Father Seraphim Rose, a brilliant Californian mind, discovered Orthodoxy in adulthood after delving deeply into Eastern philosophy. Once he made this discovery, he devoted himself entirely to this path, becoming a monk and tirelessly working to promote the truth of Orthodoxy in the contemporary world.
His birth name was Eugene, and he was born on August 13, 1934, in San Diego, California.
Gifted with a remarkable intellect, he sought the truth in Western philosophy and then in Eastern thought, for which he learned both ancient and modern Chinese, earning a master’s degree in Oriental Languages in 1961.
However, he did not feel truly fulfilled spiritually. “Throughout my years of searching, I was content to place myself above all traditions while being somewhat faithful to them,” he wrote.
“When I visited an Orthodox Church, it was only in order to view another ‘tradition’. However, when I entered an Orthodox Church for the first time (in San Francisco) something happened to me that I had not experienced in any Buddhist or other Eastern temple; something in my heart said this was ‘home’, that all my search was over.”
Eugene was baptized into the Orthodox faith in 1962 at the Russian Cathedral in San Francisco, where he soon became a disciple of St. John Maximovitch, Archbishop of San Francisco, and dedicated his life to confessing and proclaiming the truth of Orthodoxy to his contemporaries in America.
Together with a young Russian, Gleb Podmoshenski, he founded a missionary community dedicated to the first Orthodox saint in America, St. Herman of Alaska. In 1969, the brotherhood settled in Platina, California, continuing to print and publish writings about the faith.
He was tonsured as a monk in 1970, and in 1977, he was ordained a hierodeacon and later a hieromonk.
From the Californian wilderness, Father Seraphim Rose wrote numerous books and brochures that presented the treasure of Orthodox wisdom in a way understandable to the contemporary world. He wrote particularly about the spirits and currents of thought that wreak havoc in the West, from Darwinism to the New Age.
He reposed in the Lord on September 2, 1982, at only 48 years old. He appeared so radiant in his coffin that children could not tear themselves away from him, according to those who knew him.
Father Seraphim Rose’s writings have been translated into many languages and have also been published in Romania.
Source: Doxologia.ro
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