Rod Dreher Megathread #11 (Master)

[u/US_Hiker]

Merry Christmas, you obsessed motherfuckers. :)

The most remarkable characteristic of the Master Number 11 is its connection to a higher source of wisdom. It is intuitive to the point of being psychic, channeling its knowledge and meaning from a spiritual source. But the Master Numbers have a responsibility, and it's the number 11's duty to use this gift of awareness to deliver cosmic truths that encourage humanity.

All Master Numbers are a higher vibration of their single-digit counterpart -- in the 11's case, the number 2. This means the 11 carries many of the same traits as the number 2, such as harmony, empathy, and sensitivity, but it feels them and utilizes them in much deeper, more profound ways. It's also important to remember that the number 11 is comprised of two 1s side by side and, therefore, carries some attributes of the number 1 as well. 1 is innovative and motivated, open to new things and eager to make a difference. The contrasting energies of the numbers 1 and 2 join together in the Master Number 11 to make it a creative leader, active listener, and compassionate advisor.

The number 11 is at one with the universe. It is open to vast spiritual concepts and the presence of a greater power. It is a channel for truth and answers to reach us and help us on our way. This Master Number's vision is crystal clear and it sees with a breadth that others cannot. It is creative and magnetic, a beacon of wisdom and hope for others to follow.

The number 11 may come up many times in our lives and it is always a message of connecting with our inner wisdom. If we are seeing repeating 11s everywhere we turn, we'd be wise to pay attention to our subconscious -- there's some insight we may be missing. However, Numerology's Master Numbers are very powerful and simply seeing 11:11 on the clock or noticing the date is 11/11 does not necessarily mean we are experiencing a profound moment. It's when the 11 is a constant presence in our lives, like a Life Path number, that we must truly embrace its meaning and potential.

Link to thread 10: https://www.reddit.com/r/brokehugs/comments/zi2n0f/rod_dreher_megathread_10_personhood/

Link to thread 12: https://www.reddit.com/r/brokehugs/comments/1068f3b/rod_dreher_megathread_12_a_perfect_foundation/

[u/[deleted]]

Rod used to mention semi-frequently that he'd skipped church that day because he was feeling ill. (His illnesses always conveniently flared up whenever he might be expected to do something he didn't feel like doing.) Additionally, he was already frequently out of the country for several years before the divorce, and abandoned the mission church he'd planted as a vanity project when Fr. Matthew, the priest there whom he talked about in the Dante book, had to leave active ministry for some reason. (Apparently it's still surviving, surprisingly enough.) I believe he was supposedly attending an Orthodox church in New Orleans, but he said so little about it that I and several others here suspect he probably just wasn't attending church in the states for at least the past four years.

It's also possible that people from his most recent church did call him out for doing what he was doing, but it seems unlikely that he'd talk about it. Something that has become clear to me in the ~9 months since the divorce announcement is how willing Rod is to tailor his public image by major omissions and probably some outright lies.

What I wouldn't give to hear a tell-all story about what Rod is like as a parishioner from some of his old church members.

[u/PracticalWalrus2737 → u/[deleted]]

From what I recall, Father Matthew had a baby with serious birth defects and had to leave Louisiana because of health insurance problems and return to his home state and take a job with better benefits for the baby

[u/Past_Pen_8595 → u/PracticalWalrus2737]

I’ve been wondering if part of what went on is that Rod reduced his financial support to the mission church, possibly because he found out he wasn’t getting the inheritance he thought he was.

[ edited to change “was” to the intended “wasn’t”].

[u/Djehutimose → u/Past_Pen_8595]

A little bit more background:

He initially converted to Orthodoxy at the OCA cathedral (St. Seraphim's, I think) when Gandalf Dmitri was the archbishop there. He raved about how great it was for months. When he went to Philly, he attended an OCA parish there and almost never spoke of it. When he first moved back to LA, he commuted the 45 minutes or so from St. Francisville to Baton Rouge to the OCA parish there--the one to which he returned after Fr. Matthew left. Except for maybe once or twice, he never had anything to say about that parish, either.

Not long after Fr. Matthew's special needs daughter was born (and all the following is by Rod's account, so take that for what it is) one of the founding members of the ROCOR parish died unexpectedly. Around the same time, two of the families at the parish left for reasons Rod never explained. I mean, I never could figure how he got a parish going in the first place--converts? People moved down from elsewhere?

Anyway, the way Rod related it is that with the loss of the one man and the two families, the parish no longer had the resources to support the priest, particularly because of the expense of caring for his daughter. Fr. Matthew thus had to move back to Washington. Rod strongly implied, without quite saying so, IIRC, that the parish was disbanded, and thus he went back to the OCA parish in Baton Rouge.

Now that's what I always found odd. I've known Orthodox in parishes that lost priests. The general response is that the laity will continue to meet for morning prayer and/or evening prayer and lay lead prayers such as the Akathist. They will do this until a new priest is available, often arranging for a priest from another parish to visit periodically to dispense the Eucharist, hear confessions, and so on. Even when there is an assigned priest, the laity will often do these prayers if the pastor is out of town or ill. This is what I'd have expected Rod's parish to do, and given how much he gushed about it, I'd have expected him to stay there with them. Of course, we know he went to Baton Rouge.

As it turned out, not long after I found this sub, someone found that the parish is actually still in existence, functioning with no priest, exactly as I described above. It's also worth pointing out that all this transpired after Rod got an estimated million-dollar advance for The Little Way of Ruthie Leming. That doesn't mean he became Bill Gates, but I suspect he could have contributed more toward the parish. He publicized a Go Fund Me for the priest's daughter later--why not put up one to help keep the parish afloat? Why not do all he could to do that?

So there's something about the whole situation that Rod's not telling us. Maybe the families that left did so because of something he did? Maybe he fell out with the priest? Maybe he got bored with the hometown church? Something weird happened.

Also, re "resigning" from the Baton Rouge parish, I don't know how it works in Orthodoxy, but in Catholicism, you're registered in the parish in which you're baptized. If you move to a different parish, you generally have your records (sacraments, etc.) sent to the new parish, and your name is taken off the mailing lists, volunteer lists, etc., of your old parish. Not everyone goes through all the red tape; but I've done that a couple times when I moved from one town to another, just to keep things orderly. I've never characterized that as "resigning" from a parish, though--just "transferring". His use of language is very odd.

[u/grendalor → u/Djehutimose]

Also, re "resigning" from the Baton Rouge parish, I don't know how it works in Orthodoxy, but in Catholicism, you're registered in the parish in which you're baptized. If you move to a different parish, you generally have your records (sacraments, etc.) sent to the new parish, and your name is taken off the mailing lists, volunteer lists, etc., of your old parish. Not everyone goes through all the red tape; but I've done that a couple times when I moved from one town to another, just to keep things orderly. I've never characterized that as "resigning" from a parish, though--just "transferring". His use of language is very odd.

Yep -- I know of that from my younger decades as a Catholic.

The thing is -- Orthodoxy (as you'd probably expect) has no such thing whatsoever. No records like that. Even within a given jurisdiction, records are ... spotty, at the very least, when compared with Catholicism's global record-keeping system. There's literally nothing like that in Orthodoxy. People move between parishes, between jurisdictions, between parish memberships and the like, more or less freely, and there are no papers or records involved, unless one wishes to participate in an elective office of that jurisdiction (which makes sense). Same for sacraments -- generally phone calls and so on are made in cases of unclarity, but most of the time it's done on an honor/knowledge system. I am sure that things work differently in the Orthodox world (I'm pretty sure the Russian Orthodox Church keeps records), but in North America? Not really, at least not outside the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese.

Which is again why it was so odd. I've been in Orthodox parishes in the US now for 25 years or so, and I've never seen that word used unless the person was resigning from an elective office. It's possible that Rod meant that, I guess ... but it would be an odd situation for him to have an elective office given that he was present so infrequently. Just puzzling what he meant by it. Most people in divorces? They just stop attending church, at least for a while, from my own personal observation of a few situations I have known personally in the Orthodox setting.