For nearly all of my 11 years as a priest, I’ve also been a US Navy chaplain. This gives me a rather unique perspective on priesthood, since I’ve nearly always celebrated the Divine Services of the Church in places not designed for the purpose. The best of these circumstances is a base chapel facility retrofitted with Orthodoxy, but often it is on a ship, in a camp, or elsewhere remote where all that I have is only what I brought with me. On the other hand, my travels have allowed me to celebrate in places and with people I would never have otherwise.
I also have encountered a much wider variety of “parishioner” than a typical parish priest, and within those encounters have experienced a wide range of relationships. At various times and to various service members and their families I have been a counselor, a mentor, a supervisor, an advisor, and a friend, many of whom had never before ever spoken to a priest – even ones who had identified themselves as Orthodox.
Some of the stories I’ve told to friends have been received with eager interest, and so I thought I would begin sharing some of them here. I also intend to use this platform as a place to exercise my writing of sermons, the kind I don’t often get to preach because of my smaller and rather more personal congregations, but the writing of which expands my own understanding of the Scriptures and their applicability. Some of the shipboard prayers I have written, I think may also be worth sharing.
Adding color to my perspective is the fact that Presvytera Nora, to whom I have been married for nearly 30 years, and our four sons have been along with me on the crazy ride that started in June 2007 when we sold our home in Aurora, Illinois and moved to seminary in Boston, MA. You can add husband and father to the list of relationships I’ve learned from and about over the past decade and more.
Overall, the thrust of my writing will be, as the tagline of this blog states, just an Orthodox priest trying to understand how to practice the Ancient Faith in a modern world, so here, as opposed to other places, I expect to be able to grapple with some topics that I avoid elsewhere. Buckle up. It sounds scarier than it’s likely, I hope, to be.
If you’ve made it this far, then I hope you’ll stick around. More than that, please engage with the topics I write about and help expand my perspective even further.
An Orthodox Priest Abroad 