Dear Alexey,
\nGreetings in our Lord Jesus Christ.<\/p>\n
Enclosed is the article on Kireyevsky \u2014 excellent! Just what is needed! We read it last night to the \u201cNew Valaam Theological Academy\u201d (the name of our \u201csummer school\u201d) and it came as a fitting conclusion to my own long series of talks (17 hours of tapes!) on the mainstream of Western thought, from Francis to Teilhard. Teilhard, by the way \u2014 for which I mostly read our article from \u201cChristian evolutionism\u201d was greeted with real repugnance by everyone, as the arch-villain of Western thought. The most popular talk was probably that on 19th-century conservatism, of which the heroes were Nicholas I, Dostoyevsky, and Constantine Pobedonostsev. The students seemed to have benefited greatly, especially Christopher, for whom this is a kind of substitute for a college education \u2014 he is positively inspired right now. It was very good for me to organize all my thoughts, also. Fr. Herman talked mostly on literature, very revealingly, and will give the summing-up lectures the next two days. Paul Bassett will be leaving then for Jordanville (with very vague thoughts about his future; until he came here he was never really told that \u201cfloating\u201d isn\u2019t a good thing!), and Christopher also will depart for the Eastern U.S, though very likely he will return later this year. He is very sharp at getting the \u201cfeel\u201d of real Orthodoxy, but it remains to be seen whether he will be able to train his will.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re glad to hear of the progress on the chapel; don\u2019t worry about Vladika Anthony. He has to know, of course, when you are ready to open a \u201cchurch,\u201d and if he is informed now he will assume that you are, indeed, opening a \u201cchurch\u201d \u2014 and that will be a trap, because you aren\u2019t ready for that yet. Just don\u2019t start calling your improved shed a \u201cchurch\u201d or start making big plans. You are just a very small group of Orthodox Christians far off in the sticks, not a \u201cparish,\u201d i.e., something \u201cofficially registered\u201d in the \u201cDiocese.\u201d Right now Nina especially needs to be \u201cunnoticed\u201d and to grow slowly and naturally on the new soil. God knows what the future holds for all of you, but let it come as quietly and naturally as possible. This \u201cquiet and \u201cunnoticed\u201d state could be very good for Barbara McCarthy too \u2014 if she will have the patience and persistence to build the house of her soul gradually, and not give way to the fatal inclination to \u201cgo to the wilds, now.\u201d<\/p>\n
The second article, on Freud, has a rather \u201canti-intellectual\u201d tone which is going to put off some people who might be open to a critical but objective book on Freud. Even if the book itself might have something of the same tome, a little less \u201czealous\u201d review might have more punch and get more sympathy for it. It would be good to \u201ctone down\u201d the review a little more, especially if you could look at the book yourself \u2014 but use your judgment of this. Monk Daniel, by the way is Br. Laurences ex-brother-in-law. He married Br. L\u2019s sister several years ago, both of them were studying to become Jewish converts, then Br. L\u2019s sister did become one, but he gave up, they separated, and somehow he found his way to our Church, without ever having contact with Br. L at all! Americans do find their way to the Truth, with God\u2019s help!<\/p>\n
Enclosed is a newsletter from some Catholics who should be told more about Orthodoxy. (They are not far from Jordanville and know about it.) It would be good for you to send some copies of Nikodemos, and perhaps a note.<\/p>\n
Br. Paul (Bartlett) will probably be taking the car to SF this weekend to meet a friend of his, and our blue truck is not terribly seaworthy yet (radiator-wise), so most likely we won\u2019t be visiting you on St. Elias\u2019 day \u2014 which is just as well, so you won’t think anything \u201cbig\u201d has happened just because you\u2019ve added a few boards to your chapel. We\u2019ll have part of the services in our St. Elias\u2019 Skete and will be praying for you.<\/p>\n
By the way, don\u2019t become impatient \u2014 The Northern Thebaid won\u2019t be ready for another month. The Religion of the Future is being reprinted at Shasta Printing in Redding, which seems to cost only a trifle more than Vladimir\u2019s printer in SF. This will make 1500 copies, of which 800 are already sold or ordered.<\/p>\n
Our last letter to the Anglican community in Los Gatos was returned \u2014 which probably means they were evicted, as they feared. What this does to the community we don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n
Pray for us.<\/p>\n
With love in Christ,
\nSeraphim, monk<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dear Alexey, Greetings in our Lord Jesus Christ. Enclosed is the article on Kireyevsky \u2014 excellent! Just what is needed! We read it last night to the \u201cNew Valaam Theological Academy\u201d (the name of our \u201csummer school\u201d) and it came as a fitting conclusion to my own long series of talks (17 hours of tapes!) […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1339","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxaustralia.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1339","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxaustralia.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxaustralia.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxaustralia.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxaustralia.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1339"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxaustralia.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1339\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxaustralia.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxaustralia.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxaustralia.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}