From Athens to Alexandria This Year

In the midst of a lot of graduate school, Sunday School blogs, etc., there has also been a necessity this year in particular as far as travel is concerned, and so far this year we have traveled a lot.  Given my previous role of leadership in the House of Laity for our diocese, I was once again priveleged to attend our fourth (and regrettably last) Synod for the Diocese of the South for our church at St. Stephen Pro-Cathedral in Athens.  We were up there during the last week of April, and as usual it was a good Synod - got to see a lot of familiar people and it was just a great visit.  On the way home from that, we stopped over in St. Simons Island and Brunswick, where I spent a lot of my childhood with my dad many moons ago, and I also got to meet up with a dear friend of mine from elementary school days by the name of Sim Taylor - it was a great blessing to get to see him after all those years.  It was also new for Barbara as well, given she had never been to Brunswick or the Golden Isles before, but she enjoyed it as well.  This trip was an important first step for us, as a lot of new things are beginning to open up and I want to share that briefly here.

2015 was a rough year for us, as it almost cost us our house and we struggled with so much - lack of employment hurt our income, and despite an attempt to work at a couple of at-home schemes (both of which were actually scams) the year was pretty bleak last.  As 2015 ended and a lot of things started coming to a head, it forced us to see the importance of relying on God's will and His direction, and as we did so, things started to happen.  To begin, God provided in an abundant way for a great need we had, and we saved our home.  But, in the process, Barb and I talked, and we decided that we needed to follow a greater vision and plan on moving out of Florida for good after living here almost 27 years.  So, we began to explore options, and what happened in the coming months was a whirlwind of things that began to fall in place for us, and one of them occurred at the Synod this past April.

One of our diocesan bishops, Bishop Donald Lerow, actually has jurisdiction over what is called our Diocese of the Mid-Atlantic States, or DMAS, but he also pastors a parish in Jacksonville, NC, which is in the Diocese of the South.  While at Synod, Bishop Lerow and I began to talk, and as it turns out he had been praying for years for parish work to happen in my home state of West Virginia, and he really got fired up that a native of the state who was also a part of the Church wanted to go back north and do something for the Church, so as we talked, a lot began to happen, and in the coming weeks after Synod things came together quickly.

Bishop Lerow, in his wisdom, thought I would do best in Church work as an ordained deacon, and just a couple of weeks after the Synod I got this email from his secretary with the application paperwork to start the process.  As I completed and submitted everything required, I also got on with the business of taking my summer term coursework, and all went pretty quietly until about two weeks ago when another email from the diocesan secretary came with an official summons to meet with the diocesan Commission on Ministry in Alexandria, VA.  This was, on the outset, an extremely short notice, but just a few days after hearing from that we get checks from a class-action settlement we were part of in the amount of $350 between us, which supplied the need for the trip.  So, on the 19th of August, we took off at around 1 in the afternoon and headed north, and now history started to take shape for us.

The trip up was long, and having worked a partial day, traveling straight through on that 12-hour trek was not possible, so we decided to stop and get a few hours rest in North Carolina at this place in Dunn called the Highway Inn.  That was a big mistake!  It was kind of late, and we were looking for a convenient and economical place to crash for a few hours before getting back on the road, and the desk man was decent about it, and surprisingly up-front - he essentially told us that if we didn't like the room, we would be refunded with no problem, and he suggested we see it first.  That was a red flag there, and we should have really taken the good man up on that offer!  We get up to the room, which stunk, was overheated, and the carpet looked hideous due to the fact it appeared to have never been introduced to a vacuum before.   The bathroom also had no towels, and a shower was an impossibility at that point.  This motel was the stuff that bad horror movies are inspired by, and it was a disaster/nightmare of a lodging to be sure!   I managed myself to get about 2 hours sleep, with the fact that the sparse blind was letting in glaring lights from the parking lot and upon taking a visit to the restroom, I was greeted by the sight of two copulating cockroaches on a door hinge - they were dispatched and buried at sea, but considering what they were doing at least they died happy!  Not being able to sleep, I was up by 3:45 AM, and I let Barbara rest until 4:30, at which time we got up and got back on the road.  I was very thankful to get out of that crap-hole of a lodging, and would not recommend anyone staying there ever.  Usually though, with a motel like that, the lack of maintenance is a sign that it may be about to close permanently, and to be honest it probably wouldn't be a bad idea.  Dunn is a significant place regarding Christian history as it is the location of the headquarters of a very unique church denomination called the Pentecostal Free Will Baptist Church.  But, that stay didn't reflect any enthusiasm for that, and we were both relieved to kick the dust of Dunn off after that experience.

The Highway Inn in Dunn, NC.  We stayed in the room where that first window on the second floor is, the "room from hell." 

Bad motels aside, we made great timing getting to Alexandria, even with a breakfast stop in Rocky Mount, NC.  We arrived at All Angels Church, which meets in an office building just off Exit 2B on I-395, at around 9:30 AM, about a half of an hour before the Committee meeting.   There were two other candidates besides myself, and the whole proceeding took about 2 hours, which was fine.   The meeting produced good fruit, and a lot of both the priest and lay members of the Committee were very nice folks, and Bishop Lerow also provided over site - it was good to see him again as well. The outcome of the meeting was that I was accepted as what is called an Aspirant, meaning that the next stage of the process involves an MMPI test, a background check, and some paperwork submissions, which will not be too hard to do.  If all that goes well, I will be then accepted as a Postulant, and it looks as if I will be assigned to Fr. Pothin of the Frederick, MD, parish as a mentor priest who will oversee my diaconal preparation.  There is an excitement about all this happening, but also I am understandably a bit nervous too - there is a lot to do ahead of us, and it requires commitment on my part, but I can do it. 

All Angels Parish, as well as Bishop Lerow's office, are located on the third floor of this office building at the intersection of Edsall and Cherokee in Alexandria. 

The altar of All Angels Church in Alexandria - they did a tremendous job creating a beautiful parish in an unorthodox location.

After the meeting, we decided to go explore the neighborhood near the we stayed at - the Days Inn on Bragg Road, a much better place to visit than that Dunn place!   We grabbed a bite of lunch at the Royal Palace Kabob House on Beauregarde Street, and then went and checked out an Ethiopian market.  At this point, it is worth mentioning that Alexandria is noted for a couple of things, one being the Masonic Monument downtown and the other for hosting one of the largest communities of Ethiopian-American people in the nation.  Alexandria is rightly called "Little Ethiopia" because in practically every shopping center there is a shop of some sort with Amharic lettering on the sign, and that proved to be a blessing to me personally.  The first Ethiopian place we visited was the Dire Market and Deli on Chambliss Street, just across the street from our hotel.  Although a small market, it was still an experience to visit it, and I was able to stock up on both berbere and on some delicious but volatile Ethiopian biltong jerky.  I was really wanting to buy some injera, a flat pancake-like bread which is a staple of Ethiopian cuisine that is made from teff flour, but I was also a bit apprehensive about that being I feared it would not make the trip back.  But, if all goes well, we will be visiting again.  I also have a bit of a humorous story to relate about this too.  The market also has a small cafe-type eatery incorporated into it as well, and Barbara was curious about the injera bread.  Well, goofy me, with only about 3 hours sleep, noticed a plate of injera pieces sitting on a counter and thought they were samples, so I told Barb to check it out.  Turns out, the plate was a dirty plate being taken away by the wait staff for a customer, and luckily Barbara figured that out before she "partook" of it, and she wanted to shoot me!  We did get a good laugh from it later, and it is a story we can amuse ourselves with for years to come. 

The Dire Cafe and Market (now called Time Market) on Chambliss Street in Alexandria - two doors down is the Enat Restaurant, an authentic Ethiopian eatery we didn't have the privilege of trying this visit.

Visiting that market was exciting, but not as exciting as it was when we got back to the hotel.  Just across the street from our hotel is the Hamere Noah Ethiopian Orthodox Church, and being it was right there I just had to check it out, so I walked over there.  Now, Ethiopians don't just relegate church to a one-hour timeframe, but they go all day, and a lot was still happening at that little parish despite the fact the official Liturgy was over a couple of hours earlier.  The beauty of a Marian shrine at the entrance of the parish was the first thing that struck me, and in back I was also able to get some good pictures of some beautiful Ethiopian icons as well as of the ceremonial drums they use as part of their worship.  I actually was welcomed into the sanctuary, but declined due to the fact that in their churches, it is a requisite to remove your shoes, and I had holey socks on and didn't want to do that.  Maybe another day for that.  Over the next day before we left, we watched as tons of devout Ethiopian Christians parked quite a distance away and made their way to the church, ladies clad in the white traditional headcoverings in particular.   That had to be one of the neatest experiences I had ever encountered, and is one I will always treasure. 

The exterior of Hamere Noah Ethiopian Orthodox Church, facing Bragg Road - the Marian shrine is in the middle.

An up-close picture of the Marian shrine.

An array of Ethiopian liturgical drums laid out on carpets in back of the church

My experience in "Little Ethiopia" was not quite ready to be over yet, as that evening we went across the street to a Chinese buffet, but prior to going we decided to check out some of the local shops.   One of them was a 99-cent store which, judging by the Amharic signage over the door, was Ethiopian-owned, so we stopped in.  While in there, I got to talk to a nice Ethiopian gentleman who gave some insight about the "Broad Canon" of the Ethiopic Bible, which contains 81 books, including Enoch and Jubilees.  That turned out to be a stimulating conversation, and I actually learned a few things from this guy that even I didn't know, and I have been learning about Ethiopic Christianity for years!  The whole experience was a blessing, and afterwards we ate and then relaxed at the Days Inn we stayed at for the night.

The Days Inn on Bragg Road in Alexandria, where we lodged during our visit.

Sunday morning got off to an interesting start, as we got a really good night's rest and decided to attend Mass at All Angels before hitting the road back to Florida.  The folks at All Angels were a nice congregation, and they have an awesome vicar in Fr. Clarke, their Jamaican-born priest-in-charge.  We got to talk some to the folks, and the priest prayed his blessing over our travel, and we headed back.  Other than a few gas fill-ups and some Bojangle's Chicken for lunch in Petersburg, VA, the trip back was smooth and uneventful, but it also gave us a lot of memories too.  We now have all in place for a new chapter to start in our lives, and this trip sort of got that process started.  In coming months, I will document other developments as they happen, and thank you for visiting with me here on my virtual "front porch."