Fr. Daniel, please forgive me, but I spent (I won't say "wasted" but I
want to) almost 10 years of my life playing "dress up" Orthodoxy in a
group that desired the ancient faith without all that messy hard work
of actually being in organic communion within the Orthodox Church.

I don't say that is what's happening here. How could I know? But I do
know that any real and lasting work any of us do will have to be
eventually brought to the Church in communion if it is ever going to
be "fruit that remains." This "we are going to do Orthodoxy right"
mentality is absolutely a dead end. If you and your Old Catholic group
have charisms and talents, bring them to the Church. Perhaps the
Church can put them to use, but more than likely it will be as it has
been for me, a time when my own foolish notions of my gifts and
abilities will be put to the test in the fire of the hard work of
communion within the Church.

I also don't mean to engage in any lenghty discussion of the merits of
this or that vision of communion and bringing America to Orthodoxy. I
simply wish to share my own regrets for waiting so long to enter into
the hard work of communion within the Orthodox Church. The fruit that
this work has produced in my own life is worth much more than any of
the perceived "gains" I thought I had outside of the organic and
canonical communion within the Church. Please know that ever fear I
had about the Orthodox Church was well founded.

There are many within the Church who see it as nothing more than a
place to preserve yia yia's recipies and a few colorful costumes and
dance steps, or some ultimately futile attempt to pretend they don't
live where they live now. There are many within the Church, especially
here in America, who are so narrow minded that you could put out both
eyes with one bb! There are far too many who know so little about
their faith that they resort to silly nationalistic (and sometimes
racist) motivations for preserving the ancient traditions of the
faith. The sad and overwhelmingly obvious results of these weaknesses
is that these motivations will not preserve anything these folks want
to preserve. These weak motivations are, after all, too small to
preserve the timeless beauty of the Faith, and too irrelevant to keep
any of the "old world" alive. All of these fears are well founded and
certainly insist on an "eyes wide open" approach to entering the
Church.

But in spite of these very real weaknesses, there is simply no
substitute for the hard work of dealing with these shortcomings,
especially with all the benefits that come.

Because, for every narrow-minded person I have encountered in the
Orthodox Church, I have encountered a hundred sincere, faithful, and
loving believers who, through patience, compassion, and love have
guided me to a fuller understanding of the Faith. I have seen my
initial impressions of some of the ethno-centric baggage of the Church
as being too short sighted myself. I have found some of these cultural
expressions (certainly not all) to be worthy bearers of deeper truths
that have been helpful to me in deepening my own piety and faith. I
have watched as so-called "cradle" Orthodox grasp the deep healing
given to them by the Faith raise their children as committed believers
and I've watched as so-called "converts" finally see the power of
humility in living out a sense of gratitude for those who preserved
the faith so they could receive it. I have watched as young men and
women come to understand that if they first dwell deeply on the
"sublime theology" of Orthodoxy, their children will want to keep
alive those special cultural markers that allow them to display their
Orthodox faith in a healthy and welcoming way. Their children want to
learn the "language" not because of some foolish and shallow
nationalism, but because that "language" best captures the precious
nuances of the Faith they have come to love and has so transformed
their lives. It has been worth the work.

My journey isn't over, anymore than I'm sure your's is as well. Here
at seminary I am learning more than I ever dreamed, and much of that
education is occuring not in a classroom but in the daily living with
so many different people from so many different places. I have found
my worst fears and my greatest hopes both confirmed in my canonical
communion within the Church, and I wouldn't go back to my "dress up"
days for anything!