Orthodoxy through another perspective

[John Charmley]

Yes, dear Rick, it is the health of the body which is most important, and there the BOC is indeed blessed. I walked away from the Great Pascha service feeling the real joy of the Risen Lord, and the blessing of the fellowship of which I had just been fortunate to have been a part. The hour and a half journey home passed more speedily than ever, and that was not because of my speed

America is different, because Christianity there plays a more important role in public, and perhaps private, life. I remember when I lived in Fulton Mo. 18 years ago being amazed to drive down the high street on a Sunday morning and see that all sixteen Churches on it had full car parks; this in a town of 10,000 souls - and some of them had a second service and were just as full. Our Mr. Blair did not dare mention religion in case people thought he was a 'nutter'; your politicians would be 'nutters' if they failed to mention it.

In a way it is the very pluralism of American religious life which provides Orthodoxy with its recruits. Americans are used to changing their religious affliliations as their spiritual lives develop; the British, when they are religious, tend to be rather as they are with their banks - unwilling to change unless almsot forced to.

Fr. Peter's evangelical background makes him more comfortable (in the best sense) with the idea of evangelising than those of us from the C of E are. We are here, of course, for enquirers, and we do what we can - and perhaps that's all any of us can?

In Christ,

John