Comments Posted By Geo Michalopulos
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Why would that be a schism? ACOB now recognizes ROCOR as canonical, as does the rest of Orthodoxy. If Orthodox people go from a GOA parish to an AOCNA parish because of proximity, it’s not a schism. Likewise if OCA people are scandalized by the fact that ecumenists/modernists have taken over Syosset and can dictate terms to Jonah’s successor, leaving for a ROCOR (or GOA/etc.) parish is not a schism.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 21, 2013 @ 6:16 pm
I agree with you. Syosset is between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea on this one. Had they acted in a less deranged manner back in August, they would have released Jonah and this whole thing would be over with by now.
Instead they acted in an unChristian manner, and compounded their wickedness almost daily. Since Jonah’s unjust ouster, Syosset has experienced a scandal a week seemingly.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 21, 2013 @ 6:07 pm
You’re right there. It’s always cats.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 21, 2013 @ 6:03 pm
I believe that’s wrong. Foxhall Road is a seperate address. At least I hope so.
Can anyone shed any light on this?
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 21, 2013 @ 6:03 pm
Madame, thank you for putting the miscreants of Syosset in their place. After what your family has suffered, I simply don’t know how they can sleep at night.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 21, 2013 @ 6:01 pm
I can assure you, that Tuberous Bactrian is definately a lackey of Jillions.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 23, 2013 @ 9:56 pm
OK, that’s just idiotic. If your overlords in Syosset really believe this crap then that would explain a major part of their hatred for Jonah.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 23, 2013 @ 10:23 am
American History According to Andrew Cuomo
What’s curious to me is how the gun-grabbers are all of a sudden become so pro-hunting. I know these people: they hate hunters and hunting, and practically every other aspect of rural Red-state America.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 13, 2013 @ 10:23 am
Jonah the Prophet: Muzzling Military Chaplains
Nate, creating straw men does not enhance your argument. Indeed, it shows how much more intrinscly strong the traditional argument is (as explicated by Fr Hans).
The “marrying off of pre-pubescent daughters”is a case in point. Nowhere is this presently evident in the Western cultural tradition. It is found in the Old Testament to be sure but so is polygamy. In some modern Islamic societies, not only are these two phenomena in existence but so are male “brides” (typically lower-caste teenagers who become the catamites of older men) and even bestiality.
This last statement may strike some as fabulous bigotry on my part but in reality, Muslim imams (such as the late Ayatollah Khomeini) have ruled that while bestiality is morally wrong, as long as the animal is killed that sin is amesced. As for flesh of that animal, it can be sold in another town but not in the village in which the act took place.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 28, 2013 @ 8:07 am
EtS, thanks for pointing this out. I don’t know anything about Fr Tate and I was remiss in allowing this accusation to be published. Monomakhos regrets the error.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 28, 2013 @ 6:57 am
Nate, you’re extremely naive. Laws this verbose are the signs of a pharasaical, Godless society. They are literally begging to be broken.
You clearly did not read the essay reprinted in my post. Chaplains were clearly told to “get with the program or resign their commissions.”
Let’s put our cards on the table: the Constitution is essentially a dead letter. I could go through every Article, Section, and clause and show how the words are no longer being adhered to.
May I give you an example? Where in the First Amendment do we find justification for campus speech codes? Where “scholars” are not allowed to speak, lecture, and/or investigate certain subjects because they are taboo?
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 26, 2013 @ 6:58 pm
How Far is St Nick’s from the National Cathedral?
Where did I say “without guile”? (Though I do believe that Jonah is such a bishop.) Why don’t you just me to task for my points?
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 14, 2013 @ 10:14 pm
Carl, let’s cut to the chase. I know that you are enamored of canon 34 but let’s be honest: The canons mean nothing in America. They haven’t since about 1918. Or put another way: why start now?
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 14, 2013 @ 10:11 pm
Wrong again, Nate. According to the 1974 Congressional Budget Act, the Congress must pass a budget by April 15 of each year. You remember 1974 don’t you? That’s when those Wascally Wepublicans controlled the Congress under the Gingrich Who Stole Christmas. Oh wait, I’m wrong about that. The GOP didn’t take over Congress until 1995. So…I guess it was the Democrats who passed that Law.
As Emily Littella would say, “Never mind.”
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 18, 2013 @ 10:16 pm
Point three is demonastrably false. Gun crime very often increases after a gun ban. There’s a simple reason for this: prohibition never works. Only the law-abiding abide by the law. Criminals don’t.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 3, 2013 @ 9:58 pm
Very interesting piece, Lola. Thanks for publishing it.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On January 3, 2013 @ 9:57 pm
Of course it’s irrelevent when discussing economic data. However I wasn’t discussing economic data but the cauldron of violence which South Africa has sunk into. (As for myself, I have dozens of relatives who lived throughout the African continent –from the Arab north to the former Rhodesia, South Africa and even the Congo.)
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On December 29, 2012 @ 8:14 pm
Nate, have you ever been to South Africa either before Mandela took over or after? Do you know anybody who lives there?
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On December 29, 2012 @ 6:15 am
No they’re not. These “insurgencies” you speak of have devolved into criminal protection rackets or are on their way to becoming so. Just like La Cosa Nostra and the Sicilian Mafia, both of which started out as rebellions against the Normans some 700 years ago. Hamas and Hezbollah run protection rackets on the West Bank and Lebanon, respectively.
That being said, any country can have an insurgency on its hands (think Israel with the Palestinians, the US with the Indians, Spain with the Basques, the UK with the IRA, etc). The question is will the innocent bystanders be slaughtered or will they be able to defend themselves until the government sends in the Army.
Your comparison with New Zealand, Australia, and Britain also falls apart because these are by and large homogenous societies. Thanks the the 1965 Immigration Act, the US can no longer be viewed as a largely homogeneous society with only one racial minority group. It has become multicultural in the sense that there is no longer a common consensus and thus the erosion of trust not only between ethnic groups but within them as well.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On December 29, 2012 @ 6:10 am
Thank you Fr for this information. From my own perspective, the danger of gun-restrictionism is more insidious than simply disarming innocent people. What is far worse is the change in attitudes that it fostered in the UK. Namely that people are to be defenseless and accept their victimization. The laws now reflect that: in the UK, a person cannot use any force whatsoever to defend himself or his property. He must simply lie back and accept bodily harm and even death. If he fights back and wins, he will be imprisoned.
This same type of obsequiousness is what we can expect if the gun-grabbers get their way. They not only want to control us but to make us love them. Remember the last words in 1984, when Winston Smith comes to the “realization” after his torture that he “loves Big Brother.”
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On December 27, 2012 @ 10:04 pm
For the record, I was just informed by a psychiatrist that the process of deinstitutionalization began under President John F Kennedy with legislation that he signed into law. It accelerated under Reagan but under the direction of the Courts who felt that Kennedy’s legislation wasn’t being implemented.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On December 22, 2012 @ 7:24 am
I completely agree with you. In Israel, most (if not all) of the teachers are armed. Zero massacres. Correllation?
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On December 20, 2012 @ 10:21 pm
Since suicide is so prevalent, we would need to ask why it is so and examine what it is that causes such despair.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On December 20, 2012 @ 7:57 am
More from Russia, Not with Love
Fr, I take your criticism to heart and will reread your original critiques in case I missed anything. Please forgive me for misunderstanding you. I certainly hope that we aren’t talking past each other.
However I must take issue with your criticisms as found in the second to the last paragraph most recently posted. You say that you won’t “accept Jesse’s invitation to list Met. Jonah’s alleged in office because I do not have personal knowledge of any…”
So are we to assume that the OCA was thrown into an uproar, a Primate and his aged parents are in danger of being thrown penniless out onto the street, and his sister dies because of the stresses placed upon her delicate constitution, all because there weren’t any character flaws that Jonah was guilty of?
And you’re OK with Jonah being removed, the OCA being made a mockery of, and his family destroyed, becauset Jonah was removed on a whim? I’m afraid it’s that simple. You are obviously an intelligent man (JD I assume?) and well-informed. If you don’t know of any transgressios that would merit such action it seems likely to me that there aren’t any.
As for my knowledge about the law I stand accused: I’m not a lawyer. However I have consulted with lawyers and they tell me that coercion is actionable. That’s why in my own profession the pot is usually sweetened when it comes time to “part ways.” If you’re a good boy, you get a severance package and a letter of recommendation, if not so good, then it’s announced that you “resigned” and if anybody comes asking what is said is that “Bob Smith worked here from Jan 1999 to Oct 2012.” The words are terse but they’re not inflammatory.
Just last week a dental hygienest was fired by her employer because she was “too pretty” and the dentist’s wife got jealous. Wifey really hit the roof when she found out that Hubby was texting said hygienist. Lawyers are lining up right now to take her case. I’m sure that forcing a CEO to resign by threatening his paycheck while he is the sole support for two aging parents and a sick sister would make the board of directors get sweaty palms.
Yes, you’re right about the particulars about the protocols involved in the filing of an EEOC suit. That being said, there is a lawsuit and the plaintiff is the Federal Government. They can print money, St Tikhon’s can’t. Either way, it’s still a failure on the part of Syosset to not see the apparent conflicts of interest that were involved.
Whether a case brought forth on this basis will prevail is an open question. We call it the American “legal” system, not “justice” system. (OJ got custody of his children, Britney Spears lost hers.)
I honestly don’t know if you’re in the OCA but I can assure you that morale is at an all-time low. We’re talking about our Church here Father and the loss of an authentic American version of Orthodoxy, one suited to the American landscape as it continues the death-spiral it was on before Jonah assumed office (during which it received a brief respite).
As for the “haphazard style” of administration that he allegedly displayed at Manton (which you observed –I have not), are we to suppose that he displayed a similar style as Metropolitan? Certainly it was possible, but in asserting so, you would undermine your previously stated position in which you admitted that Jonah had been “undermined” himself while in that position.
Forgive the disjointed nature of my responses but the bottom line for many of us is simply this: does the hamfisted, defamatory removal of Jonah justify the massive amount of damage done to the OCA? Yes or no?
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On December 29, 2012 @ 8:49 pm
Rod, I don’t disagree with you. We aren’t Donatists. We who have been in the Church all our lives understand human frailty better than most. That being said, Evangelism is effectively quashed. Let us not forget that the vast majority of people who are seeking out Orthodoxy do so not merely because their confessions have lost Christian truth but because their leaders have spiritually abused them.
I have a non-rhetorical question to all of you who read this: what are you going to tell an honest seeker who knocks on your church’s door? That the Synod should have never elected Jonah in the first place and did so out of fear (which raises a whole lot of other questions) or that the Synod did the right thing in getting rid of Jonah because of his incompetence. If you answer with the latter, then be ready to explain why then the Synod had to make up out of whole cloth a series of libels in order to do so?
Unless someone can point away around this conundrum, I’d say we’re caught between a rock and a hard place.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On December 6, 2012 @ 7:29 am
Fr Andrei, as far as I’m concerned priests such as yourself are doing a stellar job. You and your son are doing the best they can with what resources the Lord has provided. Is it ideal? Nothing in America re Orthodoxy is ideal but you’re doing far better than the Episcopal Assembly is and a thousand times better than Syosset is doing.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On December 20, 2012 @ 8:01 am
Laurie Paffhausen, May Her Memory Be Eternal
Personally, I doubt it. I would love to be proven wrong however.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On November 20, 2012 @ 12:41 pm
Please elaborate. To whom are you are you referring?
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On November 20, 2012 @ 12:39 pm
Ron Paul’s Valedictory: Good-bye to Liberty
Correct. I don’t in my latest essay. I know what I am about to say is sexist but in the old days it was always the woman’s prerogative to say “no.” That usually stopped 98% of men dead in their tracks.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On November 24, 2012 @ 8:50 pm
«« Back To Stats PageLet’s start here: 1 in 7 Americans are on food stamps. That’s 15% of the population.
» Posted By Geo Michalopulos On November 24, 2012 @ 8:48 pm
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