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Hi , I'm Andrew . I'm an Orthodox Christian

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. I've been in the military for two

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and a half years now and

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I've been an Orthodox Christian for barely

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a year now , almost . Oh , half a year , half a year

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now . So I grew up in Massachusetts . I

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was raised Episcopalian it's

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kind of funny because my mother's Catholic

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and my dad was Episcopalian . So it was a weird

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dynamic for a little bit , but I primarily

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went . Dad was Episcopalian , so it was a weird dynamic for a little bit , but I primarily

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went to the Episcopalian church . The church I went to they had some really nice

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stained glass windows of a

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few of the stories in the Bible , as

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well as under the patron saint of St Michael , one of the archangels , archangels

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. So I thought that was all pretty cool . But as

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I kind of grew up and like I kind of

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like lost a little bit of the faith a little bit , mostly

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because it's kind of it's not really , I just

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didn't , I just didn't hit the same Because I was growing up

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there , I was going through my emotions going

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there , and when I came around high school

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age I

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was just like , okay , I'm

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tired of this , I want to like enjoy

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my whole weekends . But

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then , as I was going through high school , my mom said if you didn't know

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what you want to do after high school , she wanted me to go to seminary

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school and become a priest for the Catholic church , I believe

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, but she didn't

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really specify what church either . She's like go become

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a priest for the Catholic Church , I believe , but she didn't really specify what

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church either . She's like go become a priest . She just wanted one of her sons to become

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a priest . I'm like , okay , I'm not doing that . So I went to the military instead

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. So I went to the military . Boot

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camp was interesting because

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you have Sundays as your holiday routine

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. I

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mean , you have like a few hours off to either organize your stuff , clean

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you couldn't really sleep , you just kind of like just chilled for a few hours , but is if you

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were but you also had an opportunity to

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attend a lot of religious services . So we had

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a lot of interesting

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ones , because then your Hindu some Wicca there was like there's a Wicca

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service and of course , the Catholic Protestant Baptist , all the other Christian Hindu

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some Wicca there was a Wicca service and of course

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, the Catholic Protestant Baptist , all

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the other Christian denominations as

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well as , in

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the Islamic world , some of the Muslim

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services as well . So

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I didn't attend any of those . I

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was just too focused on just getting through boot

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camp to worry about

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that life . So

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after boot camp I went down to Pensacola , florida

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, for a little bit and

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there there was a lot of Baptists

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like kind of like on base , talking to people

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hey , you know , have you heard the word of Christ

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? And all that , and they're trying to , like you know , get

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you to go to their Bible study

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and all that , which is , I think I

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didn't go at all . But I had one of my friends who did

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go and he was baptized

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in the ocean

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with their Baptist group . What was it

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like seeing a friend

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get baptized ? So

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since I grew up Christian , I

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didn't really get the big idea

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like , oh , why is this baptism in like

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a later age , such a crazy

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idea , like why is it so meaningful

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to them ? Versus , I was just like , is

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this like good for them ? Kind

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of like underplayed it a little bit . But

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now that I've , you know , went through my own re-baptism

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, to say the least , I

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get the importance of it and why it's very meaningful

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. It's a sign of rebirth and

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all that . So

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when he got through that , he really

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did become a whole new person after that , which

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is good for him . I

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still talk to him to this day . He

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might see this , he might not . Does

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he know you're Orthodox ? He knows I'm Orthodox

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. I did invite him to my baptism

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as well . Rock band

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music for churches it's cool

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, but it's not

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for me . I couldn't really make

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it a thing for every Sunday to go to . I

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just like , all right , I need something a

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bit more tasteful

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or a bit more

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like what's the word I'm trying

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to use for this ? More reverent

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, yes , more reverent , andrew

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. Why Orthodoxy ? Though

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You're in San Diego , california , you can

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literally go to any church you can

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imagine . Where did Orthodoxy

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even first enter your radar ? The

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Orthodox Church first entered my radar when

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I was I don't

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know , I think I was in middle

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school or something . My older sister mentioned

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it as one of the first original churches

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and that kind of stayed in my mind

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all the way up until now

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. Which is crazy

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. So I was thinking about that and I was like , all

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right , I'm now , which is crazy . So I was thinking about that . I was like , all right , I'm tired

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of this Baptist church , I want to see something else

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. Like , oh , church hop , you know all right . So I'm really

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interested in this orthodoxy . What's it all about

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? So my life changed

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with orthodoxy . Well

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before I even came to the Orthodox Church I

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was kind of like in a I guess

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depression a little bit , because I came out to a

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place I didn't know . San Diego is unfamiliar territory

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. I don't know anybody out here , my family

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was not out here . I

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don't really know anyone on the ship . I don't got a whole lot of friends

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out here and the Baptist

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Church I've been going to didn't really help that . But

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when I came to the Orthodox Church I think the biggest

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thing that really changed is that I had my community

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. The big thing I was looking

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for out here was trying to find my community , that

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one I could just hang

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out with , talk to and not feel like I have to talk about

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work or anything like that , but

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just hang out with them , have fun

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. So that's probably the

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biggest thing I think the Orthodox Church really brought

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to me is that community , the light

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of life really . I

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mean I get told this all the time on the ship that hey , you know

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, when I'm not there people actually miss me . Because

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I'm this

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very fun person to be around , very rejuvenating

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person . I bring a personality of you

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know , fun and just like hey , that's

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not serious , let's not fight each other about

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this , it's reasonable , let's be reasonable

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about it . Um , which

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is something I don't really think about when I leave or

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like go do training or something , but I

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come back like hey , man , we missed you . I have people asking about

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me all the time where's where my

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aunt , where's andrea ? Even

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at the church , like , um , some of the , the

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grandmothers there , they always ask about me . Can

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you say it one more time ? Orthodoxy

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helped me get out of my

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depression and then start with

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the whole entire thing because of the community . Alright

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, cool

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, orthodoxy got me out of my depression

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when I first came to San Diego , because

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the community out here is amazing

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, especially the young adult , because

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a lot of churches I feel like I've been to have either been dominated by a lot

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of older people or just people in

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their mid-20s range . It's not like

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the whole range from like from

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cradle to grave I don't want to say that phrase , but the

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whole , you know , from very

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young to very old , has that whole

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spectrum which is just like a

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very important piece of life which I think a

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lot of people miss out on . Why I think

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orthodoxy is attracting a lot of

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young men like myself or young

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adults type deal is because it goes

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against a lot of what modernity is pushing

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towards . Very simplistic this is

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. Orthodoxy is very complex

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. There's never one answer . There's

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never a simple answer for the orthodox way

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. It's a long and

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complicated way that the only way you can explain

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it is just come and see . That's

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the only way to explain it . There's no . If

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you try to simplify it , you cut

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out so much that's so important and

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that goes on the question . It's

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going against the Mondurne , which they choose to simplify

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everything . With a lot of other churches

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they go simple . They

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usually do one specific part of Christ's

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life , whether he died for our sins and

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that they just leave them there . They don't talk about Pentecost

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or they only talk about Pentecost . They don't talk

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about his life and his struggles . Orthodoxy

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puts it all together in the

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entire year with its whole , all its seasons

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. Experiencing Lent for the first time as Orthodox

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Christian for me , since I've never

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fasted or never really done

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Lent to any

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extent , has been very difficult

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. Avoiding

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meats has been the real struggle and , as well

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as meats , dairy and

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eggs , surprisingly

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very difficult , especially with my lifestyle being

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in the military . We have a very strict

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menu and

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vegan and vegetarian options are somewhat available . Available , but they're not often the

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best and you might risk getting food poisoning . Tell

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us why . Why did you

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want to do this ? Why do

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you think this is meaningful

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for you ? I

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was going to say I'm

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going to start with a joke because I

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like being on camera . That's good , but

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in all honesty , I just wanted to talk

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about how St Anthony's as a church

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is very unique , especially

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with a lot of churches in the San Diego area , because

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it's in between a

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few different military bases . You have Camp Pelton to

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the north with the Marines , and then

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you have Naval Base San Diego

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on 32nd Street , as well as Coronado

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. You have all these different military bases around and

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all these military personnel , all these different military

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bases around and all these military personnel , and

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I just want to talk about how

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the military is like , the reason why I'm only out here . So somehow , you know , god used the

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military to evangelize and

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people in the church have seen it all the time . There's

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a whole bunch of military people getting baptized all

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the time here and they're going on deployment

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. So

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there's this big especially for St Anthony's

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. It attracts a lot of military , because military

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attracts military . That's the only way you're going

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to get them to show up . Is someone

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else in the military or someone who's daring

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enough to show up and trust

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me new , because I was a bit scared

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when I first showed up and you

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know , now I'm not and I'm excited

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, but you wanted to share this

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. I

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just want to talk about how just great

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the community out here was and it's like how

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important this , this whole entire life

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of the Saints is , is because you

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know , a lot of like Orthodoxy

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is going online . Now it's becoming more popular online

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, which is part of the reason why

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a little bit , why I showed up , started

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coming to become orthodox , because the online

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communities have been very

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active

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active . I still was an inquirer

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because this was during

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Holy Week and there's all these different services

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going on . I , just since I had nothing else to

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do , I was just like I'm just going to go to all the services , as many

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as I can , and I did . And

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then I stayed for one of the what

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do you call your event thing ? Oh

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, just a gathering . Just like a young adult

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Young adult , yeah , young adult

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bonfire . I just stayed for a gathering after church

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and they were just discussing things . And

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this was like my second or third week or something

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of us being an inquirer and

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I wasn't even technically a catechumen . They

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kind of joked around that I had an inquirer's zeal

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, which is a bit funny . Being

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right with God before deployment matters

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more so than anything else because

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I'm in the Navy , I'm

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on an old ship and

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, being a sailor , there's

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a lot of superstition of sailors . So getting

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right with God is almost a necessity because

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there's a lot of anything can go

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at sea and you're the only one that

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can maybe fix it . So if

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your ship starts flooding , starts sinking , you

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better hope you can fix it or start

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floating . And

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the same thing because with there's

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also piracy and other things going on outside

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that are affecting the Navy and

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my profession , where

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my life and where my ship could

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be in danger from either

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missiles from China or Russia type deal

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God willing not or

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just simple things like the

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ship's rocking so much that you break your leg

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on a ladder . Well , some things

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as routine as eating can become

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dangerous if you're not careful

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or if you don't make the preparations . So

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there's a lot of dangers , especially with being

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a sailor and going to sea . Getting

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right with God is a necessity . It's

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rigorous and requires discipline

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which the military kind

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of instills in you to some degree . Some

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people fight against it later on , but there's a certain level of discipline given to you in the military kind of instills in you to some degree . Some people fight against it later on , but

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there's a certain level of discipline given to you in the

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military and the Orthodox Church kind

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of . You can also

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use that discipline from the military in the Orthodox Church

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in a lot of its routines , whether morning prayers

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, evening prayers , prayers before meals

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. Hi , my name's Andrew . I'm

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an Orthodox Christian . My favorite Bible verse is

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Psalm 144 . The

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reason why that's my favorite Bible verse is because it's about

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God preparing for you , preparing

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you for war , as well

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as saying that he is your fortress and protecting

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you while you're at war . And since

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I'm in the military it's a bit more meaningful

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than some of the other . But

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also the Bible has a lot of verses about preparing

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for war . So there's

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that . I

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chose St Andrew , the first called . The

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reason why I chose that one is because I was the first

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one in my family to become orthodox

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and also

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I thought it was fitting that I would choose that one and

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keep my first name . I didn't want to

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change my name to be something really interesting

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or too crazy where I wouldn't really

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respond to it , so I just stuck

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with Andrew . Hi , I'm Andrew . I'm

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an Orthodox Christian . I'm an Operations Specialist

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Second Class in the United States , navy Woo

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, that's it . That was West America

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.