FAQ

Can I link to your post on my blog/website?

Sure, go for it. I'm flattered that anyone loves and/or hates my writing enough to want to share it.

Why won't you reply to my comment?

Because reading the comments gives me anxiety, sorry. I didn't anticipate that there would BE any comments, so I wasn't really prepared.

But wait-- if you haven't read the comments, how do you know which questions are frequently asked?

I do not. I am making all this up.

So are you afraid of debate?

Yes. I am very conflict avoidant.

Your post made me mad.

That's not really a question. But if it makes you feel better, consider that I am just a random person on the Internet with very little influence, and you have no obligation to care what I say or think.

I liked your post and it was helpful to me.

Yay! Thanks for reading! I'm glad it was helpful.

Who are you to challenge Orthodox Tradition and criticize an ordained Orthodox Priest?

Just a lady with some thoughts and a compulsion to write them down.

Are you even Orthodox?

I was Chrismated into the Orthodox Church as an adult convert, along with my husband. Our children were both Baptized in the Orthodox Church.

For pragmatic reasons that mostly have to do with our location, we do not currently attend an Orthodox church. However, Orthodoxy has profoundly impacted my understanding of Christianity, and I feel that a part of me will always love the Orthodox Church, despite the critiques I have made here.

So that's a no?

*Sigh*

Are you going to continue to write about the Orthodox Church?

I have no idea. I just write whatever I feel compelled to write.

Are you go to start posting regularly?

I have never done anything regularly, so probably not.

Oh Hey, I Still Have This Blog

Dear (Probably) Imaginary Audience,

I once again forgot, and then remembered years later, that I have this blog.

Thank you for waiting patiently for me. I like you best when you are silent and hypothetical, without judgments or expectations for regular posts. I like not knowing whether you are really there.

If I knew for sure you were real, I would be too anxious to post anything; if I knew for sure that you were imaginary, I would be disappointed.

Once, a few years ago, you became a little too real. I have to admit you scared me a bit.

So I ghosted you.

Since then, I've tried writing in a private journal, but that doesn't seem to scratch the same itch. I guess I could try the message-in-a-bottle thing, but I don't live near the ocean.

It's been a while now, and I have no reason to suppose that the people who read and commented on my posts are still lurking around.

That means you are safely imaginary again, dear reader.

It's nice to talk to you again. I think I missed you.

Grape Juice and Wafers

That’s about enough posts on sexism in Orthodox Tradition, don’t you think? Let’s turn to a more palatable topic.

No, I said palatable

Closer...

TOO FAR. GO BACK

 

Shun the apostate!

I have a confession to make. I received Communion at a Methodist church this morning. And on Orthodox Easter too! Oh how far I have strayed.

Receiving Communion at any non-Orthodox church is strictly forbidden to Orthodox Christians. That makes me officially Not In Good Standing with the Orthodox Church, in case I wasn’t already a pariah for neglecting to receive Communion for over a year, publicly criticizing a priest, and (worst of all) listening to Pussy Riot.

I guess I'm a sucker for angry female vocals

The Lord’s Snack Time

I was aware that today was Communion Sunday, but as I walked up the steps to the church I still hadn’t decided whether I was going to participate.

The Orthodox heart that still stubbornly beats in my chest suffered temporary arrhythmia the moment I entered the church, when an usher held out a basket of what I can only describe as Eucharistic snack packs.

They're only missing a trademarked cartoon character

The Communion-To-Go cups were right there in the open for anyone and everyone to grab as they walked in. The usher didn’t ask any questions about your church affiliation or whether you had fasted that morning or the state of your soul. No one’s fingers trembled as they reached into the basket.

My 5-year-old immediately wanted to eat his. The usher joked, “Sorry, you have to wait until snack time.” His joke struck me as being very close to the truth. We had to hang onto them until the end of the service, so I just set them beside me on the pew, where they sat next to my purse and the order of worship like they were ordinary objects.

Everyone was treating the Holy Gifts as if they were mere grape juice and wafers-- because, of course, that’s what they were. The Body and Blood of Christ existed only in the minds of the communicants, who saw no impropriety in their handling of the lowly, material signifier.

This anti-materialist, "symbol only" approach to Communion is not totally alien to me. I grew up in the Southern Baptist church, where the Lord's Supper usually took the form of Styrofoam-flavored discs and thimbles of grape juice served in brass trays. Individually packaged wafers and juice are just the logical next step. During the COVID-19 pandemic, sanitation concerns have greatly increased demand for these all-in-one snack packs “Fellowship Cups.”

The Mystical Supper

In contrast, Orthodox Christians believe that the Bread and Wine truly become the Body and Blood of Christ. Well, what does that even mean?

“THEY JUST DO, OK” —St. John of Damascus

Unlike Catholics, the Orthodox have no dogmatic formulation to explain exactly how the material elements of the Eucharist become the Body and Blood of Christ. They only insist that it is real, mystical, not merely symbolic.

Orthodox practice reflects this doctrine. There are a lot of rules about who may receive Communion, and when and how they may receive it. From a Protestant point of view, these rules probably seem unnecessarily restrictive; what right does the Church have to keep anyone away from the Lord's Table? From an Orthodox point of view, the rules are necessary to protect the Holy Gifts from mishandling-- and to protect would-be communicants from the spiritual and physical consequences of receiving the Holy Gifts unprepared.

A few of the rules: 

• Only members of the Orthodox Church who have recently been to Confession, have no grave unconfessed sins on their consciences, and have fasted since midnight may partake.
• No one but the priest touches the Holy Gifts with his hands. The faithful all receive from a single communal spoon, which the priest dips into the chalice containing the intermingled Bread and Wine.
• When a communicant approaches, the priest’s assistants hold a red cloth between the chalice and the communicant’s chin, lest any precious drops should fall to the floor. Proper form is to open one’s mouth wide so that the priest can transfer the Holy Gifts without actually touching the spoon to the lips.
• When all the faithful have Communed, the priest consumes what remains in the chalice. It would be unthinkable to throw it out like last week’s leftover lasagna.

 

I can hear my non-Orthodox readers saying, “One spoon? Ewww! Gross!” Indeed, the Orthodox communal spoon became a subject of controversy during the pandemic when the Orthodox Church refused to modify its practice.

Our old friend Fr. Josiah Trenham, human incarnation of the Grumpy Orthodox Cat meme, stirred the pot when he delivered a sermon condemning Orthodox who fear using the shared spoon due to COVID concerns:

[A]nd if you have a thought at all, “Oh my gosh, someone who was sick went up and took the Eucharist off the same spoon, I shouldn’t go,” banish the thought from your mind. It is a thought of unbelief sent from the devils. If you can’t banish it, by no means approach Communion, then or ever, because you are unworthy. You do not believe in the life-giving Eucharist if that is a thought that you actually embrace.

Fr. Trenham, along with several of his parishioners, later tested positive for COVID. Thanks be to God, he appears to have recovered, since he continues to post inflammatory sermons on his podcast The Arena.

That means I can make fun of him again.

As usual, Fr. Trenham’s statement was unnecessarily judgmental but otherwise not far outside standard Orthodox belief. How could the Eucharist, the Fountain of Immortality which heals our souls and bodies, transmit illness?

A devout Orthodox Christian might still wonder: does the mystical anti-microbial property of Holy Gifts extend to the spoon, the cup, the cloth, the icons, and the cheeks of our fellow parishioners?

 

The Orthodox really like to kiss stuff

 

Is there no room for altering non-essential aspects of Church practice without denying the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist? Some Orthodox argue that there is, noting that Orthodox practice (not doctrine) regarding the Eucharist has evolved throughout the Church’s history to meet the needs of the time.

So, who’s right?

If you’re asking which form of Holy Communion the Lord prefers, heck if I know. I hope, in any case, that He forgives us for imperfect celebration of His Sacraments, or else we are all in trouble.

As an English Lit major, though, I can't help but critique the symbolism embedded in the various Eucharistic forms. I think symbolism matters, whether in a novel, a poem, or real life. I think it works on us whether we know it or not, and whether the symbolism is intentional or not.

I think the symbolism of the wafers and juice thimbles is all wrong. The Lord’s Lunchables Fellowship Cups are even worse. I understand the pragmatic appeal, but they're individualistic and sterile, the very opposite of communal. We the Universal Church are supposed to be one Body— Christ’s Body.

I consumed my merely symbolic grape juice and wafer today, anyway. Grumpy Orthodox Cat would definitely disapprove. But I hope God will be pleased that, after a year of abstaining from Communion, I tried to find a way back to His Table—however hesitantly I did it and however inelegant the form. I’d like to believe that our Lord, Who descended all the way down to Hell and conquered it, can reach me where I am.

Surely this Methodist church is at least a few levels above Hell?

Kidding. I really like this new church we been visiting, despite their cringey Dunkaroos Fellowship Cups. They have an organ and they play traditional hymns.

I can deal with the snack packs as long as I get to sing “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today” on Easter

Good Bread

Christian belief and practice is diverse, so I’m sure there are many methods of celebrating Communion besides the ones at Orthodox, Methodist, and Baptist churches that I’ve attended.

I once got a taste of an entirely different Communion service when I was a volunteer in a Catholic Worker soup kitchen. It was the last time I received Communion outside of an Orthodox Church, up until today. Despite the name, the organization was not particularly Catholic. What I remember most vividly is the bread: a big, round, marbled loaf fresh from the soup kitchen’s oven. We passed it around and tore off chunks with our hands.

In retrospect, I think this experience combined the openness of the Methodist Communion with the solemnity of the Orthodox Eucharist. I touched the Bread with my own bare hands, but I believed it was more than just bread. No one demanded proof of membership, but I felt connected with everyone else there. We were literally breaking bread, eating from the same loaf. It probably helped that we were all there laboring together in Christian service.

I think the bread itself had something to do with why this experience of Communion was so powerful to me. It mattered that the bread was GOOD bread. When Jesus performed His first miracle, He didn’t just turn water into wine— He turned it into GOOD wine. The wedding guests had already gotten sloshed on Barefoot when He brought out the Louis Jadot. (That’s the fanciest wine label I know of, sorry. You get the point.)

I’m just saying, if Christ Himself has good taste, maybe we should too. Good bread might be good for our souls.

The Social Contract of Thrift Stores: Do Resellers Go to the Bad Place?

In which we decide the eternal fate of Macklemore’s soul

I scored big at my local thrift store today. I found a gallon Ziplock bag stuffed full of L.O.L. dolls and accessories. If you have a daughter under age 14, you’re well aware that a 3-inch L.O.L. doll in its original (and excessive) packaging costs around $12. Since the dolls are a “surprise” (a nifty Skinner Box trick that compels people to keep buying and buying in hopes of completing their collection), people frequently resell duplicate dolls for around $10 each.

And I got the whole bag for 50 cents.

If I were a reseller— someone who scours thrift stores for hidden gems in order to resell them at a huge profit— I could have made upwards of $100 from this find. But I’m not. I just want to bribe my stubborn 3-year-old to poop in the potty.

Right after I made this fortuitous discovery, an old guy started chatting with me about the comparative merits of the local thrift shops. I like talking with weirdly enthusiastic strangers, so I didn’t mind. Midway through the conversation, though, he casually mentioned that he is a reseller.

Now, I am a very nice person. If someone unexpectedly revealed to me that they were a convicted murderer, I would tilt my head sympathetically and say, “That must be hard.” So I did not tell this man that he is a leech on society, the trailer-trash equivalent of a hedge fund manager who moves money around the stock market but contributes nothing of practical value to humanity.

I have no idea what hedge fund managers actually do, but I’m pretty sure I don’t approve of it.

There he was, scrounging around in the kitchenware section amongst the mismatched utensils and the knob-operated microwaves, while I had a hundred bucks in glittery baby-sexpot dolls in my cart. If he only knew what I snatched right from under his nose! He lacked the expertise necessary to recognize the dolls’ value, expertise which only comes from the lived experience of trying so desperately to appease a fiery 21st-century girl-dragon that you abandon all your pre-parenthood ideals about feminist toys.

I’m just really tired of cleaning up poop, OKAY?

The very pressing question I wish to address is this: what is the social contract of thrift stores? And do resellers violate it?

I’m no expert in social contract theory, but I did skim a Wikipedia article about it a few minutes ago. I’ve also watched The Good Place several times, so I’m familiar with Chidi’s summary of T. M. Scanlon’s book What We Owe to Each Other.

I think it had something to do with chili recipes.

To begin, we might ask, for whom do thrift stores exist? When I first started thrifting, I felt a little guilty about it because I wasn’t sure it was meant for me. I grew up as a member of the socioeconomic class that only donated to thrift stores. We certainly never shopped there, except perhaps to piece together a hobo costume for Halloween. Goodwill was the place you dropped off all your old junk when your mom went into a Spring Cleaning frenzy. We felt very good about giving our junk to The Poor who, if not for our generosity, would probably have to fashion loincloths out of dirty McDonald’s bags they found beside the highway

I don’t exactly need to shop at a thrift store. I could supply the necessities of life for my family by shopping at the mall, or at least at Target. But I like it. It allows me to indulge my consumerist impulses without aggravating the husband too much. (His main complaint is that our house becomes cluttered with thrifted toys and decorations, so our agreement is that I have to donate as much as I buy. I don’t do a great job of sticking to this agreement.) I also love the thrill of a good find. It’s the closest a housewife can get to digging up pirate treasure.

Yarrr! ‘Tis a genuine Lacoste polo in 4T!

I instinctively dislike resellers because their interests run counter to mine. They take the good stuff before I can get to it. I find time to go thrifting maybe once a week, and then I only have time to visit one or two shops. I search the specific sections where I hope to find items of use or enjoyment for myself and my family. The serious resellers are there every day. They know which shops have the best selections of which items, and they know when the sales are. They search the whole place and fill their carts with anything they can hock on Facebook Marketplace. Aren’t my motives purer than theirs?

If the purpose of thrift stores is to clothe the naked, as some donors suppose, then both I and the resellers are in violation of the social contract. If that purpose extends to anyone who thrifts items for their own personal use—including middle-class housewives—then I’m in the clear, while resellers are still bound for an eternity of butthole spiders and penis-flatteners.

You’re going to miss a lot of my references if you haven’t watched The Good Place, sorry.

Maybe this theory is all wrong, though. Maybe thrift stores don’t exist for the poor at all. Maybe they exist to give us a place to dump our junk without feeling guilty about our own wastefulness.

In that case, it doesn’t really matter what we do with the detritus of consumerism. If we put it to any use at all, that is noble and rebellious, a slightly more sanitary version of Dumpster diving.

Slightly

Perhaps resellers take maximum advantage of the wasteful rich by turning around and selling their own trash back to them.

To be fair, thrift stores often give part of their proceeds to charity. There is a grain of truth in the humanitarian fantasy of thrift store donors. They think they are clothing the naked with their outgrown Lululemon leggings, when actually they are clothing me, while only incidentally providing the homeless with a fraction of a bowl of soup and a free Bible. This veneer of charity can be pretty thin. Some thrift stores are for-profit businesses that exaggerate their charitable mission in order to provide a warm-fuzzy incentive to their customers.

I do think supporting thrift stores through donations AND shopping--moreso the shopping--is morally good, but not because they clothe the naked and feed the hungry. It's because they provide a buffer between the back of your closet and the landfill. They give us the chance to rescue valuable items from the trash and reduce our demand for new goods.

Maybe I and the resellers are violating the social contract that donors believe they are entering when they magnanimously deposit their trash bags full of mangy stuffed animals and "skinny clothes" they've given up ever wearing again at the back door of the Salvation Army. But it's a social contract based on a false premise of the true function of thrift stores, so I don't really care.

This brings us to the most important question: where will Macklemore’s soul spend eternity?

Let’s take a closer look at the lyrics of “Thrift Shop.”

Draped in a leopard mink, girls standin' next to me
Probably shoulda washed this, smells like R. Kelly's sheets
(Piss)
But shit, it was ninety-nine cents! (Bag it) Coppin' it, washin' it
'Bout to go and get some compliments
Passin' up on those moccasins someone else's been walkin' in them
Bummy and grungy, fuck it man, I am stuntin' and flossin' and
And savin' my money and I'm hella happy that's a bargain, bitch

 [ . . . ]

Thank your granddad for donating that plaid button-up shirt
'Cause right now I'm up in her skirt

In these passages, the speaker reveals that his motivation for thrift shopping is to attract members of the opposite sex with his original style while saving money.

But that’s not his only objective:

I could take some Pro Wings, make them cool, sell those
The sneaker heads would be like Aw, he got the Velcros

Although the speaker seems primarily interested in thrifting items for his own personal use, he doesn’t hesitate to use his street-fashion savvy to refurbish and resell his finds for a profit.

Macklemore is both a personal-use thrifter AND a reseller.

Towards the end, he reveals another, more political purpose to his thrifting:

They be like, Oh, that Gucci. That's hella tight
I'm like, Yo that's fifty dollars for a T-shirt
Limited edition, let's do some simple addition
Fifty dollars for a T-shirt, that's just some ignorant bitch (Shit)
I call that getting swindled and pimped (Shit)
I call that getting tricked by a business
That shirt's hella dope
And having the same one as six other people in this club is a hella don't
Peep game, come take a look through my telescope
Trying to get girls from a brand? Then you hella won't
Then you hella won't 

Watch the music video if you somehow haven’t already. Observe his jubilance as he bounds across tufted armchairs, his fur coat streaming majestically behind him. This is a man who has tapped into the deep heart of thrifting and found a well of joy. We should heed his wisdom.

Housewives, resellers, frugal fashion visionaries: we all engage in a radical and commendable act when we find value in the debris of our throwaway culture.

Conclusion: Macklemore belongs in the Good Place.

Ora pro nobis 

Anyway, this is what I like to believe, because it makes me feel better about all the thrifted L.O.L doll accessories littering my living room floor.

On the Ever-Virginity of Mary

In Orthodox iconography, the three stars on Mary's veil represent her virginity before, during, and after the Nativity of Christ

 

Given my past writings, you might expect me to reject the Orthodox doctrine of the Ever-Virginity of Mary. In my post The Problem with Orthodox Tradition on Female Virginity, I argued that the Church's obsession with the virginal status of female (and only female) saints is fetishistic and demeaning. You might infer that Mary is another saint in this category--perhaps even the quintessential example.

But I think Mary is different. There are reasons besides misogyny why Christians up until the Protestant Reformation universally affirmed her Perpetual Virginity. I would like to explain why this doctrine makes sense to me, despite all my skepticism about Orthodox Tradition around women and virginity.

But the Bible says...

Many Protestants point to the supposed references in the Bible to Mary's other children, Jesus' "brothers." Orthodox and Catholic apologists, in turn, have disputed Protestant interpretations of these verses. The disagreement hinges on the Greek word adelphos, often translated as "brother," which in other places in the Bible clearly conveys the looser meaning of "male relative." I have no scholarly insight to add to this argument.

No, there is no Bible verse that directly states that Mary remained a virgin throughout her life. I can't prove it to you by simple citation.

Instead, I will argue from this fundamental Christian premise: the Word became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14). One need not be Orthodox or Catholic to follow my argument, only to accept this basic tenet.

 

Why not?

Why shouldn't Mary have lived a normal married life after Jesus' birth? By insisting on her Ever-Virginity, aren't Catholics and Orthodox implying there is something wrong with sex in marriage? What about poor Joseph?

 

Won't somebody think of St. Joseph?!

 

 

There are bad reasons for believing Mary had to be Ever-Virgin. Disgust for non-virginal women is a bad reason. But that doesn't mean there can't be a good reason.

The good reason has everything to do with the Incarnation of Christ and how that event transformed our material world, including and especially the woman who bore him. Mary could never be a normal married woman after she became the Theotokos, the God-Bearer, the one human being from whom the Eternal Son of God took flesh.

 

The Tomb was just some rocks?

Suppose, Christian reader, you knew for certain the location of the real Tomb of Christ. Suppose you could touch the stone that was rolled away, walk inside, touch the slab where the Lord's body rested.

Would you fall to your knees and weep? Would you kiss the rocks? Would you pray? Would you cover your face in awe and terror at the realization that you, a sinner, are in the very place where the Son of God conquered death?

The first Christians did know the location of Christ's Tomb, since they were the ones who laid his body in it. Perhaps Joseph of Arimathea, upon finding the tomb available again, decided to reclaim it as his own future burial place. What could be wrong about that? After all, Jesus wasn't using it anymore. It would be a shame to let a perfectly good tomb go to waste. Tombs were expensive! Rocks are just rocks. Who would care?

By the way, some Christians do believe they know the location of real Tomb. They built a church over it, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and it is a pilgrimage site for tens of thousands of faithful every year.

A lot of fuss over some rocks

The Cross was just wood?

Suppose you found yourself standing before the Cross-- the real, physical, wooden structure upon which Jesus died for our salvation.

Would you throw yourself prostrate before it?

Or would you merely see wood-- a potentially useful raw material? Perhaps it could be used in the construction of a new house, or chopped up for firewood.

 

Or turned into toothpicks

Mary was just a woman?

There is nothing wrong with burying the dead. There is nothing wrong with using wood to make things that humans need. These are good things.

There is something wrong, however, with taking something incredibly sacred and using it like any other ordinary object.

If rock and wood can be holy, why not a woman?

There is nothing wrong with a woman having marital relations with her husband. This is a good thing. But Mary was no ordinary woman, just as the Tomb was no ordinary bunch of rocks, and just as the Cross was no ordinary wood.

Moreover, unlike rock and wood, Mary was not an inanimate object. The Tomb and the Cross did not willingly consent to participate in the salvation of mankind. Mary did.

"Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word" (Luke 1:38)

One last thought experiment.

Suppose, Christian reader, you find yourself standing before the Mother of your Lord. It is really her, physically there in front of you. Her face, her hair, her hands. You can recognize her Son's likeness in her features-- or rather, you can recognize her likeness in His features, since He inherited His humanity from her. This is she, Theotokos, God-Bearer, Ark of the New Covenant, whose body grew and carried and birthed and nursed the Savior of Mankind, she who loved Him first and best.

Will you greet her as you would any ordinary woman?

 

Review: "The Good Wife as the Help-Mate" (The Good Wife, Part 1)

The creation of Eve

This is Part 1 of my review of “The Good Wife,” a 5-part lecture series by the influential American Orthodox priest Fr. Josiah Trenham. You can read my introduction post here. The first lecture, “The Good Wife as the Help-Mate,” focuses on the role of a wife as a subordinate helper to her husband. This is the only lecture in the series you can hear for free.

In this lecture, Fr. Trenham* offers a theological justification for male supremacy—to use his preferred terms, male "primacy" or "headship." He then outlines practical ways that the God-ordained gender hierarchy manifests itself in a good Christian marriage.

The doctrine of male headship is inescapable in Orthodoxy; after all, the Church only ordains men to the priesthood. Still, Fr. Trenham's extreme views on gender roles go far beyond the current norms of Orthodox Christian belief and practice.

Fr. Trenham begins his lecture by examining the Genesis 2 account of the creation of Adam and Eve. The origin of man and woman, he argues, is the basis for the hierarchical relationship between them (For those following along with the recording, I’ll cite the start time of each excerpt in parentheses):

(6:40) Here in the creation of primordial man and woman, according to the account of our most fundamental sacred text, we see the primacy of man, of the male sex, in the created order. We see the origin of the man and the origin of woman: man first and from the earth, woman second and from the rib of man. Here we see the fundamental realities of marriage and the relationship of man and woman in marriage. Adam was primary. He was created first, and Eve second. Man was not created for Eve, but rather Eve was created for Adam [. . .] Woman is not man’s vocation. Man already had received his vocation: to be fruitful and multiply, to fill the Earth, and to rule it, and to subdue it. Woman was created to be the one and unique means of Man accomplishing his vocation, the one and unique helper in Man's work, the Help-Mate.

Man’s purpose preceded and is independent of woman, while woman's purpose exists only in relation to man. Fr. Trenham appears to forget that God gave the command “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it” to both Adam and Eve (Genesis 1:28).

He continues his argument for male primacy based on creational order, quoting from St. Paul’s letters:

(7:50) And this primacy of man in creation is something that St. Paul appeals to several times in his letters. He writes in his first letter to the Corinthians, “Man is the head of woman, and God is the head of Christ. Man does not originate from woman, but woman from man. For indeed, man was not created for the woman’s sake, but woman for the man’s sake.”

(8:39) This order in creation also provides an order for interaction between the sexes in chronological time. For instance, St. Paul writes in his first letter to Timothy, “I do not allow a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man, but to remain quiet, for it was Adam who was first created, and then Eve.” Here the creational order is what lies behind the fact that in marriage the husband is the head of the family.

Fr. Trenham then gives a practical application of man’s headship, describing with surprising explicitness the proper sexual dynamic between husbands and wives:

(9:20) The man shows his headship in courtship by taking the initiative to leave his father and mother and to cleave to his wife. He takes initiative in conjugal union by joining himself to the woman to become one flesh with her. He is her pursuer. He exercises his headship in marriage by being a leader, and the corresponding reality for the woman, who St. Paul says is the “glory of man,” is to be the one and only unique help-mate of the man, the one to register and receive his pursuits, to be his final earthly destination after he has left his parents, the one to receive the august embraces in conjugal union, to partner with and enable and facilitate man in his vocation so that the new reality of their union in the governance of the earth is “very good.” [Emphasis mine.]

Translation: No topping, ladies.

In Fr. Trenham’s view, the act of intercourse is an expression of woman’s subordination to man. Paradoxically, this view places him in the company of radical feminists like Andrea Dworkin. The key difference is that Fr. Trenham believes the sexual subordination of women to be proper and good. A good wife, per his definition, yields to her husband’s passion. It is not her place to initiate sex (and in a later lecture, “The Good Wife as the Lover and the Healing Potent Drug," he will argue that it is not her place to resist her husband's advances, either).

Fr. Trenham compares the authority of a husband to that of a monarch:

(19:37) St. John Chrysostom says, “There is no democracy in the Christian home.” In general, the Holy Fathers were not fans of democracy. Rather the Christian home must, in John Chrysostom’s words, be a “benevolent monarchy,” a monarkhia, quote, “in order that the one might be subject and the other rule, for equality is oftentimes the mother of strife.”

If the husband rules as a monarch, are there any limits to his authority over his wife? Fr. Trenham assures his female listeners that “no domestic violence is tolerated by Christ” (23:01), but he undercuts this assurance by repeatedly asserting that a wife must obey her husband regardless of his behavior:

(25:14) Listen to the words of St. Peter in his first epistle: “You wives, be submissive to your own husbands so that if any of them are disobedient to the Word, they may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives as they observe your chaste and respectful behavior.”

Wow! That’s 1 Peter 3. Here, besides the universal apostolic call to wives to obey their husbands, St. Peter posits the immense power of wifely obedience. The obedience of the wife is so powerful that it’s actually able to win a disobedient husband to obedience to God without speech. This is the power of the feminine submissive spirit that is so influential over men.

Men don’t care about fighting women. Men like to fight. Men are used to blood, men are used to fights. If their woman becomes a man by fighting with him, it means nothing to him. But a woman enduring him, exercising holy patience and submission, can absolutely change his life. This is what St. Peter says. That’s how powerful a woman’s obedience is, that it triumphs over a bad husband’s disobedience and alters him, literally alters him.

(27:37) This wifely obedience and powerful virtue is especially tested and demonstrated when the husband tempts the wife by his own arrogance, by his pride, or by a tyrannical spirit, or sometimes by his own irresponsibility or even radical incompetence which might even threaten the safety of the family, or the well-being of the family in various ways. We men can do all of these things fairly easily. It’s at times like that when the good wife manifests her character by refusing to act in the face of her husband’s craziness, by refusing to act as her husband’s head, or as his teacher and judge. The good wife does not fight with her husband, she does not raise her voice against him, as though she is his head, or as though they’re co-heads. There are no co-heads. To do so is a sure and certain and certain way to cause the husband to react even worse, and to disdain whatever of importance the wife may be attempting to communicate to him.

(31:00) For a husband to unjustly yell at his wife is horrible, no doubt. But, sisters, it’s not as horrible as a wife yelling at her husband. Those are not equal acts. It is a much more serious thing for a wife to yell at her husband, especially if there are children, because the very structure and the very order of the home is completely overturned in the latter case. The good wife must seek to win her husband by her gentle and quiet spirit and without words. [Emphasis mine. Perhaps it is not horrible for a husband to yell at his wife justly?]

(34:32) The good wife obeys and submits to her husband at all times. This is where her true power and her influence lies. And it takes a lot of courage and a lot of trust in God to do this.

There is no check against a husband’s abuse of power, except the hope that his wife’s silent obedience will somehow change his behavior. It’s not clear at what point, if any, domestic abuse becomes severe enough to justify a wife’s leaving her husband. Indeed, submission to a “tyrannical” husband is, according to Fr. Trenham, the greatest demonstration of feminine power and virtue. Surely a faithful Christian woman would not run from such an opportunity to “manifest her character” as a good wife and to display her “courage” and “trust in God.”

Fr. Trenham continues, offering a breathtaking litany of the practical duties of a good wife:

(38:09) The good wife is the helper of her husband. She enhances him, she strengthens him, she nourishes him, she feeds him—this is one of the central functions of a wife, and how she can save her husband, is that she lovingly feeds him so that he doesn’t destroy himself by not eating, or by eating too much, or the wrong things, because he’s not even thinking about what he’s eating.

She adds value to his life. She contributes value to his work. Her presence energizes him, her presence comforts him. She’s at his side at important moments when he absolutely needs her. She dignifies him, she encourages him, she delights him, she cheers him, she sobers him, she calms him. She clothes him, she oversees his health, she ensures his sleep. She tames him sexually. She teaches him fidelity. She becomes involved and interested in his vocation. She helps him to find and fulfill new vocations [. . .] She counsels him. She listens to him. She calls him by such beautiful and powerful wifeliness to become a good man and a devoted husband and father.

(40:31) She also is the mother of his children [. . .] Yes, motherhood is at the heart of this help-mate role, for sure, since multiplication is the fundamental vocation of Adam. But it is not first. Being a wife is first.

(41:18) The wife also practically helps him by managing not just his children, but the whole household. She is the steward of the home.

Joan put it more succinctly in the first episode of Mad Men: "Most of the time they're looking for something between a mother and a waitress. And the rest of the time, well..."

 

Joan Harris, Orthodox theologian

Fr. Trenham's Good Wife is one who submits her entire self to her husband. Her purpose is to support his purpose. She is utterly secondary.

There are also things a Good Wife never does, Fr. Trenham instructs us:

(41:27) And she doesn’t shame her husband. Women can be smarter, they can be more pious, they can be more talented, they can be more able in every way, they can even be better at doing the very job their husband does outside the home [. . .] None of these are in any way inconsistent with a wife being a help-mate or in any way justify stealing a man’s role as the leader and head of his home. Just because the wife could do it better doesn’t mean she should do it. Just because she’s smarter doesn’t mean she should always be showing him that.

I wonder how Fr. Trenham squares this opinion with the Parable of the Talents, in which Jesus warns of the dire consequences awaiting those who neglect to use their God-given abilities.

He concludes his lecture with a diatribe against feminism and the evils it has brought upon society, including contraception, lesbianism, daycare, and shoulder pads.

Look what you've done, feminists. Look. What. You've. Done.

On a slightly less humorous note, he also asserts that "The whole date rape thing is very much the fruit of the feminist advance," because promiscuous women have caused men to lose control of their sexual aggression (58:13).

You may wonder how Fr. Trenham’s worldview ever appealed to someone like me, a college-educated millennial woman steeped in feminist theory. In short, here’s how: Fr. Trenham acknowledged all of the nagging fears that lay buried at the root of my feminism. Why had men dominated the arts, the sciences, politics, and every other field of intellectual achievement in almost every culture since the beginning of history? Why was it still so hard to achieve gender equality after decades of feminist progress? And the most disturbing and personal question of all: why did sex feel like humiliation? That feeling was not always predominant in my mind, but I had a vague and persistent sense that sex was a power struggle I was biologically destined to lose. Feminism, particularly radical feminism, answered all of those questions, but its answers left me in a state of hopeless rage. Fr. Trenham (and other conservative Orthodox thinkers) gave me an alternative explanation: women's historical and current subjugation was inevitable, natural, and good. Our position as men's subordinates was our divinely ordained rank in the cosmological hierarchy. I could embrace a submissive gender role without shame, knowing I was fulfilling my God-given vocation to be a help-mate. Instead of being a perpetually enraged feminist, I could be a saint.

St. Keela the Vanquisher of Feminism

It sort of worked for a while. I felt less angry. I got a bit obsessed with wearing headscarves to Church and even wore them outside of Church for a while. The Christian rationale for female head covering, according to St. Paul, is to symbolize man's authority over woman (1 Corinthians 11:2-16). I think I believed that if I embraced the symbol hard enough, I would eventually grow comfortable with the meaning behind it. I threw myself into the all-consuming work of a stay-at-home mother and felt very satisfied with the coherence between my lifestyle and my belief system. Whatever frustrations I felt with my role I attributed to sinful pride and the lingering influence of feminism.

But the relative peace of soul didn’t last, because I could never quite shake the shame I felt at the idea that God created women inherently inferior to men—inferior, in the sense synonymous with subordinate, "of a lower station or rank." I also suspected that the other sense of inferior applied: "less important, valuable, or worthy." Proponents of male headship try very hard to deny that the first sense implies the second. They argue that women are in some abstract, metaphysical sense equal in value to men, even though they say women were created for the express purpose of serving as men's assistants. Adam was the pinnacle of God's creation; Eve was the helper to the pinnacle of God's creation. Am I supposed to believe those two roles are of equal worth?

Congratulations, you've been awarded the position of Assistant to the Regional Manager for all time.

None of this was my husband’s fault, by the way. It was I, not he, who embraced Fr. Trenham’s reactionary version of Orthodoxy. Nevertheless, I made him into an authority figure he never asked to be, and it was tempting to blame him when I chafed against my self-imposed bonds. My effort to become a Good Wife backfired, straining my marriage instead of strengthening it. As it turns out, silent submission is NOT a great way to influence your husband's behavior, but it is a pretty good way to build up resentment. If none of my other objections to Fr. Trenham's arguments stick, the simple fact that his principles did not work in practice ought to cast doubt on them.

As you might have noticed, I have not addressed the question of whether Fr. Trenham's views on male primacy represent "True Orthodoxy." It will be clear to anyone within the Church that his views do not represent the common practice of Orthodox Christians, but that's not really the same thing. Most Orthodox Christians don't follow the fasting rules or show up on time to Liturgy, either. The truth is, I'm not prepared to say what is or is not "True Orthodoxy." All I can say is that if Fr. Trenham's arguments in this lecture are legitimately Orthodox, there's no path for me back to the Church.

*It is common in the Orthodox Church to address priests by the title "Father" and their first names. The usual form of address felt too familiar for the purposes of this review, so I instead refer to Fr. Josiah Trenham as Fr. Trenham.