A letter to an unbeliever
from the Metropolitan
LEAVE YOUR GOLDFISH BOWL
AND COME AND SEE!
Why should I? you may ask. Here is a little story, which is totally absurd, but it can perhaps illustrate why you should come and see.
A goldfish swims around in his little bowl. He has never known anything else but his little bowl. What it would be like to swim in a lake is totally beyond his experience. Although he is not really happy he thinks that his little bowl is all there is to life.
One day, a fish who has spent all his life in a lake, invites the goldfish to come and see what it is like to swim in the lake. He explains to the goldfish how much happier he would be if he joined him in the lake, freed from the prison of a little bowl. He tells him that fish were meant to swim in open water, not in a bowl! But the goldfish refuses to listen to what the fish has to tell him - it all sounds absurd.
You see, the gold fish would would have to experience for himself what the fish had to tell him. The fish could not possibly explain what it was like to swim in the lake. It was something that he had to experience personally.
And so, because the goldfish refused the invitation to come and see, and so experience for himself. He continued to miss out on the happiness which swimming in the lake could give, away from the prison of his little bowl.
We who preach orthodox Catholic Faith, are like the fish from the lake. We have experienced New Life in Christ and we want to share it with you. You were created to share this New Life. Because you do not share it, in spite of the material pleasures of your life, you remain unfulfilled by what they have to offer - and for you death is the end of the road. If you, the reader, are an unbeliever, you are like the goldfish.
You will think we talk of lot of nonsense. But the only way you would be able appreciate what we are saying is by way of a personal experience of that New Life in Christ.
We could talk until we are 'blue in the face' but you will not appreciate our message until you yourself personally experience New Life in Christ. Like the goldfish, you will need to swim in the open water. Only then will you yourself KNOW the difference between the true happiness which that New Life gives to you, and your former existence of imprisonment in your 'goldfish bowl'.
Begin your journey of discovery NOW. Take the first step NOW by attending Mass at one of our churches. But above all, persevere. The time it may take to find what you seek is 'as long as a piece of string'.
Remember that this Church is unlike the 'denominations' you have previously have encountered. We have nothing to do with Anglicanism, Protestantism or any other sect. Because orthodox Catholic Faith cannot be altered, updated or modernised, we do we follow modern Rome. But come and see! Do not live and die within the prison of your 'goldfish bowl' life. Come and begin to experience the open waters of New Life in Christ - and so be set free.
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