I found this writeup on the controversial former member of Euphrosynos Cafe, Brother Nathanael.
A few hitherto unknown facts emerge. Prominent among these revelations is the disappointment in his love life during a key juncture when he was a minor 'celebrity' for being a guitarist in a rock band opening for several diabolical rock groups.
Perhaps that situation triggered his emotional highs and lows and/or suppressed anger which seemed to be a feature of his subsequent life for some years. Hopefully, he healed from that by throwing himself into Orthodox monasticism and then launching a political career - !
Here goes the "Metapedia" story of his life and career, including mention of our Forum here :
... Kapner is best known, however, for his activism on the internet. On his website, Real Jew News, which was for a time known as Real Zionist News, he creates well researched and objectively true articles exposing the crimes of his former Jewish supremacist co-tribesmen. ...
Milton L Kapner was born on 5 September 1950, to Solomon and Rebecca Kapner, both Jewish. He was raised in Pittsburgh, but claims that his family were accepting of Christians and he was allowed by them as a child to sing Christmas carols with his Catholic neighbours at Christmas every year.[1] In 1968, Kapner became part of the Cultural Marxist hippie counter-culture, grew out his hair and beard and attended the Art Institute of California.[1] He played guitar in a rock band called Rebecca and the Sunnybrook Farmers,[2][3] which between 1968 and 1971, opened for Jethro Tull, Alice Cooper, and Blood, Sweat and Tears amongst others[1] and released an album. ...
With the 1960s psychedelic movement now fading, he cut his hair and beard, moving back East to Pittsburgh and took a job as a straight commission salesman, selling industrial chemicals, fertilizers, paints and cleaners to factories. He claims that at one point he was earning at least a six figure salary a year.[4] Kapner held this job for twenty five years and in his spare time became involved in the Jews for Jesus movement, associated with Messianic Judaism. ...
Orthodoxy: HOCNA and ROAC
Kapner converted to Orthodox Christianity in 1988, joining the Holy Orthodox Church in North America (HOCNA). ... Leaving his job as a salesman, he joined the Holy Transfiguration Monastery as a novice in 1992.... Relations with the monastery deteriorated and Kapner literally came to blows with Fr. Isaac in 2002, before leaving the Massachusetts monastery in 2003.
Following this, Kapner joined the American diocese of the Russian Orthodox Autonomous Church (ROAC). ... Kapner became associated as a novice with the Dormition Skete ... Buena Vista, Colorado in the mountains under Bishop Gregory George.[note 1] After staying there for two years, he came to violent blows with George and after being asked to leave the monastery, refused, before being arrested by the police.[5] ...
Kapner began to post on the internet in 2005, including at traditionalist Orthodox website such as EuphrosynosCafe.com under the name "Nathaniel Kapner" and opened a blog on Live Journal called +CHURCH NEWS+. ...
Fr. John, a priest in southern California ... claims that Kapner admitted to him that he suffered from mental illness; obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and bipolar disorder. He claimed that Kapner had spent time in several mental hospitals.[5] John Sanidopoulos, who runs the popular Orthodox blog Mystagogy,[11] claims that Kapner was ... a novice and then a sub-deacon .... has been criticised for wearing a pectoral cross, the skufia and performing blessings with a cross as if he were a priest. ... his unusual facial expressions and dancing ... may be attributed to his mental illness ....
http://en.metapedia.org/wiki/Nathanael_Kapner
This biographical information has been abridged to comply with copyright rules. Please click the link to read the entire article.
I want to suggest that the emotional disturbances and possible time spent hospitalized could have worked for good in
taking Nathanael out of his conventional line of thought. Not that they make "the street evangelist" sound any too stable.
But we can remember cases like the Diveyevo Fool-for-Christ Pasha. As a serf, she was beaten by her Lutheran owners. That resulted in her skull being supposedly cracked and much pain and suffering. She wandered for years and then settled near Diveyevo, where she became a renowned Eldress. If the story is true, the TsarMartyr and his wife came to Pasha's cell for a private consultation when they arrived for the canonization of St Seraphim of Sarov.
She dressed up a doll as a boy and put it in a cradle, which was meant to indicate that the royal pair would have a son after a succession of daughters. [ I am writing this from memory ]
Elder Barsanuphius of Optina consulted her when he was cruelly exiled to a different monastery by jealous factions at Optina.
This eldress too was controversial ; a few facets of her story disturbed me reading it. I am mentioning Pasha's example to say that sometimes God brings out hidden spiritual gifts through terrible sufferings and upheavals, such as being homeless like both of these 2 were.
