Well-Tempered Instruments

F: I’m sitting at my kitchen table on a Thursday morning, talking to my son Stephen Mathewes, who is going away tomorrow. He’s going to drive up to Holy Cross Seminary in Brookline, Massachusetts, and begin classes as a seminarian, and, hopefully, in three years graduate and be ordained a priest. Dad and I are very, very proud of you, son.

S: Thank you.

F: [laughs] But he also has a sideline. He was a Musicology major in college, and during the course of that time, to pick up a little extra cash, he became a piano tuner. Now, some years ago, when you all were small, I read an article in a magazine or a newspaper, assessing, “What is the very best possible job?” Of all the jobs, of all the professions. And they ranked them by different categories, like how much flexibility do you have? How stressful is it? Are you exposed to the elements? Are you out in the rain? And when they combined all of that, the best job in the world was piano tuner.

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Surviving the Economy

[Ancient Faith Radio; January 7, 2009]

FMG: Well, I’m at home, of all things. Occasionally I am at home. It’s Sunday morning at Holy Cross Antiochian Orthodox Church in Linthicum, Maryland, just south of Baltimore. If you’ve ever been to Baltimore Washington International Airport, BWI, we’re just two miles from BWI. And it’s coffee hour, and I’m sitting in the basement in the parish hall, and I’m talking with somebody who’s travelled to be here with us. I’m not the one travelling this week. Deacon Tom Braun, from, is it St. Barnabas Church in San Demas?

Dn. Tom Braun: It’s St. Barnabas in Huntington Beach, California.

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Hookups and Hope

[Ancient Faith Radio; December 10, 2008]

FMG: Not too long ago, someone mailed me a copy of an article in a magazine called “US Catholic”. This is the November, 2008 issue. And it’s an interview with an author named Donna Freitas. She’s just written a book called “Sex and the Soul”. The subtitle is “Juggling sexuality, spirituality, romance, and religion on America’s college campuses”. In this interview, Freitas talks about the research that she did on college campuses- secular, Catholic, and Evangelical. She herself actually teaches at St. Michael’s College in Vermont, which I think is a Catholic college.

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Growing a Parish

[Ancient Faith Radio; December 3, 2008]

FMG: Today I am at St. Justin Martyr OCA Church in Jacksonville, Florida, just south of Jacksonville, in the area of Mandarin. My family has owned a small farm here since 1880 or so; it’s been in the family, or with the in-laws of the family, since then. I came down to visit my sister, Dorothy, who’s a member of this church, and to visit my mother, who’s in a nursing home here, and now I’m talking to one of my favorite priests, Fr. Ted Pisarchuk. “Ball of fire” is what they call him behind his back, because he’s always up to something. You especially have a love of missions. Were you the founding pastor of St. Justin Martyr?

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The Liturgy of St. James

[Ancient Faith Radio; November 27, 2008]

FMG: I’m in a crowded and noisy banquet room here. This is the annual banquet for St. John Chrysostom Antiochian Orthodox Church in York, PA. I’m sitting here at the banquet table, we’ve just finished our… this was really a good meal. This was some kind of terrific filet mignon, sliced, a little garlic, almonds on the green beans, it was delicious. And in this little space we have between when they bring out the dessert- I love these banquets- I would like to talk to Fr. Elias Yelovich. What is the name of your parish, Father?

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The Science of Music

[Ancient Faith Radio; November 20, 2008]

Frederica Mathewes-Green: I’m sitting in the kitchen with my son Steve and his wife Jocelyn and their baby Ruth Anne, who is crawling around on the floor. She has just learning how to walk, but it’s a lot faster if you go by crawling. She’s carrying an arrowroot cookie, and dropping it, and sitting on it, and picking it up again. And every once in a while she sees that there are fingers on my hands, and she grabs a finger and tries to lead it—because she wants to walk holding on to my hands. So I kind of have to hide my hands where she doesn’t see them. Isn’t that right, Ruthie?

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Why CS Lewis is So Irritating! Part 2

[Ancient Faith Radio; October 30, 2008]

We’re back with another episode of “Why CS Lewis is So Irritating!”. And the reason that CS Lewis is so irritating, if you’re a writer, is that he already said everything. He could have left some stuff for me to come up with, but no, it’s all right there, and it’s beautiful, it’s elegant, it’s concise, it’s zing!, it’s just teriffic stuff. But he wasn’t very generous, he didn’t leave stuff over that I would eventually think of one day.

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Why C. S. Lewis is So Irritating! Part 1

[Ancient Faith Radio, October 23, 2008]

Today’s podcast is going to be one that I expect will be a continuing topic here, “Why CS Lewis is just so irritating.”

Why CS Lewis *is* just so irritating is because, he already said everything. And he said it better than I’ll ever say it. I find when I read him that I’m simultaneously just delighted and thrilled because he’s just put it perfectly, and it’s such a wonderful, original thought, and it’s even a little deeper, and then I think, darn it, if I’d had enough time I could have come up with that! Curses! Foiled again! I just have to not read him, because I just get so frustrated, because he says everything, and he says it better and more concisely and more delightfully, easier to grasp, and all that. I think this is probably similar to the scientist who thinks, Darn it, if Einstein hadn’t said E=MC², I would have thought of that! Just give me enough time!

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God So Loved the World

[Ancient Faith Radio; October 16, 2008]

Frederica: Well, here I am. Today I am in the back seat of a Camry (so it feels very familiar- my husband has a Camry, too). This one is a 2000 Camry, ours is a 2004, and the driver is Fr. Ted Stylianopoulos, and lovely Presvytera Faye is sitting in the front seat with him. We are leaving their cabin in the gorgeous town of Alstead, New Hampshire, where the leaves are turning, and it just looks like the glory of God ablaze in the woods here. It’s something else. So we went on a walk through their woods this morning, and feel very invigorated, yet still a little bit out of breath. I’m not in great shape here. I was saying to Fr. Ted that I’d love to interview him for the podcast, as he’s such an expert in so many things. Perhaps the Scriptures, or how the Scriptures are interpreted, Orthodox spirituality, the state of the Church- let me start, Fr. Ted, by asking, how long have you been a priest?

Fr. Ted Stylianopoulos: I was ordained a deacon on a Saturday and a priest on a Sunday back in 1965. So it’s been something like forty years plus.

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A Voice in the Public Square

[Ancient Faith Radio; October 9, 2008]

Frederica Mathewes-Green: I’m in the nave of the Church of Holy Ascension in Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina on Route 17, just north of Charleston. I’m talking with the pastor, Fr. John Parker. Tell me a little about your journey to Orthodoxy, Father, as we get started.

Fr. John Parker: Sure. Well, it all began during my Episcopal seminary experience in Ambridge, PA, when the library there had a sale on duplicate books. So they were 50 cents for paperbacks and a dollar for hardback books.

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