Mr
Federer, as is his wont, makes much of Werner von Braun’s statement about
America:
After World War II,
Werner von Braun, and 1,600 German scientists, surrendered to the United States
in Operation Paperclip, stating: “I myself, and everybody you see here, have
decided to go West. … We knew that we had created a new means of warfare. … We
felt that only by surrendering such a weapon to people who are guided by the
Bible could such an assurance to the world be best secured.”
We
wonder, though, how much better it would have been for the world had he,
instead of furthering the techo-sorcery of the American Empire of heresies and schisms,
followed the path of his forerunner, Werner Meyer-Hellige, in renouncing all
such scientific ‘advances’ for the sake of uniting with Christ’s True Body, the
Holy Orthodox Church:
Werner Meyer-Hellige
was born into a privileged German family in 1889. After a career in the German
Army, in 1921, at the age of thirty-two, he inherited his father’s company,
A.I. Eisfeld, a successful fireworks and explosives manufacturer.
The company was
located on a vast estate, with its own railway, a small zoo, carp ponds, a park
of exotic flora and an orchard, all meticulously maintained. Although Werner
had had no formal scientific training, he had an inventive and practical mind
and, with the help of one of his company’s engineers, he became the first
person to test the idea of a multi-stage ignition system. This was the same
technology that 35 years later was to launch the first satellites into space.
The invention could
have doubled his fortune had the Nazis not come to power. Werner, a man of
independent views, bristled at the changes introduced by the new regime. It in
turn mistrusted him and in 1934 he was denounced as being disloyal and was
forced to sell his factories. Unfortunately, all the data from his research
went to the Nazis and was to help them build their rockets. As Germany fell
into her greatest tragedy, Nazidom and Hitler’s War, Werner’s world fell apart.
After this dark
period, in 1947 he met a young and very religious Russian, Elena Konstantinovna
Radomanskaya. They fell in love, married, and she introduced him to a whole new
world, the world of the Russian Orthodox Church. Werner was sympathetic towards
his wife’s religion, but the deep personal conviction which lies at the
foundation of true conversion took a long time to develop. Elena wrote to the
future St John, then Archbishop of Western Europe, asking him to pray for her
husband, and sent alms to Mount Athos and the Holy Land with the same request.
Werner met Bishop Leonty of Geneva and he became closely acquainted with Fr
Kornily in Munich, who in the world had been a mining engineer, and they had
long discussions. Later, Werner also developed a correspondence with Fr Konstantin
(Zaitsev) of Holy Trinity Monastery in Jordanville in the USA. The latter was a
monk of great learning and fluent in German.
Under their combined
influence Werner’s desire to embrace the Orthodox Faith matured. After the
couple had moved to the Holy Land in September 1969, it was finally to come to
fruition. Visiting the holy places, attending services at various monasteries
and speaking with the monks and nuns all deepened Werner’s understanding of
Orthodoxy. However, when he decided that he did not want to postpone baptism
any longer, a real battle began.
Moments after telling
his wife of his decision to be baptised, he stumbled and fell headlong on a
stone floor. His wife barely managed to help him to bed. That night there was a
storm and he awoke, shouting and making gestures as if fending off attackers.
‘I want to become Orthodox straightaway’, he declared. His wife explained that
this was not possible, that it was the middle of the night. He calmed down, but
woke up again later and said to his wife: ‘Pick up the nun’. It turned out that
at that very moment a nun who had been praying for him was lying unconscious on
the floor of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, six miles away.
The next morning
Elena phoned the Russian Convent on the Mount of Olives and arrangements for
the baptism were made without delay. Since Werner was still unable to get out
of bed, the baptism took place in their home in Bethany. A group of nuns came
together with a priest from the Convent and also Abbess Tamara, who had agreed
to be Werner’s godmother. Knowing how long and diligently Werner had prepared
for this occasion, they all wept for joy. Werner took the name Alexander,
having been impressed by St. Alexander Nevsky’s maxim, ‘God is not in force,
but in truth’ (‘Ne v sile Bog, no v pravde’). Later he said to his wife: ‘All
my life I have been living at the bottom of the ocean, but now the waves have
brought me to the surface, to sunlight, to freedom’.
The German pioneer of
rocket technology, Werner Alexander Meyer-Hellige, was to pass away peacefully
on the Feast of the Prophet Elijah, 2 August 1970, during the prayers for the
departure of the soul. He was buried near the Oak of Mamre, where the Patriarch
Abraham had received the Holy Trinity in the guise of Three Angels. Thus the
rocketeer rose to the heavens through the charioteer.
To the Servant of God
Alexander - Eternal Memory!
--Fr Andrew Phillips, http://orthodoxengland.org.uk/oegerrok.htm
--
Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England,
South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð,
unworthy though we are!
Anathema to the Union!
No comments:
Post a Comment