[Magdalen] Prayers for my church

[Jay Weigel]

It's been awhile and I've kind of let this percolate before I make this
request, but I would like to ask y'all to pray for my church, Sts. Joachim
& Anna Orthodox Christian Church. We are sort of in limbo right now as our
bishop retired suddenly and a decision was made to dissolve our deanery.
This means we have to find a new bishop to oversee us. Heaven help me,
church politics are byzantine, but I will try to explain!

Our little parish is one of the many flavors of Russian Orthodoxy called
Old Rite or Old Believers. Specifically our branch is called "stranniki" or
wanderers....mainly because every time they were being persecuted, they
just moved....mostly farther and farther east, into Siberia and eventually
on into Alaska with the Russian fur traders, though some also went into
Georgia, Armenia, and Turkey. (Just as an aside, many Cossacks were/are Old
Rite, Nicholas II's personal bodyguard were almost all Old Rite, and it is
rumored that several of Putin's close advisors are also Old Rite, but that
is neither here nor there.) In any case, Stranniki parishes are
autocephalous and generally serve at the pleasure of whatever bishop
chooses to take charge of them....at least that's how I understand it (this
whole thing makes my eyes roll and my brain hurt, but Kate, that's why you
couldn't find us.). We have been canonical all along and want to stay that
way. So we now have to find a bishop to "adopt" us since ours retired. We
are also without a building as the lease expired on the one we had been
renting in Mt. Jackson.

SO (big breath) I am asking your prayers for the parish and for our priest,
Fr. Kyrill, as he is currently in talks with a bishop. Also for the rest of
us, who are currently kind of at loose ends. Also that we may find a place
in which to worship so we may be back together as a church family under one
roof.

Jay the newly chrismated