Young American men who join the “men’s” Russian churches

“A lot of people asks me, ‘Moses’ father, how can I increase my man in a ridiculous level? “

In Video on YouTubeThe priest advocates the form of viral, neoplagical courage.

Skinny jeans, crossing his legs, with iron, eyebrow formation and even into the food of soup is one of the things he finds out as too feminine.

There are other videos of Moses McFurson’s parents – a powerful father of five – athletics to the sound of Heavi metal.

He was brought up by a Protestant and once worked as a roof, but now he served as a priest in the Russian Orthodox Church outside Russia (Roco) in Georgetown, Texas, a branch of the Mother’s Church in Moscow.

Recently, Rocor, a global network with the headquarters in New York, is expanding across the United States -mainly as a result of people who are transformed from other faiths.

Over the last six months, Father Moses has prepared 75 new followers for baptism in his Church of the Mother of God, north of Austin.

“When my wife and I were converted 20 years ago, we called Orthodoxy a secret because people just didn’t know what it was,” he says.

“But last year our congregation three times increased.”

During the Sunday Liturgy in the church, Moses’ parents impresses me the number of men in the twenties and the thirties who pray and cross themselves in the back of the nave, and how this religion – with traditions that date back to our 4th century – seems to attracts young people with life in modern America.

The Teodor software engineer tells me he had a dream, and his wife he loved but felt empty inside, as if there was a hole in his heart. He believes that society was “very harsh” on men and constantly tells them they are wrong. He complains that men are criticized for wanting to become a breadwinner and support his wife at home.

“We are told that this is nowadays this is a very toxic relationship,” says Theodore. “It’s not as it should be.”

Almost all the converters I meet have decided at home school, partly because they believe that women should prefer their families, not careers.

Father John Whiteford, Archporia in Rocory from Spring, north of Houston, says that home education provides religious education and “a way to protect your children”, avoiding conversations about “transgenderism, or about 57 gender or anything”.

Compared to the millions of believers in the gospel mega in America, the number of Christian Orthodox tiny ones is only about one percent of the population. This includes the Eastern Orthodoxy, as practiced in Russia, Ukraine, Eastern Europe and Greece, as well as in the Eastern Orthodox from the Middle East and Africa.

Founded by priests and clergy, who are fleeing the Russian Revolution in 1917, the Rocor is considered by many as the most conservative Orthodox jurisdiction in the United States. However, this small religious community is vocal, and what unfolds in it reflects broader political changes, especially after the dramatic turn of President Donald Trump to Moscow.

A valid increase in the number of transducers is difficult to evaluate but Data from the Pew Research Center It believes that Orthodox Christians make up 64% of men, which is compared to 46% in 2007.

A Less study Of the 773 transformers appear to be a tendency. The most recent aliens are men, and many say that the pandemic has pushed them to seek a new faith. This is a poll according to Orthodox Church in America (OCA), which was created by Russian monks in Alaska in the late 18th century and now has more than 700 parishes, missions, communities, monasteries and institutions in the US, Canada and Mexico belonging to the Russian Orthodox.

Professor Scott Kenvrati, who studies history and thought about Eastern Orthodox Christianity – especially in modern Russia – says his OCA parish in Cincinnati “absolutely tears at the seams”.

He visited the same church for 24 years and says that the number of congregations remained resistant. Since then, there has been a constant stream of new requesters and people who are preparing for baptism known as catechmen.

“This is not just a phenomenon of my own parish, or in several places in Texas,” says Professor Kenwori, “it’s definitely something broader.”

Digital space is key in this wave of new converters. Moses’s father has great next online – if he shares A picture of a positive pregnancy test In his Instagram -channel, he receives 6000 likes for the announcement of the arrival of a sixth child.

But there are dozens of other podcasts and videos represented by the Orthodox clergy and the army of followers – mostly men.

Father Moses tells his congregation, there are two ways of serving God – to be a monk or a nun, or marrying. Those who go the second way should avoid contraception and have as many children as possible.

“Show me one holy in the history of the Church, which, if, blessed any control over birth,” says Moses. As for masturbation – or what the Church calls self -care – the priest condemns it as “pathetic and unclean”.

Father Moses says that Orthodoxy is “not masculine, it’s just normal”, while “everything became very feminized in the West.” He believes that some Protestant churches are mostly serving women.

“I do not want to go to services that feel like a Taylor Swift concert,” says Moses’ father. – If you look at the language of “Music of worship”, it’s all emotion – it’s not men. “

Elisa Bielich Davis, a former Protestant who now belongs to the Greek Orthodox Church in Austin, is a Sunday school teacher and has her own podcast. He says that many converters belong to the “crowd of anti -grate” and sometimes have strange ideas about their new faith – especially those in the Russian church.

“They perceive it as a military, firm, disciplinary, male, authoritarian religion,” says Ellis. “It’s somehow ridiculous. It’s almost as if old American Puritans and their madness arise.”

Buck Johnson worked 25 years and takes Podcaste counterflow.

He says he was initially scared to enter his local Russian Orthodox Church when he “looks different, covered with tattooing,” but tells me he was greeted with his hands open. He was also amazed that the church remained open throughout the closure.

Sitting on the couch in front of two huge television screens in his home in Lokhart, he says his new faith changes his view of the world.

“Negative American views on Russia is what worries me,” says Bak. He tells me that the main “hereditary” media presents a distorted picture of the invasion of Ukraine.

“I think here in America, America has the content of a boomer that survived the cold war,” says Bak, “and I don’t understand why – but they say that Russia is bad.”

The head of the Russian Church in Moscow, Patriarch Cyril, uncertainly supported the invasion of Ukraine, calling it a holy war and expressing little sympathy for his victims. When I ask the Architect John Whiteford about the main clergyman of Russia, which many see as a warmer, he assures me that the patriarch’s words were distorted.

Putin’s footage and photos cite biblical poems, holding candles during the worship at the Moscow Cathedral of Christ the Savior and getting rid of their swimming trunks to immerse themselves in the icy water in Epiphan, it seems to have caused a chord. Some – in America and other countries – consider Russia as the last bastion of true Christianity.

Almost ten years ago, another Orthodox transformation turned into a priest from Texas, Father Joseph Glisson, moved from America to Borisoglebsky, in the village four hours north of Moscow, with his wife and eight children.

“There is no homosexual marriage in Russia, it has no civil unions, it is a place where you can go to the school of your children and – of course – I love a thousand years of Orthodox Christianity here,” he told the Russian video.

This bizarre Texas strike is located in the forefront of the movement calling on the Conservatives to move to Russia. Last August Putin presented a quick way The general values ​​of Visa For those who escape from Western liberalism.

Returning to Texas, Bak tells me that he and his colleagues -the heads turn his back for instant pleasure and American consumer.

“We think about things in the long run,” says Bak, “like traditions, love for your family, love for your community, love for neighbors.

“I think Orthodoxy is well suited to us – and especially in Texas.”