New converts tend to make the same handful of mistakes. Some are theological. Some are practical. Some are just about getting along with people who’ve been Orthodox their whole lives.
The good news? They’re fixable.
Treating Orthodoxy Like a Debate You Won
If you came from an evangelical background, you’re used to doctrine working a certain way. You read the Bible, figure out what’s true, accept it, and you’re good. Done.
Orthodoxy doesn’t work like that. It’s not a set of propositions you agree with. It’s a life you enter. Theosis isn’t something you understand and check off, it’s a transformation that takes decades. But converts often show up expecting to master the theology in six months of reading and then move on to arguing with people online.
I’ve watched this happen. Someone reads three books, gets chrismated, and suddenly they’re correcting cradle Orthodox about the filioque on Facebook. It doesn’t go well.
The fix? Slow down. Prioritize the Liturgy over the library. Yes, read. But let your spiritual formation happen in confession, in communion, in the rhythm of fasting and feasting. Theology isn’t just information. It’s doxology.
Becoming More Orthodox Than Thou
Here’s a weird one. Converts sometimes overcorrect so hard from their previous errors that they create new ones. You’ll meet someone who left a loose evangelical church and now insists that everyone must pray the entire Horologion daily or they’re not really Orthodox. Or someone who demands that the parish switch to Church Slavonic because English is too modern.
This is rigorism, and it’s poison. Orthodoxy has room for economia, pastoral flexibility within the tradition. Not everything is a hill to die on. Some things are cultural. Some are disciplinary. Some are actually theological. Learning the difference takes time and humility.
Metropolitan Kallistos Ware talks about this. The Church is a hospital, not a courtroom. We’re here to be healed, not to prove we’re the sickest or the most perfectly compliant patient.
Skipping the Basics
You’d think this wouldn’t need saying, but people try to rush catechesis all the time. They want to get chrismated fast, maybe because they’re excited, maybe because they think they already know enough from reading.
Bad idea. Catechesis isn’t just information transfer. It’s formation. You’re learning to pray, to fast, to stand in church for an hour and a half without checking your phone. You’re learning what it feels like to confess your sins out loud to another human being. You can’t get that from a book.
And it doesn’t stop at chrismation. If anything, that’s when the real learning starts. Attend the adult education classes. Ask your priest for a reading list. Don’t assume you’ve graduated.
Alienating the Cradle Orthodox
This one cuts both ways, but converts do make predictable mistakes here. Sometimes they assume cradle Orthodox don’t really know their faith and need educating. Sometimes they expect cradle Orthodox to be walking encyclopedias of patristic wisdom and get disappointed when they’re not.
Both attitudes are problems. Cradle Orthodox grew up breathing this stuff. They might not be able to explain the hypostatic union, but they know how to keep a fast and when to venerate which icon. That’s not nothing. And converts bring something too, fresh eyes, zeal, questions that need asking.
The key is humility. You’re joining a family that’s been here a while. Learn the parish’s history. Volunteer for coffee hour. Don’t show up with a list of things that need fixing. Build relationships first.
Mistaking Culture for Doctrine
This is huge in a place like Southeast Texas, where most Orthodox parishes have ethnic roots. You’ll walk into a church and hear Greek or Arabic or Slavonic, see certain customs, taste certain foods at the fellowship meal. Some of that is Orthodoxy. Some of it is just Greek or Arab or Russian.
Figuring out which is which takes discernment. The Nicene Creed? That’s doctrine. Baklava at Pascha? That’s culture. Using the Julian calendar? That’s complicated, it’s disciplinary, not doctrinal, but people have strong feelings.
Don’t reject everything ethnic as irrelevant, and don’t assume everything ethnic is essential. Ask your priest. Read the canons. Learn what the Church actually requires versus what your particular parish happens to do.
The Practical Fix
So how do you avoid all this? A few things help.
Find a spiritual father or mother early. Not just for confession (though yes, go regularly), but for guidance. Someone who can tell you when you’re overdoing it or underdoing it, when you’re being too rigid or too lax.
Stay plugged into your parish. Don’t do Orthodoxy online. Don’t get your formation from forums or podcasts alone. Show up. Serve. Let the people around you shape you.
Start small with the ascetic stuff. You don’t have to go from zero to full Lenten fast overnight. Add one fasting day. Pray a short rule. Build slowly. This is a marathon.
And give yourself grace. You’re going to mess up. You’re going to say something dumb in coffee hour or forget to venerate an icon or eat cheese on a fasting day because you forgot to check the calendar. That’s fine. You’re a catechumen or a new convert, not St. Seraphim of Sarov.
The Church has been doing this for two thousand years. She knows how to handle mistakes. Yours aren’t new, and they’re not unfixable. Confess them, learn from them, and keep showing up.
