Tonight I asked the boys if they wanted to hear some "Treesa" stories (stories from my childhood) before kissing them goodnight. They were enthusiastic. Max immediately came up with the story of "Treesa and the Bears." I said, “Treesa and the Bears?” --wracking my brain to remember any encounters I might have had with a bear or two in my youth...skunks, yes... crawdads and snakes, yes... no bears that I can remember. “Yeah,” he said, “There was a Mama Bear...? and a Baby Bear...? and you took their oatmeal…?” So, in his mind--at least for some of his childhood--his own Mama broke into a bear house, ate their porridge, and broke their furniture. I am charmed beyond words.

Their favorite story (and mine) is when Treesa, after winning a cake-baking contest against her big brother Jimmy, stuffed his losing cake in his leather church shoes because he snidely remarked he knew his cake was better than hers whether he won or not.

My beloved big brother, Jim, who is now a successful lawyer in Atlanta and a extraordinary chef, once took on his little sister in a cake baking contest. We were both in middle school and had time to kill after school before our parents got home from work. Occasionally we would make cookies, pizzas, or other miscellaneous junky and snacky foods. I don't remember how it happened but we decided to have a bake-off.

One of us was convinced he could make an amazing cake; the other knew how to read a cake recipe.

Big Brother made a two layer black-walnut cake with coconut maple brown sugar icing. Little Sister made a chocolate cake with Cool Whip wiped over the top. We decided that our mother would be the judge. After being presented with a slice from each of our cakes my mother, a natural (if not a very good) politician, said, "Well, I like Treesa's cake best because I really do like chocolate more...But Jimmy, yours is good too!"

So tonight I ask the boys, "When Jimmy made Treesa angry and she stuffed cake into his shoes, do you think Treesa got spanked?" NO! "Did Treesa have to stand in the corner?" NO! "Did Treesa get grounded from TV?" NO!

"Do you think Treesa had to clean out her brother's stinky shoes while he watched?" YES!!

Despite the genuinely disgusting nature of this (well-deserved) punishment, Treesa did have the satisfaction of telling her brother that at least his shoes smelled more like cake instead of his stinky nasty feet.

Trash and Treasure

Early last spring my eldest daughter got a job at a small health food store in town. Nearly every day she worked, she brought home expired dry-goods and/or a huge banana-box of “rotten” vegetables for my compost. “Expired” is probably a legitimate term for a stores selling dehydrated veggie crisps and gluten-free, wheat-free cranberry flax seed granola bars. But “rotten” is a term more subjective, I imagine. For health-food hippies, if you’re going to buy an organic bok choy, or organic lettuce for $5 more than you would pay at the WalMart, its leaves had better not be bent or wilted. The peppers had better be without blemish, and the asparagus ($7.99# for Pete’s sake) had better be crispy—or dipped gold if you ask me.

I really did enjoy foraging through these boxes full of often legitimately, slimy vegetables in search what a solicitous hippie might toss aside as rotten, but a humble, frugal mommy sees as cash (or slightly wilted cash) in the bank. My biggest boon was green onions, lettuce, and Swiss chard. I still can’t figure out why they threw away the lovely, crisp bunches of onions I rescued, but I won’t complain. Some of the regularly tossed items were broccoli sprouts, cilantro, parsley, sweet potatoes and kiwi. A few times I ran across a pear or a strawberry which an employee had partially eaten and tossed away. So this job of mine wasn't without its share of nastiness.

We were also given two huge salmon carcasses. I boiled one for fish stock and let the other one sit on the patio till it was positively wretched. Then I dug a big hole next to the garden and buried it there. My mom says this keeps bunnies away. Whether this helped, I'll never know. But next time, I’m going to skip the rotting fish and rely on my cats.

A few weeks into Lent Rose showed up after work with three gallons of expired, raw milk and four gallons of expired whole buttermilk. Having been making tvorog at Pascha for years, this was indeed a Godsend, and it turned out lovely. I also made buttermilk cheese which turned out very nicely too.

This year the kids and I have been dumpster diving of a different sort. I have a friend whose son built his entire treehouse from discarded lumber. There are a number of new neighborhoods popping up all around us, and since hearing this we have hauled in an amazing number of boards and posts from these dumpsters. Some are only slightly warped or knotty, and most of them are treated deck lumber. But they are entirely useful for our purposes.

At one house we visited there was a long board just waiting for us. We pulled it out and pushed it carefully into the back of our van. Just then, around the corner came a man with two other long boards on his shoulder. We thought we were going to get into trouble, but he asked, "Would you like these too? And there are a few more in the back I'll go get for you." Apparently he was making the stairs for the back door and had just finished his job. We were delighted and happy to accommodate.

Now I no longer have any excuses for not building the treehouse, the chicken coop, the picnic table and the miscellaneous other things I have wanted to do since buying this house with the acre of woods at the back. I got a miter saw for Christmas. So that with my circular saw and my jigsaw should be enough for us to get started on something soon.

I have wondered, though, which were worth more before they were thrown away, the banana boxes of organic veggies or the pile of lumber.

Homemade Laundry Detergent

Homemade laundry detergent has been my best discovery in years. It is simple and inexpensive. I made my first batch two months ago and I still haven't made a dent in the five-gallon bucket I made.

Here's the recipe:

4 Cups - hot tap water
1 Fels-Naptha soap bar (I have heard you can use any kind of bar-soap, but I don't know)
1 Cup Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda*
½ Cup Borax

Grate bar of soap and add to saucepan with water. Stir continually over medium-low heat until soap dissolves and is melted.

Fill a 5 gallon bucket half full of hot tap water. Add melted soap, washing soda and Borax. Stir well until all powder is dissolved. Fill bucket to top with more hot water. Stir, cover and let sit overnight to thicken.

Stir and fill a used, clean, laundry soap dispenser half full with soap and then fill rest of way with water. Shake before each use. (will gel)

Optional: You can add 10-15 drops of essential oil per 2 gallons. Add once soap has cooled.

-Top Load Machine- 5/8 Cup per load (Approx. 180 loads)

-Front Load Machines- ¼ Cup per load (Approx. 640 loads)

*Arm & Hammer "Super Washing Soda" - in some stores or may be purchased online. Baking Soda will not work, nor will Arm & Hammer Detergent - It must must be sodium carbonate.

I'm grateful there are enough homemakers in Lexington, SC that the WalMart has all three items right next to each other on the shelf. I found this at the Duggar Family Website.

This is by a Facebook friend of mine (Matushka Ann Lardas) on today's saint, Xenia.

[I] am thinking about the first Christians, and how they lived in a world that was okay with infanticide and all kinds of deviance and took money from them to fund their own persecution, and yet they not only survived, they overcame. Why? Through the power of their very great love for God and for each other. When they were first killed, they had no way of knowing if there would ever be more Christians. But they didn't think about "legacy," they thought about salvation, and a nation and an empire and the world was transformed. Today's amazing St. Xenia was named for the martyr St. Xenia, a rich patrician who didn't want her family to stop her from being a Christian, so when the Romans arrested her and asked her name, she replied only "Xenia," meaning, "Stranger." We are strangers here. This world does not reflect or revere our values. But through love, we can be transformed, and in the process, a thousand souls can be saved around us.

Love is stronger than hate, and through Christ, life is stronger than death.

Stand Fast and Watch

Stand fast on spiritual watch, because you don’t know when the Lord will call you to Himself. In your earthly life be ready at any moment to give Him an account. Beware that the enemy does not catch you in his nets, that he not deceive you causing you to fall into temptation. Daily examine your conscience; try the purity of your thoughts, your intentions.

There was a king who had a wicked son. Having no hope that he would change for the better, the father condemned the son to death. He gave him a month to prepare.

The month went by, and the father summoned the son. To his surprise he saw that the young man was noticeably changed: his face was thin and drawn, and his whole body looked as if it had suffered.

“How is it that such a transformation has come over you, my son?” the father asked.

“My father and my lord,” replied the son, “how could I not change when each passing day brought me closer to death?”

“Good, my son,” remarked the king. “Since you have evidently come to your senses, I shall pardon you. However, you must maintain this vigilant disposition of soul for the rest of your life.”

“Father,” replied the son, “that’s impossible. How can I withstand the countless seductions and temptations?”

Then the king ordered that a vessel be brought, full of oil, and he told his son:

“Take this vessel and carry it along all the streets of the city. Following you will be two soldiers with sharp swords. If you spill so much as a single drop they will cut off your head.”

The son obeyed. With light, careful steps, he walked along all the streets, the soldiers accompanying him, and he did not spill a drop.

When he returned to the castle, the father asked,

“My son, what did you see as you were walking through the city?”

“I saw nothing.”

“What do you mean, ‘nothing’?” said the king.

“Today is a holiday; you must have seen the booths with all kinds of trinkets, many carriages, people animals…”

“I didn’t notice any of that,” said the son. “All my attention was focussed on the oil in the vessel. I was afraid to spill a drop and thereby lose my life.”

“Quite right, my son,” said the king. “Keep this lesson in mind for the rest of you life. Be as vigilant over your soul as you were today over the oil in the vessel. Turn your thoughts away from what will soon pass away, and keep them focused on what is eternal. You will be followed not by armed soldiers but by death to which we are brought closer by every day. Be very careful to guard your soul from all ruinous temptations.”

The son obeyed his father, and lived happily.

Watch, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong. (I Cor. 16:13).

The Apostle gives Christians this important counsel to bring their attention to the danger of this world, to summon them to frequent examination of their hearts, because without this one can easily bring to ruin the purity and ardor of one’s faith and unnoticeably cross over to the side of evil and faithlessness.

Just as a basic concern is to be careful of anything that might be harmful to our physical health, so our spiritual concern should watch out for anything that might harm our spiritual life and the work of faith and salvation. Therefore, carefully and attentively assess your inner impulses: are they from God or from the spirit of evil? Beware of temptations from this world and from worldly people; beware of hidden inner temptations which come from the spirit of indifference and carelessness in prayer, from the waning of Christian love.

If we turn our attention to our mind, we notice a torrent of successive thoughts and ideas. This torrent is uninterrupted; it is racing everywhere and at all times: at home, in church, at work, when we read, when we converse. It is usually called thinking, writes Bishop Theophan the Recluse, but in fact it is a disturbance of the mind, a scattering, a lack of concentration and attention. The same happens with the heart. Have you ever observed the life of the heart? Try it even for a short time and see what you find.

Something unpleasant happens, and you get irritated; some misfortune occurs, and you pity yourself; you see someone whom you dislike, and animosity wells up within you; you meet one of your equals who has now outdistanced you on the social scale, and you begin to envy him; you think of your talents and capabilities, and you begin to grow proud… All this is rottenness: vainglory, carnal desire, gluttony, laziness, malice-one on top of the other, they destroy the heart.

And all of this can pass through the heart in a matter of minutes. For this reason one ascetic, who was extremely attentive to himself, was quite right in saying that

“man’s heart is filled with poisonous serpents. Only the hearts of saints are free from these serpents, the passions.”

But such freedom is attained only through a long and difficult process of self-knowledge, working on oneself and being vigilant towards one’s inner life, i.e., the soul.

Be careful. Watch out for your soul! Turn your thoughts away from what will soon pass away and turn them towards what is eternal. Here you will find the happiness that your soul seeks, that your heart thirsts for.

(Translated from Pravoslavnaya Rus) and taken from

ORTHODOX AMERICA, Vol. XIV, No. 2-3, September-October, 1993

St. John of Shanghai

Octopodes and Pocketses

I didn't know that the plural of octopus is neither octopi nor octopuses, but rather, octopods or octopodes. It doesn't much matter because this is indeed a story of just one octopus, a baby one.

On Orthodox Christmas Eve, I asked my daughter, Rose, and her young man, David, to take the children home from church after the morning liturgy. Instead of going home, David took them all out to eat so they could go Christmas shopping before the evening vigil. Since this was the final day of the Christmas fast, they went to an Eastern Buffet. One of the items on the buffet was baby octopus, which of course delighted the children--especially the crocodile hunter himself.

Max put a few on his plate. After eating one leg he decided it was less appealing in his mouth than on his plate.

During their shopping trip David overheard the Marko whispering intensely to his brother, "Put it back in your pocket!" Max put "it" back, but David was suspicious, thinking the boys were shoplifting.

"Max, what have you got in your pocket?"
"Nuthin"
"Max what's in your pocket? Take it out."

Out came the octopus to the amusement of everyone around.

"Max, put it back in your pocket."

However, a few hours later, at Christmas Eve vigil, David recalled that the octopus was probably still in Max's pocket.

Orthodox canons restrict any blood in the altar; neither are dead animals allowed. Despite this dead animal not being bloody, but lightly seasoned and probably linty, it was still a dead animal.

"Max do you still have that octopus in your pocket?"
"Yeah."
"You need to get rid of it. Throw it in the men's bathroom trash."

So like a good little altar boy, he got rid of it.

Later on in the evening, as David shared the tale with Josh. Josh said he had seen it in the trashcan and had thought to himself, "Hm. That's either a very fleshy spider--or an octopus."

Although this made me laugh when Margaret retold the story to me this morning, my lingering thought was something my husband often says: "however bizarre some of the Orthodox canonical regulations seem, they are written for a spiritual or practical reason, and probably had a particular historical event guiding their origin."

Christmas Letter 2011

OK. I give up. It's not going to happen. I put together my Christmas letter thinking I would be able to send it out at least by Orthodox Christmas. But I put off too many things that when I should have done it, other events (including the passing of one our beloved friend and one of our church founders, Dusan) delayed its printing. So I will publish it here in hopes I can direct some of my family to the Blog to receive our belated-belated Christmas greetings.

Christmas Greetings from

the Mancusos!

It must seem strange getting a Christmas card in January, right?

In our church Christ’s birth is celebrated on January 7. As a family we have been giving out presents on December 25 and going to church for Christmas on January 7. This year our family decided to follow the tradition of our Orthodox church when celebrating Christmas. If you Google “Julian Calendar” and “Gregorian Calendar,” all of this will be clear. As for us, this means I get 13 extra days to order presents online, get discounted goodies, and write Christmas letters!

This is going to be a long Christmas letter because we have had a year like we haven’t had in a long time. Our oldest daughter, Rose, left for college in August, and we’ve been adjusting ever since. Because she has been my unpaid babysitter for nearly a decade, we have had to learn how to do simple things as a group. It has required a little re-training and re-adjusting. In her absence, the house acquired a simple rhythm and peaceful chaos. But, since Rose is only 90 minutes away at Coker College in Hartsville, SC, we get to return to our normal mega-chaos every now and then.

Rose is doing very well in school. She received almost a full scholarship to college and is studying music-education, which is a double-major. She was the only freshman accepted into the chamber choir. Since she has been home-schooled almost all her life, our biggest fear was her adjusting to a normal academic setting. Despite some misadventures her first semester, she is now thriving both socially and academically without us—which is more a relief than you can imagine.

Ella is likewise loving school. She is breezing through her math and history programs, reading anything and everything within her reach. One of her birthday presents was a book-light. For Ella it was being given a brand-new privilege: reading at night. She is singing soprano in our church choir and is excelling in her piano lessons.

Margaret is likewise taking piano lessons and seems to be vocally and musically inclined like her sisters. Even though she sometimes struggles academically, she makes up for it all with her wit and good humor. A couple months ago she decided to dig a catfish pond in our woods. The hole is now six feet deep and eight feet wide. We haven’t yet figured out how we will ever keep water in the pond (or keep the catfish alive, named Vladimir and Gabriel), but we’re having fun all the same.

Max and Mark are consummate boys. During baseball season they are outside dreaming of baseball and tumbling all over each other with a baseball before school hours. During football season they are outside calling plays and tumbling all over each other with a football before school hours. After school they tumble and roll with whatever sports imagery they need. This is a new kind of academic beast for me. My daily goal is just to hold them down long enough so they can learn to read, to do math and chores.

This year we have travelled and vacationed more than ever. Margaret and Rose travelled to Ohio to attend the 90^th birthday party of my Great-Aunt Margaret in July. They returned with historical tales and genealogical inquisitiveness.In September our family took our first long vacation in over 10 years to a beach house in Myrtle Beach. Despite nearly losing my youngest son in the ocean during a rip-tide, we enjoyed our time immensely, going to an aquarium, a water park, an historic plantation, and a pirate dinner-theater. The last day we went to the beach at sunrise and saw thousands of fish silhouetted in the waves and jumping out of the water. Ella and Max actually saw a shark make one of those nature-channel jumps by the pier. The whole experience was more than magical and truly relaxing (except for the rip-tide incident, obviously).

In November the youngest four and I took a road-trip through North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky and Ohio. We met up with my sister and my parents in Lexington, KY to visit some of the horse racing sites in the area.

At Thanksgiving, a few days later, my brother and his family, my sister and her two kids, and I with the youngest four stayed in the historic Hadley/Harvey home in Wilmington, Ohio. We partook of the traditionally magnificent Hadley-Farm Thanksgiving Feast with homemade pies, caramels and more sides than one could ever imagine (there was also turkey). My cousin Christine and her husband opened up the 200+ year old museum-house so we could “camp” there for three days. The children played football in the front yard and spent hours looking at the mammoth tusks, arrowheads, deer-heads, and innumerable other artifacts contained in the house and barn. We heard intriguing family history that culminated in a tour of the Quaker church and cemetery in which many of my ancestors are buried.

We took an Eastern route home, making a spontaneous visit with my cousin David and his family on the way. The children enjoyed playing lava-monster and parachuting with their long-distance cousins. On our way home we drove the loopy and hilly roads of Southern Ohio on our way to visit an Orthodox monastery in West Virginia. There we visited with friends, petted goats, saw soap- incense- and candle-making rooms, and walked over the mountains in the rain. The boys went through five pairs of pants within 3 hours because of rain and mud puddles.

In early December Fr Mark and I went to Miami, Florida for a clergy conference. I hadn’t planned to attend, but a parishioner donated his flyer miles so I could go. Coincidentally, it happened that the day we left was our 20^th anniversary. Even though we were supposed to leave on separate flights, my flight was so ridiculously delayed that the airline allowed me to reschedule with Fr Mark. Even though we were supposed to be separate, we ended up riding together on this historic flight side-by-side.

In Miami we were given a tour of the city on an open-air double-decker bus—and yes, we were on top. We then took an airboat tour of the Everglades, including an exotic animal exhibit, culminating in an alligator handling—yikes!

The next day, during a church service, Fr Mark was made archpriest. This is a huge honor for him and our little parish. Usually it is given to priests after fifteen years; Fr Mark was made archpriest after eleven. I’m not sure if I can express how proud I am of him, but I will take this opportunity to say so. It is well deserved and hard-won, Glory to God.

I am still painting, working to beautify the new church we acquired last year in December. It is an honor beyond words to be able to be able to do so.

Yes, this was a long Christmas letter. I apologize for it’s length, even though I won’t say it was tardy!

May Our Lord Jesus Christ bless you and keep you and grant you peace and joy in the New Year!

With love from,
The Mancuso Family
2011

Church that Held the 7th Ecumenical Council at Nicea to be Turned into Mosque

Church that Held the 7th Ecumenical Council at Nicea to be Turned into Mosque

My daughter is named after the Blessed Empress Irene who convened the 7th Ecumenical Council. I feel sick about this.

My six year-old, after hearing the guitar solo, said, "that's the deacon!"

Mother Lays Down Life For Baby

Mother Lays Down Life For Baby

:O

Not since seeing an angel piñata have I been this shocked at consumerist Christianity.

Our Creator took on flesh and became--a carrot?

Here's the angel pinata.


You can choose "hit-activated," meaning, it talks when you hit it.

Here is an interview with my husband by Fr Steven Ritter about our starting a mission church in South Carolina. It starts at 13:42, but the entire episode is very good.

This is my daughter Margaret helping me put the finishing touches on the halo of St Olga.

It's taken three months to get near to finishing her and St Vladimir. They're each full length icons about four feet long. They'll adorn the "pillars," which are not free-standing pillars, but sections of our walls which jut out from the flat wall about 10 inches.

We will have a challenge hanging anything on the walls in our new building because the majority of them are concrete. A staple gun (our tool for hanging canvas icons when we were in the storefront) barely makes a hole. One thing I haven't figured out how to do is glue the canvas and control how much they shrink. If I get a chance I'll research it before doing more on the walls. The next project I've been assigned is the Holy Doors.


When I do think about it, I realize what a blessing I've been given to be the primary iconographer for this church. If it had not been for many moving pieces providentially falling into place at the same time, my husband would probably not be a priest at all, we would not have St Elizabeth's, not have this building, and the icons would never have been painted. It's the Story of my life how all these things have actually happened, instead of not happening. Thanks be to God--and a few pesky clergymen.

About How Ugliness Comes With Sin

Yesterday, before leaving for the vigil and Lamentations for Dormition of the Most-Holy Theotokos, I was flipping towards the reading for the day in the Prologue, and ran across this homily by St Nikolai.

I don't want to presume anything about anyone else, knowing it applies to my own soul primarily. All the same, it should be required reading for every Orthodox woman.

About how ugliness comes with sin

"Instead of sweet smell there shall be stink; and instead of a girdle a rent; and instead of well set hair baldness …and burning instead of beauty" (Isaiah 3:24).

This is the word about extravagant and wayward women, about the daughters of Zion who have become haughty and "walk with stretched forth necks and wanton eyes, walking and mincing as they go and making a tinkling with their feet" (Isaiah 3:16). What was it that made the Hebrew women proud? Was it virtue? Virtue never made anyone proud for, in fact, virtue is a cure against pride. Was it the strength of a people and the stability of the State? No, on the contrary, the prophet exactly foretells the imminent bondage of the people and the destruction of the State. And, as one of the main causes for slavery and destruction, the prophet cites vain extravagance, spiritual nothingness and wayward women. What, therefore, made them so proud and haughty? Ornaments and embroideries stranded beads and necklaces, trinkets and hairpins, garters and girdles, perfumes and rings, quivers and mirrors. Behold, this is what made them proud and haughty! Exactly, all of this is an expression of their ignorant pride but the true cause of their pride is spiritual nothingness.

From spiritual nothingness comes pride and that external melange of colors which women drape over their bodies is only an obvious manifestation of their ignorant pride. What will become of all this in the end? Stench, disheveledness, baldness and burning. This will occur when the people fall into bondage. As usually happens: first, the spirit is enslaved by the body and then the body is enslaved by an external enemy.

Thus, that will be even then when the inescapable conqueror of our bodies comes death. Sweet smells will not help in the grave, the kingdom of stench. Neither will there be a need for girdles for a naked spine (skeleton). Neither will braided hair save the skull from baldness nor all the beauty from the black remains of burning. This is the inescapable fate of the most beautiful, the healthiest the wealthiest and the most extravagant women. But this is not the greatest misfortune. The greatest misfortune is that the souls of these women with their stench, disheveledness, baldness, and burning will come before God and before the heavenly hosts of the most beautiful of God's angels and righteous ones. For the stench of the body connotes the stench of the soul from depraved vices; a disheveled body connotes the insatiability of the soul for bodily pleasures; the baldness of the body connotes the baldness of the soul of good works and pure thoughts; burning of the body connotes the burning of the conscience and the mind.

O, how dreadful is the vision of Isaiah, the son of Amos; dreadful then and even dreadful today; dreadful, because it is true.

O, Lord Holy and All-pure, help the women who make the sign with Your Cross, that they may remember their souls and to cleanse their souls before Your Righteous Judgment, so that their souls, together, with their bodies do not become eternal stench.

(http://stnicholasredbank.com/august9-16.htm#a15)

Fr Mark and The Dove

My husband was interviewed yesterday by a Christian radio station in Oregon. I think he did a wonderful job. He's a great public speaker about the Faith, but even better in a Q&A context with a sincere questioner.

This writeup is from the website of our Eastern American Diocese in English and Russian. Here's a link to the introduction to St Athanasius' On the Incarnation by C. S. Lewis which my husband mentions in the interview.

August 20, 2011
Columbia, SC: Priest Mark Mancuso gave an interview to The Dove radio show about the significance of the Transfiguration in the Orthodox Church

On Friday, August 19th, on the Great Feast of the Transfiguration of our Lord, Priest Mark Mancuso (rector of St. Elizabeth the New Martyr Church in Columbia, SC) gave an interview to Steve Johnson on The Dove radio show about the significance of the Transfiguration. In this fascinating interview, Fr. Mark explains to a Protestant audience how the Orthodox Church celebrates the feast of the Transfiguration, and how this important biblical event foreshadows our own Resurrection. Fr. Mark also gave the listeners some critical insight into the teachings of the Holy Fathers and recommended they read the writings of St. John Chrysostom and St. Athanasius the Great. Click here to listen to the full interview (23 min.).

Media Office of the Eastern American Diocese