I went to the Celebration Youth with His All Holiness Patriarch Bartholomew I, with my fiver year old. I had my reservations, but Spiritual Father reassured me that regardless of what I think, my Serbian Orthodox jurisdiction acknowledges him and so does the Serbian Monastery of Hilandar on Mt. Athos so, what the heck. He said specifically, "she is an innocent child, keep her out of church politics..."
Anyway it was awesome. When he came in he blessed many of the little Greek kids (we were the ONLY non-Greeks there). The he stops right beofre my blue eyed beauty and blesses her and kiss her on the head and remarks on what beautiful eyes she has. (I later saw on the picture he has blue eyes too, LOL).
He gave a beuatiful sermon on Christmas and all children are a reflect,ion of the Christ child for their live and innocence. After the sermon, when he was trying to leave everybody was flocking around him, and he came with the Bishop of Atlanta to bless my daughter and I, and proceeded to engage in conversation with us from what jurisdiction are we. He then introduced us to an old priest-monk who was speaking to us in Russian. The old monk told me Vladika Artermije from Kosovo and Vladika Amfilohije from Montengro are his Orthodox Brothers, etc. It was awesome and I feel very blessed that I was blessed by them and able to kiss their hands and talk with them. In retrospect, I come to the conclusion that I was singled out by the fact that I was the only one in a headcovering, and I am very grateful I decided to wear it after all.
Christ is Born!
Indeed He is Born!
God's Peace!
In Christ,
Tessa
