Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Welcome to Ancient Faith Presents. I’m Bobby Maddex, operations manager
of Ancient Faith Radio, and today I will be speaking to Fr. Serafim Aldea, a
Romanian
Orthodox monk who is starting a monastic community on an island off
the coast of Scotland. Fr. Serafim, welcome to the program.
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: Thank you so much for inviting me.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Tell me a little bit about yourself. Are you cradle Orthodox, are you a
convert? How did you end up a monk?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: I’m pretty much both at the same time. I have been baptized, like
everyone in a traditional Orthodox country, but I have been baptized in a time
when Romania was a Communist country, so my parents don’t really have much to
do with the Church. I myself discovered the Church when I was 18 or 19, so in a
way I’m a convert as well.
Monasticism
was never an option in the sense that when I discovered the Church and I
discovered Christianity, I basically wanted it all or not at all. So it
basically happened at the same time I entered the Church. I decided to become a
monk, and then when my father-confessor finally gave his blessing, I entered a
monastery.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: And where have you been serving up to this point?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: I entered a monastery called Râșca, which is in northern Moldavia. It is
one of those painted monasteries, if you think of Voroneț or Gura Humorului,
one of those that have paintings on the outside; Râșca is one of that group.
And I’d been there until 2009, when I got a scholarship to do a PhD with Fr.
Andrew Louth, in Durham in England on Fr. Sophrony’s ecclesiology.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: So why did you decide to start this monastery, and why in Scotland of
all places?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: Now that I look back, it’s very easy to rewrite history. There’s always
a temptation. The truth is my history with England at least started in
2003-2004, when I went to there to study for the first time for an MA. I felt
this attraction to Scotland and especially the Hebrides, for no reason
whatsoever. I just felt, “That is my home, and that is the place I must get
back to sometime.” Then I entered the monastery, and then I thought I would
live in Moldavia forever. Then I was offered that PhD, and then the first two
months in my PhD, someone told me that there is an abandoned church in the
Hebrides and would I want to go there? I know, looking back, I want to say I’ve
been attracted by the saints there—St. Columba—the truth is that I’ve only
discovered all that history afterwards.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Then what are your plans for the monastery? How large would you like to
it to be? What will the monks do to help sustain the monastery?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: I don’t plan to have anything large, and in many ways I can’t actually
do it. I can’t do it, because, being the UK, you’ve got a million planning
permissions and ordinances and applications you have to fill, so I can’t build
a very large building, but a small five-to-six monastic community seems
excellent to me. What I envisioned is a monastery that is British, 100% dedicated
to the Orthodox communities in Britain, and trying to somehow resurrect or
reimagine that English or Celtic tradition of the Hebridean island. That is
what I would really like to see.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Tell me, Fr. Serafim, about the property you will be using for the
monastery. You said it’s abandoned?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: Yes, it’s called Kilninian, which simply means “Church of Ninian.” It is
a church that used to belong to the Church of Scotland until, I think, the
‘80s, when it was deconsecrated. After that it was bought by a group of
Catholic monks who tried to establish a monastery. They couldn’t; they didn’t
succeed. They couldn’t find land to buy; after a number of years, they had just
given up. When they left, they just donated the church to us. So what we have
is an empty, beautiful 1766 building, but unfortunately there’s no land around
it, so there’s no other buildings.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: As I understand it, the patron saints of the monastery would be Ss.
Ninian and Cuthbert. What can you tell me about those two saints?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: The original, initial patron saint was St. Ninian. I’ve added St.
Cuthbert, just because I’ve spent four years in Durham, next to his shrine, and
in these four years I really just fell in love with St. Cuthbert. He’s such a
warm and loving saint, embracing and just always ready to help. When I ended up
at Kilninian, I somehow missed him.
God made it
so that I met Sister Marina, a wonderful, wonderful woman who helped us a great
deal in getting this church, and she was praying at that time for the unity for
the Orthodox in the British Isles, and I thought, “Well, we’ve got St. Ninian
who’s specifically Scottish. Why not add St. Cuthbert as well, who’s
specifically English?” That way we can actually pray for that unity.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Very good. Now, you mentioned just a short while ago that there’s no
room to build any additional buildings on that property, and I understand also
that the church building that is currently there is a historical monument and
the land around is categorized as an outstanding natural beauty area. So what
are the implications for you of all these designations?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: It’s really quite simple. If the church is declared a monument, and a
church as old as Kilninian is a monument, you simply cannot change its
architecture or its structure in any way. In other words, I can’t have the
cells inside the church, for instance. The fact that Kilninian is in an area of
outstanding natural beauty—it sounds wonderful; it is wonderful, but in truth
again it implies all sorts of limitations. For instance, what we can build
should be smaller, at least the perspective from the road should look smaller
than Kilninian itself, and the church is quite tiny. It must also be somehow
hid behind Kilninian, so it doesn’t affect the scenery. But that’s not really a
big problem, because I wasn’t aiming and I’d never trade for a big monastic
place. I really want this to be a tiny monastic and also missionary center, so
five, six, if God allows, seven monastics living there would be a wonderful
thing.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Is there anybody currently residing at the monastery, and if not, when
do you plan to move in?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: At the present moment, it’s illegal to live at the monastery. Being the
UK, again, with health and safety regulations, although one cannot live in a
church or in a building that doesn’t have running water or toilets, the only
thing I can do is to run around and present this monastery to people so that,
God willing, towards September this coming autumn, I would be able to buy the
piece of land surrounding the monastery. Once I have that piece of land, I can
use an ancient spring on that territory—it’s actually called the Spring of
Ninian—to draw water from it. I can build a septic tank and have a toilet, and
then I can move in.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Now you are at St. Vladimir’s Seminary currently. Are you in the States
to raise funds? Is that why you’re here?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: Yes, that is why I’m here. Unlike the group of Catholic monks, we’ve
been a bit luckier, and people on Mull have been extremely, extremely friendly
and helpful and open to us, so we’ve found at least the land to buy and have
signed the contracts to it, but until September I must fund-raise and I must
get, somehow, £65,000 to buy a five-acre land. So, yes, I am at St. Vladimir’s.
They’ve been very nice to me, offering accommodation and support, and I travel
every weekend to various parishes. I present the monastery, and I receive
donations.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Okay, and how has the fund-raising been going so far?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: People are very supportive. People are very, very supportive, but I
understand that in many ways, they need a personal relationship to me. Yes, it
matters that the monastery is in such a historically important place for
Orthodoxy. It does matter that everybody seems to love St. Cuthbert and St.
Ninian, and it matters enormously that many people in America have their roots
in that Irish-Scottish tradition, but they also need a relationship to me, and
that makes things go rather slowly for what we need now, because we need that
amount of money until September.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Well, there may be a listener or two out there who, just by listening
to your voice and by our conversation here today may want to help out the
monastery. How can listeners learn more about you, learn more about the
monastery, and then also offer their assistance?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: Well, I started this whole thing and I got my bishop’s blessing and my
father-confessor’s blessing to try and establish the monastery in [the]
Hebrides. I really didn’t know that my first worry was how to introduce myself
to people on Mull without scaring them. You know, we look kind of weird with
our long beards and being dressed in black, and they are British. So the first
thing I did was to establish a website: mullmonastery.com, “Mull” being
M-u-double-l. And in time, over months, that website actually grew, and it now
contains information about me, a way to contact me, and pretty much everything
we’ve discussed so far is there, is on the monastery website.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: And you said again that is Mullmonastery, m-u-l-l-monastery? Is that
correct?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: Dot-com, yes.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Dot-com. Okay.
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: Mullmonastery.com
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Mullmonastery.com, and we’ll be sure to put a link to the website on
our description of this particular episode of Ancient Faith Presents. Father,
is there anything else you’d like to add before I let you go today?
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: People who’ve been there somehow are the biggest supporters. People who
have been to Iona, which is like a stone’s throw away from Mull—you actually
have to stop on
Mull to get to Iona—they are the biggest supporters, and they
understand why it’s so important for Mull to take back Western Europe. I feel
as if we’re moving towards other countries, other areas, like Africa, South
America, and that’s wonderful, but we forget that we have our roots, or a big
part of our roots, in Europe, and if we let go of that, that will impact back
on us.
The last
thing, especially for Americans—it’s striking how many people have their
ancestors coming from either Ireland or Scotland or England. It’s as if you are
somehow rebaptizing your own roots by supporting this monastery in [the]
Hebrides. It’s the first Orthodox monastery in the Hebrides in over a
millennium, more or less since the Celtic Church there disappeared.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Wow. Well, Father, I really appreciate you taking some time out of your
day today to tell us a little bit about the monastery. It’s just a pleasure to
meet you.
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: I appreciate so much you giving me the chance to tell everyone about the
monastery, and, God willing, you never know: maybe one day we’ll have you as a
guest in the monastery.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Ah, that would be wonderful. Like many, I have roots in the UK as well.
My family is Welsh, and we’ve never been.
Fr. Serafim Aldea:
Well, when you come, just go on the website, get my email, and let me know.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: All right. Sounds very good. Thank you for joining me.
Fr. Serafim
Aldea: Thank you.
Mr. Bobby
Maddex: Once again, I have been speaking with Fr. Serafim Aldea. I’m Bobby
Maddex, and this has been a listener-supported presentation of Ancient Faith
Radio, on the web at ancientfaith.com.
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