December 13, 2013

Psalm 43

Oh send out thy light and thy truth; let them lead me,

let them bring me to thy holy hill
 and to thy dwelling!
Psalm 43:3 (Transfiguration, entrance hymn)

In addition to commemorating Saint Herman of Alaska we are remembering Father Alexander Schmemann, one of the architects of the Orthodox Church in America, who reposed on this day thirty years ago. Light and transfiguration were constant themes in his writing. He wrote about the “bright sadness” of Great Lent, which brings about a “mysterious liberation” through the paradoxical darkness of its discipline and services.

As we experience this mysterious liberation, as we become ‘light and peaceful,” the monotony and the sadness of the service acquire a new significance, they are transfigured. An inner beauty illumines them like an early ray of the sun which, while it is still dark in the valley, begins to lighten up the top of the mountain…

“Sad brightness”: the sadness of my exile, of the waste I have made of my life; the brightness of God’s presence and forgiveness, the joy of the recovered desire for God, the peace of the recovered home.
(Great Lent, 33)

May Father Alexander’s memory be eternal!

The Archives as Witness

Archives Meeting
OCA Archives Advisory Committee

Yesterday Archivist Alexis Liberovsky opened the start of a “summit” to create plans for preserving and developing the OCA’s archives and making this rich historical resource more widely available to scholars and the Church. It is a providential coincidence that we are meeting as we commemorate Saint Herman of Alaska and the 30th anniversary of repose of Father Alexander Schmemann.

The Orthodox Church places much emphasis on history, not out of antiquarian interest but because the records of the past hold important lessons (for better and for worse) about how faith has been lived out. Metropolitan Tikhon and the OCA’s officers joined in the discussions that brought together an impressive group of advisors.

  • Gregory J. Shesko, former OCA Pension Board member. Currently is secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners (appointed by the Governor) and a trustee of the Needham Free Public Library where he co-chaired the Renew Our Library campaign which successfully secured $15.7 million to build Needham’s new library. He has also been a member of the State Advisory Council on Libraries since 2007. He previously served on the MBLC’s Planning and Design Review and Construction Review Committees. A Harvard graduate, he is retired from Brandeis University where he was Assistant Dean of Arts and Sciences and Assistant Provost for Academic Finance and Administration.
  • Dr. Jurretta Jordan Heckscher, Digital Reference Specialist at the Library of Congress. She is a member of Saint Mark Church in Bethesda, MD.
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  • Dr. Anatol Shmelev is curator, Russian and Eurasian collection and research fellow of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.  He has conducted onsite research in the OCA Archives.
  • Matushka Tamara (Turkevitch) Skvir, a strong supporter of the OCA Archives, and a contributor of valuable archival material from her grandfather, Metropolitan Leonty.
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  • Archpriest John Erickson, retired Dean and Professor Emeritus of Church History at Saint Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary, who has twice served as chairman of the OCA Department of History and Archives.
  • Alexis S. Troubetzkoy, author/historian, teacher, headmaster, not-for-profit administrator who worked with the Tolstoy Foundation and IOCC. Continues to have close connection to the OCA Archives, which began through his late father, Serge Troubetzkoy, former OCA Archivist.
  • Dr. David C. Ford, Professor of Church History at Saint Tikhon’s Orthodox Theological Seminary, where Alex Liberovsky has annually spoken in his classes on historical and archival topics for the last 12 years.
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  • Elizabeth Mikhalevsky, Metropolitan Council liaison, Washington DC. As an intriguing personal note, her grandfather was librarian of the imperial Russian library at Tsarskoe Selo, and her grandmother was secretary to the Librarian of Congress.

The meeting ends today and a full report will be published on Monday.

Stewards

Week 3: Recruiting 300 Stewards for the Orthodox Church in America

Today is the last day of the website campaign to recruit Stewards, and on Monday we will post the results. If you’ve added your name, thank you. If not, I hope you’ll consider doing so today or over the weekend.