September 1, 2026, born and raised in Ohio, I spent most of my youth in the confines of suburban Central Ohio where I existed within a fifty-mile radius for the first twenty-five years of my life; sheltered in a loud, prying, yet supportive, tribal Macedonian – Balkan community with a relatively nominal Orthodox Christian upbringing. Life in this Balkan Tribe was a lot like Middle Earth except The Shire was inhabited by loving, hairy, giants, who grilled meat, talked loudly, and drank Budweiser. We supported each other, sometimes this support was too much for a growing boy. All the growth, joy, and heartbreak that I experienced took place in what seemed like in a well-stocked ethnic survival shelter, plenty to eat, TV to watch, but no other experiences to glean from, no new individuals to share with. It was all too familiar to evoke change. Quite frankly, it always seemed like I had much more to give, without a communal capacity to receive. Especially, when young boys are designed, biologically and spiritually, to search for what J.R.R Tolkien coined in the Lord of the Rings as the Long Defeat. I longed for something that I didn’t even know existed – a losing cause in this life, but an eternal victory. I needed some form of battle, a war to fight for something bigger than what I was, what my community was. If anything, to prove to that community that I loved them.
Much of my contact with the outside world was only a glimpse of a narrative when I would visit family in Southeastern Europe for a couple of months at a time. As much as I would have liked to promote my worldly experience, familiarity with a culture is minimal when you got to leave and go back to your Shire within thirty days of that said experience. In other words, it was nothing like having to live in that divergent culture indefinitely. That would soon change.
After college, I left home and joined the Peace Corps conveniently to be sent to the very place I had visited with my family throughout my childhood – Macedonia. For the first time in my life, I was away from the restraints of the giants. But then again, I was simultaneously sent to a familiar place. In writing this, I also realize just how much of my college career was merely half of the experience it could have been commuting to school every day while sleeping in my own bed at night. Meals cooked, laundry cleaned and folded, the family couch my second throne outside my bedroom. Homework completed on the bed-adjacent desk which held a green desk lamp and an old school Macintosh that I only turned on to practice my typing for the fun of it. Yes, there was no Internet in my home as of yet – all of my university papers were handwritten in cursive. All of my sources taken from the Thompson Library on Campus in Columbus. So, it would be a safe bet to claim that moving to the Balkans in order to finally work on their dial-up Internet was ironical to say the least. I was an anomaly. If I’m honest, a bit of a freak of nature, actually.
I guess the point of what I am trying to express here is that I am apt to slow progression; the very last to rush to new technological advances and cultural change. I need moments. Crucial moments to figure out my next move. I was always happy to exist in familiar settings, with very little newness and excess. Which is why it was a difficult move to Arizona after my Peace Corps stint. With new wife by my side, I left the Balkan tribal gang of Central Ohio, again, and followed my older sister to Arizona. Needless to say, at this point, not only was I not completely readjusted to my shift back to the American culture I was accustomed to prior to moving abroad, now I was moving to a completely different State. A State that embodied a completely different climate, landscape, and culture to that of the Midwest, let alone the Balkans. It was, for all intents and purposes, an entirely different planet. From Middle Earth Hairy Giants to Desert Rats. But, things happened among the Cacti, Scorpions, and Sand.
As much as Arizona was different, I still really enjoyed my time there. I began to “re-enter” the Orthodox Church while I was in the Peace Corps being engulfed by Orthodox Culture, which was synonymous with civil culture. Churches were everywhere, life was Orthodox, as my wife would tell me. Early on in this new beginning in Arizona, not only was I able to escape the confines of the Tribal Shire allowing me to finally begin my Long Defeat, but the new scenery also brought back a conversation that I had with my grandmother when I was barely ten years old. When she posed the question, “what do you want to be when you grow up?” I instantly blurted out, “A Priest, grandma!” My grandmother, who was a devout Orthodox Christian, who taught me to pray, to venerate the Most Holy Theotokos and Christ more than anyone, replied “over my dead body! You’re going to be a pediatrician!” You see, my grandmother spent the latter half of her life in communist Yugoslavia, a multi-state nation that still allowed for some semblance of Orthodoxy but also complimented this religious freedom with ridicule of those who attended, especially the clergy. She remembered the mocking of clergy, ministers of an antiquated life, the center of jokes, and, ironically, as those who chose a vocation that went against the brotherhood and unity ethos usurped by the party from the Followers of Christ’s Chalice, reformulated to the narrative that true unity was found around a mortal man who dawned a red star, and allegedly created a unified, multi-ethnic state of brotherhood. That multi-ethnic state fell apart in 1990 due to envy, greed, economic strife, and lack of a lasting, eternal Ethos.
Yet, I remember chuckling at the absurdity of my grandmother’s wishes even as a child. There was no way I was going to school for that long to be a doctor. So, I just left the conversation at that. Regardless, this recollection while a desert dweller, reignited the Godly calling. I soon entered my studies for the Diaconate. It wasn’t the priesthood, I told myself, but my intention was to leave that door open if it was the Lord’s will. I was ordained to the Diaconate in 2013 at St. Ignatius of Antioch Orthodox Church in Mesa, Arizona. To my joy, and many times to my sorrow, it has been the best decision of my life. My service to the Church has been more fulfilling than anything that I have ever pursued. My love for Christ, my love for the Divine Liturgy, and my love for God’s faithful has filled my life with meaning, joy, and heartbreak. All of which are required for the clergy. All of which are required for the Long Defeat.
So, this is where I am. A few months back my wife was asked to lead the Orthodox Academy in Wichita Kansas that is part of the Antiochian Community of this small, yet welcoming city. A new Shire, in a new Middle Earth. Education is my wife’s gift, she’s called to it, and being who I am, raised the way I was, experiencing what I have experienced, it was my honor to humble myself to her calling. Some young brothers would call this a complete Beta Move, bro. I would reply, sure, maybe, but I can still bench more than you can, bro.
For the third time in my life, I packed up (my wife did most of the packing) this time with family and moved again. By the Grace of God, I expect more of the same here, meaning, love, and heartbreak – except in a new city, a new State; much closer to where I started, but still far enough.
Throughout my life, no matter how sheltered, culture shocked, and freak-at-nature, I have learned to love wherever it may be. We must establish roots, but we also must be willing to follow Him wherever He takes us. Beauty is everywhere, and so are God’s faithful who require those willing to minister to them. So, here I am, I still am unsure if I have full readjusted to my return after my life abroad. There are some days that I just don’t understand what I see, hear, and read. Even among American Orthodox. Maybe it’s my own faulty understanding. In fact, I know it is. But maybe it also has to do with the possibility that a lot of us still don’t understand that we have to enter the Long Defeat. We’re too scare to lose in this life so that we can win in the Everlasting Kingdom.
I also hope my old tribes now know how much I love them. With the help of God, my journey towards the Long Defeat was for them.
Amen.
Deacon Christopher Purdef is Chairman of Share the Faith Ministries – Orthodox Christian Mission to America. Former Hairy Giant from the Shire of Central Ohio. New resident of Wichita, Kansas, who serves at the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos Antiochian Orthodox Church in that very city.
Source: Deacon Christopher, Versification and Wandering Substack