London, April 1, Interfax – Certain Anglican Commonwealth churches will simplify rules of ordaining clerics next year. “Realities of today’s life require revision of certain canons and rules. We have agreed to women clergy and ordination of open gays, but we shouldn’t stop on the achieved,” the Rev Anthony Priddis, the Bishop of Hereford said in his interview to the Monday Telegraph. Three years ago he gained popularity for supporting a woman-priest who had changed sex. According to Priddis, next... Read more

Having been involved with a couple Lenten Retreats over the past two weeks, not much bloggin’ goin’ on. Pics from those events, with commentary, forthcoming. Our Lady of Cicero, pray to God for us! Read more

Though this week’s podcast is a serious one, dealing with sex … sex can be just plain funny. Sex is the funniest topic, with the most serious consequences. I was around 8 years old when I asked my mother the question — not how babies are made — but, having just welcomed a baby brother a year earlier, I asked her where the baby came out … You know: “Mom, where did the baby come out of your body?” I... Read more

REEDSBURG, Wis. (AP) – An elementary-school event in which kids were encouraged to dress as members of the opposite gender drew the ire of a Christian radio group, whose angry broadcast prompted outraged calls to the district office. Students at Pineview Elementary in Reedsburg had been dressing in costume all last week as part of an annual school tradition called Wacky Week. On Friday, students were encouraged to dress either as senior citizens or as members of the opposite sex.... Read more

Letters have been pouring into the Orthodixie headquarters over the past week, many of them dealing with what can only be said and not written. You’ve all no doubt heard it, it is pronounced “********.” For instance, here’s a note from Penelope in Kentucky:Dear Fr Joseph, I am new to Orthodoxy, having been received into the church just last year. Though English is my first – and only – language, I have learned many foreign words and phrases since entry... Read more

Yesterday, April 1st, otherwise known as Rosalie’s birthday, I was blessed to once again travel with the Seniors of St George to make the annual Bluebonnet St Paraskevi Monastery pilgrimage. Click pics to enlarge. Here’s most of the pilgrims — birthday girl is third row back in the middle (others were still shopping in the monastery gift shop). Monastic housing (aka notbadatall). Last year’s pic (on the right) reveals just some of the work that’s been done in just one... Read more

The news media have been responsible for some of the greatest April Fools’ Day pranks in history. In 1977, the London newspaper The Guardian published a seven-page supplement commemorating the anniversary of the independence of San Serriffe, a completely imaginary small island nation located in the Indian Ocean. The article described the geography of the nation — it consisted of two main islands, which together formed the shape of a semi-colon; the northern one was called “Upper Caisse” and the... Read more

Recently our parish librarian reported that two Orthodox Study Bibles had gone missing from the parish library. We looked everywhere, and then it dawned on me … I said, “Look! If Orthodox people are stealing Bibles … that’s a good sign!” You know the old Baptist trick where the pastor stands in front of the congregation and says, “Turn with me now to Second Hezechiah, Chapter 3 …”? (I didn’t think so … Orthodox never get that joke. They always... Read more

On Sunday, March 16th, the Orthodox Clergy Association of Greater Houston and Orthodox faithful gathered for Sunday of Orthodoxy Vespers, hosted this year by St George Antiochian Orthodox Church. The pastor of St Jonah of Manchuria Church, Fr John Whiteford, was the guest homilist. As it happened, that morning was also the falling asleep in the Lord of Fr John’s Metroplitan, LAURUS, head of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia; this coincidence is reflected in his homily, “The Reconciliation of... Read more

In addition to being Greek Independence Day …And the Great Feast of the Annunciation (new style) … It’s the birthday of novelist and short-story writer Flannery O’Connor, born in Savannah, Georgia (1925), the only child of a rare Catholic family in the Protestant Bible Belt. When she was five, she became famous for teaching a chicken to walk backward; a national news company came to town to film the feat and then broadcast it all around the country. She said,... Read more