Kevin Basil

Dear friends and followers: It has become necessary for me to take a break from social media. This will continue for at least the next three weeks, because I am finishing two major papers from last semester. I may come back just before August turns over the watch to September, or I may continue through the end of the fall semester. I have not decided yet.

Please keep this sinner in your prayers. As one of my teachers said recently, Prayer changes things.

I don’t watch much television (unless I’m at my parents — but that’s another story). In fact, for the past year, the only show I have been watching is Smallville, mostly because it was the final season. So now there is a hole where Smallville used to be. I have recently learned that Glee is now on Netflix streaming. Although I am certain it would become addicting, I am thinking I might give it a try. I am currently listening to the first season soundtrack on Spotify. Epic.

No, Glee is not at all like Smallville. I am a multivalent little atom.

Any thoughts? Do you like Glee? What do you like most or least about it?

A close friend of mine (and my godson) recently preached on the Sunday of the Paralytic. As I commented when he posted the text of his sermon, “I particularly liked the reversal of the ‘crutch’ accusation at the end, and how it tied in with the central medical theme. Great job, and I hope that your hearers were edified.” I highly recommend reading the whole thing.

I would like to offer one further remark — and it may simply reflect a different perspective: I have become somewhat sensitive of late to the fact that the cross is the center and sine qua non of Christian faith. Chris mentioned the Lord’s passion (which is the cross); it could have been a bit more central to the entire homily. The cross is the sacrament from which every other sacrament flows. You see this in icons of the crucifixion: A cup capturing the blood and water flowing from the Lord’s side. (This image of baptism and eucharist — of the church as sacrament — represents a timeless connection rather than an historical event. The crucified Lord eternally gives birth to the church in the timeless reality of the cross.) I would have nailed the fact that the Lord’s cross is the medicine (and sometimes, we don’t get a spoonful of sugar to make it go down more easily).

Sometimes we speak easily of the church and theology without referring it back to the cross. However, the earliest patristic writers, as well as many of the most important through the centuries, always took the cross as their starting point and referred to it constantly. The more that our teaching becomes able to stand apart from the cross (which is the revelation of God enfleshed), the less it resembles patristic teaching. A theology which can stand without the cross is not the gospel and it is not really Christian.

In closing, I reemphasize that I really liked this homily. However, I think that the cross is crucial to Christian teaching and thought it important enough to mention. In some ways, this merely reflects a different perspective. I am emphasizing this crucial element of Christian teaching partly due to the deep vale where my own journey has taken me. However, part of it is also a shift in thinking spearheaded by Fr John Behr, now the dean at St Vladimir’s Seminary, where I am a student. I highly recommend his book, The Mystery of Christ. To get an idea of his central thesis, read this article: “The Paschal Foundations of Christian Theology.”

What is the end goal of fighting for equal rights for the GLBT[Q] subculture? asks librarian Ronald G. Lee in “The Truth About the Homosexual Rights Movement.”^[1] In answering it, his thesis is that:

…actual behavior …distinguished from the arguments… [put] forward for the benefit of the naïve and gullible, represent the real aims and objectives of the homosexual rights movement. … In other words, if you support what is now described in euphemistic terms as ‘the blessing of same-sex unions,’ in practice you are supporting the abolition of the entire Christian sexual ethic, and its substitution with an unrestricted, laissez faire, free sexual market.

To some of my readers, that thesis may sound like the ravings of a homophobe. By the time we get to this thesis, though, Mr Lee has already let us know that he’s an insider. “By the time I lived in Austin, I had been thinking of myself as a gay man for almost 20 years,” he writes in the second paragraph. Lee’s article is entirely anecdotal, and it may be a sophisticated, extended ad hominem against GLBT[Q] rights activists. However, it seems to me that his perspective may not be isolated or eccentric, and his conclusion should be answered, if not accepted.

Lee argues that he never found monogamous gay couples. I know two. My experience is biased (both of the couples I know are family members). I am asking several friends, family members and acquaintances to comment on this article with their experience — anonymously if necessary. Is the gay subculture as Lee describes it? How should a reader understand his thesis that monogamous homosexuality is merely a front for indiscriminate sexual license, the real goal?

Please read the article and comment on the article. Uncharitable comments will be deleted. Anonymous comments are welcomed if charitable.

Today’s gospel:
Mark 8:34-9:1 (Schmemann Standard Version)

And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him find what makes him happy and take up his joy and follow me. For whoever would save his happiness is blessed, but whoever loses his joy for my sake and the gospel’s will be cast out into eternal darkness where the fire never ceases and the worm never dies. For what does it profit a man to gain his soul and forfeit his happiness? For what can a man give in return for his joy? For whoever is ashamed of me and of my happiness in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the happiness of his Father with the holy angels.” And he said to them, “Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God coming with joy.”

Today’s hymn:
Troparion of the resurrection

O Lord, save your people, and make joyful your inheritance. Grant happiness to the people who are always happy, and by your resurrection preserve your habitation.

Our father among the saints, Patrick, archbishop of Armagh and all Ireland, wonderworker.

Troparion, Tone I
Today, Armagh rejoices with Antrim and Mayo, * and all Ireland praises the illustrious apostle, Patrick. * On all he met he made a deep and lasting impression, * for the grace of God overflowed his noble and sensitive nature. * With the Lord Christ as his breastplate and the undying lamp of the Spirit in his hand, * he went forth to make the Irish people children of the font,
*** baptizing them into Christ, the only lover of mankind.

Kondakion, Tone IV
The evil one is ever on the watch to carry off entire nations as booty, * viciously plundering their spirit and leading the minds of the people into error. * For this, you wisely spurned the world as a passing dream prone to destruction, O holy Patrick, * preferring to be a merchant of that which lasts forever. * Thus, you led the Irish nation to worship Christ, our God, * becoming the blessed father of a multitude of sons and daughters in the Lord.
*** Beg him now to save our souls.

From The Monks of New Skete, Troparia and Kondakia.

O Lord and master of my life! Dispel from me the spirit of discouragement and slothfulness, of ambition and vain talk!
Prostration.

Instead, give me the spirit of prudence and humility, of patience and charity.
Prostration.

Yes, my king and Lord, let me look at my own sins and refrain from judging others: For you are bless’d unto ages of ages, amen.
Prostration.

Then, with three lesser reverences:

O God, have mercy on me, a sinner!
O God, in your mercy wipe out my sins!
I have sinned very often, Lord; forgive me!

Prayer text copyright © The Monks of New Skete.

Sometimes we look to the skies, hoping to be reassured. And the only response is silence. Even the wind does not whisper among the leaves. Has God abandoned us? The psalmist cried out: My God, my God! Why have you forsaken me? And the Lord, by quoting this psalm, expresses this same alienation on the cross.

But that psalm ends by underscoring the psalmist’s commitment to God in spite of being abandoned: But my soul shall live for him and my children shall serve him. And the next psalm begins with the answer to the question: The Lord is my shepherd, there is nothing I need. Even though he seems to ignore our cries, leaving us in darkness, he is present. Even if I walk through the valley of darkness, I fear nothing: you are there with your rod and staff, and with these you console me.

Even when he seems to be silent, he is still present, and he loves us even when we doubt him.

The chapel of St Athanasius Orthodox Church, circa 2009.

Nine years ago, a tiny transformation occurred. Christ the Life-giver Orthodox Church in Nicholasville, Ky., formerly a mission of the Evangelical Orthodox Church (EOC), entered the Orthodox Church in America (OCA). Unlike other parishes that entered at the same time, every single member of Christ the Life-giver chose to remain with the parish in its transition to the OCA, an amazing detail that is sometimes forgotten. In the days that followed, a new name (Saint Athanasius) appeared in the window, and the layman who was formerly the priest would again be ordained to lead the tiny band of pilgrims. To better understand the place of that decisive moment in the history of the parish, I present it here through the lens of my own life.

My story begins in 1995, when I entered the Roman Catholic Church. Before that, I was an evangelical, and I continued to attend an evangelical college. One of my art professors began reading about Eastern Orthodoxy and attending prayers held in the living room of a nearby seminarian, David Rucker. Rucker was studying missiology. He served in Hong Kong, and he was frustrated over inadequate responses to ancestor veneration in Asian cultures. He believed that Eastern Orthodoxy could provide a positive answer for Asians. My professor’s interest piqued my own, and I began attending the Sunday evening prayers. In the fall of 1995, Rucker began holding catechism classes. He invited me to attend, and I did.

In 1996, Rucker’s doctoral thesis advisor unexpectedly died, and he faced the prospect of completely rewriting his thesis on ancestor veneration in Chinese culture. When he discussed returning to Hong Kong with his missions board, he realized that Orthodox practices had become more than an academic investigation. The evangelical mission board forbade him to use the sign of the cross or icons in his ministry. They required the impossible. Read the rest of “The Transformation”

Christians who favor classical forms of Christianity often wax eloquent (to say nothing of vociferous) about the twelve days of Christmas.^[1] What is occasionally forgotten is that the seasonal cycle of Christ’s birth and revelation as the enfleshed Son of God the Father^[2] concludes with a feast which honors the scriptural event of Christ’s presentation and his mother’s purification according to Judaic law forty days after Christmas on February 2.^[3]

In some Western customs, pious Christians considered it bad luck for Christmas decorations to be up after Candlemas. This indicates that they perceived the Christmas season (as distinct from the twelve day feast itself) to continue until Candlemas. Christmas decor was acceptable and could remain in place up to (and perhaps including) this celebration; after Candlemas, the Christmas season definitely ended, and people boxed their decorations for another year.

Yesterday I dined in a nearby International House of Pancakes. Among the ordinary songs of the Muzak playlist, holiday tunes occasionally still played. None of them were Christmas carols, I noted, but it was still interesting to hear an establishment such as Muzak (or a surrogate music service) continuing to play holiday music over a week after New Year’s Day. Usually, secular marketers have boxed up and forgotten everything Christmas before the twelve days are even half-way over.

I grant that the holiday tunes selected were far from Christmas carols: they included Amy Grant’s cover of “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” and Wilson Philips’ “Hey Santa,” among others. However, I smiled as I mused that it perhaps could be a start towards extending the holiday season into January rather than into October.

Merry Christmas!

The following interchange took place as I purchased beer at a convenience store on my way home from my extended family’s Christmas party tonight. The cashier was a cute brunette who sold me beer, so she was at least eighteen years old.

Cashier: May I see your ID?
Me (getting ID): You just made my day.
Cashier (looking at ID): Oh, you were born the same year as my mom!
Me (laughing) You just ruined my day.
Cashier: You’re still young.

Yeah. Right.

I’ve updated my page on problematic words for readers. A decent resource for words of which readers seem perennially unsure (or sure and quite surely wrong).

“Seminary is where blogs go to die.”

Someone posted that on the true blog-killer, Facebook, and I laughed. I almost wrote, right here in the space where you’re reading these words instead of what I wanted to write, “And something clicked inside me.” But that something clicks a lot and not a damn thing ever happens.

Take, for example, my Greek studies; I’m probably going to fail that class. Am I having trouble understanding what the aorist is, you ask? Or perhaps getting moods mixed up: Confusing the subperative and the injunctive? Nope. The problem is that I’m not memorizing a damn thing. That’s my problem. I know this. Something inside me keeps on clicking, and nothing changes. Click. See? Nothing. Click-click-clicklicklicklicklicklick. Not. A. Damn. Thing.

Something else needs to start clicking deep down inside me.

I might rename this old beast. I named it Decimation and Reconstruction around seven years ago. The blog was itself only a few months old, a little over a year. The webserver hosting my blog (and those of several other men in my parish) was cracked and everyone’s blog was down for about a week. At the time I thought Decimation and Reconstruction nicely summarized what happened and coincidentally served as a nice metaphor for our lives. I have left the title in place for seven years now.

I think perhaps I should rename the blog. Something like “The Abomination of Desolation,” or “Desolation and Recrimination,” or some other play on a Latinate “-tion” ending. Something that reflects that reconstruction never really happens: What is happening is always destruction. Even when we think we’re rebuilding after a massive decimation, we are either deluding ourselves or we are just building another Babel for the next act of God to destroy.

A meditation on the meaning of the season of Advent.

I grew up in the West, and so Advent was an important part of the preparation for Christmas.^[1] The Advent wreath, Advent calendars, singing “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel,” “Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus” — these memories burn in mind like a flame as shining examples of what Advent means.

Advent comes from the Latin adventus, meaning “coming.” “Beginning the Church’s liturgical year, Advent is the season leading up to the celebration of Christmas. The Advent season is a time of preparation that directs our hearts and minds to Christ’s second coming at the end of time and also to the anniversary of the Lord’s birth on Christmas,” according to the website of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops. The second coming of Christ is the focus of Advent because the readings and proper hymnography of the church remind the faithful of the yearning of suffering Israel, as well as the imminent coming of the Lord. The burning desire of the old covenant saints burns in our hearts as we long for the coming of the Lord.

The first Sunday of Advent always follows the last Sunday of the church year, the Solemnity of Christ the King. Prior to the liturgical reforms of the twentieth century, the gospel for Christ the King led directly into the yearning of Advent (Mt 24.15–35): “And then the sign of the Son of man will appear in heaven; then, too, all the peoples of the earth will beat their breasts; and they will see the Son of man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” (v. 30, NJB)^[2] The King is coming: Be ready! It is the perfect prelude to the penitence of the coming season of preparation. Read the rest of “The Coming One”

At St Vladimir’s Seminary, where we have been hosting the relics of our community’s patron, the holy great prince Vladimir, the Seminary’s octet and St Tikhon’s Seminary’s Mission Choir sang the Saturday all-night vigil antiphonally. There are already some videos up. The videos uploaded on November 13 all capture the vigil we celebrated before the relics of St. Vladimir.