Journey Back to Eden.pdf - St Mark Coptic Orthodox Church Chicago

A TIME FOR FAREWELLS 205ham fruitful at last.” And how can one preach unless he is sent? Avery touching farewell he gave me!JULY 29, WEDNESDAYThe crowds yesterday were great in the church, coming even inthe awful heat for the special blessings of visiting the monasticchurch. I lingered after the Kodes for a while because so many pilgrimswanted my blessing—any monk would do. So there I was, heldcaptive by their coming in a line. This has happened to me again andagain in so many other contexts that I have become familiar with theritual of it. How abandoned we are, as monks, in the West!“Out of Egypt I Have Called My Son”JULY 30, THURSDAYI returned to Cairo and am staying now with my friends, theKamal-Hanna family, as I prepare to take my leave. Everyone isvisiting: priests, Religious, people from the Patriarchate, secretaries,neighbors, even Moslems I have met. Everyone is now visitingthis house. Somehow word has gotten out that I am leaving,and I have a steady stream of well-wishers who come to embraceme, to hold my hand, and even to cry at the thought of seeing mego. It’s extraordinary that my visitation could have had such meaningfor any of them. But they are a warm people, and they regard itas a grace when anyone comes into their lives, as I have, askingquestions and taking great interest in them. I’m an anthropologist;that is my work. But my fieldwork has certainly become a pilgrimage.The two of them are now closely interwoven in such a waythat it will be hard for me to distinguish one from the other.Long-Suffering God,You neither change, nor endure diminishment. You arealways the same. Beyond all my imagining, you are the sourceof every virtue in your holy ones, and in you is all the beautyand truth by which your creatures are attractive and attracted.But in us is a virtue beyond all value, if we grasp it,a beauty beyond all desire, if we embrace it. Patience. Longsufferingand forbearing, we become like you. We await the