Seraphim Rose and the Church that Never Was
I have been re-reading Damascene's Father Seraphim Rose: His Life and Works, and I find it once again encouraging/pushing me towards a much more serious Christian practice. I had for a moment or two last night a vision of trying to rebuild Holy Britain--and did those feet +Our Lady of Glastonbury+Our Lady of Walsingham--in the contemporary Disunited States. I found what seemed to be a wonderful Church of St. Brendan on a cliff overlooking the Atlantic. But it was a computer rendering.
Which makes me wonder how much of Seraphim's work was about recreating a Russia that was if not computer-generated, largely memory-generated. I do indeed think that it existed, but whether that kind of Christianity is what might save North America, I'm not sure. I do love the feel of St. Herman's however, and there are many biographies of recent/contemporary saints in that tradition, and that living connection is what seems to be missing in Holy Britain. The closest I can think of at once is Michael Ramsey. Memory is probably a better guide than computer simulation.
So. Here i sit, at my little flickering screen in a tin can on the edge of nowhere, with rain falling on the roof as I drink another cup of instant coffee and probably think of things much too high for me. I can't help but feel great remorse for a life spent erratically, a life with a scattered vision. Can I do more now than just say 'Lord Jesus Christ, son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner'? That is of course what I must always say. But what might be the answer in my old age.
