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We received the following email on the afternoon of Holy Saturday in response to Young, LGBTQ, and Stuck at Home. In allowing Orthodoxy in Dialogue to publish it, our young correspondent hopes to let other young, closeted or semi-closeted, LGBTQ Christians know that they are not alone. He also hopes that Orthodox hierarchs, pastors, and laity will begin to provide a spiritual home where LGBTQ people can feel respected and safe.

I am a 20 year-old trans man and Christian. I’ve been reading Orthodoxy in Dialogue for close to a year now. I was raised Catholic but starting last May I started to explore more of the old apostolic churches only to find a wealth of history and tradition among Orthodox churches that was previously unknown to me entirely. Since then I’ve been interested in joining an Orthodox church, preferably spending some time as a newcomer in a parish before making that decision. Unfortunately, my college has essentially no Orthodox Christian presence at all (unlike every other Christian group on campus!) and the nearest Orthodox church has absolutely no one my age and exhibits no real interest in newcomers at all, which makes attending fairly unappealing.

The elephant in the room, of course, is the relatively open hostility towards LGBT people from the Orthodox churches, especially in zealous online circles. Orthodoxy in Dialogue has been almost the only indication of any LGBT presence in Orthodoxy at all that isn’t treated as a political conspiracy or social ill.

I was reading through your website the other day when I came upon your article Young, LGBTQ, and Stuck at Home. That title, of course, perfectly describes my current situation, as my college has sent almost all students home, and where I had to immediately retreat back into the closet in mid-March instead of late May and faced with the prospect of indefinite life at home with seemingly endless coursework as my only reprieve from the toxicity around me. What struck me especially was this paragraph: Read More

{a poem and prayer in time of COVID-19}

Three days in the tomb, the angels in heaven sing,
and three times around the chapel, You
enable us on Earth to glorify You in purity of heart.

Three—a number we can hold in our minds, that
we can count on our fingers. We can praise the Three
in One, speak the language of Trinity even if we
can’t parse all the grammar, can’t break the sentence
down—we can speak Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Read More

If any be devout and love God, let them enjoy this fair and radiant triumphal feast. If any be wise servants, let them rejoicing enter into the joy of their Lord. If any have laboured long in fasting, let them now receive their recompense.

If any have wrought from the first hour, let them today receive their just reward.

If any have come at the third hour, let them with thankfulness keep the feast.

If any have arrived at the sixth hour, let them have no misgivings, because they shall in nowise be deprived therefor.

If any have delayed until the ninth hour, let them draw near, fearing nothing.

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