Death to the World
Punks Turned Monks
Fredericia Mathewes-Green
January 1, 1997
High in a Russian Orthodox monastery in the California mountains, Father Damascene and Father John had a problem. They wanted to place an ad in Maximum Rock and Roll, "the most hardcore" of all the punk magazines, but were having trouble getting it past the editor. If this sounds like the beginning of an interesting story, just wait. The story actually began a few years earlier. Four years ago, John Marler arrived at the St. Herman of Alaska monastery in Platina, California, weary of life. Though only nineteen, he had already been guitarist in two successful punk-rock bands, Sleep and Paxton Quiggly. Once he found faith in Christ and a home in Orthodoxy, the new monk wanted to bring the same hope to the punk subculture he had just escaped, a community of kids crippled by nihilism and despair. The St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood (which sponsors the Platina abbey and several other monasteries) had already begun attracting some kids from the nearby town of Chico, and Mother Neonilla--previously a "serious punker" herself--encouraged Fr. John to reach out to them. The first idea called for fellow-monk Fr. Damascene Christensen, who had recently completed the book Not of this World: The Life and Teaching of Fr. Seraphim Rose, to write an article about Fr. Seraphim for publication in Maximum Rock and Roll. "But as I read over the magazine, I realized there was no way they'd publish something like this," Fr. Damascene recalls. Next, they decided to try to place an ad, but the editor's response--"What the @#*% is a Brotherhood?"--tipped them off that this wasn't going to fly either. The monks were told, "We only run ads for music and 'zines." (For the uninitiated, a 'zine is a rough, homemade-looking magazine, scissored and pasted ...
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