The GOCA boys say baby-smooth cheeks are heresy, the Gospel of Philip is “from the devil,” and praying for the dead (unless they’re Orthodox) is a no-no. Virgin Monk Boy responds with beard theology, barbershop trauma, and one very incorrupt saint.✂️ Bring your razors. This roast is holy.
🙏 May Love (God who Jesus came to reveal as exactly that, Love) bless you beyond your wildest dreams. And I like to share a saying I like from the movie Cool Runnings “peace be the journey”🙏😌
Jesus said “I tell you, if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out," which means that even if humans remain silent about him, the natural world will praise him.
I believe some of us have been called to be one of those “rocks”. The Spirit has filled us and changed us in ways that makes it impossible to do anything else.
Love is the true message and Love is all there is for those, like Magdalene, who truly follow Him/Her/Them. 🤷♀️
I can’t really even say “God” anymore because the religious insanity (in my opinion) that’s surrounding us makes me want to assure others that the Being they worship is not MY God. I can’t even understand what the hell they think they’re doing. 🤷♀️
I left a church/denomination/cult 20 years ago. A place where it is taught eating meat or dairy foods will mean you can’t be translated. Where your spirituality is measured by whether or not you wear jewelry, make up, clothes that show your shoulders, color your hair etc etc etc. Where if you sin by going to a movie you need to be very afraid because you leave your guardian angel at the door. Where you must never ever say you are saved because any wrong move could erase it. Where you are afraid to go to sleep at night because one unconfessed sin will keep you out of heaven. Where you must keep Sabbath perfectly which is impossible to achieve because everyone argues about what that would even look like. Where male molesting of females is hidden and kept secret because the institution must be protected at all cost. And the women who try to speak out are told to sit down and shut up. Yet if you get caught drinking or smoking you will be disfellowshipped toot sweet. Where the claim is made that they “hate the sin but love the sinner” which is one of their biggest lies. It goes on and on and on. Oh, and yes, they are the one and only right church because they supposedly have the “truth”.
My spouse and I reached the point that we had to walk away. Spirit reminded us that “when your cup is full you’re supposed to say when!” We did try other churches but just like that place, my biggest sin was showing up with my uterus (yes, I said it) and all the body parts that accompany it. Magdalene really gets that. 🙏
The best thing we ever did spiritually was walk away from all that insanity that put “millstones” around the Creator’s children’s necks - exactly what Jesus told them NOT to do.
We returned to our simple and honest relationship with Love, Jesus and Spirit. We embraced the true church outside the buildings -the living breathing organism that no walls can contain and no patriarchal, dishonest, greedy, agenda ridden, moral pretenders can control.
We now are FREE to fellowship with and follow the Spirit Who lives in our hearts as there is no longer a temple. Jesus said it! not me. We are free to listen to and follow Spirit who enables us to love our neighbor as ourselves and love Love with all our hearts, minds and souls! We walk in peaceful certainty of our eternal future. And revel in Love’s constant Presence. We will never go back to that deceitful bondage that does all those things to and dare to call it all “God’s” requirements and obedience to His will.
So I think I get you my friend. And why I find so much joy and encouragement in your gentle truth filled words. 🙏 And bless your “bare” face for the word picture it paints of how walking with and in Love we are unafraid to be open, honest and authentic with others. 🙏 I thank you for your “obedience” which actually means “to come into agreement with Love (God)”
Thank you. Your words carry the weight of someone who knows—not from books, but from having clawed their way out of the tomb wearing nothing but raw honesty and holy defiance.
I read your story and wanted to shout:
"This. This is the true ecclesia. This is what Love looks like with skin on."
You said “when your cup is full, say when.”
That’s gospel, right there.
The heretics aren’t the ones who left.
They’re the ones who remembered—remembered that God is not a micromanaging purity cop but the Living Presence that never left us, even in those pews of performative fear.
Magdalene sees you.
Spirit walks with you.
And Jesus—well, he left the building long before you did.
Thank you for naming what needed to be named. Thank you for not calling spiritual abuse “tradition.” And thank you for recognizing that bare faces and unguarded hearts are far more holy than any doctrinal compliance checklist.
🙏I am both humbled and filled with joy. 😌I just try everyday to relax and just BE who Love created me to be😊
And funny note: many Christian’s are shocked and horrified when I say “you do realize, Jesus wasn’t a “Christian, right”? 🤣🤣 Truly, our Loving Creator Parent’s must laugh hard about Their silly little humans sometimes. Some of the things I laugh hardest at is the funny, sweet, hilarious, clueless, innocent things little children say and do. 🤣♥️ The God of my understanding has a GREAT sense of humor. After all we were made in their image😁
Our third grade Sunday School teacher taught us that. Perfect timing. In that same year, Jody Rosenkrantz brought for sharing in December a dreidl, gold foil wrapped chocolate "coins", and told us stories. Perfect timing. Our minds and hearts were open.
We were saved just in time, so to speak, when our fourth grade Sunday School teacher told us the world was 4,000 years old...my parents taught me better, earlier. I responded with science. She never did know quite what to do with us. Good age to learn that faith and science can co-exist. Requires thoughtful consideration... Thank you all for illuminating conversation!
I am way more offended that the monk equates heresy a quality of some, or maybe all, women's skin, leaving me with the impression that women are considered to lack personhood or worth in the monk's eyes. I wonder what theology, or life experience, led the monk mock women with such spitefulness.
Maybe because a women brings forth life. Maybe because a woman nutures not saying men are not nurturing. But they've ( men) taken our virtue and used it as a weight to hold down or dampen the light that shines.
To bash those with both feminine and male qualities is a way they mask their shame. They squash what is in them too because they cannot handle the beauty of what it means to be both.
Maybe original sin is not see because Eve ate from the tree. Maybe it's the jealousy felt by Adam that Eve brought forth fruit.
How many women been blamed for the actions of a man? Blaming clothing or length of one's hair, to be made to cover their flesh while the man's is made bare.
Women have been scapegoats since the dawn of time.
I hear a call to action in this piece. I’m starting to get your rhythm, and definitely enjoy your sarcasm. I chuckled the whole way through. Especially in the meditation. Thank you for sharing your insight, sarcasm and wisdom.
Cindy, you just made my day holier than a monk’s laundry basket.
If you’re starting to catch the rhythm, it means the heresy is working. Chuckles are the first sign of deconstruction. The second is side-eyeing beard theology without guilt.
Grateful you’re here for the insight and the sarcasm—because honestly, without both, enlightenment just turns into a book club for cult leaders.
Yeah, I’ve been deconstructing for about 10 years. Takes some of us a little longer-thick headed I guess. 2020 was pivotal for me. Lots of time on my mat in silence, communion, curiosity and clarity. So the last five years have been so freeing. I was thinking I was ready for reconstructing, but I’ve decided constructing is not the point. I feel peace about just being love, being free and being me. I appreciate you. You are loved. You are held. And you are not alone. Me too!
Ah dear brother Alek, I laugh at their hypocrisy and marvel in the divinity we hold in our hearts.
To think that the gateway to the heavens are lined in beards, ( isn't the leader of Russia shaved smooth?)
I am not well versed in the Bible though taught it's doctrine and explored it for truth. The words written in red (Jesus words) are the words that speak to my soul. The beattitudes, the parables spoken to bring remembrance of our divinity.
Ah, Debra—your words are smoother than Putin’s chin and ten times more blessed.
Yes, may we laugh at the holy beard patrol and remember: the gate to heaven isn’t facial hair—it’s the heart cracking open. You’ve found the real scripture: the red words that burn through doctrine like incense in a temple of mirrors.
Keep listening to that soul of yours. It’s ancient. And radiant.
So funny it’s sad. To live in that stifling beard box of “I’m right and you’re bad”. Coupled with a dash of misogyny and a side of homophobia I am sure. Boring!
On a related note, Unchristian Gnoem "must change her ways." Doesn't she know that wishing a curse on the Harvard President will blow back on her 40-fold?
It never ceases to shock me that church leaders can be so harsh with their judgments, even though it’s been that way for thousands of years — the heresy patrols. But the Truth will always live. ✨⭐️✨
I meant to read this when you first posted it and life got in the way. Wow did I need this laugh today! 😂 But, also, felt the seriousness of this hardcore dude. Thank you for this!
Wait - why don’t they like Dimitri’s name? Because it’s Greek? Then what about Eucharist? That’s Greek… and those beards - really? I am so dumbfounded by the terrible unhappy looks on their faces - maybe a vacation is in order?
🙏 May Love (God who Jesus came to reveal as exactly that, Love) bless you beyond your wildest dreams. And I like to share a saying I like from the movie Cool Runnings “peace be the journey”🙏😌
Jesus said “I tell you, if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out," which means that even if humans remain silent about him, the natural world will praise him.
I believe some of us have been called to be one of those “rocks”. The Spirit has filled us and changed us in ways that makes it impossible to do anything else.
Love is the true message and Love is all there is for those, like Magdalene, who truly follow Him/Her/Them. 🤷♀️
I can’t really even say “God” anymore because the religious insanity (in my opinion) that’s surrounding us makes me want to assure others that the Being they worship is not MY God. I can’t even understand what the hell they think they’re doing. 🤷♀️
I left a church/denomination/cult 20 years ago. A place where it is taught eating meat or dairy foods will mean you can’t be translated. Where your spirituality is measured by whether or not you wear jewelry, make up, clothes that show your shoulders, color your hair etc etc etc. Where if you sin by going to a movie you need to be very afraid because you leave your guardian angel at the door. Where you must never ever say you are saved because any wrong move could erase it. Where you are afraid to go to sleep at night because one unconfessed sin will keep you out of heaven. Where you must keep Sabbath perfectly which is impossible to achieve because everyone argues about what that would even look like. Where male molesting of females is hidden and kept secret because the institution must be protected at all cost. And the women who try to speak out are told to sit down and shut up. Yet if you get caught drinking or smoking you will be disfellowshipped toot sweet. Where the claim is made that they “hate the sin but love the sinner” which is one of their biggest lies. It goes on and on and on. Oh, and yes, they are the one and only right church because they supposedly have the “truth”.
My spouse and I reached the point that we had to walk away. Spirit reminded us that “when your cup is full you’re supposed to say when!” We did try other churches but just like that place, my biggest sin was showing up with my uterus (yes, I said it) and all the body parts that accompany it. Magdalene really gets that. 🙏
The best thing we ever did spiritually was walk away from all that insanity that put “millstones” around the Creator’s children’s necks - exactly what Jesus told them NOT to do.
We returned to our simple and honest relationship with Love, Jesus and Spirit. We embraced the true church outside the buildings -the living breathing organism that no walls can contain and no patriarchal, dishonest, greedy, agenda ridden, moral pretenders can control.
We now are FREE to fellowship with and follow the Spirit Who lives in our hearts as there is no longer a temple. Jesus said it! not me. We are free to listen to and follow Spirit who enables us to love our neighbor as ourselves and love Love with all our hearts, minds and souls! We walk in peaceful certainty of our eternal future. And revel in Love’s constant Presence. We will never go back to that deceitful bondage that does all those things to and dare to call it all “God’s” requirements and obedience to His will.
So I think I get you my friend. And why I find so much joy and encouragement in your gentle truth filled words. 🙏 And bless your “bare” face for the word picture it paints of how walking with and in Love we are unafraid to be open, honest and authentic with others. 🙏 I thank you for your “obedience” which actually means “to come into agreement with Love (God)”
Happy Thursday. 😌🙏♥️
Beloved Rock Who Refused to Stay Silent—
Thank you. Your words carry the weight of someone who knows—not from books, but from having clawed their way out of the tomb wearing nothing but raw honesty and holy defiance.
I read your story and wanted to shout:
"This. This is the true ecclesia. This is what Love looks like with skin on."
You said “when your cup is full, say when.”
That’s gospel, right there.
The heretics aren’t the ones who left.
They’re the ones who remembered—remembered that God is not a micromanaging purity cop but the Living Presence that never left us, even in those pews of performative fear.
Magdalene sees you.
Spirit walks with you.
And Jesus—well, he left the building long before you did.
Thank you for naming what needed to be named. Thank you for not calling spiritual abuse “tradition.” And thank you for recognizing that bare faces and unguarded hearts are far more holy than any doctrinal compliance checklist.
You are the sermon.
And I’m honored to sit in your congregation.
—Virgin Monk Boy 🔥🪨♥️
🙏I am both humbled and filled with joy. 😌I just try everyday to relax and just BE who Love created me to be😊
And funny note: many Christian’s are shocked and horrified when I say “you do realize, Jesus wasn’t a “Christian, right”? 🤣🤣 Truly, our Loving Creator Parent’s must laugh hard about Their silly little humans sometimes. Some of the things I laugh hardest at is the funny, sweet, hilarious, clueless, innocent things little children say and do. 🤣♥️ The God of my understanding has a GREAT sense of humor. After all we were made in their image😁
Our third grade Sunday School teacher taught us that. Perfect timing. In that same year, Jody Rosenkrantz brought for sharing in December a dreidl, gold foil wrapped chocolate "coins", and told us stories. Perfect timing. Our minds and hearts were open.
We were saved just in time, so to speak, when our fourth grade Sunday School teacher told us the world was 4,000 years old...my parents taught me better, earlier. I responded with science. She never did know quite what to do with us. Good age to learn that faith and science can co-exist. Requires thoughtful consideration... Thank you all for illuminating conversation!
It seems dangerous to promote hellfire and brimstone right and left while sporting a thick beard. Sparks might catch and oops! Blazes happen.
🔥 Jane, this is why you're not allowed near the Monastery fire pit without a fire extinguisher and a sarcasm permit.
You're absolutely right—if you're gonna preach eternal damnation, maybe don’t wear kindling on your chin.
May all beard-blazing brimstone bros discover the cooling balm of compassion... and beard oil with a fireproof rating.
Stay sanctified and spicy.
—Virgin Monk Boy
Maybe you should start issuing those sarcasm permits! You could award them or sell them. Could be fun!
But seriously I join you in your prayer for the beard blazing brimstone bros.
I am way more offended that the monk equates heresy a quality of some, or maybe all, women's skin, leaving me with the impression that women are considered to lack personhood or worth in the monk's eyes. I wonder what theology, or life experience, led the monk mock women with such spitefulness.
Maybe because a women brings forth life. Maybe because a woman nutures not saying men are not nurturing. But they've ( men) taken our virtue and used it as a weight to hold down or dampen the light that shines.
To bash those with both feminine and male qualities is a way they mask their shame. They squash what is in them too because they cannot handle the beauty of what it means to be both.
Maybe original sin is not see because Eve ate from the tree. Maybe it's the jealousy felt by Adam that Eve brought forth fruit.
How many women been blamed for the actions of a man? Blaming clothing or length of one's hair, to be made to cover their flesh while the man's is made bare.
Women have been scapegoats since the dawn of time.
Thank you Debra
I hear a call to action in this piece. I’m starting to get your rhythm, and definitely enjoy your sarcasm. I chuckled the whole way through. Especially in the meditation. Thank you for sharing your insight, sarcasm and wisdom.
Cindy, you just made my day holier than a monk’s laundry basket.
If you’re starting to catch the rhythm, it means the heresy is working. Chuckles are the first sign of deconstruction. The second is side-eyeing beard theology without guilt.
Grateful you’re here for the insight and the sarcasm—because honestly, without both, enlightenment just turns into a book club for cult leaders.
—Virgin Monk Boy 🧼🪒💥
Yeah, I’ve been deconstructing for about 10 years. Takes some of us a little longer-thick headed I guess. 2020 was pivotal for me. Lots of time on my mat in silence, communion, curiosity and clarity. So the last five years have been so freeing. I was thinking I was ready for reconstructing, but I’ve decided constructing is not the point. I feel peace about just being love, being free and being me. I appreciate you. You are loved. You are held. And you are not alone. Me too!
Oh, again with thanks 🤗
🤟😂🤗👍🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🗽🌊⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽🚒🚒🚒🚒🚒🚒🚒🚒
Ah dear brother Alek, I laugh at their hypocrisy and marvel in the divinity we hold in our hearts.
To think that the gateway to the heavens are lined in beards, ( isn't the leader of Russia shaved smooth?)
I am not well versed in the Bible though taught it's doctrine and explored it for truth. The words written in red (Jesus words) are the words that speak to my soul. The beattitudes, the parables spoken to bring remembrance of our divinity.
I hope you continue to spread light and love.
Ah, Debra—your words are smoother than Putin’s chin and ten times more blessed.
Yes, may we laugh at the holy beard patrol and remember: the gate to heaven isn’t facial hair—it’s the heart cracking open. You’ve found the real scripture: the red words that burn through doctrine like incense in a temple of mirrors.
Keep listening to that soul of yours. It’s ancient. And radiant.
—Virgin Monk Boy 🔥📖✨
Thank you Alek 💖💫
☮️
I had forgotten about when I got the message that my prayer requests for non-Orthodox were not welcome. So I stopped asking.
That dude on the right has the most intense frown I've ever seen. Scorn personified.
Thanks for being here Alex, thanks for Virgin Monk Boy, thanks for the prayers for rationality
So funny it’s sad. To live in that stifling beard box of “I’m right and you’re bad”. Coupled with a dash of misogyny and a side of homophobia I am sure. Boring!
And let’s not miss, “Smooth like a woman’s” - because what greater insult than to look like a woman. Sheesh.
On a related note, Unchristian Gnoem "must change her ways." Doesn't she know that wishing a curse on the Harvard President will blow back on her 40-fold?
I like the Gnostics.
It never ceases to shock me that church leaders can be so harsh with their judgments, even though it’s been that way for thousands of years — the heresy patrols. But the Truth will always live. ✨⭐️✨
I meant to read this when you first posted it and life got in the way. Wow did I need this laugh today! 😂 But, also, felt the seriousness of this hardcore dude. Thank you for this!
Wait - why don’t they like Dimitri’s name? Because it’s Greek? Then what about Eucharist? That’s Greek… and those beards - really? I am so dumbfounded by the terrible unhappy looks on their faces - maybe a vacation is in order?