Chapter 60: A Revelation for Liz

January 5, 1984, Columbus, Ohio

"Master, Bless!" I said to Vladyka ARKADY when he greeted me in his office.

"The Lord bless you, Subdeacon Michael," he said as I kissed his hand.

"Anthony, would you please bring the tea?"

"Right away, Vladyka," Subdeacon Anthony said.

"Sit, Subdeacon. We'll use the comfortable chairs so we can have a quiet chat."

I sat in one of the very comfortable wingback chairs, and the bishop sat in a second chair, which was very close. Subdeacon Anthony brought in a Russian tea set, poured tea into glasses for each of us, then left the office, closing the door behind him.

"How are you, Mischa?"

"I'm doing OK. School starts again Monday."

"What courses are you taking?"

"Physics, biochemistry, molecular biology, world religions, and a music survey course."

"Are you working?"

"Just as the Resident Advisor. I'll work for Mr. Sokolov over the Summer. The Summer following my Senior year, I want to go to Europe and backpack for the Summer, which I was going to talk to you about at some point, but I decided I should mention it now."

"You want to see the world before you spend seven years not seeing the Sun because of medical school and your Residency?"

"Exactly. And I'll certainly be married and likely have children before that point, which makes for a very different kind of trip."

"Yes, I could see that! One of my brother bishops and I did something similar the Summer before our last year of seminary. We called it our Rumschpringe."

"Deciding if you wished to accept ordination without marrying first?"

"Yes, but through prayer, not through debauchery!" he said with a smile.

"It's difficult to see you as a young man, wearing blue jeans and a T-shirt and carrying a beat-up backpack."

"And yet, such photographs exist! And there is plenty of trouble young men can get into that does not involve young women!"

"I find THAT hard to believe, too."

"And yet, I was a young man such as yourself thirty-five years ago, with all the same struggles, questions, and concerns. There is no magic in the laying-on of hands, Mischa. I remember when I was assigned to my first parish as associate pastor. The priest said to me, "Welcome, Father Timofei! You'll begin hearing confessions at Vespers tonight!"

"He threw you into the deep end!"

"Yes, but think what might have happened if he had said 'you are not ready' or, perhaps worse, I had said 'I am not ready'?"

"You're saying that if he waited until you felt you were ready, it would never have happened."

"Do you think I am worthy of the office of bishop?"

"Of course!"

"Do you think I think that?" he asked with a smile.

"I'd be surprised if you did. And I take your point."

"Do you? What would my point be, Mischa?"

"That our worthiness comes from the Holy Spirit, through the congregation when they exclaim 'Axios!' at ordination. Not because, as you say, the laying-on of hands is magical."

"Father Herman has taught you very well."

"He's had to work hard at it," I replied with a smile. "And Father Nicholas has taken up the burden now."

"Is it supposed to be easy?"

"No, but as the Apostle Paul says, 'I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.'."

"Indeed. I would like you to do two things."

"Whatever you ask," I replied.

He smiled, "A servant's heart and, I think, a good teacher. I'd like you to take on teaching the young adult Sunday school — the High School and college group."

Deacon Grigory had been their teacher, so the request didn't surprise me. In many parishes, a young, newly graduated seminarian would be appointed to teach that group. At Holy Transfiguration and Saint Michael the Archangel, it had been the deacon because neither parish was large enough for an associate pastor. I hadn't expected the request, but I realized I should have. It was perfectly logical, given the theological training I'd had growing up.

"I'll speak with Father Nicholas and arrange a meeting with him to ensure I understand the curriculum."

"Good."

"And the second thing?"

"Several members of the congregation approached me about the lack of a deacon at Saint Michael."

"Motivated by my grandfather, no doubt."

"I may have heard from Mikhail Ivanovich," Vladyka ARKADY said with a soft smile.

I chuckled, "Did he at least wait until Father Deacon Grigory came out of surgery."

"I believe he made his wishes known some time ago when you were sixteen."

"Forgive my sarcasm, but my response is 'shocking'."

"He is a determined man, your grandfather. But you know that I would never ordain anyone unless the congregation could truly say 'Axios!'."

"I have a significant impediment," I replied.

"I assume you are speaking about the lack of a wife?" he asked with a smile. "Somehow, I do not believe the grandson of Mikhail Ivanovich is called to chastity."

Nor the son of Rahil Mikhailovna, but His Grace did not need to know that, and that wasn't what he was referring to.

"He did place an order for a great-grandchild on Nativity," I replied.

"He wanted a grandchild from the moment your uncle was born."

"The situation is complicated by my medical training, and not just because of trying to support a family."

"You're referring to the issue you raised with Father Herman?"

I nodded, "Yes."

"Have you spoken to anyone at the medical school about it?"

"No, only the doctor who came to career days at Harding High."

"There is an alternative, according to Doctor Evgeni, of which many Roman Catholic doctors take advantage, and that is declining the training to do elective abortions but participating in procedures for women who miscarry. Catholic hospitals have to train for that procedure. You could do that part of your training at another hospital. According to Doctor Evgeni, that's very common. It's called being a 'visiting student'."

"I suppose I should have done more research instead of struggling with the idea for the past three years."

"Are you sure? Did anything come from that struggle?"

I nodded, "It did. I had a prepared speech for you based on my limited understanding."

"Would you like to give it now?" he asked with a smile. "Because I'd like to hear it."

I nodded, "It went something like this — In any ethical dilemma, my decision would depend on the question of whether or not whatever was done, or whatever was being proposed, would help the patient. In that kind of situation, I really wouldn't care about the law or ethics or anything else. My primary duty HAS to be to patient care, not worrying about what some administrator or insurance company or drug company or government bureaucrat wants. And that's why I was considering the training. Because, as I see it, my duty to my patients HAS to override my own feelings, morals, ethics, or whatever. Once I substitute what I want for what they need, I cease being a physician."

"Quite true, Subdeacon. And not all that far from pastoral care — what I want, or what Father Nicholas or Father Herman want, sometimes has to be set aside in favor of what the person or congregation under our spiritual care needs. And I'm sure you know the parallel."

"Christ as the Great Physician, the healer of souls. He set aside His will in favor of the Father's will, or from a different perspective, what He wanted was set aside for what we needed."

"That's a bit unorthodox," he said with a smile, "but it does make the correct point. For the training at a Catholic hospital, there would be no need to refrain from the Eucharist and no disqualification for the diaconate."

"Leaving perhaps a larger problem, if you want to ordain me soon."

"It wouldn't be before you finish your undergraduate degree — the Synod prefers younger men to have a college degree before ordination. The deacons who are ordained later in life have a different path."

"Why is that?" I asked.

"Because," he smiled, "we require a college degree for all our seminarians who wish to become priests."

"Which is not my calling."

"I would agree, but there's no point in trying for an exception to the usual practice when it's less than eighteen months away."

"There is a significant challenge in supporting a family, not to mention the amount of time I'll need to spend studying and training."

"Is it unsolvable?"

"Well, no, but..."

"May I be direct?"

"I don't think you need to ask that," I said. "I would expect it."

He shook his head slowly, "Not on this topic; on this topic, I do need to ask."

"Please, be direct."

"The young woman, Kimiko, is a lovely girl, but Father Nicholas and Father James are both concerned about her catechism. They feel she is not approaching the Church for the right reasons."

"She sees it as a duty or obligation," I replied. "I've spoken with her about that."

"And you know the Church will turn no one away, but two years might be optimistic. I am not telling you what to do, Subdeacon, just correcting what I said when we first discussed this."

"It's more complicated than that, Vladyka," I said. "I had a long talk with her earlier this week about some very important core differences between how things are here and how they are in Japan, and my grave concern is that when she becomes an American, suddenly those things she did out of a sense of duty will no longer make sense."

"I will say this, and no more — there are a number of eligible young women in the Church. You might find one who would make a good wife for a deacon and who might have creative solutions to the concerns you raise."

"Vladyka, are you specifically telling me that you do not believe I should continue my relationship with Kimiko?"

"No, because that is not my place."

And yet, he was, like Doctor Mercer, nudging me to a decision, one which was already percolating in my heart. I knew, as much as I wanted to be with Kimiko, there were just too many hurdles, and it would be too easy to trip over them. I wasn't quite ready to throw in the towel, but I wasn't nearly as optimistic as I had been.

"I value your counsel," I said.

"Take what has been said by me, and Father Nicholas, and your friends, to heart. Pray about it. Think about it. Then make your decision."

"I think I may have laid a trap for myself," I said with a rueful smile.

"And what trap is that, Subdeacon?"

"That what I want may not be best for the church, and what is best for the church may not be what I want."

"Whose will are we to serve?"

"God's, of course."

"If you know that, then you are most of the way to figuring out what you should do."

I nodded, asked for a blessing, and when I'd received it, I left the office. Clarissa was waiting for me, and followed me to the nave of the Cathedral.

"Well?"

"Let me digest everything, and we'll talk tomorrow afternoon after we get home from the blessing of the waters. OK?"

"OK."

January 6, 1984, West Monroe, Ohio

"In the Russian tradition, the priest or bishop would throw the blessing cross into the river, and young men would dive in to retrieve it," I said.

"'Hold my cross and watch this?'" Clarissa teased.

I laughed, "Nice."

"And I'm not sure ANY amount of blessing would have me diving into the Scioto and Olentangy rivers!"

"We don't go in for the idea that God will automatically protect us from foolish acts! You won't find any snake handling in the Orthodox Church!"

"What?" Clarissa asked with a smirk, "'And he shall cause you to dive into rivers and not come down with some bizarre disease' isn't in the Bible?"

"No, and I'm not about to drink poison, either!"

"You do speak in tongues," Clarissa teased.

"A misinterpreted Biblical concept if there ever was one. Read it as 'foreign tongues', and all it's saying is that if, for example, somebody is preaching in Greek to Russians, that's cool, so long as someone translates. And mostly, we've eliminated Church Slavonic here because very few people speak Russian, let alone what amounts to a Middle English version of the Divine Liturgy; think Chaucer and The Canterbury Tales. The Romans finally got with the program of the ancient Church in the 1960s."

"Orthodox services were all in Greek, right?"

"Yes, because that was the language of the eastern part of the Roman Empire. When the faith spread outside the empire, or the empire shrank, the local churches acted pretty much similarly to how we have here — they started in Greek and, over a few generations, switched to the local common tongue. We started in Slavonic and Russian, and now we use English. When the faith came to some new place, everything was translated, so you have the Divine Liturgy in Japanese, English, Russian, and a host of other languages."

"Ready to tell me what the bishop said?"

"He wants me to teach Sunday School for the High School and college group. That fits the usual pattern, though I'm not a recent seminary graduate assigned as an associate to a parish. Deacon Grigory, like Deacon Vasily, taught those groups because neither parish is large enough to need, or support, two priests."

"That did not require overnight thinking — you've taught Sunday School before."

"We discussed medical training, and I discovered something I didn't know."

"What's that?"

"Do you know what a 'visiting student' is?"

"No."

"When we do our Clerkships and Sub-Internships, it's possible to do them at places other than the medical school and the affiliated hospital. And that neatly solves my problem."

"How so?"

"By doing my gynecology and obstetrics training at a Roman Catholic hospital."

"Whoa! They'd train you on the procedures necessary to care for a miscarriage or tubal pregnancy, or whatever, without you having to do an abortion!"

"Exactly. And nobody at Church could question it because everyone knows Catholic hospitals do not do elective abortions."

"Very neatly solving your dilemma."

"Yes. It means I'll have to work in Columbus or Cincinnati for however many months that Sub-Internship is, but that's really a minor inconvenience compared to the alternative."

"So you didn't need your prepared speech."

"I told him I had one, and he asked to hear it. He pointed out the obvious — that priests and bishops have the same kind of struggles when dealing with spiritual matters."

"Doing what's best for the person or the congregation rather than what they might want to happen?"

"Basically."

"You're stalling."

I smiled wanly, "He pointed out something which should be obvious to anyone who paid even the slightest attention — Saint Michael the Archangel Orthodox Church needs a deacon."

"You, of course."

"Me, of course. That's when I raised my concern about our medical training, and he subtly reprimanded me for not investigating further. With that disposed of, it was a matter of timing. In that discussion, I discovered something else I wasn't aware of — that to ordain a young man to the diaconate, the Synod requires a college degree. I was going on what I knew about men like Deacon Grigory, who were ordained later in life. Deacon Grigory doesn't have a degree."

"Why the requirement?"

"Because the assumption is that young men will eventually be made priests and that the diaconate is a stepping stone. This would be an exception, and as Vladyka put it, there's no need to create an exception when the situation resolves itself in eighteen months. That's longer than he would prefer to wait, but given the principle of doing what's best for me and not wanting to needlessly buck the system, he'd like to ordain me right after graduation."

"And that order your grandfather placed at the Christmas party?"

I chuckled, "The bishop knows full well that my grandfather has two very specific desires — to have great-grandchildren and to see me ordained a deacon. But it would appear people from Saint Michael approached him as well. That's the usual way."

"I'm sensing a sea change coming. You have to marry before then, obviously."

"Obviously. No son of Rahil Mikhailovna Borodina is going to be chaste!"

Clarissa laughed, "I get the picture your mom was something of a challenge growing up."

"That's a very polite way to put it," I said with a sly smile.

"The bishop told you not to marry Kimiko, didn't he?"

"He'd never do something like that, at least not directly. Nor would he expect me to follow such an instruction. But his opinion on the matter is fairly clear. And he, Father Nicholas, and Father James have both expressed concerns about the exact issue that has bothered me."

"The whole 'duty to convert' thing?"

"Yep. The priests aren't blind, and Kimiko may be ridiculously polite and deferential, but she's also very much of the mindset of whatever the Japanese word for «бабушка» (babushka) would be. She's never hidden her thinking on that, and I really would have been surprised if she tried to hide it from the priests doing her catechism."

"That seriously narrows the options for anyone who isn't already Orthodox."

"Assuming I accept the bishop's desired timing."

"As if you wouldn't?"

"Remember what we said about desire coming into conflict with needs?"

"Yes, but I simply can't see you defying him in that way."

"It's not defiance, Lissa," I said gently. "It may be only eighteen months away, but it is eighteen months away. The only thing I can do is take each day as it comes, deal with it, then take the next one, and so on."

"But Kimiko?"

"You know I was struggling with that already, and the conversation she and I had the other day ought to tell you that I've developed serious doubts that she can actually be happy here in the long run."

"How long does catechism take? I mean, in the usual case of a Christian becoming Orthodox?"

"It depends on the individual. I've seen periods as short as six months and some which are closer to two years. Are you thinking about Maggie? Or about you?"

"Maggie."

"Are you SURE about that, Lissa?"

She sighed deeply, "If I was SURE about it, I wouldn't be struggling with it, would I?"

"No. And no pressure. If you and I are meant to be together that way, the ordination can wait, the desires of the bishop and my grandfather notwithstanding."

"And Angie?"

"Father Nicholas spoke to Father Stephen. A week from Saturday at the parish in Loveland."

"And is that something you could countenance?"

"I resolved to put that out of my mind and just take it one step at a time. Obsessing does me no good."

"I think Jocelyn was right to be surprised. I've been with you constantly for two years, and even I'm surprised."

"Would the old Mike have made a good doctor or a bad doctor?"