A Statement By His Holiness on the George Zimmerman / Trayvon Martin Case

In the wake of the jury’s verdict in the Zimmerman case, it is difficult to reconcile different feelings and emotions.  While I understand the horror and pain that any parent feels at the untimely, violent and tragic death of their child, I can also see both sides of the equation having myself been stalked and robbed at night.  Here, I see less about race than about perceived race.  Mr. Zimmerman is as misunderstood and now targeted by racist blacks just as much as the rabid white racists have painted Trayvon Martin out to be a thug and druggie.  The truth is, of course, somewhere in the middle.

While avoiding canonizing the tragically dead, and with all attention to his past and record and how Zimmerman must have felt in that contextual situation, I have been a bit concerned by the apparent lack of detail concerning Martin’s past positive accomplishments.  It is entirely appropriate to include commentary about anything illegal in his past during a trial, of course, but is it standard operating procedure to excise everything which points to the good that he had done?  After the trial, when a lot more became public, it has come to light that this young man, before his sudden descent, was more of a model citizen. He scored high marks in mathematics and the physical sciences, and was taking flight lessons. Some have been quick to connect the motive to take flight lessons with a supposed desire to transport drugs. We have no way to know what was in Martin’s heart. Making suppositions about his thoughts and desires is uncalled for, and an attempt to try the deceased, who was not the one on trial.

This raises a question less about race than about values.  What happened in this youth’s life which convinced him that drugs were a better choice than all the good he had been involved in?  What changed so fundamentally that his behavior began to change too?  As much as I realize how painful it is to realize and receive unpleasant truths about those we love, we have to remember that we are human and make mistakes, sometimes with long-reaching or even tragic results.  George Zimmerman chose to carry a gun that night.  Trayvon Martin chose to act suspiciously at a time of night when he should have known better.  So what gives?

My bet is that drugs were playing a large part in the personality changes and the unwise and rash choices which led to the tragedy and its aftermath. The exact way that they played a part may never be known.

Whatever the family may feel about the verdict, Mr. Zimmerman will be paying for the rest of his life with death threats and notoriety, and remember that the jury saw things we, the public, did not, and arrived at their verdict.  In light of the legal structure in Florida, there was no other verdict they could lawfully return.  I have seen emotion-driven trials end with the judge actually setting aside a jury verdict after publicly scolding the jury for ignoring the LAW and following their hearts.  Legal enforcement is NOT meant or designed to allow feelings to dictate trials, though it often happens anyway.

In conclusion, the Byzantine Catholic Church only asks why so much positive in this young man’s life before the sudden aberrations was carefully and thoughtfully excluded from the public record and commentary until now.  While we of course support the legal system and hope for its continuing evolution and thus the verdict, there are still some disquieting questions which remain unanswered.

His Holiness Mar Laurentius I

Patriarch

What are the chances of you being you?

Food for thought!

From God!

How To Build A Church In Today's World Without Even Trying

The beginning is the hardest part, for one must begin with one saved soul - And by itself - One saved soul is simply that: One.

For God to be present in a place for a state of worship to exist, there must be a second soul. The Holy Spirit provides the third, and worship may begin. Now, prayer requires but one soul, but worship requires two, yet of the two souls only one must be saved. God is present whenever two or more are gathered in His name.

Now to begin a church. Our saved soul gives the gospel of Our Lord to the unsaved soul in this time and place, and asks the unsaved soul if he might believe in his heart that The Lord Jesus Christ did die for his personal sins thus redeeming him and making him a part of The Body Of Christ. If our unsaved soul answers: "I do so believe." He then becomes a postulate ready for Baptism. Water is poured three times over his head, once, "In The Name Of The Father," once, "In The Name Of The Son," and once, "In The Name Of The Holy Spirit," with the hand of the Baptist being laid on the head of the one being Baptized after each of the three pourings of the water.

Now we have the requirements for prayer with God presence guaranteed us being met, and God will never leave the two who have gathered in His name. If they do not abandon one-another they have a church, if they do, they are two saves souls, and the opportunity to form another new church begins anew.

+ Metropolitan Joel
Apostolic Chancellor


  

The Free and The Hooked Fish.

As we look at the weather tragedies across the United States, our attention is drawn to the Midwest, where tornadoes have cluster-ravaged several states... Centering on The State of Oklahoma.

We are reminded of Biblical floods, earthquakes, and storms at sea. Note that the Bible takes these events in stride; as in, they always have been and always will be. This is because it is the truth. We may ask - Does the Bible offer us no comfort? Well, no, and yes.

For thousands of years writers have grappled with, "the eye of the storm theology". Few of their explanations come near to satisfying us. We want answers and we want them every time a new disaster rears its ugly head. Then the passage of time dulls our appetite for immediate answers and we settle back into the comfortable label: "Acts of God". That is until the next time a portion of our world explodes in earth, wind, and fire.

Okay, you may accuse this writer of saying a lot of nothing about the subject that is something, but with Acts of God, it is hard to do more. So...

We pray for the victims of these latest disasters and those soon to come after I close this writing. Yes, more storms are on their way. More property and lives will be shattered and lost. Then we will pray again. Possibly, a Jewish philosopher explains the unexplainable the best: 

"When a trout rising to a fly gets hooked on a line and finds himself unable to swim about freely, he begins with a fight which results in struggles and splashes and sometimes an escape. Often, of course, the situation is too tough for him.

In the same way the human being struggles with his environment and with the hooks that catch him. Sometimes he masters the  difficulties; sometimes they are too much for him. His struggles are all the world sees and it naturally misunderstands them. It is hard for a free fish to understand what is happening to the a hooked one."

                                                                            Karl A. Menninger 

+ Metropolitan Joel
Apostolic Chancellor

  

For Christians, some days are more slippery than others

There is an old term for men like myself: Churchman. The term means that the person knows, understands, and is involved in every facet of their church's worship, operation, politics, and administration. Guilty as charged! My whole life has been the church. Now, being somewhat obsessive-compulsive, I took things to the next level and added church music to my churchmanship... Something few people do. Music has always been a separate preserve in the church appreciated by all, understood by few. In my midlife crisis, I was rescued in my musical abilities by another churchman, and I never forgot it. I vowed to pass the favor along, and rescue other off-the-rails church musicians as well.

Fast forward twenty years and I'm sitting at the console of a huge organ next to an 85 year old woman named Joann who had been the previous organist for 18 years, and retired for 10. Though she had an organ at her home, she had become despondent not playing for a large congregation, and had lost her ability to play as a conservatory trained organist. The tragedy of it all was as the outgoing organist she had helped design the very organ we were both sitting at on this lovely sunny Monday afternoon, but had never played the instrument.

With a great deal of poking, prodding, pushing, praying and yes, making her mad at me, there we were in the church at the organ console. The woman was terrified to the point of turning to stone. I told Joann to relax, ignore the hundreds of buttons, knobs, and switches, and to just concentrate on the three keyboards we call manuals, and the 32 note pedal board. I confidently placed a hymnal on the lighted music rack, set up her voice registration with the draw knobs, and commanded her to play.

She did. In the wrong key, in the wrong tempo, on the wrong manual, and held down a single pedal note throughout the butchering of the entire song that was unrecognizable as a standard of the church: "Let all mortal flesh keep silent." When she painfully finished and released the last note, I asked her, "What was that?" She bit her lower lip and sheepishly answered,
"I'm not sure, but it was at least sound."
"Lets have another go, try this..." And I flipped the pages to, "Holy, Holy, Holy."

It sounded like the pipes where crashing down around us, but at least this time in was in the right key, tempo, correct manual, and she even managed a few correct pedal notes. Encouraged by this, I slammed another hymn in front of her, this time: "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God." My attempt was to ease here into a classical composer as the music was written by Bach, even if the words were not. This time around she managed a credible rendition, so I decided to take a leap of faith. I pulled out a 1932 concert repertoire book edited by E. Power Biggs, telling her that these notes were larger and more easy to read. What I didn't tell her was that it was the unfinished Requiem by Mozart, which since unfinished is not familiar to church organists who do not play the formal concert circuit. To keep from scaring the poor woman into a cardiac arrest, I had gem clipped a piece of paper over the title and composer's name. I know what you are thinking! And you're right, just keep it to yourself and don't say it out loud, you'll upset those around you with that kind of language.

Glory be to God! She played the damn thing! Oops... I need to take my own advice! Then as my head was turned for a moment, she took down the book and removed the gem clip and piece of paper. The look she gave me told me to Get Out. I jumped down from the organ bench, and dashed for the stairs. She was right behind me and grabbed a standing hat rack made of solid oak with a point on its top and swung it out like a lance with the intent of skewering me. I bolted down the back stairs forgetting that I was wearing organ shoes that are not designed to walk in, the cape of my bishop's cassock flapping behind me as I gained speed. A cassock is also not designed for the fifty-yard-dash, and my pectoral cross was slamming around attempting to decapitate me.

Meanwhile, what used to be nice sweet Joann, now a mad old hag bent on running me up the bell tower and ringing my brains out, was in hot pursuit. The woman normally hobbles along slowly with a cane, but was doing a credible job in attempting to catch me. At the bottom of the stairs we encountered the wooden floor with our organ shoes, which are the equivalent of skates and an ice rink, and off we went. We slipped, slid, banged into walls, still fleeing at top speed and screaming along the way in the fear of breaking our necks, with me taking note the woman had managed to keep that coat rack turned harpoon aimed at my backside. At this point I hate to admit it, but I'm quite tender there. Bishops are not exactly triathlon contenders... So I attempted to run even faster, organ shoes be damned!

All this commotion alerted Father John to attempt to save his bishop, and he came running from the opposite direction and as we turned the corner we crashed into one another. Then Joann, not being able to put on brakes in those organ shoes fell right on top of us, disarming herself as her intended staff of death flew out of her hands with a mighty crash and careened down the hall finally impaling itself in a large potted plant.

This little adventure took the fire out of the 85 year old organist, a 60 year old bishop and his 33 year old priest. The only real casualty was the large potted plant cut in half by a flying hat rack. The entire matter was dubbed, "The slippery organ affair," And the three of us agreed over our aches, pains, and several cups of Earl Gray, not to mention it again.

Of course I eminently violated that oath by posting it here.

+Metropolitan Archbishop Joel 

"Mary..? By any chance did that angel tell you just how we are supposed to raise God to be human once you give birth to Him?"

"No Joseph, no child comes with an instruction manual... And whenever God attempts to instruct adults who can very well read scripture... Even you tell me, 'Now that went well.'"
 
"Oy Vey!"

Over the many years of my ministry, I have from time to time had some agnostic person attempt to convince me that Jesus sinned according to a number of passages in the Bible. Now, I have to concede that not everything that God tries always works according to plan the first time out of the gate, but then again I would always counter by saying to the aforementioned agnostic person that they would be right only had Jesus not been The Christ. The Son Of God... But since Jesus is God. Buzzzzz! Ya got it wrong! Next contestant please!

Many times in The Old Testament God blew His top with a number of His prophets. That was not sin, because He is God... Master of The Universe. The same goes for the occasion where the twelve year old Christ is presented in the Temple on His thirteenth birthday, then His parents discovered that He was not in the company of people they were traveling with back home to Nazareth. So, Mary and Joseph turn back to Jerusalem where after a three day search they find their brand new teenager calmly standing at a lectern spouting scripture before a bunch of priests and scribes in the Temple's public courtyard. This sight alone floored them! But then...

"Young man," Joseph interrupted, "Why did You treat us this way? Letting us think You were on your way home within our group, but then staying behind like this... We were worried to death... Do you have any idea how much trouble we had finding you? We have searched this entire city for three days. Son, this is the very last place..."

Jesus right smartly cuts Joseph off telling him: "Why did you have to search for Me, did you not know that I would be in My Father's House?"

Now, the Bible is quite uncomfortable at dealing with teenage rebellion, so in the places where it does appear, it is always played down. The sheer brevity here though is glaring. Let's fast forward to 2013 and take for an example two parents searching Washington D.C. for three days to finally find their kid preaching in the pulpit of The National Cathedral... The situation begs the question: What a big to-do must have taken place when they found their child? Surely not just the few words stated in The Gospel of Luke. So we jump back two thousand years but if in modern teen-speak, Jesus really said something more like this:

"Well, first off, you of all people should know that you're not My Father... Secondly, neither of you obviously know Me very well at all after having raised Me for twelve years when all I ever talk about is the Temple. If you had paid attention you would have known just where to come find Me without it taking you three days to blunder into Me..."

The Bible just tells us that Mary kept all these things in her heart. Rightttt... Okay, if I had said a thing like that with attitude to my parents when I was thirteen, I would have had the board of education applied to my seat of learning. Most likely Joseph would have liked to go there as well had Mary not been there, but then again, my parents were not charged by God with raising God... Yet Mary most likely kept Joseph from beating Jesus's bottom to a rosy red, but yet again both Joseph and Mary realized for the first time they were hearing Jesus speak with the authority of The Christ. As such, it only appears that He broke the commandment: "Honor thy father and thy mother." The Bible tells us that Mary and Joseph marveled at the response Jesus gave to them that day in the Temple. The verdict is in! The boy Jesus did not sin!

Then again, maybe Jesus still got spanked. Jewish Law of that time prescribed laying a rod on a child for disobedience, and Jesus even went one step further by talking back to Joseph. In all likelihood, the priests gathered listening to Jesus would have called for Him to be given the rod for back-talking to Joseph in the Temple Court.  Luke just tells us that: "Jesus went down with them and was obedient to them." There is no mention of if Jesus received punishment or not. Certainly a normal child in the same circumstances would have been punished. Where The Old Testament prescribes parents killing their children for certain misbehaviors, The New Testament is almost silent when it comes to the physical discipline of children. The Holy Family was in the presence of the Temple authorities, the highest court of both Jewish life and Jewish justice. They did not know who this boy was, indeed, twenty years later when they did discover His identity, these same authorities would send their guards out to arrest Him for daring to proclaim Himself God.   

In light of all this food for thought, we must remember, that before Jesus was even conceived, an angel had told Mary that her child would be The Son of God. Therefore, Mary and Joseph not only knew they were raising the world's Creator sustainer and redeemer, from the get go, but their own personal Saviour as well. Imagine the parents of Jesus trying to wrap their minds around that! From their point of view, Mary and Joseph most likely grabbed Jesus, begged their leave from the priests and once clear of the Temple gates ran at top speed all the way back to Nazareth. They had just wanted Him a Bar Mitzvah like any Jewish boy turning thirteen, not to attract the close scrutiny of the entire Sanhedrin.

Well, they made it to safety, and the next time the Bible speaks of Jesus He's a grown man about to begin His ministry and is about to get in trouble again. Jesus tells His mother to mind her own business when she informs Him that they have run out of wine at the wedding feast they were attending. Unlike the previous occasion, this time, Mary stands her ground, letting her Son know that it was her business, thank you very much! They were honored guests at a family wedding! Without another word, He does as She commands: Jesus turns jars of water into wine. This is the first time Mary intercedes with her Son on behalf of humans. A function that she continues to this day. God not only honored Mary by choosing her to be His mother, but also honored Her as the only human who could tell Him what to do. The rest of us have to ask. That is called prayer!

We are reminded of Mary's honored role in heaven every time we see an icon of The Theotokos.

Pray for the intentions of She who prays unceasingly for us.

+Joel

 

The Enemy of my Enemy is my Friend? or Two plus Two equals 5.867 squared?



WHO... Got it! 

 

WHAT... Got it!

 

WHEN... Got it!

 

WHERE... Got it!

 

WHY...  Duh?




 

Father in Heaven,


We pray for those killed, those in critical condition, and those maimed and wounded at the finish line of the Boston Marathon.

Lord, we have no idea as of yet as to the motive... Both the Waco, Texas event and the Oklahoma City Bombing took place in the middle of April. Then too, tax day is here as well, and our country is still embroiled in financial disputes and distress. And Father, those a just a few domestic issues from American history that come to mind.

Overseas there are thousands, even millions who wish to do us harm, and even though the war on terrorism has been fought diligently, that fight is far from being over. Is there ever to be an end to human suffering brought about by humans? Is it not enough that natural events and accidents each year cost countless lives?

We of faith are sensitive to the needs of the one, yet we tend to look at numbers and tally them when tragedies occur... As if the greater the number the greater the tragedy. Father of us all, numbers do matter, but we must consider this:

How do we know if the next great world leader is among the dead no matter if one, or one thousand, is killed in a given incident? The next great scientist? The long awaited diplomat that could bring the Israelis and Palestinians together at last? How can, how could we ever know? We cannot!

That is why every single life is precious. Say that one life lost; is not destined for greatness. Is that death diminished? No! Father, through your Son's actions at the grave of Lazarus we know that no life is ever diminutive. That every life has a purpose even if that purpose seems to be unseen except by You and never witnessed by human masses. 

Heavenly Father, the death of the one is a tragedy, the death of many a holocaust; Yet we pray to you for them all.

Oh hear our prayer, and let our cries come unto You, Oh Lord of Mercies.

Amen.

To Brothers and Sisters in Christ in Africa:

 

 

Our Patriarch has been unpacking the many boxes of church files and going through them while I have been reworking and developing our presence on the world wide web.

 

 

Today, our Patriarch made me aware of a great number of letters that were sent to the recently deceased second patriarch of our church. Letters that went unanswered due to his illness over the last year of his life. I am told that most of these letters are from priests and bishops in countries on the continent of Africa.

 

Let me assure our brothers and sisters in Christ in Africa, that our new Patriarch will respond personally to your letters as soon as humanly possible. We ask that you understand that the oversight in not replying to your letters was not intentional, but again; was brought on by the changing of the administration within our church headquarters in the United States, due to the sickness and death of Patriarch +Mar Markus I. We apologize sincerely and beg your forgiveness for not have realized these mistakes sooner.

 

Please know that we of The Byzantine Catholic Church in the United States are praying for you all, and we understand what we are reading in the letters that you sent to our offices so long ago. We realize that Orthodox Christianity in your part of the world has to struggle in order to survive against great sources of power and many dangers. We fully intend to do everything in our power to assist in the survival of your ministries.

 

In the meantime, if you find this new website, please e-mail us and let us know that you have previously written to our church but received no response, and we will get back to you by email as soon as we receive yours.

 

You are not alone!

 

 

In Christ Jesus,

+Metropolitan Joel

Apostolic Chancellor to His Holiness +Mar Laurentius

The Third Patriarch of the Byzantine Catholic Church   



A Letter from the Apostolic Chancellor

 

 

My brothers and sisters in the Lord,

 

 

We have been through some interesting struggles in the past three weeks since the death of our second patriarch. Since he maintained his own office, it was closed by his family when he died. The files were sealed in numerous boxes, the telephone was turned off, and all of this had to be reinvented at a new location.

 

A new downtown Los Angeles telephone number was installed. Of course the office had to be set up from scratch, and files gone through and purged of years of stuff that no longer needed to be kept. Then begin the filing of the files that we kept which will be going on for some time. Our newly elected and enthroned patriarch ordered a full facelift update of our web presence that took weeks to complete. Whew! Are we done yet? Not!

 

None of these activities leave any time for reflection or morning of the passing of a man that led the church for forty-six years. We are just now beginning to slow down a bit and catch our breath, yet there is still much work to do.

 

Those of us that lead the church constantly pray for you and we hope that at this time of change in the church that you will pray for us as well.

On a lighter note, we have discovered that one side effect of the gallons of coffee we have all been consuming, and the little sleep we have been getting, is that we now all talk to each other in staccato. For you non musical folk, that means; "choppy." We really sound quite funny. Our new patriarch has dubbed it as "barking" at one another. The result of the barking means that we are constantly asking each other: "What did you just say?, or Would you repeat that please?" The flip side of that is; "Yes, got that, can we now just move on to the next thing on the list."

 

Now do you see why we are hoping that you are praying for us?

 

Sincerely at work, I remain yours in Christ,

 

+Metropolitan Joel

    

A Letter From Our Patriarch

 

 

My Dear brothers and sisters of Our lord,

I guess that I could begin to address what troubling times we live in, but the reality is that throughout human history, even in the best of times, we have still lived in troubling times. So, therefore let us slant the perspective in favor of the lens that our God sees things through.

 

Imagine the world in which we live were a giant aquarium, and life on earth were the creatures within it. As owner (caretaker) of the aquarium, we would provide food, water, infrastructure, indeed everything that was necessary for the world inside the tank.

 

However, the creatures would have free agency, just as we humans do. We would not be able to completely control their lives. If one particular fish picked on another, we might not be able to intervene each and every time. Our aquarium is a big place. Our fish would expect us to have total control, but if we did they would not be free to choose to do good or evil on their own. Our fish are here to learn something. Not just to exist. A fly also lives. How much more so do we humans?

 

Our fish must cooperate in helping us tend to our/their aquarium. In doing so they cooperate in the ongoing creation of their/our world that is ever expanding with the universe, thus helping to create and maintain the world in which we, with God, coexist. Like the aquarium being in our living room, our world is in God's house. We live with God! Even if we choose to not believe that he exists, we still live with God. This statement is an atheist's nightmare, because they have no way to counter it. They might not choose to believe in God, but our God choses to believe in them...  Whether they like it or not... And he forgives when we allow him to forgive. Yes, we cooperate in our forgiveness too.

 

When we look at responsibility and partnership our fish have with us, in other words, that we have with our Lord God in our world as humans, we see that we are co-authors of the planet, its environment, and what happens on the large scale of human sufferings and the relief of human sufferings. When we fall short of cooperating with God, when we fail to do what is right and just, there is a now almost archaic word for it: Sin.      

Faithfully Yours In Christ,

+ Mar Laurentius
   Patriarch