Children of My Heart by Ancient Faith Publishing

Children of My Heart

Finding Christ through Adoption A s h l e y L a c ko v i c h -V a n G o r p

Ancient Faith Publishing î Ż Chesterton, Indiana

Children of My Heart: Finding Christ through Adoption Copyright © 2014 by Ashley Lackovich-Van Gorp All Rights Reserved Published by: Ancient Faith Publishing (formerly known as Conciliar Press) A Division of Ancient Faith Ministries P.O. Box 748 Chesterton, IN 46304 Printed in the United States of America ISBN 10: 1-936270-91-9 ISBN 13: 978-1-936270-91-0

Part I The Holy Land If God is slow in answering your request, or if you ask but do not promptly receive anything, do not be upset, for you are not wiser thanÂ God. â&#x20AC;&#x201D;St. Isaac of Syria

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Prologue

The soft, steady sounds of women chanting drifted up from the far right corner of the Church of St. Mary Magdalene. The relentless desert heat forced itself inside, making it difficult for me to remain standing. I shifted my weight from foot to foot, trying to ignore the warm sweat dripping down my temples. While the nuns hardly seemed troubled, the weary pilgrims clustered around the entrance of the church, periodically sneaking in and out in search of even the most subtle of breezes. This experience contradicted every stereotyped image I had of a Russian church in which believers wearing snow boots huddled together with frozen fingers and blue lips. But this was not December in St. Petersburg. This was June in Jerusalem. The delicate but strong voices of the nuns filled the church and, entwined with incense, drifted up as a communal prayer. Determined not to surrender to the heat, I closed my eyes and slowly made my way through my prayer rope. Lord Jesus Christ, Son

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of God, have mercy on me a sinner. I grounded my feet, bowed deeply before the icons, and embraced the specific time and place, my earthly here and now, that connected me with eternity. I was on the Mount of Olives, and there was nothing I wanted more than to draw as close to God as possible. Here and now, I remember thinking between prayers, embrace the blessing of being. A small hand tugged at my skirt, abruptly and unexpectedly shaking me out of my prayer. Trying to hide my annoyance and maintain a kind heart, I looked down. A seven-year-old Palestinian girl looked up at me and smiled. I responded with a slight, closedmouth smile and quickly reentered my prayer. “If I don’t encourage her,” I told myself, “she won’t bother me again.” Only seconds later I heard stifled giggling from behind me. I closed my eyes tightly and concentrated on the steady voice of the priest as he prayed in Old Church Slavonic. This was a test of obedience, and I was going to focus on God. The giggling became louder in an obvious effort to attract my attention. Instead of looking back at the girls, I looked up at the icon of St. Mary Magdalene, brilliant red Pascha egg in hand as she told the emperor of the story of the Resurrection. I stared at the egg and told myself not to look down or back, that the girls could only continue their attention-seeking games for a limited time before they would give up and forget about me. Having lost all prayerful attentiveness, I repeated Pascha egg over and over and over in my head to bide my time. Pascha egg, Pascha egg, Pascha egg, bright red Pascha egg, Pascha egg. But the giggling continued and I eventually surrendered, reluctantly turning around to see a bench full of Palestinian girls whispering and sharing secrets in their native Arabic. I had intended to shoot them a very stern authoritarian look, but instead I locked eyes with one of the older girls, who could not have been more than twelve or thirteen years old, and reluctantly smiled.

At that moment, it was all over. In a remarkably quiet cluster they came over to me, leaned on me, tugged at my flowing skirt, and decided to prayâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;or more accurately hang outâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;next to me throughout the Liturgy. I looked over to the nuns for help, but they were all focusing so intently on the kingdom of heaven that my earthly plea was not noticed. Resigned to my fate, I ceased my scripted prayers and tried to keep the girls as quiet as possible so that others might not be disturbed. Looking back, I now realize that before the girls came over to me, I was going through the rituals with an empty heart. Only when they came to me, with their Arabic whispers and muffled laughter, did I finally begin to pray. Little did I know that this little prayer, inspired by these girls, was only the beginning of a journey toward faith, love, and a new life.

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Chapter 1

I beg Dirk to stay out just a little later. It is only just after midnight, and the music is fabulous. The people are fabulous. The food is fabulous. We are laughing under the fabulous stars in a fabulous garden. This entire night is just fabulous. I bat my big green eyes (he loves my eyes) and tilt my head and give him the sweetest smile I can muster. He gives in. I throw my arms around his neck and kiss his cheek. This is just fabulous. Fabulous is the only adjective that comes to mind because I am drunk. Like most expatriates, in this case Westerners who have left their home countries to work in an area of conflict, I like to drink. And my affinity for alcohol is maybe a bit magnified by my ethnicity: we American Serbs do enjoy the occasional, or perhaps daily, alcoholic beverage. So, when the bountiful waters are free-flowing, how can this simple Serbian refuse? I sit on a table and swing my legs back and forth as I sway

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my body to the music. It’s sly, rhythmic, and whimsical Arabic music and, since it is falling on foreign ears, it sounds exotic and passionate. A handsome man, perhaps in his forties with hair like Richard Gere, comes over and sits on the table beside me. He offers me a cigarette. I tilt my head and study his face: maybe he is Richard Gere. He certainly wouldn’t be the first celebrity to parachute in and advocate for peace. He smiles, extending that smooth white cigarette. I don’t smoke—unless a handsome man is making the offer. “What brought you to Jerusalem?” he asks as he holds the lighter for me. “Love,” I reply, blowing smoke out my mouth and stifling a cough. When I’m intoxicated, the urge to look sexy and cool is at its height. “Oh, now, that’s too bad, because I was hoping you were looking for love.” I shake my head. No, even in my deliriously drunken state I am happily married. Over a year ago I followed this love, Dirk, to Jerusalem. He was hired to work as the country director for International Orthodox Christian Charities (IOCC). Meanwhile, I was living and working in France, spending most of my time just like this in Paris. So I packed my bags and followed him to the Middle East. I got a job in Beit Jala, a tiny Christian town right outside Bethlehem, and expected butterflies and rainbows. That was not what I got. Living and working in Palestine, a political entity under Israeli occupation, can be brutal. For nearly a year, my life involved traveling in Palestinian minibuses that were stopped five or six times an hour and swarmed with Israeli military police; living in a house that regularly ran out of water during a summer when the temperature highs reached over 100 degrees; and explaining to the fathers of Copyright © 2014 by Ashley Lackovich-Van Gorp. All Rights Reserved. Published by Ancient Faith Publishing

teenaged Muslim boys that, while I appreciated the recommendations of their sons, I did not want to become their third or fourth wife. I pulled my memories of Paris to me as desert sand pulls the rain. Palestine was not for me. “And you stayed,” the charming man remarks. “Despite that Palestinian nightmare, you stayed for your true love.” “Yes,” I reply with a smile. “That’s love.” But that isn’t entirely true. To be truthful, that “following love” line is just an excuse, a veneer to make me appear less of a mess than I am. Dirk and I would have continued our relationship had I returned to France. Had he trotted off to Pakistan or Uganda or Cambodia, I wouldn’t have followed in the first place. But he had headed to the Holy Land, a place for which I longed and ached. I was a Serbian Orthodox Christian in the midst of a crisis of faith. I didn’t admit this internal predicament to the Richard Gere lookalike; I didn’t say this to anyone. This was on the inside. And it was killing me. One of the shortcomings of some cradle Orthodox is that we can tend to focus mostly on the tangible aspects of our spirituality. Dirk is a convert to Orthodoxy from the Methodist Church. Having spent most of his life in a tradition that he feels focused heavily on creating superficial feel-good sensations rather than on worshipping God, he embraces the traditions of the Church in light of the fullness of worship. As a cradle Orthodox in a crisis of faith, I tended to put all my cards on the demonstration—filling my house with icons, lighting a candle in church, and crossing myself during airplane takeoffs. Rest assured that, while struggling not to fall off the flimsy table at that party, I was indeed wearing a prayer rope. Still, I did take comfort in these hollow acts as they served a greater purpose: They kept me connected to God outwardly when there was little within. Sample pages only. Purchase the full book at http://store.ancientfaith.com/children-of-my-heart-findingchrist-through-adoption/

So there I was, drawing dangerously close to thirty and still partying like a rock star in a frantic attempt to fill my spiritual void. About a year after I arrived in the Holy Land, Dirk and I married, which prompted me to put more plaster on the façade of faith. Right before our wedding, I made a marathon confession in which I let all my sins and shortcomings pour out. Out of all my offenses, the priest zeroed in on my outward piety and inward chaos. “God forgives everything,” he started. “But how can you be forgiven if you don’t believe in sin? And how can you believe in sin if you don’t believe in God?” I was speechless. I lowered my head away from the Gospel in shame. But here the priest surprised me. Sensing that my heart was indeed facing the right direction, he smiled and told me that I would get there someday. “In the meantime,” he added, “fake it until you make it.” I certainly did not expect such a response from a priest, but it was comforting in that his words encouraged me to hang onto that blessed little thread that, however weakly, connected me to God. “Something will change when you least expect it,” he added, “in God’s time—not yours.” But how long could God take? I’m a modern American woman whose life is based on deadlines and schedules. If Plan A doesn’t work, I jump to Plan B. At some point, the candles and incense were destined to lose their meaning, and then I would have no choice but to develop my contingency plan and try on a new religion. So by the time I sat smoking with Richard Gere, I had been in the Holy Land for about a year and a half. After I married, I quit my horrible job for a new—and much more fulfilling—job and began working on a much-anticipated master’s degree. Dirk and I found a cozy little apartment that never ran out of water, and we acquired a pet guinea pig and some IKEA furniture. We made friends, mostly Copyright © 2014 by Ashley Lackovich-Van Gorp. All Rights Reserved. Published by Ancient Faith Publishing

secular Westerners living in Jerusalem for humanitarian work, just like us. I found things in Jerusalem that made me happy: frozen coffee at a café called Aroma, lush green parks overlooking the Old City, and my favorite soap opera on Israeli TV. There was a shopping mall nearby, which allowed me to refurbish my wardrobe to fit in with my new neighbors. And here I was, at this party, like dozens of parties before it and dozens of parties after it, seizing the moment with one vodka tonic after another. So you see, in Jerusalem I was looking for a spiritual holding space where I could find my faith. At the heart of Orthodoxy is worshipping God, as Orthodoxy itself means “right worship,” and if I were to call myself an Orthodox Christian I knew I needed to live out my proclamation and worship the Lord. I may not have confessed it to anyone, but the real reason I moved to Jerusalem had little to do with love and everything to do with my empty heart. I sought spiritual reprieve, silence, and the ability to pray, all things I had never experienced despite spending my entire life in the Orthodox Church. In order to worship God, I needed to believe in God. And that, in a nutshell, is what this colossal move to the Middle East was all about. Anyway, by now Dirk is truly ready to call it a night. He comes over to me and I introduce him to my new friend, who is obviously lusting after his wife. Dirk is not jealous, as he knows no amount of alcohol could trick my loyalty. We bid farewell to Mr. Richard Gere, to the fabulous music and fabulous food and fabulous drinks and fabulous garden, and make our way home. I must have drunk more than usual at that party, because I woke up with a humbling hangover. I forced my weary, pathetic self out Sample pages only. Purchase the full book at http://store.ancientfaith.com/children-of-my-heart-findingchrist-through-adoption/

of bed around noon because I had a Skype date with an Orthodox friend from my hometown, Aliquippa, which is part of the greater Pittsburgh area. After we said our hellos, I confessed I had lost count of the vodka tonics and was now listening to a steady buzz in my head. “You know what,” she said, carefully trying to approach a serious topic. “You sound a lot like St. Xenia before her husband died.” “What?” I snapped, having no idea who St. Xenia was. “St. Xenia. She cared only about fashion, parties, and other material things until her husband died. Fearing for his soul, she repented and spent the rest of her life serving others. I’ll ask her to intercede for you.” I was not amused. First, I was a bit insulted. “I care about things other than secular passions,” I mumbled as I glanced uncomfortably at the heap of expensive Israeli clothes that remained on the floor from last night. Second, Orthodoxy was a sensitive issue, as eighteen months after my arrival in Jerusalem I remained hollow and untamed. I knew I was failing at my faith, and I didn’t need this reminder as I struggled to crawl out from under an oppressive hangover. Third, if she was implying I needed a tragic event to fill my soul, I’d rather remain empty. Still, this call stirred me. “St. Xenia,” I surprised myself by praying after I hung up, “help me so it doesn’t take the death to save me.” What a stupid prayer, I thought after mumbling it. I staggered back to bed, wishing to sleep through the next decade. Whether it was due to St. Xenia’s intercession or not, the next day I got up early and started a new ritual: morning prayers at the Tomb of Christ. I hit snooze on my alarm three or four times, but eventually pulled myself out of bed and headed to the Old City. I walked the long zigzagging path to the Church of the Resurrection, the actual Copyright © 2014 by Ashley Lackovich-Van Gorp. All Rights Reserved. Published by Ancient Faith Publishing

place of the Resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I balanced myself on the cobblestones, my long skirt swishing, as I ignored the countless souvenir vendors along the way. When I arrived at the courtyard of the church, I took it all in, shaking myself out of the cloud of surrealism and reminding myself that I was standing before the Tomb of the Lord, the actual site of His burial and glorious Resurrection. I began by bowing deeply as I kissed the stone on which the body of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ had lain. If I was lucky enough to be alone or at least not caught in the middle of a mob of pilgrims with perpetually flashing cameras, I would be able to linger undisturbed, forehead and outstretched hands pressed against the cold hard stone that had been kissed by hundreds of thousands of pilgrims before me. Those pilgrims surely prayed for the grace of God as well. I wondered if their prayers had been answered as I tried desperately to detect some internal stirring of faith. “Move me to worship You,” I prayed, “move me to know that You are there.” Nothing. Day after day, nothing. More Jesus prayers. Earlier risings. Longer bows. Nothing. St. Xenia, I concluded, had not heard me after all. Disgruntled and frustrated, I huffed out of the church, walked the reverse zigzag back out of the Old City, and went about my day as if nothing extraordinary had occurred. Because, in fact, nothing extraordinary had occurred. A cup of coffee at my kitchen table would have been more invigorating. Eventually I decided I was trying too hard. Maybe, I concluded, I just need a break. So I stopped lighting my candles and thinking so much about my faith. Instead I watched television, passed an astonishing amount of time with my pet rodent, learned how to cook pizza from scratch, and spent my evenings enjoying a vodka tonic with my expatriate friends. Sample pages only. Purchase the full book at http://store.ancientfaith.com/children-of-my-heart-findingchrist-through-adoption/

And still nothing. Day after day, nothing. More TV. More pizza. More vodka tonics. Nothing. After a few weeks of this mundane existential ritual, I went back to my Orthodox rituals, recalling the advice of the priest to fake it until I make it. “I’ll make it one day,” I would remind myself before prayers. Something is better than nothing.

Chapter 2

One day a friend told me about a school for girls in Bethany run by Orthodox nuns from the St. Mary Magdalene Monastery. Still exasperated by my lack of faith, the last thing I wanted to do was to meet some nuns. Really, I would have found more appeal in a root canal. But professionally I work with programs for girls. “We should check it out,” Dirk said. “Russian is the closest thing to Serbian you’re going to find here.” Fair point. A little Russian mingling might do me some good, and maybe I’d learn something I could use in my work. Having grown up in the Serbian Orthodox Church, I knew the stories from Bethany well. In the Serbian tradition, Lazarus Saturday is commemorated with a celebration for children. This much-anticipated day meant a short church service (and for a child the length of the service was indeed of monumental importance) followed by candy, games, and little presents in our church hall. I felt a little warmth in my heart and smiled at the memories. The

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story of Jesus entering Bethany danced in my head, with Lazarus walking out of the tomb right before my eyes. Bethany is located only a mile and a half east of Jerusalem on the slope of the Mount of Olives, which explains how our Lord was able to travel relatively easily to and from the hometown of his friends Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. I imagined Him, perhaps walking in simple leather sandals with His disciples, entering Bethany in mourning to comfort Mary and Martha—and then later dining with them and the resurrected Lazarus in a spirit of joy and comfort from God. Or, as I liked to think, partying hard with His friends to celebrate yet another smackdown on those who said He wasn’t God. I smiled at my version of the story, thinking maybe Bethany could help me reconcile myself with my faith. But there is no casual walking to and from Bethany to visit friends today. Bethany is technically in Palestine, which is not a country but a political entity occupied by Israel. Jerusalem is in theory shared by the Palestinians and the Israelis, but in practice it is part of Israel. If our Lord were traveling from Jerusalem today, He would be stopped at a military checkpoint, as He would be crossing a border from one territory into another. Bethany is cut off from Jerusalem by the Israeli Security Wall, which is called the Apartheid Wall by Palestinians. Upon completion, the wall is expected to be 403 miles in length, much of it comprised of cement, reaching a maximum height of 25 feet. There are entrances at certain points in the wall, which are guarded by Israeli military and infamously called “the checkpoints” by those who know them. I remember the first time I crossed the checkpoint to Bethany. It was September 2008 and the weather was fiercely hot, so hot that it hurt to inhale as the heavy, heated air burned my chest. Dirk and I were traveling together. He drove, and I played with the radio, perhaps hiding my nervousness about the impending checkpoint. Copyright © 2014 by Ashley Lackovich-Van Gorp. All Rights Reserved. Published by Ancient Faith Publishing

Entering Palestine tends to be much easier than leaving it; Palestinians, Israelis, and foreigners can all enter, but only Israelis and foreigners who create no suspicion can exit freely. So exit screenings are intense, as each car is stopped and the passengers must all show their passports. Since Palestinians don’t have passports (remember, Palestine is not a country), they are weeded out quite quickly. Entering Palestine means driving at parade speed past soldiers armed with IMI Tavor assault rifles. As long as no one in the car looks Palestinian, the car is not stopped. Still, this mandatory procession makes the heart rattle against the ribs. Once waved through the checkpoint, we entered Bethany: impoverished, dusty, desolate, at once overpopulated and barren. I couldn’t imagine it then, but I would come to love this town, this forgotten consequence of war and occupation. As we drove the one bumpy, unpaved main road to the school, I noticed the people on the street were barely interacting with each other. The children were not laughing. The men walked slowly, as if they were in physical pain. And the women, in this increasingly reactionary and conservative Muslim town, submissively and quietly trailed their husbands and fathers. This is where Christ visited with His friends? This is where He prayed and called out for Lazarus to rise and walk? This is where His last miracle took place? No, I couldn’t imagine any of this happening here, in this Palestinian ghetto. This was not the place of my childhood imaginings, and this town certainly did not match the pictures of Christ in Bethany we happily colored in Sunday school with Mrs. Popovich. This place was terrifying. I wanted to blink my eyes and go back to that party with a certain Mr. Richard Gere. The school was only a few minutes from the checkpoint and was, given the crime and street violence I’d later encounter firsthand, wisely invisible behind a metal gate. We spoke with the guard, Sample pages only. Purchase the full book at http://store.ancientfaith.com/children-of-my-heart-findingchrist-through-adoption/

who ushered us into a lush grassy yard, at the end of which stood a large house. Behind the house was the school compound. I knew there was one nun, Sister Martha, who administered the school, but I imagined she either lived at the monastery in Jerusalem or stayed in a very modest room here at the school compound. But the house was much bigger than any home I had lived in—at least three stories high. This was not exactly a humble monastic dwelling, especially when compared with the widespread poverty in the neighborhood. As Dirk and I stood silently absorbing our surroundings, a slightly older nun came running out of the home, drying her hands on a dish towel and smiling. “Sister Martha,” I said in a joyous voice as she approached. “Njet,” she replied, “Sister Mary.” Sister Mary? Who was Sister Mary? Before I could figure out what had happened to Sister Martha, we heard a crash from the house, then the raised voices of what sounded like a small herd of children. Then a very deep and labored sigh from Sister Mary. I noticed she closed her eyes for a few seconds, seemingly trying to remain calm and collected. “Sister Martha,” Sister Mary said with a warm and heavy Russian accent as she looked at the house in obvious despair, “is coming.” She then turned from us and hurried into the house. Dirk and I stood bewildered: this was not the typical start to a school or monastery visit. We walked slowly and awkwardly toward the house, uncertain of what to do. Then Sister Martha emerged. I had heard Sister Martha was a German convert to Orthodoxy, which conjured up too many preconceived images of the stern, stout, aging German who ran the school with an iron fist. Instead the nun coming toward me was youthful, smiling, and moving so swiftly that her cassock made a Copyright © 2014 by Ashley Lackovich-Van Gorp. All Rights Reserved. Published by Ancient Faith Publishing

rapid swishing sound as she walked. “I’m so sorry,” she said in a raised voice before she was close enough to speak at a normal volume. “The girls . . . It’s always the girls.” Sister Martha greeted us each with three kisses and then took my hand, pulling me to the picnic table outside the house. Sister Mary soon appeared with tea as Sister Martha got to the point of this visit: to talk about the Bethany Girls’ School. We learned that this school was the only private school for girls in Bethany. The community had mixed feelings about the school, with many of the conservative men opposing the entire concept of educating girls. As I’ve learned, too many Palestinian men think the perfect bride is an illiterate adolescent who believes her husband has the right to beat her if she burns dinner. “Still,” Sister Martha reassured us, “except my girls, all of the students are Muslim.” Enough Muslim families support the school to keep the opponents at bay, but this means that Christian nuns are fighting for the rights of Muslim girls. As Sister Martha continued her fascinating description, a slim, bashful adolescent girl came out of the house. Smiling shyly at us, she ran over to Sister Martha and whispered what sounded like a request while never taking her eyes off us. This girl was Palestinian and therefore a speaker of Arabic, yet I heard muffled Russian words. Sister Martha responded in quick Russian, and the girl ran inside, almost tripping at the doorstep as she kept her gaze on these two non-Russian foreign visitors. “She lives with us,” Sister Martha explained with a contented sigh. “Sorry. It’s always the girls . . .” We learned that when Sister Martha said “the girls,” she meant the eleven Palestinian girls who lived with her on the school compound, in the very house that seemed to me such a bizarre home for one nun. All eleven girls were Orthodox Christians. While these Sample pages only. Purchase the full book at http://store.ancientfaith.com/children-of-my-heart-findingchrist-through-adoption/

girls were not orphaned in the traditional sense, they were not able to return to their homes. Some had been abandoned, others sold into prostitution, and others beaten so badly that home might mean death. Some simply could not live with their parents due to poverty or neglect. “We are all they have,” Sister Martha said. “They are the children of God, given to us in place of their parents.” She explained that Palestinian tradition defines children as the property of their fathers. How can you protect children when they are property, like a car or a pair of jeans? Yes, there were some child protection laws, but this was Palestine, an occupied territory on the brink of economic and social collapse. How these girls arrived at the school and how the nuns managed to keep them safe were secrets that stayed within that compound. Sister Martha was the caretaker of the girls, and Sister Mary took on the enormous obedience of cooking and cleaning for all of them. I smiled more gently when Sister Mary brought the next round of tea. Dirk and I shared the cooking and cleaning for our two-bedroom apartment, and at times I still felt overwhelmed by my part-time duties. I admired Sister Mary’s stamina and was quickly reminded of why the Lord had not called me to be a nun (well, that and my then lack of sincere faith). Sister Martha’s role was more confusing for me. She was a nun, meaning that she had been called by God to lead a monastic life of fasting, prayer, and obedience. Despite this path, she had clearly become a mother to not one, not two, but eleven Palestinian girls. How did one merge the monastic focus on the kingdom of heaven with the earthly demands of children? I found myself in a captivating confusion. As our conversation came to an end, I couldn’t resist admitting to Sister Martha that, in my experience, Orthodox nuns prayed and Copyright © 2014 by Ashley Lackovich-Van Gorp. All Rights Reserved. Published by Ancient Faith Publishing

did not raise children. Nodding her head toward the three little girls gathered at the window to catch a glimpse of these odd American visitors, Sister Martha smiled and whispered, â&#x20AC;&#x153;This is how I pray.â&#x20AC;? This is how I pray. For the first time since arriving in Jerusalem, I felt a little leap inside my belly. My soul was stirring.

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