Ant update

After a thorough cleaning, the office looks and smells fabulous.  It seems, other than a few stragglers, the ants are gone. 

Susie-Q removed all the ink cartridges from the printer and put them in a zip lock bag.  She reinstalled all new.  The ziplock has a half-dozen ants crawling around.  It appears one of the cartridges was infested during shipping despite being sealed.  Must have been infested during the refill.

Totally gross, very true.

As future reference to readers, should you get ants in the house, a cheap solution given me by an exterminator is to sprinkle a line of baking soda at the entry point.  They won’t crawl over it.  I have also used Avon’s skin-so-soft sprayed around the entry points and that has worked as well.

Thanks for the idea Mother BUT I’ll take a pass on that idea!  I don’t think we want the office smelling like garlic. 

The ants go marching two by two…Hurrah! Hurrah!

What do ants and ink cartridges have in common? One would think nothing, right? Not in our office. Read on to discover the excitement of the day.

At 12:15 I received a call at home from my co-worker Susie-Q. (Today is my usual day off.)

Hey, how’s it going today? Busy? Silence on the other end of the phone. Then a strained voice says…

Philippa?……There are ants in the printer.

What? I’m sure I misheard her. Ants? IN the printer? On occasion I’d see one traipsing up the wall or across the floor and with nary a thought, whack ‘em dead. Fini, right? Apparently not!

Philippa, there ARE ants in the printer.

Uh? Really? Are you sure?

Yes Philippa, I am positive!!! I was printing some documents and the ants were coming out with the paper! I turned the printer upside down and they are ALL OVER THE PLACE!!!

Okay! Okay! This is totally gross Heavy sigh. Get out the vacuum, open the printer up and vacuum the thing out!!

Uh. Oh. Okay.

Do you want me to come to the office and help you do it? We’re both a little squeamish about bugs so company in these things helps!

No, no. That’s okay. It’s a good idea. I’ll do it and I have to go to the office-products-in-a-box store. Why don’t I get those canisters of air and use that too?

Great idea! But take printer outside and spray that sucker clean and leave it out there! In the meantime, I’ll run to the store and get some ant traps. Tomorrow when I come in I’ll do a thorough office cleaning and put out the ant traps.

Oh good! That sounds like a plan Philippa! Ugh! I feel like I need to take a shower! Talk to you later!

About two hours later, the phone rings again.

Philippa? It’s me again. Ya wanna hear the rest of the story?

Lord have mercy…Okay. What happened?

I opened the printer cover and they were ALL OVER the blue ink cartridge! All over it! I took the cartridge out and threw it away. Talk about disgusting. When I leave today, do you think I should put the printer in a trash bag?

Oh that’s an excellent idea! Suffocate them! Then we’ll see if they’re gone for good.

This has to be the strangest thing I’ve ever heard of! Ants attracted to an ink cartridge? Has anyone ever heard of this? Hopefully a thorough dusting, vacuuming and wiping down will get rid of them all together. The last thing I want to do is print out a letter with a squashed ant crossing a ‘t’.

4 things about me

A) FOUR PLACES I GO OVER AND OVER:  Church, Work, College, Store(s)

 

B) FOUR PEOPLE WHO ENCOURAGED MY FAITH ALONG THE WAY:  Aunt Bobby, Sister Brigit my first grade teacher at St. Donato’s Roman Catholic Elementary School, the Hubster, Greatschemamonk Seraphim.

 

C) FOUR OF MY FAVORITE FOODS:  Pasta, Chocolate, Chicken w/Gravy, Good ‘n Plenty candies

 

D) FOUR PLACES I WOULD RATHER BE RIGHT NOW:  The Beach, Somewhere warm, in the Garden, rocking a baby.

 

E) FOUR MOVIES I WOULD WATCH OVER AND OVER:  Gone With The Wind, Little Women, The Ghost & Mrs. Muir, Spartacus

 

F) FOUR THINGS I LIKE ABOUT THE ORTHODOX CHURCH:  Spiritual paternity, the smell (reminds me of praying & the feel of holiness), The Theotokos, The Prayers.

 

G) FOUR OF MY FAVORITE HOBBIES:  Reading, needlework, fiddling in the garden, crochet

 

“Let Us Love the Church Fervently”

“Let us feel for the Church.  Let us love her fervently.  We should not accept to hear her representatives being criticised and accused.  On the Holy Mountain the spirit in which I was nurtured was orthodox, profound, holy and silent – without conflicts, without disputes and witout censurings.  We should not give credence to those hwo make accusations against the clergy.  Even if with our own eyes we see apriest doing something we judge negatively, we should not blieve it, nor think about it, nor talk about it toothers.  The same is true for the lay members of the Church and for every person.  We are all the Church.  Those who censure the Church for the errors of her representatives with the alleged aim of helping to correct her make a great mistake.  They do not love the church.  Neither, needless to say, do they love Christ.  We love the Church when we embrace with our prayer each of her members and do what Christ did – when we sacrifice ourselves, remain ever vigilant, and do everything in the manner of Him who when he was abused did not return abuse, and when He suffered did not threaten (1 Pet 2:23).”

Wounded by Love:  The Life & the Wisdom of Elder Prophyrios (p91-92)

This note was posted on the discussion forum, Monachos.net, during Pascha 2007.  I repost it here because it is full of excellent thoughts, especially as we approach Pascha 2008.

Dear friends,

Last night I went to Matins to find my priest looking tired and overwhelmed, and even heard him say, “I feel old.” This made me sad and brought me to the realization that if he is pained to see his flock wandering away, how much more does it pain our Heavenly Father when we wander straight into harms way by walking into the lion’s den?

My friends – we have a lot to be accountable for. This Church is OUR church. WE are the next generation – but where is everybody? Last night, not including our priest, the choir made up about 9, and the parishioners made up about 5. If there were no choir, there’d be hardly anyone left in Church. Again, where is everybody?

We spoke to an older lady who tends the lampadas faithfully from day to day, week to week. She mentioned last year during Holy Week, she had no one to help her, so was there until midnight tending and changing the lampadas in order for us to feast.

Some of my fondest memories as a child were when I would help my Aunty in the small Church the family used to attend, to “change everything from black to white” on Good Friday evening. I remember the smiles and the smell of silver spray paint outside, as the boys tended to their candlesticks, shining them and making them look as new as possible for the upcoming feast. The women inside would be cleaning, sweeping the floors, dusting the icons, and arranging big, fragrant white flowers. The men would be behind the iconostasis putting up the XB sign, making sure the light bulbs and electricity worked. Others would be ironing the vestments, but most importantly everything would be changed from the deathly black, to silvery clean white. And every year, my Aunty would faithfully tie the floral embroidered white cloth around Christ’s waist on the Cross, in devotion almost as if she were standing before the real Christ Jesus’ body Himself. All this was done with such love, fervency, and mostly with such sweet anticipation of the coming feast of victory over death, and the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.

My friends, the old ones who do these jobs are not going to be around forever. Plus with people leaving due to the political nature of the Russian Church’s reunification and the discomfort with that (which is entirely another matter all together), I now realize it is time for us young ones to step up and help. If we don’t, do you think the generation coming behind us – our children, and our children’s children – will follow? Unlikely. If we don’t take action now, the Church will become an empty morgue, and the Saints who so faithfully and lovingly stare down at us from the walls above, will shake their heads in shame and sadness at having no one to serve Christ Jesus with them.

Please, please if you can, stay and help tend the Church – yes during Holy Week (and I know we’re always tired after such long services, but …) – and carry this on throughout the rest of the year as well. It may not seem like much, but every little bit helps. And God will greatly bless you for your faithfulness in serving Him.

In many ways I could have authored this letter.  Many a Saturday I, too, spent at church with my aunt.  She and other ladies would dust and clean the altar area (she was Roman Catholic), change the altar linens, and put away all the cleaned linens in the closets and drawers.  I was given a dust rag and the direction to “dust the pews”.  Let me assure you, there were a LOT of them to dust!  And dust I did!

Then we would truck home to Aunty’s house, wash the soiled linens, hang them to dry, starch and iron them, then repair holes or torn hems as needed.  When new ones were needed, Aunty made them and I embroidered the little red crosses in the center.  I have wonderful memories of these days of service.

Now I find myself doing much the same in my own parish.  Just today I cleaned off spots, ironed off wax and pressed the white altar vestments in preparation for their use for Pascha.  The gold altar vestments have been dry cleaned at home (with the awesome Dryel product – try it out!), pressed, hung on hangars and taken to church in preparation for after Pentecost. 

Certain times I find myself on hands and knees wiping up wine droplets from some dear one’s shakey hand when they receive it after Communion or plucking up antidoron crumbs and tucking it in my pocket in order to toss it to the birds outside or even picking out the melted wax from the candle holders. 

Too often the only bodies in the church for Vespers are those 3 or 4 of us in the choir and Father.  Too often I see Father’s eyes filled with sorrow when he opens the Royal Doors for Liturgy and finds the Nave half full.  Perhaps a dozen or less come Friday nights through out Lent for the Akathists.  Where is everyone?  Where is the struggle?  How can one experience the joy and fullness of Pascha without the struggle of Lent?  Without the service?  I don’t know.

As Father said today in his sermon, it is not too late to join those on the road to Pascha.  There are two weeks remaining.  God accepts us at any hour.  Two make the hard journey easier to bear.  Won’t you come along and link arms with me or another pilgrim and journey to Jerusalem together?

 

Sharing new finds

Some new blogs I’ve added to my list of “check frequently!”

Veni Vidi Credidi:  I love this guy, jamesthethickheaded.  He has some very poignant thoughts.

Orthodox Christian Thoughts by Fr. Athanasios Haros:  Elizabeth at “The Garden Window” found this one.  Fr. Athanasaios is at seminary.  Today’s post is excellent and reminiscent of a recent conversation I had with my spiritual father.

The Forest Philosopher:  Bill visited my blog today and left a very nice comment.  He’s been blogging about a month I think he said.  Check him out.

Saving Face

Everyone needs to save face at one point in their life.  And really, it is only God who knows Gorbachev’s heart.  Let’s leave it up to Him to decide.  However, one must ask the obvious….if Gorbachev knelt in prayer…who was he praying to…and why?!  What is the point?!

 

Read about it here:  

 

 

Former Soviet boss Gorbachev denies conversion to Christianity

 

 

Hell & its creation

Interview

28 March 2008, 12:50

God didn’t create the hell for sinners, they did it themselves

The Russian Orthodox Church’s representative to the European International Institutions Bishop Hilarion of Vienna and Austria, on Interfax-Religion’s request, commented on the recent suggestion of Danish Lutheran theologians to consider the hell and the devil a metaphor and to accept only existence of the paradise.

- This theology should be considered in general context of liberalized Christian dogmatic and moral teaching developed in depth of many Protestant communities in several recent decades. Everything that makes Christianity is “inconvenient”, “uncomfortable” is being omitted, “the dark Middle Ages” heritage is cleared up. Christianity in light version is under construction and the hell and devil don’t match it.

A tragedy of Protestantism has originally been the following. Seeking to get rid of medieval stratification of Catholicism, Protestants didn’t properly study the heritage of the Eastern fathers. And today when arguing with the Middle Age hell and devil, liberal Protestants don’t trouble themselves with reviewing the Holy Fathers and their conception of afterlife retaliation.

Meanwhile, the Eastern Christian tradition has never considered the hell as created by God to punish sinners. God didn’t create the hell, free will of people has created it. It exists not because God wants it, but because people keep it existing. They first create the hell on Earth and then carry it on to the afterworld.

-What do you mean by the hell on Earth?

- When a man using his power over others makes Earth the hell for them. Didn’t Hitler turn Earth to hell for millions of people tried and tortured in concentration camps, perished in gas cameras and battlefields? Didn’t Lenin and Stalin make hell for thousands and millions of people who died in camps or were shot on false denunciations or sentenced by Stalin’s “troika”? Don’t today’s terrorists, who kill peaceful citizens, take them hostage and cut off their heads, turn Earth to the hell?

And is it believable that malefactors and monsters, who kill other people and revolt against God and all-hallows will share the paradise with righteous and saints? Is it believable that the paradise will welcome both John the Baptist and Herod, St. Veniamin of Petrograd and Lenin, thousands of the murdered new Russia’s martyrs and confessors and their torturers? It removes division between the good and the evil. Then there’s no difference if you are a saint or a villain, if you do the good or the evil, if you save people from death or kill them.

-So sins will be inevitably recompensed?

-Any person bears moral responsibility for his actions. And he will answer for the sins of his earthly life in the eternity. St. Isaac the Syrian writes that sinners in the hell are not deprived of God’s love. On the contrary, love is given equally to everyone: to the righteous in the Heavenly Kingdom and to the sinners in Gehenna. But for the righteous it becomes the source of joy and bliss while for sinners it is the source of torture.

Thus, God didn’t create the hell for sinners, they did it themselves. God doesn’t send sinners to the hell, but people who oppose God’s will and revolt against God choose the hell themselves. And this choice is made in their earthly life rather than in some distant eschatological prospect. It is right here on Earth that infernal tortures and “the Kingdom of God come with power” begin.

- However, even the Orthodox divine service says that the hell is “abolished” by Christ after His Resurrection from the dead?

- The reality of the hell, its existence for sinners and even the possibility of its eternal existence don’t contradict the news of its abolition by Christ resurrected. The hell is really “abolished” in the resurrection of Christ, as it is not inevitable for people anymore and doesn’t have power over them. But those, who consciously oppose God’s will and commit crime and sin, restore destroyed and abolished hell as they don’t want to reconcile with God’s love.

I’d like to stress it again: God didn’t create the hell, people created it for themselves, God destroyed and abolished the hell, but people restore it again and again. The hell is re-created every time when the sin is consciously committed and isn’t repented.

Article taken from Interfax-Religion