DoxBro's Blog of Life

A rather scattered reflection...forgive my scrambled thoughts and sloppy writing::: Thursday morning I spent the majority of my day at Transfiguration Monastery for the celebration of the feast of St Herman of Alaska. It was quite a special morning. The Divine Liturgy and a wonderful visit (over lenten lunch) with the Mothers and Sisters of the monastery. I also had the chance to visit with Fr Tom Hopko, a well known speaker in the Eastern Orthodox Church in America. All in all, Thursday was a wonderful day. A feast day, a happy day.  The next day, Friday morning, I was a keynote speaker at a breakfast for a business organization. My goal was to talk about my experiences in different aspects of life, and how one thing always impacted another. The speech was about 35 minutes and I had no idea if I had any impact on the group I was speaking to. But after I finished my speech, it was a matter of minutes before half of the room had formed a long line to greet me and talk with me. T...

Hey everyone. Sorry it's been so long since my last post. Busy busy. Anyway, I wanted to let you know what I'll be doing this weekend. This is a short one, but very exciting. If you don't already know, I'm currently the President for my schools college student organization called Orthodox Christian Fellowship (OCF). As president I feel the opportunity to build community, friendships and to encourage growth in the Orthodox Christian faith. As part of the exposure and growth in the faith, I recently arranged a trip to go to Taylor, Pennsylvania., as a pilgrimage to see two weeping icons of the Theotokos. For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, an Icon is a religious image of Christ, saints or even specific events (Christmas, Easter, Holy Friday, Palm Sunday..etc). These icons are considered to be Holy, because of Who and What they represent. The image itself is not worshipped, nor is the image itself venerated. But rather, it is what the image ...

Hello readers. This blog post is intended for reader interaction.  I'm going to post a brief thought with some questions, very general. It's your job to think about it and respond. Please keep comments on the given topic. Most of all, keep it clean.  I'll post some basic questions for starters.  ____ __________ I've noticed a lot lately that people are moving away from traditional Christianity and moving toward a new contemporary idea of Christianity. One in which there's no label of Christianity being a "religion," but rather a way of life. A contemporary idea where there's no need for a temple or structured liturgy in order to develop a love and relationship with Christ.  While I would agree that the Church is not simply a building where people gather, I have to ask how these new churches will maintain the message and substance of Christ and His Church? In other words, when a person or a group of people wipe out all the customs, traditions ...

The Thanksgiving Miracle I dedicate this to my old roommate, who will never read this, and more importantly never know he gave me my Thanksgiving miracle. This was written last year, a few days after it happened... and to this day, I hold this experience close to my heart. Since I wrote it, I have not edited or revised it beyond name changes (to keep those involved anonymous) and spelling errors.  _____         __________     _______________  November 22, 2011 was a day just like any other. I was up late the night before and had to wake up early for class, which of course meant being exhausted all day, and more importantly, not getting (nearly) enough beauty sleep. So by default I knew when I woke up Tuesday morning that I would be tired and somewhat lazy; thinking about nothing but being able to go to my apartment and take a nap before my OCF (Orthodox Christian Fellowship) meeting.       ...

A friend of mine recently told me, "I've always felt comfortable opening up to you because I know you'll never judge me." He's right, I'll never judge him. I've gotten a lot of negative attention lately and many comments which make me seem like an intolerant and judgmental  piece of garbage. Comments which describe me as being, "full of hate." Things which aren't so much hurtful, but rather, untrue. These comments are made by people who (for the most part) do not know me very well. It's fine to have assumptions about who I am and what I am. But please, save your energy of badmouthing me, and put it into getting to know me, or understand where I'm coming from. Lately I've put a lot of my writing energies into the "No No's" of my belief system. Obviously this limits my audience because not everybody sees things the same. So, I'll be starting a series on love, peace, friendship, patience, kindness, generosity,...

Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory Forever. Thank you for stopping by. So, my recent post " Opening Up About my Weaknesses " got a lot of attention in the past few days. Mainly the comment section due to my stance on a very controversial issue. Either you'll agree or you won't. (The post has been temporarily been taken down until the haters calm down). Anyway, this post is quite different.  I wanted to start this post with some scripture.  John 15: 1-17 “I am  the true vine,  and my Father is the gardener.   He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit,  while every branch that does bear fruit  he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.   You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.   Remain in me, as I also remain in you.  No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain i...

Hey everybody! Just wanted to thank all of you for reading and supporting my blog. I know many of you are reading for multiple reasons. Some are looking for someone to relate to, some see this as refreshment and others see it as stupid. Regardless of why you read or follow my blog, I must be clear that my articles are written to express myself. These are based off my experiences and interactions, my thoughts and observations. I'm not out to cause holy-war or anything. If you agree, great. If you disagree, great. If you don't care, great. If you don't like what I post, don't read it. Simple as that. If you like what you read, continue to support it. I do my very best not to judge people for who they are. I do my best not to look down on anyone as individuals --  it's not my place to do so. Yes, I'm very open on where I stand with controversial/sensitive issues, but it doesn't mean I dislike or condemn people. I simply condemn the actions. Again, I...