Throughout the week as I think of you, my godchildren, catechumens, enquirers, and brethren in Christ, there are things I wish to say to you that do not fit easily into our weekly lessons. Even when I resolve to speak to you, if I don’t write down my thoughts, I forget them, only to remember them after we have met. In writing them down, they often take the form of scrawled notes on napkins and, often, I wish I could give them to you in some form that would bring them back to mind on occasion. I’ve hesitated to create a ‘newsletter’, until we receive a blessing to formalize our catechetical school. So, for now, I’ll simply put them in the form of a catechetical letter from myself, godfather and catechetist to you, my beloved children, friends, and brethren.
Do me the service, then, as I risk being somewhat bold in the manner of my speaking to you, of remembering that I really have nothing to say if the Church does not say it, nor have told you any truth if I contradict the consensus of the holy fathers or the seven holy Oecumenical Councils. That is partly why I decided to ‘dedicate’, still unofficially as yet, this series of letters to the honor of The Pillars of Orthodoxy, as I hope also to receive blessing to do for our ‘portable catechetical school’. If I have anything at all good to say to you, the glory is to God, and if I err, it is my error and my shame.
– Catechetical Letter 11/30/2005