Saint Andrew Antiochian Western Rite Orthodox Church, Oklahoma City

For all of my life, I have been looking for The Church. And now, I have been (to borrow a book title of C.S. Lewis) "Surprised by Joy" in finding The Holy Orthodox Church!

In 1954, I was baptized as an infant at Trinity Episcopal Church in Houston, Texas. Our family went to church faithfully every Sunday and I was confirmed at age 11 and served the rest of my teenage years as an acolyte. My faith came alive at the age of seventeen and a year later I found myself expressing a call to "the ministry"- as best I understood what that meant.

In searching for the will of God in my life, I found myself entering Oral Roberts University in 1972. As I got involved in its campus ministry (dormitory chaplain for two years) my desire continued to surge in wanting to know as much as I could of the Holy Scriptures and theology. I graduated with a B.A. in "Theological and Historical Studies" in 1976. The course study was a general History of Christianity combined with Systematic Theology.

For the next two years, rather than go straight to the Episcopal seminary, I worked in radio/tv broadcasting and got married. As a young married couple, we got involved in small-group home ministry and for one year, my wife, Susan, was the Children's Education Director for our church.

During the early 1980s, I was employed with an oilfield service company until that industry began to go bust. That forced me to go looking for work elsewhere. I believe I was divinely led to my next job as a prison chaplain for the State of Oklahoma. During those (almost five) years it became apparent to all who knew me that I indeed had pastoral gifts. Although my schedule had flexibility, the warden insisted that I always be at the prison's chapel on Sunday mornings in order to conduct the worship service.

In 1991, the Lord redirected my ministry. I resigned my chaplaincy in the prison system and was hired by Prison Fellowship Ministries - an organization founded by Chuck Colson (former White House counsel to President Richard Nixon). As their Executive Director in Oklahoma, I interacted with Correctional officials, spoke to church groups across the state about getting involved in prison ministry, trained scores of volunteers and organized in-prison Bible studies and seminars for inmates. I served with Prison Fellowship for a little over six years.

In 1994, I enrolled in the St. Michael's Seminary program of the Charismatic Episcopal Church (CEC) and was ordained a deacon in March 1995, and then ordained a priest in April 1996. Bishop Kenneth Myers commissioned me to begin our mission on Trinity Sunday, June 2, 1996. Our attendance grew to an average of 65 on Sundays and I have been supported full-time for a little over 4 years.

During my seminary training, I found our curriculum to be greatly influenced by Orthodox theology. Learning the faith and practice of the Undivided Church of the first millennium was truly an epiphany to me. It forced me to ask myself the watershed question of, "If our denomination believes in that same Faith of the Undivided Church, then why am I not submitting to its authority on earth, which is still undivided after two millenia?"

The answer became uncomfortably obvious. I could no longer, with any integrity, continue to be a part of trying to reinvent The Church into the image I think she needs to be. With great joy, and as a layman, I rejoiced to become a catechumen with fifty of my former parishioners, of the Holy Orthodox Church on May 6, 2007.

On Jan. 21, 2008, I was ordained to the holy priesthood by His Grace, Bishop BASIL and the ministry of St. Andrew the First-Called, Orthodox Church has been birthed. Come and grow with us!