Why do you make it so hard to become Orthodox?

OrthoCuban has a first post in a multi-part series entitled, "Why do you make it so hard to become Orthodox?" A good question. My experience (with friends and family who have converted and having spoken to priests on the matter) is that the experience one catechumen has can differ wildly from another based on jurisdiction. I know a person who entered the Church after taking three classes and another who did so after almost a year and a half of classes and conversation with the Economos. Some of this is a result of a set formation process and some of it is the discretion of the priest.

In the West, the Latin Church has the RCIA program (a set, year long, class often attended weekly) that people are sent to. The Eastern Catholic Churches are much less structured (surprise!) and tend to follow the Orthodox practice of a parish-centric system.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention that the role of the priest, who often acts as the spiritual father for Orthodox catechumens, is much more personal and the variable timelines acknowledge the reality of a developing spiritual relationship.

Last week one of my readers asked me to comment on the year-long process to become Orthodox and be allowed to participate in the sacraments. Let me begin with a bit of contrast. Recently, an evangelical who worked on the Mike Huckabee presidential campaign, and is a blogger, wrote a posting listing ten problems with evangelicalism. Let me pick up on just one of them as an introduction to this topic...

Complete post here.