[Magdalen] Facing East (long)

[Eleanor Braun]

On Mon, Aug 20, 2018 at 5:13 PM, Ginga Wilder <gingawilder at gmail.com> wrote:

> May you continue to feel a belonging in your new church home.  This is a
> wonderful story of your life's journey, Jay.  May you be blessed forever.
> Ginga
>

And let the people say......AMEN!

Eleanor


> On Mon, Aug 20, 2018 at 5:02 PM Jay Weigel <jay.weigel at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Dear All,
> >
> > As you all probably know, I have for the past year been attending a tiny
> > Old Rite Russian Orthodox church in Mt. Jackson, Virginia. I wandered in
> > one Sunday and had the immediate and very strong feeling that this was
> > where I was supposed to be. I had been "wandering in the wilderness"
> pretty
> > much ever since I got to this area. The only Episcopal church I felt even
> > remotely welcome in was really too far away to be practical for me to
> > attend with any regularity and was in what appeared to be a very long
> > interim at the time I went there. I went to the nearby big Lutheran
> church
> > for nearly three years and although I really liked the pastor, I never
> felt
> > like part of the congregation and there came a point where I just
> couldn't
> > "Lutheran" any more. I even tried the Anglican church, but though I loved
> > the people there, I couldn't quite deal with the theology, and frankly,
> the
> > music gave me a headache. I was pondering checking out the Russian
> Orthodox
> > Church in south Harrisonburg, which is ROCOR (Russian Orthodox Church
> > Outside Russia) when I happened to drive by Sts. Joachim and Anna in Mt.
> > Jackson on my way back from the optometrist and decided to check it out
> the
> > following Sunday. I felt like I was where I should be.
> >
> > My pull toward Orthodoxy started in my teens when I was introduced to the
> > music of the Russian Orthodox Church through my high school choir. The
> > first service I ever attended was a vespers service in the new/old Greek
> > Orthodox Church in Madison, WI, in which my dad sang in the choir. IIRC
> it
> > was the first service in that church as an Orthodox Church (it had been a
> > Methodist church for many years) and it was attended by bishops and
> whatnot
> > from Milwaukee and Chicago. I remember clouds of incense so thick you
> could
> > barely see the iconostasis. (The Greeks were kind of surprised that they
> > had to deal with all the other Orthodox in the area coming into their
> > church as they were the only Orthodox around for a number of years, but
> > they got used to it, I think.) Anyway, for a number of years I had little
> > contact with Orthodoxy other than reading, listening to music, and
> > attending Pacha service at the Greek church in Knoxville with my friend
> > Sheila. I was always more attracted to the Russian branch, primarily, I
> > think, because of the music but also there were aspects of the
> spirituality
> > that attracted me. All this is by way of explaining where my path has led
> > me.
> >
> > I will be chrismated into the Orthodox Church on September 18. There is
> > some significance to the date we have chosen, as the following Tuesday is
> > the Synaxis (coming together) of Zacharias and Elizabeth, and we are
> > celebrating it on that Sunday. Elizabeth is my middle name, was my
> mother's
> > name, and is the name of a saint that in recent years I have felt close
> to.
> > Mary's older cousin has a motherly aspect that appeals to me and that I
> > also try to emulate.
> >
> > It is not that I don't love the Episcopal Church that I was born and
> > brought up in and that I raised my family in. I do. It is more that I
> have
> > found what I need at this time in my life in Orthodoxy. I will continue
> to
> > worship in my old church whenever I go back to Tennessee. And I'm not
> > leaving here either. We have a number of folks of several religious
> stripes
> > (and even a few of none!) and nobody seems to mind.
> >
>