Chaos is coming, so get ready.

That was the warning that -- four years ago -- iconographer and YouTube maven Jonathan Pageau offered to leaders of the Orthodox Church in America's Diocese of the South.

 The French-Canadian artist was reacting to cracks in "cultural cohesion" after Donald Trump's rise to power, with wild reactions on left and right. And corporate leaders, especially in Big Tech, were throwing their "woke" weight around in fights over gender, racism, schools, religious liberty and other topics. Fear and angst were bubbling up in media messages about zombies, fundamentalist handmaidens and angry demands for "safe spaces."

Pageau didn't predict a global pandemic that would lock church doors.

But that's what happened. Thus, he doubled down on his "chaos" message several weeks ago, while addressing the same body of OCA priests and parish leaders.

"If some of you didn't believe me back then, I imagine you are more willing to believe me now," he said.

Pageau focused, in part, on waves of online conspiracy theories that have shaken many flocks and the shepherds who lead them. Wild rumors and questions, he said, often reveal what people are thinking and feeling and, especially, whether they trust authority figures.

"Even the craziest conspiracy nuts, what they are saying is not arbitrary," he said, in Diocese of the South meetings in Miami, which I attended as a delegate from my parish in Oak Ridge, Tenn.

"It's like an alarm bell. It's like an alarm bell that you can hear, and you can understand that the person that's ringing the alarm maybe doesn't understand what is going on. ... They may think that they have an inside track based on what they've heard and think that they know what is going on. But the alarm is not a false alarm, necessarily."

The chaos is real, stressed Pageau. There is chaos in politics, science, schools, technology, economic systems, family structures and many issues linked to sex and gender. It's a time when conspiracy theories about vaccines containing tracking devices echo decades of science-fiction stories, while millions of people navigate daily life with smartphones in their pockets that allow Big Tech leaders to research their every move.

This chaos will lead to change, one way or another, he said. The goal for church leaders is to listen and respond with biblical images, themes and stories -- as opposed to more acidic chatter about politics. The pandemic was especially challenging for bishops and priests in ancient, liturgical churches, since life in their parishes is built on intimate sacramental acts in confession, Holy Communion and anointing the sick.

In Eastern Orthodox flocks, leaders are also trying to make sense of two conflicting trends. A census for 2010-2020 (.pdf here) found that the number of Orthodox Christians in America shrank by 17%, with the large Greek Orthodox Church declining 22%. Other jurisdictions, including the OCA, showed slower declines, while the number of new parishes increased.

Meanwhile, Father Andrew Stephen Damick, an Antiochian Orthodox priest who specializes in online ministries, recently contacted priests around the country about Facebook accounts of rising numbers of "inquirers and catechumens showing up" at their parishes during the pandemic. Only three said this wasn't the case, while 28 affirmed these reports.

"A number said that they noticed that the newcomers skew younger," said Damick, on his Ancient Faith Ministries weblog. "Several said it's more than they've ever had -- in some cases, double." At his own Pennsylvania parish, the number of newcomers last year topped the total from the previous decade.

The vast majority of priests at the Diocese of the South meetings reported the same phenomenon. Several reported a pattern frequently seen online, with young men turning to Orthodoxy after following the writings and YouTube posts of University of Toronto psychology professor Jordan Peterson. This led them to online dialogues between Peterson and Pageau, which then led them to the iconographer's "The Symbolic World" YouTube stream and other online Orthodox channels.

"It's the guys, it’s the guys, it's all these guys. ... These young men in their 20s and early 30s, they're out there urgently hunting for something," said Pageau. "I sympathize with the warrior, crazy, aggressive energy in these young men -- that crazy ball of warrior energy.

"You can change the world with 2,000 guys like that. It has happened before."

FIRST IMAGE: Logo from Jonathan Pageau “Symbolic World” YouTube channel.