Rome, Constantinople & Canterbury (Chicago Style)
Come and hear a first-hand report on a conference entitled Rome, Constantinople, and Canterbury–Mother Churches? from one of the participants, Touchstone senior editor Patrick Henry Reardon. The conference runs tomorrow through Sunday at St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Seminary in New York. Speakers for the New York ecumenical event include: Metropolitan Kallistos (Ware), Metropolitan Philip (Saliba), Bishop Hilarion (Alfeyev), Rev. Richard John Neuhaus, Rev. Ralph T. Walker, Rev. John Erickson, Rev. Patrick Henry Reardon, and Bishop Keith Ackerman.
Date: Thursday, June 12, 2008
Location: All Saints Orthodox Church
4129 West Newport Avenue
Chicago, Illinois 60641
Time: 7:00 PM
There is no charge for this event. Street parking.
Refreshments & fellowship follow the report.
(Please visit our “free book” table afterwards as well!)
Contact: Julie Grisolano, 773-481-1090 or grisolano@fsj.org
This kind of talk is prime for recording and posting. Even an ad-hoc amateur recording.
This kind of talk is prime for recording and posting. Even an ad-hoc amateur recording.
“This kind of talk is prime for recording and posting.”
Here, here! (Or should I say: “Hear, hear!”)
Greetings from Bucharest!
You can get recordings of all the plenary sessions of the various Orientale Lumen conferences, either on cassette or CD, from Eastern Christian Publications, or by going to the Orientale Lumen web site at:
http://www.olconference.com/
I hope you are enjoying your trip. I have two students heading to Bucharest later this month for a month or so of legal studies. Any recommendations for good places to eat, visit, etc. will be welcomed and passed along.
It is a city of great contrasts, combining medieval, neo-romantic, communist ugly and Euro-trashy modern architecture cheek by jowl. There is construction everywhere, and traffic is horrendous. Either walk or figure out the busses and subway. I told one of my hosts that the Romanians seem to have gotten their driving skills as well as their language from the Italians. He told me that the Romanians gave lessons to the Italians. They are still dealing with the aftermath of the 1977 earthquake here (communist efficiency!) and some parts of town have the streets torn up so that sewers can be installed (at last!).
There are millions of places to eat, and at 2.36 RON (also called lei) to the dollar, prices are still reasonable. You can find almost anything, though Italian competes hard with native Romanian cuisine. Out in the country, you can probably find more authentic food.
As my daughter told me, be careful about the water, wash all raw fruits and make sure the meat is well done (it’s Apostle’s Fast for me, so I am sticking with fish in any case).
One thing that has struck me is the visible faith of the people. Churches are everywhere in Bucharest. I counted eight in the course of a 2 km walk this afternoon. Most of them are quite small, in Orthodox fashion (in Western Europe, they would hardly be considered chapels), and some of them are almost in ruins (many are being restored, even as other buildings languish), and all of them are in use. I went to Vespers in a small painted church (icons on the outside as well as the inside) dating from the 17th century yesterday. The service was in Romanian (instead of Slavonic, which surprised me), so I did not understand a word. The people sang the liturgy in traditional Romanian tones, adding folk harmonization (no books were in evidence). I passed another church this morning on the way to a meeting, and Orthros was in progress. This, on weekdays!
About half the people in the churches were old women, but the rest were young people, including couples with children. People cross themselves as they pass by these churches, and when I went into several today, I found men in their early thirties earnestly praying. In another one, people were lined up to go to confession–again, mainly younger people. At several, young children, between six and twelve years of age, just seemed to wander in, crossed themselves, and then went to a favorite icon, kissed it and walked out.
My daughter, who has spent several months in Romania, mainly in the countryside, told me about the piety of the Romanian people, but I did not expect the situation to pertain in the capital, which is, in many respects, a bustling European city. Apparently, the EU has not yet been able to secularize the Romanian people, and given their stubbornness and suspicion of foreign rulers (but not foreigners generally!), I doubt that they ever will. I’ve heard people in the Commission complain that the Romanians are willing to reap the benefits of EU membership (mainly the cash), but are most unwilling to comply with its regulations–unless there is some tangible material benefit. Good for them!
you can listen to all of the talks of this event @ St. Vladimir’s here.
(http://ancientfaith.com/specials/svs_jan2008/)