St. Vlad's: it's in the mail

So, I mailed my application for St. Vlad's yesterday.  I even took a picture of the envelope for posterity.  I'm surprised at how little emotion that I have for this significant event.  I feel as if, in some way, I have sealed my fate by finally sending this application which I swore that I would never send.  

Here are some things to put on a checklist if you are thinking about applying for St.Vlad's:

1.) Download all forms from the svots.edu website, then warm up your form-filling-out arm

2.) Be prepared to write a three-to-four page essay about yourself in regard to your desire to attend seminary

3.) Get a copy of your baptismal certificate (if you don't have one, talk to your priest)

4.) Set up an appointment with your doctor for a physical ( a requirement before being accepted)

5.) Contact your bishop and petition him for his blessing on your desire to apply to seminary

6.) Start thinking fun thoughts, such as, "How am I going to feed my family, pay my bills and pay for school?!?"  And then realize that if God can bring you to St. Vlad's, he can take you through St. Vlad's.

..........

Today, I am in High Point, North Carolina to set up my company's showroom in anticipation of the  fall 2008 furniture "Market" season.  I will be tending and mending furniture that retails for (in some cases) more than the estimated value of my house.  I am NOT kidding, or exaggerating.  Mind, my house isn't all that nice and I live in a notoriously small Georgia town, but how can a single piece of furniture retail for over $70k?  People will make appointments to come visit our showroom in a week or so, and will spend obscene amounts of money on our furniture.  

........

As I finish writing this post, I find myself back at home after a difficult week of pre-market set up.  I find myself more and more unsure about being involved with this sort of business on any level, though I know some very good people who wouldn't think twice about this sort of thing.  It's just a job, it's just business.   But this is 'compartmentalized thinking', and I can't buy into it.  We don't live in a two-storey universe, as Fr Stephen Freeman has said many times in his podcasts (which I highly recommend).  We live in a world that is at once both physical and spiritual.  God is not somehow relegated to another existence apart from the one that we mistakenly refer to as "the one, true reality".  He is here and now, and by way of His Son and through His Spirit reveals the kingdom which is here and is to come.  That kingdom is 'the norm', not this world.  That being the fact, I struggle with Christianity being shaped and molded to fit the so-called demands of this world.  I struggle with my company's three-point priority list, in which the third point states that my company will "honor God in all we do".

How will I deal with parishoners who don't see the importance of taking on this struggle and allowing it to transform their lives?  How will I deal with myself when I try to make this world into 'the norm' by which I judge those persons around me, as if I were the master of my first- storey existence and God was somewhere else?

I am struck by the incredible self-indulgence that my "christian" company seeks to sell to those who are seeking to find a way to fill in their (often times) empty existence.  No matter how beautiful the 'junk' is, it is still ultimately just junk.  Beautiful to be sure, and a form of our God-given creative drive which gives Him glory in some way.  But at the end of the day, a $12,000 armoire is still $12,000 worth of junk.  It will burn.  Hopefully we won't  burn with it.