Eastern Orthodox General - Tell your Story
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Here's my story:
>was baptized
>nominal Christian, kinda went to church each Sunday, didn't take it seriously
>discovered this website
>took the redpill
>was natsoc for a while
>meanwhile borderline atheist, more like JP style
>suddenly I realize that what I believe is actually taught in this religion
>been pretty religious ever since
Ancient Faith Radio, listen to Orthodox hymns while you browse the Orthodox General!
>ancientfaith.com
holy shit this is good
Jesus is a slav trap queen
Away with you moortuguese
It is, isn't it. Unfortunately I'm not Orthodox because the Churches are a little bit insular and cater exclusively to ethnic minorities, but still I admire their theology
Good movie
desu as long as your heart is in the right place. Church is not necessary for salvation, although it helps. So even if church is far away and stuff, it's really about your own heart and achieving theosis through prayer and concentration (look up hesychasts and the lives of hermits). It's also about loving the people around you just like yourself. I'm not about the legalistic approach of the RCC, the acts themselves are good but not necessary. As long as your heart is in the right place, God might choose to save you.
PS
but to be real, if you are really gonna start down this path, take the trouble of getting out to a parish and getting baptized one day lawl.
>born Orthodox
>go through rebellious phase
>go punk at 12
>turn NatSoc at 14
>extremely atheist
>extremely nihilist
>troublemaker
>drugs
>alcohol
>violence
>depression
>on the edge of sanity
>re-discover Orthodoxy again
>read the church fathers for the first time
>most radical words i've ever heard
Orthodoxy is guerrilla Christianity
Are there statistics on Protestant / Catholic converts to orthodox? It seems rather popular lately, but maybe it’s just the places i go.
I'm eastern catholic but my story is the same.
>nominal Christian bordering deism
>then stumbled across catechism and learned about faith
well damn. God guided me away from diving this deep down, mine was only limited to legalizing gay marriage and loving Obama. Welcome back brother.
why eastern catholic though instead of the OG version?
At least for Catholics it's probably because Pope Francis is a faggot
idk desu, i heard that many people leave orthodoxy because, well, (((muh West is more fun))).
I believe God let me go all the way down or else i wouldn't be able to see things clear because of my stubbornness and false pride. Thank you brother.
well what matters is that you got out of it.
About pride, it plagues all of us. I know for myself, i often think "i'm too good to fail", but time and again I do. Every time i get into one of these situations, it's like "damn, i have a long way to go compared to other people at my age" like St Sergius of Radonezh. That guy lived in the forest and hand-fed bears at my age.
>When you remember Constantine XI
Yes, pride is the hardest passion for humans to get rid of, yet most of us hardly know how much of a burden it really is. I'll look up St. Sergius, i love monastic Saints.
How accepting are the Orthodox churches to people who are not of the ethnic group they're focused on? There are Greek, Serbian, Russian, and Ukrainian ones near me, but despite being a mutt I have no trace of any of those. I am also not very familiar with the Serbian and Ukrainian ones at all.
>born into the church
>baptized in a Ukrainian Orthodox church
>sometime in my life, fell out of religion due to depression
>realized I was an idiot
>went back to the church
>realized that it was not only the true faith but the true church as well
>fasted for nativity
>began researching more about Orthodoxy
>rediscover Nicetas the Goth, my patron saint, and how he was martyred by pagans
>read about Nicetas of Novgorod and how he was haunted by demons his entire life and how he overcame them
>read about Seraphim of Sarov and his inspiring asceticism
>read about Seraphim Rose, and how he overcame homosexuality and atheism
>read about the desert fathers
>inspired by the tribulations of the great Orthodox saints
>began replacing shitty metal with angelic hymns
>buy a prayer rope from an Orthodox monastery
>buy an icon of Christ and the Theotokos
>found my old prayer book in Church Slavonic, which was given as a gift to my family after my birth
>pray every day
>mfw my friends sometimes come to me for spiritual advice
>mfw my depression is melting away because I am feeling Christ's warmth again
>mfw degenerates envy me, but I still tell them that I love them as siblings of Christ
>mfw I plan on entering a monastery as a novice after college
>grew up in a secular Lutheran family
>the kind that only go to church on Eastern and Christmas, and only then to please great grandma
>am taught a very consumer-friendly American protestant version of the faith
>parents lose even that little interest
>teaching the faith and church visits stop completely once great gran dies
>it's bad enough that I know we are "Christian" but kid-me can't even remember the name of the denomination
>become a teenager
>become an edgy atheist teenager with nothing but contempt for the faith I grew up with
>intensified by mum having repeating crisis of faith and dragging us to the local megachurch
>am dragged up on stage and a girl around my age cries on me about accepting Jesus into my heart
>she has such strength of feeling and conviction that I'm almost tempted, but realize I wouldn't be doing it for the right reasons
>settle down as I come into adulthood; atheism fades into agnosticism
>become quietly desperate to find a purpose; to belong to something greater than myself
>decide to seek out a new faith and flirt with foreign faiths; cannot find something that both speaks to me and feel authentic in its tradition
>dismiss the faiths of Abraham out of hand; it all feels too transactional; fake
>assume there's nothing for me and flounder for years
>feelings towards Christianity soften, but I'm still certain that it's not for me
>have been lurking Sup Forums since I was a teenager, but didn't start lurking Sup Forums regularly until after Sup Forums harbor
>find myself becoming more and more disillusioned with the world
>come to see Christianity as a bulwark of civilization
>start looking into the various denominations; I dismiss Protestants out of hand; the ritualism in Catholicism is appealing but the Pope is a joke; but what is Orthodoxy?
>find my way into a thread wherein OP posts talks with an Orthodox Abbot
>end up watching all three parts (a good three hours of video) and then everything I can find on it
>buy my first Bible
c
If I start attending an Orthodox church, will I find a qt traditional wife before February?
>grow up pentecostal
>hate church
>go through edgy atheist phase for quite a while
>go to the Bible by random spur of inspiration and read that day's proverb
>reading the proverb doesn't feel like reading and feels like carefully chosen words specially for me
>no longer personally capable of denying the existence of God
>try going to local evangelical churches
>they're fucking awful and unfulfilling
>stop going to church again for a while
>randomly ask my biblical scholar sister what the deal with eastern orthodoxy is
>she tells me its the purest and truest tradition and doctrine of Christianity since the time of Christ
>there's a Greek Orthodox church a couple blocks away from where I live (and literally a block away from the memeacostal church i went to growing up)
>attend Divine Liturgy a few months ago to see what it's like
>immediately fall in love and realize that Orthodoxy is what religion is supposed to be
>feel like being immersed in a cool oasis and told to drink deep after years of walking thirsty through the desert and being told that water was all around me
>attend Divine Liturgy as often as I can, wear a three bar cross necklace and am in catechism
I also bought an orthodox study bible and orthodox prayer book, and have tried to get into the habit of reading the daily scripture on and off. I need to work on building my habit of prayer though.
OP, in the future, you should include these links in the OP
goarch.org
oca.org
So people can find a church near them.
For all my fellow catechumens,
ancientfaith.com
this is a great podcast series explaining the beliefs of Orthodoxy in the context of comparing it to other strains of Christianity and other religions. Great for building an understanding of the faith.
All glory be to God. Lord have mercy on us.
Another great Orthodox podcast is the Orthodox Nationalist. Great podcast about the history of Orthodoxy and its relation to Nationalism and related idea.s
radioaryan.com
JEWS IN THE CLOUDS OF SMOKE! JEWS EVERYWHERE!
I supposse you'll be most welcome. The only reason we keep ethnic traits on our churches overboard is because those churches were build by Orthodox immigrands and they are the only Orthodox there. I believe this will change in the future when there'll be more native converts.
The church I go to is Greek Orthodox and there are a lot of Greek people there. The priest naturally speaks Greek and talks to the other Greek parishioners, in Greek. I don't speak a word of Greek.
There are other non-Greeks there. While the community and connection between the Greek people there is apparent, they aren't unwelcoming or unkind to me or any of the other non-Greeks.
Really, those ethnic descriptors alter minor things in the church. The language used for liturgy, maybe some musical differences, maybe some of the minor practices or traditions or the artwork, but the dogma and doctrine is still the same Orthodoxy.
I recommend the Greek one simply because the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese in America is pretty trad and pretty great, though all Orthodoxy is very traditional to my understanding Greek is the most.
If there are multiple orthodoxy parishes near you, try multiple and go to the one you like the most.
dat orthowave tho
>have a feeling this is for me
>that I've finally found the right path; but am I ready to step onto it?
>start reading my Bible, but struggle; because autism I can't skip to the New Testament as people sometimes recommend
>read some lighter books; try to keep watching Orthodox faith videos
>am stunned when people start saying things light "God bless you!" to me; feel lighter and happier; is it so obvious?
>find the nearest Orthodox Church; there's a Russian one in a tiny little house and a Greek one in a building that looks like a Church
>drive out there a couple times but can't bring myself to go inside
>personal life happens
>for months I intend to pick up my Bible again, to go to a Church service; etc
>the people around me have nothing but contempt for the faith or patriotism
>feel like I cannot be myself around them; that I cannot celebrate this with them; that they will not accept it
>become frustrated that I let my personal life and close people distract me from what feels like the right path
>make nebulous promises to myself and end up making excuses when I break them
>don't like the person I feel like I'm becoming; I liked who I had been becoming as I sank into Orthodoxy
>turn frustration into righteous fury; lets do this!
>have picked up my Bible again; decide I'm going to finish reading it and I'm going to go to Church in time for Lent
>start prepping for a long-term fast too; this will require clarity and determination
Have mercy on me, brothers.
(and yes that probably could've been a lot shorter)
thank you my friend
it's original content
wow welcome back. Yeah what always keeps me in faith is that the advice of these folks is actually valid and works. Like if you just be catholic, catholics dont' really explain "why" this is good, they just have rules that you follow to please God (at least tha'ts how I see it). Orthodoxy actually provide a more personal reason to believe imo.
as I said in a post before, it's all about the heart. Baptism is good, but not necessary for salvation. A good heart, and the reliance on God to guide you is the best way to get up there.
I'm glad that both of you seem to have the latter.
like all abrahamic religions, it's garbage.
Then leave fedora tipper
good resource pack, will def use next time
don't forget to include orthodox nationalist link dude does good work and deserves it
True, we need tengri ressurection here
Good luck man, God be with you
Wow that's some serious dedication. I've sometimes flirted with the idea of joining a monastery but I know I'm not cut out for such a rigorous lifestyle. You have my best wishes if you go on to do so, friend.
bump
I know what you mean, however I go to the Antiochian church, a little less than half of the congregation are converts. Rest are Syrians, Greeks, Serbs and Russians. Basically the de facto convert Orthodox church. I would assume its similar in Australia.
>half British half Greek
>baptised Greek Orthodox in Greece
>only orthodox member of family is grandmother
I've been practicing orthodox for a few years now but only recently am making a concerted effort to become more pious
>pushing catholicism didn't work jidf decided to change course
>copys my storys from neopagans
> Religion of the weak
No thanks