I am sick tonight, so I'm sitting here with my NeoCitran while I'm typing. Once I'm done the medication, it's off to bed for me.

Tonight was the Compline with the Cannon of St. Andrew of Crete at church. A friend of mine came for the first time. She reminded me of some of my first times in the Orthodox church. It's next to impossible to follow along in the sheets that you are given and there is so much going on it's information overload. My legs and back are very sore now from the prostrations, too.

......But...... back to my story. Where was I?

Bruce and I decided that we would go to both churches - Mennonite and Orthodox. That way we would both have our spiritual needs met. Every other Sunday we also had Care Group in the afternoon, so we would leave the house at about 10:15 a.m. and get home about 7 p.m. I'm glad there is always a lunch after St. Vincent's, and there was always potluck snacks at Care Group. People constantly asked us how we did it, but we just did. It was assumed that we didn't book anything else on Sundays. Not that it was really a day of rest - it was a day of Church.

In the beginning I think I grilled Bruce on EVERYTHING in the Orthodox church. I picked on the theology more than I ever did in Bible College, or any other time for that matter. I was especially hung up on the Mary-thing. I said that the liturgy is full of the worship of Mary. She is equated higher than human beings and pretty much on par with God. And why in the world are the Orthodox so hung up on her being ever-virgin? What about the brothers and sisters that had come to him? If Mary was so special, why did he shun his own mother when she came to call on him? This was an issue I really struggled with. To the point that one day after the liturgy I sat in the sanctuary and cried to God asking for an answer. This is what I heard:

* Does it matter?
- What?
* Why are you struggling so hard? Does it matter? Does it matter if Mary is ever-virgin or not? Will you believe in me either way?
- Pause. Oh.

The conversation didn't really answer my question, and yet it did.

Now here is one of my ongoing dilemmas in the Orthodox church. It's not uncommon for me to have conversations like this - dialogues that go back and forth with a voice in my head that is not my own. Am I crazy? Am I deluded? It's not like it happens all the time. Not even every day or even every month. But it started when I was in Bible College. When I asked Father Bernard about it, the answer I heard was that it is most unlikely that I hear the voice of God. Only the really spiritual who have walked for many years in the disciplines would hear the voice of God. So..... what does that make me? I don't consider myself overly spiritual. I don't read my Bible daily. I don't even set aside special time to pray. I pray on the run, mostly. And, embarrassingly, most often in the bathroom.

I don't know. But I do know that my NeoCitran is now done, so I'm heading to bed to get the rest I need to function tomorrow.