Book Title:     Discovering the Rich Heritage of Orthodoxy
Author:           Fr. Seraphim (Charles) Bell (Ph.D.)
Publisher:      Light and Life, Minneapolis, 2001
 
Recollection of a quite intense pursuit of the Orthodox Faith and Orthodox Church by now Father Seraphim Bell.  Fr. Bell is a graduate of Oral Roberts University and earned an M.Div. from Fuller Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. in Theology from Kings College, University of Aberdeen.  He served as minister in the Church of Scotland in Aberdeen and Edinburgh before returning to California to serve at First Presbyterian Church in Mountain View.  He subsequently started a new congregation affiliated with Vineyard Christian Fellowship.

It was in his third year leading his growing community in the Vineyard Fellowship that he felt that he was without clear direction in his spiritual life.  He then commenced an intense inquiry into the “New Testament Church” which he and his congregation were searching to become.  His search began with several written works – Timothy Ware’s Orthodox Church and Peter Gilquist’s Becoming Orthodox – and conversations with a local Orthodox priest Fr Jon Braun who was also located in the Santa Clara Valley.

As he encountered Orthodox Faith and Practice, including liturgical worship, saints, and sacraments, his study included Holy Scripture as well as a review of writings of the Protestant reformer John Calvin with whose works he was well acquainted.  He cites Calvin’s comments on the Virgin  Mary, the Mother of God, and the implication for the understanding of the Holy Eucharistic as set out by Calvin in New Testament Commentaries.  

In addition, his own theological education provided him with a knowledge of New Testament Greek that allowed him to understand words which have less precise meaning in English translations of the New Testament. An example is Matthew telling us that Joseph “did as the angel of the Lord commanded him, and took her as his wife and kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a Son (Matt. 1:24,25) (italics added).  The author points out: “The Greek word which we translate “until” is hoes and is frequently used in the Bible to indicate action which continues past an event.” (p. 38)\

This and other commentaries with clarification of words from original Greek offer insight to anyone who may have found English translations for particular words wanting.

On the Lending/Library Shelf

Title:            Pearl of Great Price
Author:        Sergei Hackel
Publisher:    St Vladimir’s Seminary Press
Date:           First Published 1965, revised edition 1982; 149 pages
Subtitle:      The Life of Mother Maria Skobtsova (1891-1945)

From the cover:
        Pearl of Great Price is the moving story of Mother Maria Skobtsova, a nun of the Orthodox Church, who was born into an aristocratic Russian home but who died a martyr’s death in one of Hitler’s concentration camps.  In the intervening years, the vicissitudes of life led her through two marriages, childbirth and childrearing, and exile from her homeland – until she became an unconventional nun, devoted to the  service of the destitute and the despairing in Nazi-occupied France during WWII.
        Mother Maria was eventually consigned to Ravensbrück concentration camp because of her support of Jews in Paris.  There she continued to help those around her until  – and even by means of – her own death.  
        Now canonized by the Orthodox Church as Saint Maria, she demonstrates how to love the image of God in each person, even when surrounded by hatred, undiluted evil,  and brutality.  

        Mother Maria was glorified by the Church of Constantinople on January 16, 2004, along with her companions, Priest Dmitri  Klepinin, her son George (Yuri) Skobtsov, and Elie Fondaminsky. They are commemorated on July 20.     

        Author: Sergei Hackel (+2005), priest of the Moscow Patriarchate in the UK, was for many  years the editor of ecumenical journal Sobernost and the ”voice” of the BBC Russian religious broadcasts during the Soviet era.
 
Readers' Comments:
        Mother Maria was regarded as unconventional in her comportment and activities as an Orthodox nun – opening a “homeless shelter” in Paris, going personally each day to Les Halles to secure food for the shelter, but her deep Orthodox faith and counsel were true at all times in spite of incredible adverse events and situations in her life’s journey. To read that in the concentration camp she gave support and what little material goods she had (e.g., meagre portions of camp food)  – and always with a smile and words of hope in faith.   Reading her life makes one look more closely at one’s own – with Mother Maria’s life as a standard and measure.  (See: http://orthodoxwiki.org/Maria_Skobtsova for more information about her life)