Eremos Workshop: Reviving the Holy Tradition of Making. 

Peace!  My name is Tyler DeLong, I am the husband of Holly, and father of five beautiful children. My family and I were received into the Orthodox Church five years ago. I’ve been a woodworker and print artist for about 10 or so years. 

My love for this work started when I was a child, but deepened significantly during my graduate studies in theology, seeing both the immense theological imbeddedness of poiesis (the act of making), as well as the importance of making found in the spiritual practices and tradition of the Church. This is witnessed not only in the place of iconography and architecture in the worship of God, but also in the spiritual discipline of making the ordinary objects of everyday life. Most radically, we see it in the Eucharist. 

I believe many of these realities, and their internal meaning, have been increasingly neglected in modern culture, and I believe that the best way to change that is to start using our hands again in the holy process of working out our salvation. Eremos Workshop is my small way of seeking this revival, and I’m glad you’re here with me. 

Eremos is the Greek rendition of “wilderness”, or “the deserted place”. The theological roots of this word are not only embedded within the monastic traditions of Eastern Orthodoxy, but reach deep into our common history as the people of God seeking Him out in the wilderness, the wastelands, and deserted places of the world. To me, this theological reality is especially poignant in our own cultural milieu, and should be attended to with a special focus.