This past May, I graduated with my Master’s in Theology with a concentration in Sacred Arts from Saint Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary. A few days before commencement, all the graduates were invited to a dinner with the faculty and the board of trustees. At this event, we were each given the platform to offer words of farewell, reflection, and/or gratitude.
As I contemplated what I should use these few minutes to speak about, I thought about my journey to seminary. People come to seminary for many different reasons. Some know that they want to be a priest or a chaplain, so seminary seems like a natural step along the way. For some, they have no idea what they want to do. That was my situation.
I was 22-years-old and working a job in hospitality that was slowly but surely draining me. Despite the emotional and spiritual disconnect I felt within this situation, I was well-suited for the practical aspects of the job. I was promoted and put on track that was meant to lead to a job at the corporate headquarters.
Part of me felt gratified by this recognition, but, after flying out to visit the headquarters and getting a taste of what life in that world would look like, I knew that it wouldn’t be worth it. I knew I did not want to pursue that path, but I was not sure what to do instead. All I knew was that I did not want to wake up in five or ten years with regret. I did not want to take this job just because it was in front of me, only to realize later on that I had wasted years of my life pursuing an empty goal.
So, there I was, confused and scared. What should I do now?
The answer came to me, as it so often does, in a most unexpected way. By the grace of God, my parents had just moved to Saint Vladimir’s when my father was hired as the professor of Old Testament. Everytime I would call home or visit my parents, I felt an increasingly strong pull to the seminary. I could not explain it— after all, seminary is for priests, and that has never been on the table for me. But then I met some of the other students, and I began to realize that seminary had a lot to offer, even to those not pursuing ordination.
This thought grew inside of me until I resolved to go home and tell my parents this crazy idea: I wanted to come to seminary. As it turns out, they were planning to sit me down that weekend to tell me that they thought I should come to Saint Vlad’s.
The years between that weekend and this graduation dinner seem to have passed in absolutely no time at all. And yet, I somehow feel like I have always been a part of this place. I did not know something could feel so familiar in so few years. I have speculated with other students that this phenomenon comes from the quantity, quality, and variety of obligations and opportunities that seminary holds.
My time at Saint Vlad’s has been filled with countless blessings that I never imagined I would have. For one, I didn’t think I would get so much extra time with my parents. For most children, after you go off to college, you don’t get much time at home. So these years have been a blessing. I was a classmate with my mother, and we sat next to each other in my father’s class. It has been a wonderful and unique blessing; one of many such blessings that seminary has offered.
Amidst the busy schedule, I was often struck by the goodness of everything that I was busy with. Yes, I had a million things to do, but those things were going to chapel, rehearsing with the choir, reading the Church Fathers, and writing about Saints and theologians. Seminary allowed me to immerse myself in the Orthodox Faith and to do so alongside my classmates, friends, and family. It gave me a community.
For all the good, though, it also presented many, many challenges.
It is hard here, and not just because the academics are intense. There is chapel, choir practice, obediences, and all the little interactions that add up throughout the day, leaving you feeling like you have no time. Some days, I was struck by how good all of this was, but other days, I was not. Some days, I was just tired or frustrated.
It was on days like those that I felt I had the most to learn.
I wrote my Master’s thesis on gratitude, specifically on “radical thanksgiving.” I asked how it is that we are expected to give thanks for things like suffering, loss, and hardship; how we can be expected to give thanks when we feel like we have nothing left to give.
But this is what we are called to do at seminary. Of course, we are called to be thankful no matter where we are, but seminary provides many unique opportunities to practice radical thanksgiving. In an environment where everyone was explicitly working for the Church (for there are many jobs wherein this ministry is just as powerful, yet not as explicit), I felt guilty for ever feeling tired or fed up. At first, I did not know what to do with these feelings because I felt like I could not complain in this setting. I was forced to face my own ingratitude in a way that I never had been before. Then, I realized that thanksgiving is not an emotion, it is a choice.
When the classes feel too hard, when the work feels like too much, when you feel like you have nothing left to give, and all those small interactions that add up during the day start to feel like too much…when you don’t know what else to do, you can give thanks.
Even if you do not know what exactly it is that you are giving thanks for, even if you have no idea how things could get better, if you don’t think you can make it through, you can give thanks. Giving thanks to God reminds us that it is not our strength that gets us through; it is His.
This is what I decide to speak about in my few short minutes, because it is what I feel to be true. Seminary has not been easy. Seminary has not taught me how to ignore the bad and seek the good. Instead, it has taught me that the Christian life is hard. Moreover, it has taught me to be grateful that this is so. I am thankful that these years have not been easy. I am thankful that these years have forced me to confront my shortcomings and to wrestle with a response.
Though this struggle will surely persist for the rest of my life, I feel reassured that I can choose how I want to respond to challenges. Even if I know nothing else, I know that I can choose to give thanks to God.