Six seminarians submitted essays for the 6th Annual St Matthias Merit Scholarship Contest on Wednesday, November 1, each answering a common essay prompt curated by an anonymous group of donors.

The essay prompt read as follows:

When a forlorn kindergartner arrived home from school, he asked his mother if it was true that he was going to Jupiter to get stupider. His mother answered, 'No;' got him a first-grade book about the solar system; took him to an observatory to see Jupiter and the moon and to a daytime telescope to see Mercury and the sun; and lastly gave him a copy of Psalm 121. 

More than acquiring a passion for learning, what was the better part of this experience for this child? Refer to Matthew 15:13-14 and excerpts of Psalm 121 to answer the question in an essay with a 750-word maximum.

The scholarship panel asked the entrants to bear in mind that the intended audience for these essays is school-age youth as well as the general public; eventually, the panel hopes to share a collection of winning essays as a resource for high school readers.

After carefully evaluating each essay submission, the St Matthias Merit Scholarship Essay Contest panel awarded this year’s first-place prize of $3,300 to seminarian Emil Prisquilas Peter.

According to the panel, Emil’s essay, "Girded by the Sword of Trust," took first place because “Emil put himself in the shoes of the child and wrote in an approachable style for youth and parents. In so doing, Emil understood the mother's perspective; effectively summarized the child's preparation to receive and comprehend Psalm 121; and answered the essay question by elaborating on how the child's improved understanding of God will help him deal with ongoing challenges.”

Read the winning essay

The essay contest panel also expressed their appreciation for the thoughtful, well-written essays of the remaining five applicants, and thanked the Seminary for the great privilege of sponsoring the contest.

Emil Peter offered his sincere thanks to the St Matthias Scholarship Essay Contest sponsors, saying, “I am extremely elated for winning the Scholarship Essay Contest this year. I would like to extend my sincere gratitude towards the donors of this scholarship. I urge them to continue supporting the seminarians through their gracious donations and at the same time continue challenging us with interesting topics for the essays every year.”

Emil Prisquilas Peter is a first-year seminarian in the Master of Divinity (M.Div.) program at St Vladimir’s Seminary and is projected to graduate in May 2026. Emil hails from Mumbai, India, and is a member of the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church. He has a B.E. in Electronics Engineering and an M.S. in Computer Engineering and worked a corporate engineering job for three years before deciding to follow his lifelong calling to ministry. After considering multiple seminaries in several different countries, Emil decided on St Vladimir’s Seminary, in large part due to the Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) component of the M.Div. program here, a requirement that is unique to St Vladimir’s Seminary. Emil says, “During my time at St Vladimir’s Seminary, I hope to enhance my knowledge of the Scriptures and also to embark on a spiritual journey that will get me closer to God and to know Him better.”

Congratulations, Emil!

About the St Matthias Merit Scholarship Essay Contest

The St Matthias Merit Scholarship Essay Contest is offered annually, thanks to the generous contributions of a family of anonymous donors. These donors also select the topic of the essay contest each year and develop thorough and thoughtful criteria to determine the winner.

The contest is one of many offerings by the Seminary to help its seminarians graduate tuition debt-free as they go forth to serve the Church. SVOTS also administers need-based tuition grants, need-based scholarships, merit scholarships, continuing education grants, and matching grant opportunities for seminarians. These are made possible thanks to many benefactors who have graciously given funds to St Vladimir’s.

Previous winners: 

• 2018, Sophia Theodoratos: An Amazing Race
• 2019, Andrew Kayaian: “Follow me”: Religious Reality over Facebook Phantasm
• 2020, Alexander Earl: Thou Hast Prepared a Table Before Me ...
• 2021, Theodore Mantzikos: Argus the Watcher
• 2022, Dn Silouan Parchert: God is Greater than Our Hearts

By Emil Prisquilas Peter (M.Div. ’26)

I would imagine that the kindergartner would have experienced bullying here from one or a group of his female classmates, who would have mentioned the phrase “Boys go to Jupiter to get stupider” to indirectly imply that all boys are stupider and less important when compared to girls. Putting myself in the shoes of the child, I would imagine that he is very sad and low in confidence owing to the bullying that he just experienced. He might have come under the apprehension that being a boy, he might be stupid and he is not at par with the girls in the class.

At such a young age, being bullied and, coming to false and incorrect conclusions could be detrimental to a child’s mental growth and confidence. Knowing this fact and, understanding the sensitivity of the matter at hand, his mother sets on a corrective course. First of all, she educates him about the solar system. She wants him to understand the structure of the universe that we are living in and wants him to learn about the different planets in our solar system. Then she makes the lesson more fun by taking him to an observatory to view Jupiter and Moon, followed by a visit to a daytime telescope to view Mercury and Sun, providing him the visual aid to solidify his understanding by making him see by himself what he had learned about. I really liked the mother’s choice of planets here. She chose Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system, and Mercury, the smallest planet in the solar system. Choosing polar opposite-sized planets clearly would solidify his perception of the solar system.

Later after their small study tour, she gave him a copy of Psalm 121 to read. Psalm 121 is the song of ascents, which reminds us of God’s care for us and to be confident in Him to take care of us. With the Psalms reading, she is strengthening him to deal with the bullying that happened to him today and at the same time preparing him for many more such events that might happen to him in the future. She is urging him to keep trust in God, our Lord, to take care of him in times of trials and tribulations that he might face in his life. God will be with him in times of trouble and will make sure no harm occurs to him. It is the same God who created the solar system that he just learned about and saw, which is just a tiny speck in God’s colossal creation. As mentioned in verse 6, “The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night”, our Creator has put so much care into the order of the universe that the Sun and the Moon that he sees in the sky would bring no harm to him. If He could protect him from these celestial bodies, for sure He would protect him from any evil that could befall him in his life. The life of his mother is a testimony to the fact that “God will protect him”.

So, if we go by the literal sense of the phrase itself, knowing about Jupiter and for instance, one day being able to arrive on Jupiter, doesn’t make him stupider but smarter. Good education along with courageous decisions taken with trust in God would only lead him to enlightenment and success. This doesn’t put him below par with others but above par. He should be paying no heed to what people around him have to say, for in Matthew 15.14 we read “Let them alone; they are blind guides of the blind. And if one blind person guides another, both will fall into a pit.” So, paying attention to the “blind” would only lead him to fall and fail in his life. He is guided by the “Light of the world”, who has removed his blindness, and he should be led only by His Word. Through this exercise, his mother carefully prepares him to tackle bullying and stereotypes that he would have to face in his life. And she girds him with the very sword that she had used in her life to ward off troubles and trials in her life, which is The Trust in God.