Baptism, Pt. 1

St. Katherine's is getting a new Priest in July and he asked us to write a "Spiritual Biography". He wanted to get a sense of the parish and how folks came to St. Katherine's.

Lance immediately said he did not want to do it. Apparently, he is not in a great place to talk about why he is at St. Katherine's.

So, I started to write a draft in my diary (which is over 10 years old and is not even half filled) and read it to Lance. We both found it funny and I thought I would share it on my blog.

I have been baptized three times.

The first I do not remember as I was a baby. My mother was Catholic when I was born and it was important to her that I be baptized. My father, apparently, raised no objections though he was Seventh-Day Adventist.

The second time I was baptized was when I was 10 or 11 years old. I do not recall the exact date, but somewhere in my mother's garage exists an embroidered handkerchief with the date. Obviously, I have lost track of it. I do remember the second baptism. I remember my father told me the parish council thought I was too young -- the SDA church typically baptizes at age 12. I remember talking to Pastor David Brass about my relationship with God. Pastor Brass is one of the nicest Pastors I knew and I will always think of him fondly. When he dunked me three times in the adult font at church, my feet rose to surface each time. My mother found this comical. I cannot quite recall who was there, but we must have had family because there was a pink iced "Congratulations" cake at the Top Gallant Court house in Houston. (We lived there while my Tio Jorge and Tia Lulu were in Kentucky -- it was their home.)

I grew up SDA and, besides an occasional Mass for a wedding or funeral on my mother's side, it was all I knew. My parents believed in God, we prayed at every meal (eaten at home or out), we attended every church service possible, and we carried our Bibles to church every Saturday. My parents were very involved in parish life -- my father on Parish Council, my mom helped with Sabbath School, and both lead the teen group until we moved to San Antonio.

No one knew my father's addiction to pornography or how I found it in second grade. So, when my father had an affair that lasted through my high school years, it came as a shock to our church community.

Dr. Flum, my OB, said once that the beginning of adolescence is when a child finally recognizes a parent's humanity -- his flaws and faults. I had my moment as a sophomore in high school and turned from God when I found out all that had happened in my parents marriage. If Christianity could not provide a stable home, I would find some other truth.

I became an atheist for the remainder of high school and when I turned 18 I no longer went to church with my parents. I volunteered at Planned Parenthood and at an event I discovered the Unitarian Church. I began to attend services and became obsessed with Transcendentalism. Having dispensed with Christianity and searching for truth, I had a natural home in the Unitarian Church.

Before my senior year, when I was 17, I traveled to Greece, Turkey, and Italy on a school trip. Outside the cave where St. John wrote the book of Revelation, I saw a young man wearing a St. John's College t-shirt. I could not believe my luck -- since Sophomore year of high school I was enamored with this college. I had read every piece of literature I could find and was determined to go there.

After being a complete nuisance and obnoxiously irreverent in the cave of St. John, I made a point of connecting with this guy. As it happened, he was Greek Orthodox. I didn't really care as my main goal was to know more about the college. Though he attended the Annapolis campus and I was interested in the Santa Fe Campus, I was so excited to meet someone and get a first hand account of what it was like. He painted an ideal picture for me and I made a point of going.

I went in October of 1997 to visit St. John's College and there in a Sophomore math class I saw the most gorgeous guy ever. He was quiet in his blue hooded sweatshirt, curly brown fro encircling his head like a halo and large glasses framing his green eyes. The Great Books Program plus the promise of cute boys was all I needed -- I applied, was accepted, and started in the fall of 1998.

About half way through Freshman year, I read Plato's dialogue "Timaeus" and began to think about God again. I had read parts of the Kabbalah before I started St. John's and decided that since Christianity had failed me, I would become Jewish. I talked to Jewish friends, attended Purim and Passover meals, and bought a menorah for Hanukkah. Still, it seemed like a majority of being Jewish was ethnicity and I didn't have that background. I wanted to be a part of some ancient tradition but was running up against a wall.

At the time I was dating a guy who converting to Catholicism -- the cute guy from the Sophomore math class was no where to be seen. I began to attend church with the Catholic Catechumen which was a huge step for me. Growing up SDA, I was warned about the Catholic Church. They worshiped idols. The Pope was just Satan in disguise. It was all very evil and suspicious and the Godfather was cited as a reference (or something written by Mario Puzo).

I actually found it quite nice. The hymns were pretty, it had an organized system for services, and I liked the religious art. The statues were a little disconcerting, as were the relics; I was beginning to like Christianity a little better though.

One day in Mass it struck me that Sunday was a celebrated day for all Christians as a commemoration of Christ's resurrection. I mentioned this to my boyfriend at the time and he replied "Um, YEH," in a rather incredulous tone.

I was, as they say, hooked after that. Many of the prayers and Saints were starting to make sense to me. I bought prayer cards of two saints -- St. Joan of Arc and St. Therese of Liseux (the little flower) -- and tried praying. I wanted God, Christ, tradition, ritual -- still something about Catholicism wasn't right. My boyfriend mentioned the "backwards cousins" to the Catholics: the Orthodox. It sounded intriguing to me.

In San Antonio I purchased a copy of The Orthodox Faith by Bishop Kallistos Ware. During Christmas break Sophomore year I began to go to Orthodox services. The biggest listing in the phone book was for Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church and I went to as many services as I could. I found a little envelope in the pews: check here for tithing, here for other gifts, check here if you are interested in learning more about the Orthodox Church. I checked the box, gave my mom's address, and read all the pamphlets they sent.

It sounded amazing, but I was going back to school and didn't know if there were any Orthodox churches in Santa Fe. I mentioned this to my boss at the time, Matt Johnston. Turned out he was a Catechumen at a local Orthodox church. It was Russian though. I hemmed and hawed about wanting to go, but I didn't want to commit. He said it was no problem, he would pick me up on Sunday. And so I went and never stopped going.

St. Juliana's Russian Orthodox Church was a ROCOR parish under Bishop Gabriel and served by Father Cyprian at the time. Father Cyprian, however, was moving back to Georgia and I would have to wait to be baptized. Still, before the summer, I was made a Catechumen. I could have chosen St. Genevieve for my patroness and kept my old name, Jennifer. But, I never really liked the name anyway. So, I chose "Juliana" because I wanted my children to know where our family became Orthodox. Not that I thought I would have children or get married -- but it like saying "when I win the Lotto" and never playing. It was just one of those things I thought.

I had been accepted to the Minority Medical Education Program in Chicago for the summer before Junior year and planned on working in Admissions half the time. I was in the office when I received a phone call from a mom frantically trying to get arrangements squared away for her son who was going to transfer from Annapolis to Santa Fe for his senior year. Parents were not supposed to call the 1-800 number, but I always disregarded this because I knew long distance rates were high.

After talking with the mom and getting the necessary information to transfer her call, I discovered her son was Phil Navarro, the guy I met outside the cave of St. John in Greece. We were both so excited to connect and she seemed really excited that I was Orthodox. "But I am in a Russian parish," I said. "Oh, it's all the same," she replied.

Matt Johnston had hired his friend Lance Kirmeyer to help out in admissions that summer. The odd thing about St. John's is you knew who everyone was even though you hadn't been introduced. Lance had said "Nice singing" to me in the cafeteria after a chamber choir concert I was in and made some sort of joke about me being bored at the front desk. And he knew my name though we hadn't met. Lance had a pretty sweet deal -- he worked Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. I didn't really care for him and it didn't seem like he cared all that much for me.

When I came back from Chicago, it was a different story altogether. I had a traumatic experience in Chicago with folks being a little gruffer than I was used to in the South/Southwest and accommodations less than ideal. Add to that an adventure finding a ROCOR parish in Des Plains and going to a fairly hostile Greek church and it made for interesting stories to share with Lance while we were stuffing envelopes. Turned out he had taken a year off after Sophomore year to travel around the world and he shared his adventures with me. And I had broken up with my boyfriend. And he had kind of stopped seeing, or at least pursuing, some girls he was interested in pursuing. And he covertly asked me out, and we stayed up all night talking, and we just kept hanging out. Once evening, about 2 am, I realized he was the guy I saw when I visited St. John's as a prospective student. After a series of questions about where he was Sophomore year, it turned out he was the guy. The guy!

Now, I was becoming Orthodox and a new priest was on the way to St. Juliana's. And Lance was very interested in me and doing things very un-Orthodox even for a Catechumen. What was I do to?

To be continued...