Thinking aloud

We celebrated our orthodox easter this weekend. We missed out on most of the easter lead up during Holy Week - just couldn't fit the daily drives and time into the schedule, but went friday, saturday and sunday. We participated in palm sunday, with branches and a procession around the church. We saw the shroud of christ on Good Friday. We stayed up to midnite on Saturday, when all the lights went out. Then our candles were lit from one special one, and we again had a procession around the church, proclaiming that christ has risen. Then we had a little agape(?) feast to break the lenten fast. (We only fasted a week and half, and only cut out meat. Most others had fasted 50 days, and cut out meat, dairy, eggs, alcohol, chocolate, ect) Then on Sunday we had a large feast - roasted pig, huge wheel of cheese, tons of food.

We are liking this church. We will be going a bit longer than just April. We'll see how long.

Reading a great book called Thirsting for God, about Protestants seeking more, and some finding it in the Eastern Orthodox church. I hadn't really realized how Protestants were different than other religions, in what ways. Many of my questions were answered, and many of my questions were asked in the book as 'common questions that protestants have' - which means that my questions aren't just my struggle to figure things out, they are 'common' questions that others have found within the church. That was an eye-opener for me. I'll have to do some more reading.

examples: we are a rationalistic society, so when one church says that it is interpreting the scriptures correctly, but others say that another way is the correct one, then we try to research the answers - find the right way through knowledge. and i have been, by reading everything i can, visiting all different types of churches, checking out different religions.

protestant churches have sermons and prayers that come 'from the heart, spontaneously, talking to Jesus as a friend, intimate'. But that means that each sermon and each priest is different, and the sermon is judged - was this one more profound, did I click with his view, did people like it? And prayers are all about us, talking to Jesus. In the first centuries after Jesus died, church and prayer were different - they were based on the idea that love and spirituality were acts, not ideas. the people of the church participate fully in the services, prayers, fasting, ect. the senses are filled with sound, smell, sight, touch, taste. and in doing these things repeatedly, their mind is freeer to commune with jesus and God. like in the middle of doing the dishes, you figure out the solution to a problem - your mind has been freed up with the repetitive actions. Or something like that.

My thinking is all muddy today. Not coming out to make sense. I'll work on that for next week :)