Posts in category Faith
The Protection of the Mother of God
is a feast of Orthodox churches.
On Oct. 1, 911, Constantinople was besieged by a viking-style gang consisting mostly of Russians. The fall of the city seemed inevitable. Most non-military population gathered in churches where the services had been conducted day and night. At four o’clock in the morning st. Andrew, the fool-for-Christ, and his disciple Epiphanus, came to see Our Lady praying in the altar. After the prayer, She has covered people gathered in the church by Her veil, as if protecting them from cold or cloaking from the enemy.
The city was spared by the time. The gang turned away satisfied with a modest tribute. Since that the orthodoxes celebrate the feast of Protection, or Intercession, or Veil: Greek word ÓêÝðç can mean all of above. It may seem strange that the feast is most loved by Russians, wrong side in the story. It requires some reasoning to gasp that the violence and terror inflicted by Russian gangs (either state-owned or private) abroad must be a minor fraction of that inflicted on their own soil. The conclusion is that Russians need the protecting veil most: to cloak from themselves.
Anyway the protection, the mercy comes to everybody. Mostly undeserved. Glory to God.
Nativity of the Mother of God
I should have posted this four days ago. However, I was on trip and the internet connection was such that I could not do it. Ok, it’s better late than never.
The feast of Nativity of the Mother of God is celebrated in Orthodox church on Sep. 21 (two weeks later than Catholics do: the calendar is shifted). This is the first feast from the twelve great ones in a yearly cycle of church celebrations that starts on September 1. This is how must people know it.
As to me and my family, this feast has a special significance. On this mere day I was appointed for a permanent position at Delft University of Technology. This has ended a difficult nomadic period in my life. I have got a possibility to do research and support my family, thanks to the Mother.
Why do I write about it now? Well, this took place 15 years ago, a kind of jubilee. Do you think it was a joyfull day for me? Not quite. In this less ideal word, if one gets some, another does not. There was a job search by that time, four people on the list. Me. My student with whom we did splendid physics and were having a good time. He could not find a research job in the Nethrelands and is now a prof in Grenoble, France. My good friend who has actually brought me to Delft and has helped me a lot. He could not stay in research he liked and works for a soft company.
Crux II
I’ve already mentioned in this blog that I’m a Christian. The time has come to reveal more: I’m not the only one among the scientific stuff of TU Delft. We’ve a kind of small organization that does not advertise itself. It’s called Crux. Once in a month we meet, trying not to attract much attention.
Why not to attract? For forty years passed since Great Secularization of Dutch society it did not feel quite proper to talk about religion within university environment. The students are of course allowed to have interests, and there are several active student Christian organizations. As to the stuff, the common opinion was that faith is so deeply personal and so irrelevant to any academic acitvies that any mentioning of it is improper, very much like mentioning, discussing and promoting personal physiology. This is why we’re still a bit cautious. Although times seem to change: more and more academics actively and publically discuss questions related to interactions between science and religion and even provoke such discussions. Cees Dekker, prof of molecular biology at our Kavli Institute, is especially famous for this: see his site www.ceesdekker.net.
So two years ago Cees Dekker and Hans Hellendoorn, prof. in applications of computational intellegence, have founded Crux, In our meetings, somebody usually gives a (short) presentation that ignites a friendly discussion that can be about everything: from the best ways to handle Ph.D, students to what Scriptures say about environmental issues. Starting this year, we also invite postdocs and Ph.D. students: this is called Crux II.
Today we got very deep in philosophy. Kees Roos told us about Wittgenstein and Goedel. Yet everybody find it interesting and can say something about. Glory to God.