My return to blogging

Sorry for the delayed return folks!
I would love to share my after-becoming-Catholic news back on this blog, so I hope you will be interested in reading them....

See you soon!
Pax Vobiscum!

Please pray for these good souls

I ask that the kind readers of my blog pray for:
Sr Julia,
Bradley
Bill
and Dawn
May God give them strength and shower them with His love and mercy in their hour of need.
Amen!

Reconciliation

The Sacrament of Reconciliation has always been one of the sacraments of our Lord that helps us connect to Him. Why can we get so close to God when we only kneel before the priest in the confessional?

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

We start our connection by establishing the first formula with which we establish our foundation upon which we will build our whole dialogue, instead of saying Hello, we have based our beliefs and we begin our confession by setting the base greeting with which we call upon the Merfcy of the Holy Trinity. Therefore, the priest from the other side suddenly becomes somebody we have grown to know each day. He acts in persona Christi, in the person of Christ (instead of Christ), creating the bond between Him and us. So this connection is not established by a crystal bowl or the calling of spirits, but by sound faith and a sound relationship with God.

We are faced with the recollection of memory of our passed sins before we enter the confessional, and as we kneel and cross ourselves, we in fact face our inner self, sinful as it is, and bow before God's eternal blessing, wisdom and mercy by letting his light guide us through the confession, by confessing everything we confess that we are sinful, but that we want to become better. Confession is not a place where the weak come to be weaker. In fact, the ones weak from their sins usually come there to become stronger. Because it takes great courage and strength to face our sins, our wrongdoings and our going astray.

After we confess our sins or ask for guidance, we hear something which is greater than anything we've heard before. After the penance due for the sins we've committed we hear something which we haven't expected. I went wrong, I confessed and the Lord is Merciful enough to forgive all of our sins! What Power and at the same time what Mercy we are faced with. The sins we commit as we go through the Stations of the Cross, are in fact a modern representative of the people participating in Jesus' passion on his way to Calvary. If we try and re-live those moments of the life of our Lord, we can see our sins from another perspective.

The powerful psychological image of the Confessional, is something we find in other practices as well. If you go to a psychologist or a psychiatrist, you do pretty much the same. But the psychologist or psychiatrist can never do one very important thing - forgive our sins. This glorious duty is only entrusted with our priests.

If you can find Michel Dangoisse's, Laissez-Vous Reconcilier avec Dieu, (Reconciliate Yourselves with God, also translated as Accounts 0r Testimonies about Reconciliating with God) or a similar book that explains why you need to go to confession, might help those of you who are still in doubt of whether or not you need to confess.

It's better than going to your local square and shouting from the top of your lungs "I HAVE SINNED", because I doubt that even God would like to hear you:) when you can ALWAYS go to Church and open up! And don't worry, your sins will never be heard by anyone else as the priest is obliged to keep them to himself even if he is under threat for his life, and the only cost you have to pay is to be penitent.

From my personal experience, I believe that confession has made me stronger and has given me a guidance in life, but most importantly it brought peace and happiness to my soul. The Holy Trivium is a wonderful time to go to Confession. Why not use it? You always know that there will always be a door open for you there.

Entering...Entered:)

Well, the biggest challenge of all was of course to make the selection of Church and tradition. Something was wrong, I did not get what I want from the Orthodox Church. The splitting up of churches in 1054 instead of ending there and getting the dialogues going, it had gone further down in the East. With the split of the Bulgarians and others each and every country forgot Constantinople and decided not to recognize the surpemacy which used to belong to "the New Rome" in that period after the split with Rome.
Now this is something huh? Suddenly all that I had been hearing of having something "ortho-dox" (right way) in your church. And there had been a talk going on against Catholicism. There's another problem. There are Orthodox Churches that don't recognize each other. Each country has its own Orthodox Church, but there isn't a THE Orthodox Church anywhere.
During my reading of the Bible I stumbled upon Matthew 16:18:

Thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

Now who and where's Peter? Of course as the more informed amongst you already know he resides and is succeeded by means of Apostolic Succession in the Holy Father - the P0pe.
So I said to myself: What am I waiting for? I never realized the wealth of the Internet before. Being able to inform yourself is something wonderful. I started gradually building up my knowledge and reading everything I could. With the help of a wonderful person from the USA, I could even receive books and read them in hard copies:)
After much reading and self-preparation as well as a great support from my friend, I decided to visit my local diocese. I was welcomed as a friend and was not scorned but instead I was listened to very carefully and I received the explanation. I was given a choice to either join or only participate within the Church. My inner-self knew that just participating would not help my need for God. I had to enter into full Communion. It is something deeper than you have ever felt before, you just know that it's there, waiting for fulfillment and nothing you can do can stop it in any way. You're not aware of how strong this feeling was! I just had to keep going and it gradually developed into something greater. Fortunately I had a great guide and received, God willing, an even greater father and brother in Christ.
Developing into a Catholic took a great courage and strength, which I have never believed nor expected to happen. Courage because you are getting into something new and partly unknown and strength because you're facing up a community and an outer world that might not accept your decision with open arms. But there is only one way to go by it. Accept what you want and more importantly accept God with all your heart and with all your mind.
After I have converted, I changed. For the better. And people noticed it and are still noticing it. Conversion is only the beginning. After my conversion I grew and am still growing spiritually.
So therefore I have proudly entered the Catholic Church in 2007.
My next posts will concern my growth, I'll try and recommend books and sites as well as practices I've found helpful.
Semper In Christi

A peak into the light

Usually it's very hard to live in a way of life that you think does not fulfill your expectations, so it was a hard thing to first acknowlidge that things weren't going the way that I wanted them to be. This is why it took me first a lot of time to inspect my own religion or the way that my Church goes about it in it's tradition and beliefs. So what do you do first when you're in doubt about your religion? You go to a priest.
Older priests in my country had started their practice during Communist times which enabled them to create a tradition of religion that might suit the goals of the system, which preached that "religion is the opium for the masses" so tradition was more important than faith. So people didn't learn any prayers and weren't taught in their religion.
So bearing that in mind, I was told that I shouldn't bother myself with such things, and that it was their job (the priests' job) to deal with the questions of God.
Prohibition does wonders to a young man's mind. I went deeper into the subject by looking for some books and articles on religion and about whether my religion was the one that had the truth.
This is the period when I started doing a more intense study of the Bible with the help of different materials which came from different pamphlets and internet sites by different Christian sects (or whatever they are called) which helped me get a basic understanding of what the Holy Scripture was. I couldn't understand why the priest I talked to didn't tell me to go to the Bible for answers; that's what priests used to do on films, and I read lots of commentaries by different priests who actually suggested a certain amount of Bible study for the practicing Christian.
Meanwhile I found out that prayer was something to be said, so I started learning pace by pace how a Christian should really pray. At that time a new magazine on Orthodoxy was being issued and I had the opportunity to read more about it, and about the "do's and don'ts". I tried to follow many of these advices, but I was always pulled back by my environment which didn't accept religion as a way of life, but as a way of differenting between peoples and nations.
People here, usually attend the liturgy if they are told to or if there's a big holiday (Christmas or Easter) so that it has become a part of the lifestyle of the population that they should follow their own religion (as a counter-influence of the Muslim tradition of regular attending prayers and everything).
On this crossroad of my life I decided that I will practice whatever I think secretly, and I will perform my public duities as I was supposed to do. It wasn't easy, but I did it. I found an Orthodox priest online who told me that what I was doing was right and encouraged me to follow the path I have selected.
But something was wrong. My lifestyle didn't go allong with the choice that I had made to follow God as He would instruct me, and as his earthly representative (the Church) would tell me.
I prayed one day saying "God, please lead me to the right path and I will obey your wish".
This is the time when I started reading about Church history and the 11. century split between Orthodoxy and Catholicism.
The magazine gave an article commemorating the visit of the late Pope John Paul II to Greece, and discussed certain aspects of difference between Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy. I think that this would be my initial close encounter with the Catholic faith. I started watching Catholic Masses from Italy and from my country and I was astonished by them. The organization of the Church and the complete hierarchy and the order it gave was the most appealing thing to me at that time (and if I might add, it still is).
I was given a chance in life, a chance to choose. And I had a new topic on my mind that I had to explore the Western way of life, the way of moving away from the East and tradition, towards something that appealed to me after such a long time. I finally had the right choice to make, and Deo gratia, I finally was able to have at least a small ray of light from our Heavenly Father.

The Change in Course of Pax

Hoping you will understand I had to take a short break from blogging. In this post I will make a short digression before I continue explaining my path into Catholicism.

After the unfortunate death of my beloved mother, I am now able to say that I can get myself to write something even though I can't say that I'm very peaceful in these moments. Still, what we as mortal men cannot provide for this life, God will always find a way to help us in any way He thinks appropriate.

I was never a person to believe in miracles. Perhaps because miracles happen in unexpected moments, and because they fulfill small portions of our lives in a very significant way.

Those who have died have left a very important legacy behind them - the ones who will remember them and will mention them to the further generations. They also leave a great empty space because the greatest pain I am filling at the moment is the physical lack of a person who brought me up and gave everything to make me happy.

But I am not alone! I always thought that I will remain alone eventually, but I'm not alone! And that feeling of being watched over by our Heavenly Father gives me strength to go on. I must go on because that is the plan that God has set forth for me. I am glad that he didn't let my mother suffer very much and it sets my soul at a certain level of peace.

I thank God for the friends and family he has given me and I pray for all of them every day as I pray for the rest of the soul of my departed mother. Give me strength and peace Oh Lord, to hold up against all attacks and pains so that I can endure all temptation. Amen!

In Principio...

I was wondering how I was supposed to start telling my own story into the Catholic Church, a journey that is still going on and will continue until the last day determined for me by God.

I suppose the best way to start explaining why I want to join and why I consider the Catholic Church as the true Church of God is to start at the beginning of my understanding of religion. As I have said in my introductory post, I was born into an Orthodox Christian family, which saw religion as a part of its identity rather than a need to communicate with God. Similarly to the Catholic Church there are a number of Church traditions that are followed. So, instead of being taught by a priest or a religious scholar I learned about the traditions of Orthodoxy in my home. Not a really good way to define religion by people who only practice traditions not the religion itself!

I was taught that the centre of Christian life was out of the church, and the church was only a place where one is supposed to go to once in a while because his identity was Christian, and excessive church-going was and still is considered to be silly or unneeded. Believing in God was something different from practicing religion, which would include going to liturgy (theia leitourgeia θεία λειτουργεία meaning holy service, which is the Greek word for Mass) and taking the Eucharist (I'm sure you understand that) which in Orthodoxy means taking a leavened bread and wine (I was told that Catholics take unleavened bread and only the priests and clerics are allowed to take wine).

Orthodox tradition also includes lighting a lot of candles and kissing many icons, while leaving money on them (even though in recent times many of the priests have protested against this tradition because when you go to church you don’t want to see crucifixes and icons of saints cluttered with money. The other explanation was that this was only a part of the pagan traditions which haven’t died out in the mentality of the people. Fortunately for me I have only seen other people practicing more bizarre traditions than this like slaughtering lambs in the church yard or slaughtering and throwing lambs and other animals into the foundations of new houses or buildings. I’m sure you’ll find this bizarre but many priests allow it, because usually after the throwing of the so-called “kurban” (meaning offering (remember Abraham’s offering?) and nowadays it’s usually practiced by Muslims) the priests also blesses the foundation so that the house would be blessed by God. (Thank God – Deus gratia, we’ve never practiced any of this in my family). Drinking holy water has always been something that we were taught we should do. Even washing with holy water is practiced to heal some illnesses.

Taking the Eucharist every Sunday was never a part of my tradition. Praying to God was something that I learned by myself. Mind you, I never knew any proper prayers. I started praying the "Our Father" when I was 19 (and I learned it by myself). My first Hail Mary was said when I was 22 years old. The traditionalistic view of religion stuck with me for quite a long period of time. I even learned a very foolish prayer which went something like this: "I pray to all the forces of the Universe and our Lord Jesus Christ to..." followed by whatever request I had at that time.

When we talk about holiday traditions there is much more than Easter bunnies and turkey. Christmas for example is celebrated after New Year’s (on January 7^th) and before Christmas the Orthodox Church still practices a fast (I’ll talk about the fasts a bit later in this post). New Year’s Eve is something that is celebrated more than Christmas. People tend to overeat and drink and then go to the Christmas service (liturgy) and some of them even take the Eucharist even though they are not actually prepared for it. Taking the Eucharist in the Orthodox tradition is conditioned by a fast (which usually lasts for forty days but usually people tend to take it after fasting for one week). What I mind most about the Orthodox way of fasting is that people don’t realize that fasting is something that is more spiritual than physical. You can’t distinguish between someone who fasts and the one who doesn’t, first and foremost because you can hear foul language from both of them (especially when they drive) and then because many of those new-age believers (who detested religion but now are devout Christians) overdo many things and it all looks like a great travesty rather than something spiritual. The physical conditions of Orthodox fasting divide fasts into “oil fasts” and “oil-less fasts” (I know these words don’t really fit English, but I thought it would be nicer to use them as they are the literal translations of the words in my native language). Oil fasts are fasts in which one can eat food prepared with oil, but not meat, while the oil-less fasts mean that you mustn’t use oil in your food (this excludes olives as a source for oil, dairy and of course meat, so basically you can only eat some bread, boiled beans or fruit throughout the day and lots of black coffee or teaJ). Even though the Church does not really care about whether you fast properly it gives some appeals to the people not to forget the aim of the fasts, which is not really respected by the people.

And one day, I said “This is something I don’t understand! Religion must be something more than going to church and lighting candles for the living and the dead once in a while.” At this moment my initial “Pax in Anima” (Peace of the Soul) started to rebel. My distress and curiosity opened the door for the question: “Am I on the right path?”

What I got as an answer was very simple - NO...