The Importance of Sharing Orthodoxy With This Present Generation
Recently, we received a text message from a woman, telling us that she had been getting telephone calls concerning Abbot Tryphon. She claimed there are people who saw the photo of me standing with a group of young men in the speakeasy museum in Butte, Montana, holding a rifle, while surrounded by “white supremacists”. She said these people are all horrified that I would pose for such a photo. That we were tourists at a museum, taking photos, just like hundreds of other tourists before us who descend into this subterranean walking tour. Like hundreds before us, the tour guide took photos of us standing behind the old speakeasy bar, holding the same toy rifle.
This woman accused me of making myself, the monastery, and ROCOR, look like “white supremacists”, thus confirming the NPR lie that had its basis in an attack on my brother monks in Wayne, West Virginia, and the whole of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad. I tried reaching out to her with love, but only received further rage and abuse.
It should be noted that the “scholar” whose book defamed Holy Cross Monastery, and suggested the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia was attracting young white supremacists, is a member of the Orthodox Church in America. This sort of attack is not good for Orthodox unity in this country, and it is particularly tragic that this “scholar’s” book was the basis for the National Public Radio airing.
You can imagine the stress I’ve been subjected to, after finding out that many individuals have been bombarding the diocese about that photo, demanding something be done about me. It is obvious to the young men who accompanied me to this subterranean museum, as well as Metropolitan Jonah, who was also a speaker at the conference, that it was a simple act on my part to demonstrate my love for them by descending into this below street, and very cold, area that included jail cells from the turn of the century, as my way of lovingly supporting these young Orthodox men.
I descended with them, not because I really wanted to, but because I felt they needed “grandpa” to be with them. My heart breaks with the knowledge that so many young people have walked away from the faith, and that so many priests are not reaching out with the love and friendship that would help them see their need to be walking with Christ. I certainly regret that I agreed to hold the toy gun, even though I know that hundreds of individuals who have gone on this tour have done so in the past. But, as a monk I should have been more aware of how it might cause some to be offended, should the photo go public, but when the man giving the guided tour handed the toy to me, I agreed to hold it, not even thinking the photo might go viral.
At seventy-six I am no spring chicken, as the saying goes, and I am aware of the need to be prepared for my own inevitable demise. The clock is ticking for all of us, but once you face a heart condition you hear it ticking for the first time. When my cardiologist referred me to a specialist dealing with the electro-vascular, I realized my heart problems could bring about my death sooner than expected. The fact that I’ve needed a cane to keep my balance (I’ve fallen numerous times in the past month), is also a clear wakeup call that my own death may be sooner than I expect.
I ask for your prayers, dear ones. The stress that I’ve faced in the past week has been hard on me, and I do not want to face my end in a state of stress and worry. I want to die with a smile on my face.
Love in Christ,
Abbot Tryphon
About the author
Fr. Tryphon is the Abbot of the Monastery of the All-Merciful Saviour, which was established in 1986 by Archimandrite Dimitry (Egoroff) of blessed memory. The Monastery is under the omophore of His Eminence Kyrill, Archbishop of San Francisco and Western America, of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia.
3 thoughts on “The Old Sharing With The Young”
Χαῖρε, Abbot Tryphon ,
We are not in the days of Archie Bunker anymore and people take themselves too seriously. I to have to walk with a cane at 42 years of age. I will keep you in my prayers. Thank you for all that you do!
In Christ,
William Burgs
Thanks for your solidarity, and for your prayers.
Abbot Tryphon
Thank You for all you do and stand for. Your a man of GOD 1st and a Great American 1st. "In God We Trust". We need more people like you in this country to point out what is wrong in Truth with Grace, Understanding and Respect for others.
We are greater than the sum of our parts. "Eplurabus Unum".
Diversity dose not bring us together. Ghengas Kahn was "Divide and Concur".
It is our Unity in Independence that makes us Interdependent to Protect Inalienable rights. "Communion / Trinity".
It is not a melanoma thing or a cultural thing it is a Human thing.
Blessed are the Peacemakers like you.
In Christ,
George