Moving to Orthodoxy
What happened to Elke along the journey?
On Epiphany Sunday, January 8, 2023, after 45 years as an Evangelical believer, I was chrismated, i.e., I was anointed with the Holy Myron oil as a confirmation of the Holy Spirit by Abuna (Father) Zmargdos at St. Mary’s Syriac Orthodox Church in Glendale, Arizona, and became a member of the Syriac Orthodox Church of Antioch, the second-oldest church after the Church of Jerusalem. Acts 11:26 describes that the believers were first called Christians in Antioch.
Several friends have been enthusiastically supporting me in this journey toward Orthodoxy. Others have directly or privately asked “why,” assuming I am walking away from biblical faith. It is time to explain. Still others have begun to ignore me or maybe have written me off. To explain my journey to Orthodoxy, I decided to write down some of the key moments.
I started my Ph.D. in Intercultural Studies at Columbia International University in August 2021. After some deliberation, I settled on studying the Aramean families of the Syriac Orthodox faith in Germany, originating from the Tur Abdin region in southeast Turkey, and the faith development of their second and third generations born in Germany. When I began, I knew close to nothing about this faith community and the particulars of their faith. However, I also knew that as a missiologist, I would have to figure out how to share Christ in this community.
I live in northern Arizona. However, my research group lives in Germany. How could I best reach them? There are 1,500 Aramean families in and around my hometown of Gießen, Germany. As soon as my sister, who still lives there, found out about my research, she set out to find me interview partners in the Aramean community. Through the very first one, a sweet and kind owner of an ice cream shop, I was led to Deacon Yuhanun Savci at Mor Had Bschabo Church in Pohlheim-Hausen, where my sister lives.
A few short days later, I met Deacon Yuhanun at the church. We had a wonderful time learning a bit about each other, and he then proceeded to answer my interview questions and give me a tour of the church. I walked away feeling confident that I had started my interview series off with the best person I could have begun with. I found a man of profound faith and incredible knowledge about the Bible and the Syriac Orthodox Church. A short while later, Deacon Yuhanun, a religion teacher at local schools during his work week, showed up at my sister’s house with a whole pile of sheets his students had answered from the interview questions I had shared with him. Reading through their anonymous replies, I learned even more.
On one of the following days, I was invited to the church for church choir practice (the choir is made up of young girls and women). It was a slow night due to some miscommunication, but I was able to speak with two of the women there and gain even more insights. More importantly, I met Sare Aksoy there for the first time. Immediately, I realized I had found a woman on my spiritual wavelength. I could have spoken with her all night about her deep and abiding faith. But, alas, Deacon Yuhanun had a meeting with some of the church's men, and we had to stop chatting. I walked home profoundly impacted by the most wonderful expression of love for Christ I had just encountered.
Frankly, I wasn’t expecting this. I had expected rote prayers and traditions, but not much “live” faith. Come to find out over the next few months how incredibly mistaken I was and how many caricatures I had drawn of Orthodox Christians. I had simply bitten off and swallowed hook, line, and sinker what my negative memories of the Catholic Church I grew up in had left me with. Yet, if I was honest, during my bachelor’s degree work at Providence College, I had already met Catholic priests and nuns who didn’t fit those caricature molds.
Deacon Yuhanun took an enormous amount of time after my return to the US to answer my questions. He also countered my needling of what I still perceived to be erroneous teachings with great patience. Take for example my questioning the Syriac Orthodox “worship of Mary.” Without missing a beat, he carefully explained that the Orthodox faithful do not worship Mary but venerate her—a juxtaposed concept. Worship was reserved for the triune God alone, as Deacon Yuhanun explained. Mary was venerated, meaning she was elevated due to her role as the Yoldath Aloho, literally the “Birth Giver of God.” Mary is called Theotokos in the Eastern Orthodox world.
The Orthodox believers saw her as both alive with Christ and in the role of the Queen Mother. For anyone who has studied the Old Testament, the role of Queen Mother is abundantly clear in the lineages of the kings of Israel and Judah. The wife/wives of the king were not nearly as visible in government affairs as the mother of the king. Little by little, and with great patience, Deacon Yuhanun dismantled the arguments I had. He took me back to Scripture. He pointed out what the Church Fathers had written.
Upon returning to the US, I also started thinking about my prejudices toward Orthodoxy. They began when I married Nick, and the Greek Orthodox worship I sporadically encountered seemed stiff and not Spirit-led. (Nick left Orthodoxy behind when we married, but has also recently returned to his Greek Orthodox roots.) Not to mention that I couldn’t understand a word. Now, I wanted to think about this afresh. Deacon Yuhanun had made me pause and think for sure. Lots of prayers and Bible reading went into the next weeks. I also found a reference to an older book by Mark Shea entitled “By What Authority.” I purchased it used for a couple of bucks and literally devoured it. Mark came from Evangelicalism and wound up Catholic. His conclusions rattled my world. Like Lee Strobel did in “The Case for Christ,” Mark set up his investigation very methodically and almost lawyer-like, and his analysis was thorough. His starting point was questioning the role of tradition, and reading his book made it clear that I believed in and was supportive of tradition without realizing it.
I had recently re-read the Didache, probably the oldest patristic document. The Didache (“Teaching”) is the short name of a Christian manual compiled before A.D. 300—and most likely in the late first or early second century. The full title is The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles. I realized how much of what I as a Christian believe in the pro-life realm stems straight out of the writings there, much more so than from the actual pages of Scripture. This was just one example that had me revisit the Church Fathers’ writings. I came to realize that my reading of the Church Fathers in seminary was always very selective and limited to what supports what I now call “the Protestant narrative.” Reading the Church Fathers afresh made it abundantly clear how many pieces were missing from that reading, e.g., the clearly defined church hierarchies and apostolic succession already visible shortly after Christ and, in several cases, before the canon of Scripture was settled.
As my head was spinning from all this new knowledge, my heart craved to participate in Orthodox worship. I realized how the mystery of God is so prominent in the liturgy, and I truly craved to know God more in this mystical manner. I couldn’t understand the Syriac liturgy, but Deacon Yuhanun kept supplying me with PDF files I could study offline to be able to follow along. Very quickly, it was obvious that not only was the liturgy used ancient, but that it was completely based on Scripture. There simply was no disconnect between tradition and Scripture. Tradition was always confirmed by Scripture.
On another visit to Germany, I got to meet Mor Philoxenus Mattias Nayis, the Archbishop of the Syriac Orthodox Church in Germany. Deacon Yuhanun took Sare and me up to Warburg to Dayro d’Mor Jakob, the monastery of St. Jakob of Sarug and seat of the archdiocese of Germany. Meeting Sayedna (the archbishop) was yet another moment that made it abundantly clear that I am dealing with a Christian of deep and profound faith, a man who exudes Christ’s love and peace in all his communication. I could participate in the evening prayers at the monastery, and it was probably at that moment that my heart was sealed to accept the truth of the ancient Orthodox faith, rooted in Christ Jesus alone.
A few days before, another encounter helped me on my way. I drove to the Coptic St. Antonius Monastery in Kröffelbach, Germany, at the recommendation of Deacon Yuhanun. There I met Abuna Makarius, a Coptic monk who had been at the monastery since 1998. Abuna Makarius answered many of my questions, again pointing me to Christ with every reply. He explained the veneration of Mary and the saints to me again. They represent the Church Triumphant, those who have gone before us to be with Christ. We, the Church Militant, remain. The Church Triumphant is the “cloud of witnesses,” cheering us on, that we read about in the book of Hebrews. They are there to pray with us for what our hearts demand us to pray for. It is like asking your friend to pray with you for something. In the same manner, the Orthodox faith sees the departed saints as alive with Christ and perfectly capable of praying with us. They are not the ones that prayers are directed at; rather, they, like our friend here alive with us on earth, plead our case with us before Christ. There is no mediator between God and man other than the Man Christ Jesus. But a group of friends with influence in the high places certainly don’t hurt! If a prayer is fulfilled, the praise still goes to God.
Abuna Makarius sent me off with a stash of books, most of which were written by the late Pope Shenouda III, the Coptic patriarch who died in 2012. He was a prolific and deep writer, and his books helped further answer questions. Pope Shenouda wrote a comparative theology that was extremely helpful. With every topic questioned by Protestants in Egypt, he showed where the biblical support came from. Another book Abuna Makarius gave me discussed the role of the priesthood. In addition, he shared several book titles with me of Evangelicals who had come to Orthodoxy. Many of these books I have now read or are on my nightstand. It is not rare for Protestants to find Orthodoxy! I didn’t realize that until then. I wasn’t a one-off.
Many, many more conversations, readings, prayers, and deep thoughts went into the decision to join the Syriac Orthodox Church. It wasn’t easy to become a member. The Greek or Russian Orthodox parishes here in the US are much better set up to accept catechumens (those who wish to convert). For me, it took just about an act of God, as I would say! Well, it took two archbishops (Mor Philoxenus Mattias Nayis and Mor Clemis Eugene Kaplan, the Archbishop of the Diocese of the Western USA), several Abunas (priests), a couple of deacons, a teacher at Agora University, and probably just as many prayers for me. But here I am, as of January 8, a confirmed member of the Syriac Orthodox Church who rejoices in the ancient path she is now following. I truly feel that I am worshipping with all my senses now, and my devotion to Jesus Christ has grown tenfold.
Jeremiah 6:16 says: “This is what the LORD says: “Stand by the ways and see and ask for the ancient paths, Where the good way is, and walk in it; Then you will find a resting place for your souls. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.’”
I am happy to say that I WILL walk in it.
