I realised that though I may not fall in the “34.1%”, with the majority of men, in Christ I am still represented in the bell curve of masculinity, such a heavy weight was lifted. I belonged. I’m here. I’m here. I remember that season of discovery vividly – how the Holy Spirit used it to re-instill so much lost confidence in my soul,  even convicting and burdening me for my fellow brothers, whether in the 34.1% or in the 0.1% bracket, now that I had realised that we are one Body. “For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts…” Romans 12:4-6(a).We the Church, embrace the undeniable spectrum of personalities existing within humanity as it is created in God’s image and likeness, for “Christ is all, and is in all.” Colossians 3:11(b). In the Lord, the gentle man and the resilient woman, the expressive male and the reserved female, the stay-at-home father and the working mother alike, hold a significant role in the Body of Christ. A role that only the 0.1% on the bell curve can fulfill; a calling though not understood by the world, is fully known and anointed by The Father.

Every member of the Body becomes a spirit reflecting a trait of his/ her Creator in your eyes, when you choose to embrace the normal distribution that exists within your own sex and the opposite sex. This liberating truth opened the door to the brotherhood I had longed for all along; pure, unfiltered, edifying, long-lasting friendships with other men. Brotherhood that challenges me when I am falling short, comforts me when I am miserable, corrects me when I am backsliding, and prays for me when I am broken. By the grace of God, I now have brothers whose souls are knit to mine, and though we may fall at different points on the spectrum, “a friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for a time of adversity” Proverbs 17:17. 

“I want you to know that the love that is between me and you is no bodily love, but a spiritual love. For bodily friendship has no firmness or stability, being moved by strange winds.”

– St. Anthony

‘David & Jonathan’ by Joanne Rozeik

If you have walked a similar road to me, I pray for your healing. I pray that your rooted identity in the Lord would nourish your self-confidence; that the chains of self-doubt and low self esteem would break free today. I pray that you would accept the radical truth that you are called to serve and minister to those very same people that make you feel unqualified. “The man from whom the demons had gone out begged to go with him, but Jesus sent him away, saying, “Return home and tell how much God has done for you.” So the man went away and told all over town how much Jesus had done for him.” Luke 8:38-39.

If you fall in the 34.1%, I pray for your healing also. For we are one Body, and if one brother or sister is hurting, then you are hurting also. I pray that the Lord would use you to embrace His children at all ends of the beautiful spectrum that humanity has been created into. I pray that you are a voice for those that have yet to discover theirs.

“Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.” Ephesians 3:20-21

I’ma tell you what you need to hear

Cause the truth would be too much

Macklemore , Chance, – Need to know

‘I swear by the Name of God that I shall tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth’

This is the commandment/the mantra  I lived by. Truth was the absolute good, but the fresh waters that said ‘the truth will set you free’ ran muddied. Everyone knows the saying ; The truth hurts. It’s often thrown around and accepted as unavoidable reality….And so we blunder and we stab because, that’s what the truth does…right?

But what if we use true words to do untrue things?

Just in the same way that lies can be used for selfish gain, truth can be too.

It can be used to belittle, demoralize, to crush or inflate.

When you pass on information that wasn’t yours to tell,
When you reveal the sins of another,
When you use it to start theological debates without The Spirit,
When you use it to inflate yourself and show off your spiritual or intellectual achievements,

Is that really truth?

Does the truth somehow deweaponize every statement?

The reality is that “truth” wielded as a weapon , ceases to be the truth.
Truth is a Person. Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life”
But even beyond this, we need to recognise the fundamental reality of what it means to be a person. It is to be relational and therefore, our truth has to be relational too.

It must be the right thing in the right way at the right time.  Our truth must never be separated from love. As the Scriptures say – we must learn to walk in Love. We must put on Christ and choose to be inseparably, fully truthful and fully loving

‘speaking the truth in love’ Ephesians 4:15

The word apokatastasis  appears in (Acts 3:21), in the story where Peter heals a lame man.

‘Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing  {apokatastasis} may come from the presence of the Lord, and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began.’

The word refers to God’s unfolding of the story salvation. That unfolding is a movement towards truth in love. All created things are becoming more fully what they are meant to be in relationship with God and all things around them. This movement is “good.”

Just as the story of salvation was unfolded to us, maybe we too need to learn some origami.

Discernment and discretion are required of those who wield the truth. As we grow up into all things (Ephesians 4: 15) we realise that we need to judge every situation rightly. Just like how St Abba Marcarius  hid the sins of his brother that allowed a woman into his cell or like how Jesus was slow to unveil the sins of the Samaritan woman.

God speaks the worlds into existence and that alone would make us fearful at the words we utter. So let us take a moment before we speak and ask ourselves;

it is true?

is it necessary?

is it kind?

“God knows every person from before the foundation of the world and provides their unique life and the specific conditions of their earthly way that are literally the best possible conditions for them.”

This is a convicting statement as Fr. Hopko explains that it is pride that leads us to say things like, if only I would have been born in this time period, or into a wealthy family, or this or that way… We think we know better than God what is best for us! It is a awe-inspiring and humbling thought to know that God has placed us exactly where and when we need to be, and given us everything we need.

Another quote that touched me was:

“…’form of life’ is not necessarily a job or profession. For example, some people may be called to suffer on this earth and to bear the results of fallen humanity in the most violent manner—to be victimized by disease, affliction, or both physical and mental disability; to be the objects of other people’s cares or disdain.”

Our vocation isn’t necessarily tied to what we do in this world, but rather who we are becoming. Being a doctor, lawyer, or engineer should not be an identity but rather a means to an end. Furthermore, we are instructed to bear illnesses that come to us patiently knowing that it is God who has allowed them and is using this vocation of suffering as a means for salvation.

This pamphlet also touches on the ‘ways of  salvation’ that the Lord has given us:

“Some will sanctify their lives being married; others will be single. Some will do it in clerical orders; others as lay people. Some will be monastic; most will live in the everyday secular world.”

But it also affirms the vocation we share in common:

“In a certain sense, every person has the same vocation, which is to be a saint… We can cooperate with God. We can share His holiness. We can become, as the saints themselves teach us, all that God Himself is by His gracious action in our lives”

These last two quotes really sum up the entire matter for me:

“In the eyes of God none is better than the other. None is higher or more praiseworthy. Each must find his or her own way and glorify God through it. Ultimately this is all that matters”

“Being faithful were we are is the basic sign that we will God’s will for our lives”

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did! (download by clicking this link or read below)

Finding_Ones_Calling_In_Life

photo courtesy of Nickolay Khoroshkov

Mother Theresa

~

“Imagine you’re walking through a forest.

Full of tall strong beautiful trees

Resilient against the wind and the rain

Beneath the soil

They are tied together

Intertwined

Beneath the soil

There are millions of roots

Connected

And they are better together

And when I think of these trees

I think of us

And how we try to go through life by ourselves

The times we’ve felt broken

The times we felt left

The times we’ve been hurt by someone else

We proclaim this loud and bold

But unlike the trees

We decide

To go it alone

I marvel at the pain

We can too easily shut out

I marvel at the years

We choose to lose sight

Everyday we see people’s wounds

But we never see past them

We never see through

We pick up our pace

We pick up our stones

We cross the other side of the road

We say there is no more room at our table

We love at a distance

We are only fair weather friends to weather the storms of this life

Because loving people’s imperfections is inconvenient and messy

Yet there’s no line of Scripture where Jesus commands us to seek our ease

No line where He commands that we seek our self

We look at people’s broken behaviours

ignore,

belittle

condemn

judge,

Look for quick cures but we do not see

Every broken behaviour comes from an unmet need

Behind every broken is someone who looks like our saviour

We go it alone

But alone is not what we were created for

Alone is not what the church was created to be

Isn’t it the one who cares for the poor and needy

The little and the least

Whom Christ will say come sit at my table

Come sit with me

When I hear this my immediate thought is

Where can I find a hungry

thirsty

naked

foreign

sick

imprisoned

stranger

Whom I can relieve

But In my attempts to love the needy

I discover my own poverty.

In clothing the naked,

I discover am naked of all virtue

In visiting the prisoner

I realise I am imprisoned by prideful thoughts

In visiting the sick

I learn I am sick with selfish desires.

I am who Jesus is referring to

I am the Least of These

It is not that poor guy on the street corner

Or the lonely girl in the corner,

who are the least of these.

No, it is me.

I am the least of Christ’s brethren.

I may not be poor naked sick or imprisoned in body

But I am poor naked sick and imprisoned in soul

I am starved of loving kindness

parched by lack of forgiveness

Sick with the disease of lust

Naked of compassion

Imprisoned by habits of self-indulgence.

And if I am the least,

If I really know that I am the least

Then the least that I can do

Is not go it alone

The least I can do is share my bread

When I am the one who hungers for righteousness

The least I can do is share my cup

When I am the one thirsting for Life.

The least I can do is share my stuff

When my I am so poor of anything valuable

The least I can do is sit with the lonely

When I am too lonely of the Father’s house

I have no clothes to cover my own sinful nakedness,

I have no medicine to heal my own blindness

I have no key to liberate my imprisoned soul.

Yet

He calls us His temple

Because we are pieces that come together to build and hold up one another

He calls us His body

Because we are all different parts and no purpose or function is like the other

He calls us His vine

Because we are only living when we are connected to one another

In Him

Like the trees

We were made to stand tall here

We were made to be a part of this forest here

Standing firm against all odds

Creation representing creator God

But our own fears of being hurt

Casts a shadow on the reality

That the fissures I see in my neighbour

Are the same fractures that covers me.

Wrapped tight in this fear, we act out against love.

And when we act out against love

We act out against the One Who loves us. “

“God is love.”

1 in 3

3 in 1

A community

Just as love is meaningless without something to love.

So we are meaningless without our brother

When our brother is our life

Just as one God exists as three Persons in one,

So we were created to be wholly ourselves

When we are wholly one with the other

We don’t pray my father

But our father

We are His children

Our husband

We are his bride

Our shepherd

We are His sheep

He is the one who never leaves the one behind

No one is saved alone.

Everyone’s freedom is tangled

Everyone salvation tied up

Roots beneath the soil

So there can be no fences

There can be no hedges

No neat marked out lines

Of what is yours and what is mine

Because where my life ends

Yours can begin

When we need each other to survive

So let’s close the distance between you and me

Trade in our fear for curiosity

Tear down our fences to build bridges

Open our door for those who have no place of their own

Step into each other’s darkness with kindness as a burning lantern

Love others through their brokenness

Because our brokenness makes us more alike than unlike.

The powerless, the wounded and the weak

All those who cannot speak

Come sit beside me and tell me your story

Tell me of the million and one ways a soul can bruise

And I can tell the million and one ways a soul sees the Light.

The Light loves with abandon

His wounded hands love the wounded with no bounds.

Because we were created for one another

We belong to each other

No matter the weather

Like trees in a forest

Stronger

Taller

Together”

~