Welcome to a new feature here at the Abbey: the Chantry. You’ll be able to see it in the menu at the top of my Substack page. This is a place in which I’ll post audio recordings of my occasional talks. If I have the time and inclination, I might experiment with a few conversations with interesting people at some point in the future, though I’m not convinced the world needs another podcast. We’ll see.
In the meantime, should you be interested, you’ll find plenty more interviews, talks and conversations on my youTube channel.
The Chantry will always be free to listen to. If you’d like to support my work, and are able to, there’s a subscribe button at the bottom of this page.
In September 2024, I was asked to talk to the newly-initiated Orthodox Fellowship Ireland, at their annual gathering. Many of the people involved are new to Orthodoxy, and indeed Christianity, and some are just exploring or dipping their toes in the water, so I thought it might be useful for me to talk about how I ended up in that water myself.
So I offered this talk, which tried to lay out the key points in my messy, clueless and often very prideful spiritual journey, which despite it all still managed to get me into the true harbour, through no sailing ability of my own.
This talk was given without notes, and with various occasionally comic interruptions, so it’s a masterpiece of imperfect delivery and silly asides. But I hope there might be a few useful thoughts in it despite that.
Stumbling Towards Bethlehem