Orthodoxy and Culture

Comprehending the Incomprehensible

2011-04-15T09:16:00.001-04:00

Today he who hung the earth upon the waters is hung upon a Tree, He who is King of the Angels is arrayed in a crown of thorns. He who wraps the heaven in clouds is wrapped in mocking purple. He who freed Adam in the Jordan receives a blow on the face. The Bridegroom of the Church is transfixed with nails. The Son of the Virgin is pierced by a lance, We worship your Sufferings, O Christ Show us also your glorious Resurrection.

(Antiphon XV, Tone 6, The Matins of Holy Friday, served on the night of Holy Thursday—“the 12 Gospels”) The paradoxes displayed in the hymnody of the final days of Holy Week are a tribute to the brilliance and sobriety of Byzantine Church poetry. Indeed, the hymns of the Church are both poetry and theology bound together—given to us in melodies that are engrained into our hearts and minds for a whole lifetime and over many generations. Whether we know the Byzantine or Slavic melodies—and hopefully we learn both—these settings become an ongoing catechesis about what it means to be an Orthodox Christian believer. In truth, we don’t need “Church School” or well bound catechisms to know what we believe, to understand what our faith teaches. We can simply learn the poetry of our hymns and services and inscribe their words into our hearts. It is precisely the ability to learn the faith by singing it that made it possible for regular Orthodox people to survive the most brutal persecutions of the last twenty centuries (some of which continue to this day). The songs and theological paradoxes of our faith have been woven into the very fabric of the Orthodox Christian consciousness and they cannot be taken away by any earthly power. This is especially important for us to remember as we enter into the mystery of Holy Week, into those awesome days when we are confronted with the incomprehensible humility and majesty of God in the Flesh—crucified and risen. How do we comprehend the incomprehensible? How do we make sense of the events that we commemorate during Holy Week? We don’t certainly don’t do it by means of long theological commentaries or brilliant demonstrations of “scientific” logic. The mystery we encounter in the Passion of God in Christ can only be “understood” by means of paradox. And that paradox is best delivered when it is sung. A paradox is not a contradiction; it is not the placing of mutually exclusive terms in opposition—rather, it is the reconciliation of things normally thought to be exclusive of one another. Thus we are confronted with the Immortal One who created the world (“he who hung the earth upon the waters”) dying on the cross (“hung on a Tree”). How can He who is, by definition, eternal and uncontainable, be made subject to death and to the limits of the grave? Our mind cannot contain what appears to be a total contradiction. And, in fact, it is utterly impossible to describe this event in logical terms. It can only be resolved in paradox—that the God who made heaven and earth, Who created the ordered universe and initiated all things in beauty also came to experience rejection, hatred, and scorn by those for whom He made it. We are confronted with the heart-rending juxtaposition of Love answered by hatred, of Beauty defiled by ugliness, of Goodness opposed by wretched evil, of Life being consumed by death. And in the paradox of paradoxes, we will discover Love overwhelming hatred, of Beauty transfiguring ugliness, of Goodness overcoming evil, of Life destroying death. The supreme paradox of this universe is found in the incarnation, passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, God-with-us as one of us in the flesh. By taking on our limited existence, He has given us unlimited life. By accepting our hatred, He has enabled us to love. By accepting the ugly, death-dealing sorrow of the cross, He has transformed it into the beautiful, life-giving source of salvation. One cannot speak of these things using the narrow categories of philosophy and science; to embrace such mysteries we need to sing with tears of sorrow, repentance, hope, and joy. Recently, I watched and listened to a recording of the late Archbishop Job, of blessed memory, singing Antiphon XV. The somber beauty of the words, sung in the Byzantine melody, cut right to the heart. It was made even more beautiful because I knew the man who sang it; he brought my family into the Orthodox Church and ordained me to the diaconate and priesthood. He sang, with profound compunction, a hymn of great reverence and love. Perhaps this reveals something the mystery of the paradox, too—that the voices who sing, our friends, our parents, our mentors, the whole Orthodox community around us, incarnate the paradox of mere human beings being touched by Divinity. We, who once struck the Lord of life in the face, who spat on Him and hung him on a cross to die, are now embraced by His love. Our spitting is turned into kisses of adoration; our striking is turned into prostrations of worship, our hatred is transformed into deep love. We cannot speak of it, we can only sing it.

Antiphon XV of Holy Friday Matins (12 Gospels--Holy Thursday evening)

2011-04-15T06:44:00.004-04:00

This beautiful rendition of Antiphon XV by Archbishop Job, of blessed memory, is heartrending---all the more so to those of us who knew him. Bishop Job received my family into the Orthodox Faith (from the Episcopal Church, where I was a prietst) in 1989 and ordained me as a deacon later that year and as a priest in 1991. Just click on the title of this post to see it.

The Life of St. Mary of Egypt

2011-04-07T11:08:00.001-04:00

The following is the story of St. Mary of Egypt by Sophronius of Jerusalem. Read it with faith. There is no need for further commentary. The Life Of Our Venerable Mother Mary of Egyptby Saint Sophronius Patriarch of Jerusalem "It is good to hide the secret of a king, but it is glorious to reveal and preach the works of God" (Tobit 12:7). So said the Archangel Raphael to Tobit when he performed the wonderful healing of his blindness. Actually, not to keep the secret of a king is perilous and a terrible risk, but to be silent about the works of God is a great loss for the soul. And I (says St. Saphronius), in writing the life of St. Mary of Egypt, am afraid to hide the works of God by silence. Remembering the misfortune threatened to the servant who hid his God-given talent in the earth (Mat. 25:18-25), I am bound to pass on the holy account that has reached me. And let no one think (continues St. Saphronius) that I have had the audacity to write untruth or doubt this great marvel --may I never lie about holy things! If there do happen to be people who, after reading this record, do not believe it, may the Lord have mercy on them because, reflecting on the weakness of human nature, they consider impossible these wonderful things accomplished by holy people. But now we must begin to tell this most amazing story, which has taken place in our generation. There was a certain elder in one of the monasteries of Palestine, a priest of the holy life and speech, who from childhood had been brought up in monastic ways and customs. This elder's name was Zosima. He had been through the whole course of the ascetic life and in everything he adhered to the rule once given to him by his tutors as regard spiritual labors. He had also added a good deal himself while laboring to subject his flesh to the will of the spirit. And he had not failed in his aim. He was so renowned for his spiritual life that many came to him from neighboring monasteries and some even from afar. While doing all this, he never ceased to study the Divine Scriptures. Whether resting, standing, working or eating food (if the scraps he nibbled could be called food), he incessantly and constantly had a single aim: always to sing of God, and to practice the teaching of the Divine Scriptures. Zosima used to relate how, as soon as he was taken from his mother's breast, he was handed over to the monastery where he went through his training as an ascetic till he reached the age of 53. After that, he began to be tormented with the thought that he was perfect in everything and needed no instruction from anyone, saying to himself mentally, "Is there a monk on earth who can be of use to me and show me a kind of asceticism that I have not accomplished? Is there a man to be found in the desert who has surpassed me?" Thus thought the elder, when suddenly an angel appeared to him and said: "Zosima, valiantly have you struggled, as far as this is within the power of man, valiantly have you gone through the ascetic course. But there is no man who has attained perfection. Before you lay unknown struggles greater than those you have already accomplished. That you may know how many other ways lead to salvation, leave your native land like the renowned patriarch Abraham and go to the monastery by the River Jordan." Zosima did as he was told. He left the monastery in which he had lived from childhood, and went to the River Jordan. At last he reached the community to which God had sent him. Having knocked at the door of the monastery, he told the monk who was the porter who he was; and the porter told the abbot. On being admitted to the abbot's presence, Zosima made the usual monastic prostration and prayer. Seeing that he was a monk the abbot asked: "Where do you come from, brother, and why have you come to us poor old men?" Zosima replied: "There is no need to speak about where I have come from, but I have come, father, seeking spiritual profit, for I have heard great things about your skill in leading souls to God." "Brother," the abbot said to him, "Only God can heal the infirmity of the soul. May He teach you and us His divine ways and guide us. But as it is the love of Christ that has moved you to visit us poor old men, then stay with us, if that is why you have come. May the Good Shepherd Who laid down His life for our salvation fill us all with the grace of the Holy Spirit." After this, Zosima bowed to the abbot, asked for his prayers and blessing, and stayed in the monastery. There he saw elders proficient both in action and the contemplation of God, aflame in spirit, working for the Lord. They sang incessantly, they stood in prayer all night, work was ever in their hands and psalms on their lips. Never an idle word was heard among them, they know nothing about acquiring temporal goods or the cares of life. But they had one desire -- to become in body like corpses. Their constant food was the Word of God, and they sustained their bodies on bread and water, as much as their love for God allowed them. Seeing this, Zosima was greatly edified and prepared for the struggle that lay before him. Many days passed and the time drew near when all Christians fast and prepare themselves to worship the Divine Passion and Resurrection of Christ. The monastery gates were kept always locked and only opened when one of the community was sent out on some errand. It was a desert place, not only unvisited by people of the world but even unknown to them. There was a rule in that monastery which was the reason why God brought Zosima there. At the beginning of the Great Fast [on Forgiveness Sunday] the priest celebrated the holy Liturgy and all partook of the holy body and blood of Christ. After the Liturgy they went to the refectory and would eat a little Lenten food. Then all gathered in church and after praying earnestly with prostrations, the elders kissed one another and asked forgiveness. And each made a prostration to the abbot and asked his blessing and prayers for the struggle that lay before them. After this, the gates of the monastery were thrown open, and singing, "The Lord is my light and my Savior; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the defender of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?" (Psalm 26:1) and the rest of that psalm, all went out into the desert and crossed the River Jordan. Only one or two brothers were left in the monastery, not to guard the property (for there was nothing to rob), but so as not to leave the church without Divine Service. Each took with him as much as he could or wanted in the way of food, according to the needs of his body: one would take a little bread, another some figs, another dates or wheat soaked in water. And some took nothing but their own body covered with rags and fed when nature forced them to it on the plants that grew in the desert. After crossing the Jordan, they all scattered far and wide in different directions. And this was the rule of life they had, and which they all observed -- neither to talk to one another, nor to know how each one lived and fasted. If they did happen to catch sight of one another, they went to another part of the country, living alone and always singing to God, and at a definite time eating a very small quantity of food. In this way they spent the whole of the fast and used to return to the monastery a week before the Resurrection of Christ, on Palm Sunday. Each one returned having his own conscience as the witness of his labor, and no one asked another how he had spent his time in the desert. Such were rules of the monastery. Every one of them while in the desert struggled with himself before the Judge of the struggle -- God -- not seeking to please men and fast before the eyes of all. For what is done for the sake of men, to win praise and honor is not only useless to the one who does it but sometimes the cause of great punishment. Zosima did the same as all. And he went far, far into the desert with a secret hope of finding some father who might be living there and who might be able to satisfy his thirst and longing. And he wandered on tireless, as if hurrying on to some definite place. He had already walked for 20 days and when the 6th hour came he stopped and, turning to the East, he began to sing the sixth Hour and recite the customary prayers. He used to break his journey thus at fixed hours of the day to rest a little, to chant psalms standing and to pray on bent knees. And as he sang thus without turning his eyes from the heavens, he suddenly saw to the right of the hillock on which he stood the semblance of a human body. At first he was confused thinking he beheld a vision of the devil, and even started with fear. But, having guarded himself with the sign of the Cross and banished all fear, he turned his gaze in that direction and in truth saw some form gliding southwards. It was naked, the skin dark as if burned up by the heat of the sun; the hair on its head was white as a fleece, and not long, falling just below its neck. Zosima was so overjoyed at beholding a human form that he ran after it in pursuit, but the form fled from him. He followed. At length, when he was near enough to be heard, he shouted: "Why do you run from an old man and a sinner? Slave of the True God, wait for me, whoever you are, in God's name I tell you, for the love of God for Whose sake you are living in the desert." "Forgive me for God's sake, but I cannot turn towards you and show you my face, Abba Zosima. For I am a woman and naked as you see with the uncovered shame of my body. But if you would like to fulfill one wish of a sinful woman, throw me your cloak so that I can cover my body and can turn to you and ask for your blessing." Here terror seized Zosima, for he heard that she called him by name. But he realized that she could not have done so without knowing anything of him if she had not had the power of spiritual insight. He at once did as he was asked. He took off his old, tattered cloak and threw it to her, turning away as he did so. She picked it up and was able to cover at least a part of her body. Then she turned to Zosima and said: "Why did you wish, Abba Zosima, to see a sinful woman? What do you wish to hear or learn from me, you who have not shrunk from such great struggles?" Zosima threw himself on the ground and asked for her blessing. She likewise bowed down before him. And thus they lay on the ground prostrate asking for each other's blessing. And one word alone could be heard from both: "Bless me!" After a long while the woman said to Zosima: "Abba Zosima, it is you who must give blessing and pray. You are dignified by the order of priesthood and for many years you have been standing before the holy altar and offering the sacrifice of the Divine Mysteries." This flung Zosima into even greater terror. At length with tears he said to her: "O mother, filled with the spirit, by your mode of life it is evident that you live with God and have died to the world. The Grace granted to you is apparent -- for you have called me by name and recognized that I am a priest, though you have never seen me before. Grace is recognized not by one's orders, but by gifts of the Spirit, so give me your blessing for God's sake, for I need your prayers." Then giving way before the wish of the elder the woman said: "Blessed is God Who cares for the salvation of men and their souls." Zosima answered: "Amen." And both rose to their feet. Then the woman asked the elder: "Why have you come, man of God, to me who am so sinful? Why do you wish to see a woman naked and devoid of every virtue? Though I know one thing -- the Grace of the Holy Spirit has brought you to render me a service in time. Tell me, father, how are the Christian peoples living? And the kings? How is the Church guided?" Zosima said: "By your prayers, mother, Christ has granted lasting peace to all. But fulfill the unworthy petition of an old man and pray for the whole world and for me who am a sinner, so that my wanderings in the desert may not be fruitless." She answered: "You who are a priest, Abba Zosima, it is you who must pray for me and for all -- for this is your calling. But as we must all be obedient, I will gladly do what you ask." And with these words she turned to the East, and raising her eyes to heaven and stretching out her hands, she began to pray in a whisper. One could not hear separate words, so that Zosima could not understand anything that she said in her prayers. Meanwhile he stood, according to his own word, all in a flutter, looking at the ground without saying a word. And he swore, calling God to witness, that when at length he thought that her prayer was very long, he took his eyes off the ground and saw that she was raised about a forearm's distance from the ground and stood praying in the air. When he saw this, even greater terror seized him and he fell on the ground weeping and repeating may times, "Lord have mercy." And while lying prostrate on the ground he was tempted by a thought: Is it not a spirit? And perhaps her prayer is hypocrisy. But at the very same moment the woman turned round, raised the elder from the ground and said: "Thoughts, tempting you about me, trouble you, Abba, telling you I am a spirit, and that my prayer is feigned? Know, holy father, that I am only a sinful woman, though I am guarded by Holy baptism. And I am no spirit but earth and ashes, and flesh alone." And with these words she guarded herself with the sign of the Cross on her forehead, eyes, mouth and breast, saying: "May God defend us from the evil one and from his designs, for fierce is his struggle against us." Hearing and seeing this, the elder fell to the ground and, embracing her feet, he said with tears: "I beg you, by the Name of Christ our God, Who was born of a Virgin, for Whose sake you have stripped yourself, for Whose sake you have exhausted your flesh, do not hide from your slave, who you are and whence and how you came into this desert. Tell me everything so that the marvelous works of God may become known. A hidden wisdom and a secret treasure -- what profit is there in them? Tell me all, I implore you. For not out of vanity or for self-display will you speak but to reveal the truth to me, an unworthy sinner. I believe in God, for whom you live and whom you serve. I believe that He led me into this desert so as to show me His ways in regard to you. It is not in our power to resist the plans of God. If it were not the will of God that you and your life would be known, He would not have allowed be to see you and would not have strengthened me to undertake this journey, one like me who never before dared to leave his cell." Much more said Abba Zosima. But the woman raised him and said: "I am ashamed, Abba, to speak to you of my disgraceful life. Forgive me for God's sake! But as you have already seen my naked body I shall likewise lay bare before you my work, so that you may know with what shame and obscenity my soul is filled. I was not running away out of vanity, as you thought, for what have I to be proud of -- I who was the chosen vessel of the devil? But when I start my story you will run from me, as from a snake, for your ears will not be able to bear the vileness of my actions. But I shall tell you all without hiding anything, only imploring you first of all to pray incessantly for me, so that I may find mercy on the Day of Judgment." The elder wept and the woman began her story. "My native land, holy father, was Egypt. Already during the lifetime of my parents, when I was twelve years old, I renounced their love and went to Alexandria. I am ashamed to recall how there I at first ruined my maidenhood and then unrestrainedly and insatiably gave myself up to sensuality. It is more becoming to speak of this briefly, so that you may just know my passion and my lechery. For about seventeen years, forgive me, I lived like that. I was like a fire of public debauch. And it was not for the sake of gain -- here I speak the pure truth. Often when they wished to pay me, I refused the money. I acted in this way so as to make as many men as possible to try to obtain me, doing free of charge what gave me pleasure. Do not think that I was rich and that was the reason why I did not take money. I lived by begging, often by spinning flax, but I had an insatiable desire and an irrepressible passion for lying in filth. This was life to me. Every kind of abuse of nature I regarded as life. That is how I lived. Then one summer I saw a large crowd of Libyans and Egyptians running towards the sea. I asked one of them, `Where are these men hurrying to?' He replied, `They are all going to Jerusalem for the Exaltation of the Precious and Life-giving Cross, which takes place in a few days.' I said to him, `Will they take me with them if I wish to go?' `No one will hinder you if you have money to pay for the journey and for food.' And I said to him, `To tell you truth, I have no money, neither have I food. But I shall go with them and shall go aboard. And they shall feed me, whether they want to or not. I have a body -- they shall take it instead of pay for the journey.' I was suddenly filled with a desire to go, Abba, to have more lovers who could satisfy my passion. I told you, Abba Zosima, not to force me to tell you of my disgrace. God is my witness, I am afraid of defiling you and the very air with my words." Zosima, weeping, replied to her: "Speak on for God's sake, mother, speak and do not break the thread of such an edifying tale." And, resuming her story, she went on: "That youth, on hearing my shameless words, laughed and went off. While I, throwing away my spinning wheel, ran off towards the sea in the direction which everyone seemed to be taking and, seeing some young men standing on the shore, about ten or more of them, full of vigor and alert in their movements, I decided that they would do for my purpose (it seemed that some of them were waiting for more travellers while others had gone ashore). Shamelessly, as usual, I mixed with the crowd, saying, `Take me with you to the place you are going to; you will not find me superfluous.' I also added a few more words calling forth general laughter. Seeing my readiness to be shameless, they readily took me aboard the boat. Those who were expected came also, and we set sail at once. How shall I relate to you what happened after this? Whose tongue can tell whose ears can take in all that took place on the boat during that voyage! And to all this I frequently forced those miserable youths even against their own will. There is no mentionable or unmentionable depravity of which I was not their teacher. I am amazed, Abba, how the sea stood our licentiousness, how the earth did not open its jaws, and how it was that hell did not swallow me alive, when I had entangled in my net so many souls. But I think God was seeking my repentance, for He does not desire the death of a sinner but magnanimously awaits his return to Him. At last we arrived in Jerusalem. I spent the days before the festival in the town, living the same kind of life, perhaps even worse. I was not content with the youths I had seduced at sea and who had helped be to get to Jerusalem; many others -- citizens of the town and foreigners -- I also seduced. The holy day of the Exaltation of the Cross dawned while I was still flying about -- hunting for youths. At daybreak I saw that everyone was hurrying to the church, so I ran with the rest. When the hour for the holy elevation approached, I was trying to make my way in with the crowd which was struggling to get through the church doors. "I had at last squeezed through with great difficulty almost to the entrance of the temple, from which the life-giving Tree of the Cross was being shown to the people. But when I trod on the doorstep which everyone passed, I was stopped by some force which prevented by entering. Meanwhile I was brushed aside by the crowd and found myself standing alone in the porch. Thinking that this had happened because of my woman's weakness, I again began to work my way into the crowd, trying to elbow myself forward. But in vain I struggled. Again my feet trod on the doorstep over which others were entering the church without encountering any obstacle. I alone seemed to remain unaccepted by the church. It was as if there was a detachment of soldiers standing there to oppose my entrance. Once again I was excluded by the same mighty force and again I stood in the porch. Having repeated my attempt three or four times, at last I felt exhausted and had no more strength to push and to be pushed, so I went aside and stood in a corner of the porch. And only then with great difficulty it began to dawn on me, and I began to understand the reason why I was prevented from being admitted to see the life-giving Cross. The word of salvation gently touched the eyes of my heart and revealed to me that it was my unclean life which barred the entrance to me. I began to weep and lament and beat my breast, and to sigh from the depths of my heart. "And so I stood weeping when I saw above me the icon of the most holy Mother of God. Not taking my eyes off her, I said, `O Lady, Mother of God, who gave birth in the flesh to God the Word, I know, O how well I know, that it is no honor or praise to thee when one so impure and depraved as I look up to thy icon, O ever-virgin, who didst keep thy body and soul in purity. Rightly do I inspire hatred and disgust before thy virginal purity. But I have heard that God Who was born of thee became man on purpose to call sinners to repentance. Then help me, for I have no other help. Order the entrance of the church to be opened to me. Allow me to see the venerable Tree on which He Who was born of thee suffered in the flesh and on which He shed His holy Blood for the redemption of sinners an for me, unworthy as I am. Be my faithful witness before thy son that I will never again defile my body by the impurity of fornication, but as soon as I have seen the Tree of the Cross I will renounce the world and its temptations and will go wherever thou wilt lead me.' Thus I spoke and as if acquiring some hope in firm faith and feeling some confidence in the mercy of the Mother of God, I left the place where I stood praying. And I went again and mingled with the crowd that was pushing its way into the temple. And no one seemed to thwart me, no one hindered my entering the church. I was possessed with trembling, and was almost in delirium. "Having got as far as the doors which I could not reach before -- as if the same force which had hindered me cleared the way for me -- I now entered without difficulty and found myself within the holy place. And so it was I saw the life-giving Cross. I saw too the Mysteries of God and how the Lord accepts repentance. Throwing myself on the ground, I worshipped that holy earth and kissed it with trembling. Then I came out of the church and went to her who had promised to be my security, to the place where I had sealed my vow. And bending my knees before the Virgin Mother of God, I addressed her with these words: `O loving Lady, thou hast shown me thy great love for all men. Glory to God Who receives the repentance of sinners through thee. What more can I recollect or say, I who am so sinful? It is time for me, O Lady to fulfill my vow, according to thy witness. Now lead me by the hand along the path of repentance!' And at these words I heard a voice from on high: `If you cross the Jordan you will find glorious rest.' Hearing this voice and having faith that it was for me, I cried to the Mother of God: `O Lady, Lady, do not forsake me!' With these words I left the porch of the church and set off on my journey. "As I was leaving the church a stranger glanced at me and gave me three coins, saying: `Sister, take these.' And, taking the money, I bought three loaves and took them with me on my journey, as a blessed gift. I asked the person who sold the bread: `Which is the way to the Jordan?' I was directed to the city gate which led that way. Running on I passed the gates and still weeping went on my journey. Those I met I asked the way, and after walking for the rest of that day (I think it was nine o'clock when I saw the Cross) I at length reached at sunset the Church of St. John the Baptist which stood on the banks of the Jordan. After praying in the temple, I went down to the Jordan and rinsed my face and hands in its holy waters. I partook of the holy and life-giving Mysteries in the Church of the Forerunner and ate half of one of my loaves. Then, after drinking some water from Jordan, I lay down and passed the night on the ground. In the morning I found a small boat and crossed to the opposite bank. I again prayed to Our Lady to lead me whither she wished. Then I found myself in this desert and since then up to this very day I am estranged from all, keeping away from people and running away from everyone. And I live here clinging to my God Who saves all who turn to Him from faintheartedness and storms." Zosima asked her: "How many years have gone by since you began to live in this desert?" She replied: "Forty-seven years have already gone by, I think, since I left the holy city." Zosima asked: "But what food do you find?" The woman said: "I had two and a half loaves when I crossed the Jordan. Soon they dried up and became hard as rock. Eating a little I gradually finished them after a few years." Zosima asked. "Can it be that without getting ill you have lived so many years thus, without suffering in any way from such a complete change?" The woman answered: "You remind me, Zosima, of what I dare not speak of. For when I recall all the dangers which I overcame, and all the violent thoughts which confused me, I am again afraid that they will take possession of me." Zosima said: "Do not hide anything from me; speak to me without concealing anything." She said to him: "Believe me, Abba, seventeen years I passed in this desert fighting wild beasts -- mad desires and passions. When I was about to partake of food, I used to begin to regret the meat and fish which of which I had so much in Egypt. I regretted also not having wine which I loved so much, for I drank a lot of wine when I lived in the world, while here I had not even water. I used to burn and succumb with thirst. The mad desire for profligate songs also entered me and confused me greatly, edging me on to sing satanic songs which I had learned once. But when such desires entered me I struck myself on the breast and reminded myself of the vow which I had made, when going into the desert. In my thoughts I returned to the icon of the Mother of God which had received me and to her I cried in prayer. I implored her to chase away the thoughts to which my miserable soul was succumbing. And after weeping for long and beating my breast I used to see light at last which seemed to shine on me from everywhere. And after the violent storm, lasting calm descended. "And how shall I tell you, O Abba, of the thoughts that pushed me towards lust once more? A fire was kindled in my miserable heart which seemed to burn me up completely and to awake in me a thirst for embraces. As soon as this craving came to me, I flung myself on the earth and watered it with my tears, as if I saw before me my witness, who had appeared to me in my disobedience, and who seemed to threaten punishment for the crime. And I did not rise from the ground (sometimes I lay thus prostrate for a day and a night) until a calm and sweet light descended and enlightened me and chased away the thoughts that possessed me. But always I turned to the eyes of my mind to my Protectress, asking her to extend help to one who was sinking fast in the waves of the desert. And I always had her as my Helper and the Accepter of my repentance. And thus I lived for seventeen years amid constant dangers. And since then even till now the Mother of God helps me in everything and leads me as it were by the hand." Zosima asked: "Can it be that you did not need food and clothing?" She answered: "After finishing the loaves I had, of which I spoke, for seventeen years I have fed on herbs and all that can be found in the desert. The clothes I had when I crossed the Jordan became torn and worn out. I suffered greatly from the cold and greatly from the extreme heat. At times the sun burned me up and at other times I shivered from the frost, and frequently falling to the ground I lay without breath and without motion. I struggled with many afflictions and with terrible temptations. But from that time till now the power of God in numerous ways had guarded my sinful soul and my humble body. When I only reflect on the evils from which Our Lord has delivered me I have imperishable food for hope of salvation. I am fed and clothed by the all-powerful Word of God, the Lord of all. For it is not by bread alone that man lives. And those who have stripped off the rags of sin have no refuge, hiding themselves in the clefts of the rocks (Job 24; Heb. 11:38)." Hearing that she cited words Scripture, from Moses and Job, Zosima asked her: "And so you have read the psalms and other books?" She smiled at this and said to the elder: "Believe me, I have not seen a human face ever since I crossed the Jordan, except yours today. I have not seen a beast or a living being ever since I came into the desert. I never learned from books. I have never even heard anyone who sang and read from them. But the word of God which is alive and active, by itself teaches a man knowledge. And so this is the end of my tale. But, as I asked you in the beginning, so even now I implore you for the sake of the Incarnate word of God, to pray to the Lord for me who am such a sinner." Thus concluding her tale she bowed down before him. And with tears the elder exclaimed: "Blessed is God Who creates the great and wondrous, the glorious and marvelous without end. Blessed is God Who has shown me how He rewards those who fear Him. Truly, O Lord, Thou dost not forsake those who seek Thee!" And the woman, not allowing the elder to bow down before her, said: "I beg you, holy father, for the sake of Jesus Christ our God and Savior, tell no one what you have heard, until God delivers me of this earth. And now depart in peace and again next year you shall see me, and I you, if God will preserve us in His great mercy. But for God's sake, do as I ask you. Next year during Lent do not cross the Jordan, as is your custom in the monastery." Zosima was amazed to hear that she knew the rules of the monastery and could only say: "Glory to God Who bestows great gifts on those who love Him." She continued: "Remain, Abba, in the monastery. And even if you wish to depart, you will not be to do so. And at sunset of the holy day of the Last super, put some of the life-giving Body and Blood of Christ into a holy vessel worthy to hold such Mysteries for me, and bring it. And wait for me on the banks of the Jordan adjoining the inhabited parts of the land, so that I can come and partake of the life-giving Gifts. For, since the time I communed in the temple of the Forerunner before crossing the Jordan even to this day I have not approached the Holy Mysteries. And I thirst for them with irrepressible love and longing. And therefore I ask and implore you to grant me my wish, bring me the life-giving Mysteries at the very hour when Our Lord made His disciples partake of His Divine Supper. Tell John the Abbot of the monastery where you live. Look to yourself and to your brothers, for there is much that needs correction. Only do not say this now, but when God guides you. Pray for me!" With these words she vanished in the depths of the desert. And Zosima, falling down on his knees and bowing down to the ground on which she had stood, sent up glory and thanks to God. And, after wandering through the desert, he returned to the monastery on the day all the brothers returned. For the whole year he kept silent, not daring to tell anyone of what he had seen. To himself he prayed God to show him again the face that he desired. He tormented himself and worried himself to pieces, imagining to himself how long a year is and wanting, if possible, that the year be shortened into one single day. And when at length the first Sunday of the Great Fast came, all went out into the desert with the customary prayers and the singing of psalms. Only Zosima was held back by illness -- he lay in a fever. And then he remembered what the saint had said to him: "and even if you wish to depart, you will not be able to do so." Many days passed and at last recovering from his illness he remained in the monastery. And when attain the monks returned and the day of the Last Supper dawned, he did as he had been ordered. and placing some of the most pure Body and Blood into a small chalice and putting some figs and dates and lentils soaked in water into a small basket, he departed for the desert and reached the banks of the Jordan and sat down to wait for the saint. He waited for a long while and then began to doubt. Then raising his eyes to heaven, he began to pray: "Grant me O Lord, to behold that which Thou hast allowed be to behold once. Do not let me depart in vain, being the burden of my sins." And then another thought struck him: "And what if she does come? There is no boat; how will she cross the Jordan to come to me who am so unworthy?" And as he was pondering thus he saw the holy woman appear and stand on the other side of the river. Zosima got up rejoicing and glorifying and thanking God. And again the thought came to him that she could not cross the Jordan. Then he saw that she made the sign of the Cross over the waters of the Jordan (and the night was a moonlight one, as he related afterwards) and then she at once stepped on to the waters and began walking across the surface towards him. And when he wanted to prostrate himself, she cried to him while still walking on the water: "What are you doing, Abba, you are a priest and carrying the divine Gifts!" He obeyed her and on reaching the shore she said to the elder: "Bless, father, bless me!" He answered her trembling, for a state of confusion had overcome him at the sight of the miracle: "Truly God did not lie when He promised that when we purify ourselves we shall be like Him. Glory to Thee, Christ our God, Who has shown me through this thy slave how far away I stand from perfection." Here the woman asked him to say the Creed and our Father. He began, she finished the prayer and according to the custom of that time gave him the kiss of peace on the lips. Having partaken of the Holy Mysteries, she raised her hands to heaven and sighed with tears in her eyes, exclaiming: "Now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace, O Lord, according to Thy word; for my eyes have seen Thy salvation." Then she said to the elder: "Forgive me, Abba, for asking you, but fulfill another wish of mine. Go now to the monastery and let God's grace guard you, and next year come again to the same place where I first met you. Come for God's sake, for you shall again see me, for such is the will of God." He said to her: "From this day on I would like to follow you and always see your holy face. But now fulfill the one and only wish of an old man and take a little of the food I have brought for you." And he showed her the basket, while she just touched the lentils with the tips of her fingers, and taking three grains said that the Holy Spirit guards the substance of the soul unpolluted. Then she said: "Pray, for God's sake pray for me and remember a miserable wretch." Touching the saint's feet and asking for her prayers for the Church, the kingdom and himself, he let her depart with tears, while he went off sighing and sorrowful, for he could not hope to vanquish the invincible. Meanwhile she again made the sign of the Cross over the Jordan, and stepped on to the waters and crossed over as before. And the elder returned filled with joy and terror, accusing himself of not having asked the saint her name. But he decided to do so next year. And when another year had passed, he again went into the desert. He reached the same spot but could see no sign of anyone. So raising his eyes to heaven as before, he prayed: "Show me, O Lord, Thy pure treasure, which Thou hast concealed in the desert. Show me, I pray Thee, the angel in the flesh, of which the world is not worthy." Then on the opposite bank of the river, her face turned towards the rising sun, he saw the saint lying dead. Her hands were crossed according to custom and her face was turned to the East. Running up he shed tears over the saint's feet and kissed them, not daring to touch anything else. For a long time he wept. Then reciting the appointed psalms, he said the burial prayers and thought to himself: "Must I bury the body of a saint? Or will this be contrary to her wishes?" And then he saw words traced on the ground by her head: "Abba Zosima, bury on this spot the body of humble Mary. Return to dust that which is dust and pray to the Lord for me, who departed in the month of Fermoutin of Egypt, called April by the Romans, on the first day, on the very night of our Lord's Passion, after having partaken of the Divine Mysteries." Reading this the elder was glad to know the saint's name. He understood too that as soon as she had partaken of the Divine Mysteries on the shore of the Jordan she was at once transported to the place where she died. The distance which Zosima had taken twenty days to cover, Mary had evidently traversed in an hour and had at once surrendered her soul to God. Then Zosima thought: "It is time to do as she wished. But how am I to dig a grave with nothing in my hands?" And then he saw nearby a small piece of wood left by some traveller in the desert. Picking it up he began to dig the ground. But the earth was hard and dry and did not yield to the efforts of the elder. He grew tired and covered with sweat. He sighed from the depths of his soul and lifting up his eyes he saw a big lion standing close to the saint's body and licking her feet. At the sight of the lion he trembled with fear, especially when he called to mind Mary's words that she had never seen wild beasts in the desert. But guarding himself with the sign of the cross, the thought came to him that the power of the one lying there would protect him and keep him unharmed. Meanwhile the lion drew nearer to him, expressing affection by every movement. Zosima said to the lion: "The Great One ordered that her body was to be buried. But I am old and have not the strength to dig the grave (for I have no spade and it would take too long to go and get one), so can you carry out the work with your claws? Then we can commit to the earth the mortal temple of the saint." While he was still speaking the lion with his front paws began to dig a hole deep enough to bury the body. Again the elder washed the feet of the saint with his tears and calling on her to pray for all, covered the body with earth in the presence of the lion. It was as it had been, naked and uncovered by anything but the tattered cloak which had been given to her by Zosima and with which Mary, turning away, had managed to cover part of her body. Then both departed. The lion went off into the depth of the desert like a lamb, while Zosima returned to the monastery glorifying and blessing Christ our Lord. And on reaching the monastery he told all the brothers about everything, and all marveled on hearing of God's miracles. And with fear and love they kept the memory of the saint. Abbot John, as St. Mary had previously told Abba Zosima, found a number of things wrong in the monastery and got rid of them with God's help. And Saint Zosima died in the same monastery, almost attaining the age of a hundred, and passed to eternal life. The monks kept this story without writing it down and passed it on by word of mouth to one another. But I (adds Sophronius) as soon as I heard it, wrote it down. Perhaps someone else, better informed, has already written the life of the Saint, but as far as I could, I have recorded everything, putting truth above all else. May God Who works amazing miracles and generously bestows gifts on those who turn to Him with faith, reward those who seek light for themselves in this story, who hear, read and are zealous to write it, and may He grant them the lot of blessed Mary together with all who at different times have pleased God by their pious thoughts and labors. And let us also give glory to God, the eternal King, that He may grant us too His mercy in the day of judgment for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord, to Whom belongs all glory, honor, dominion and adoration with the Eternal Father and the Most Holy and Life-giving Spirit, now and always, and through all ages. Amen. The End and Glory Be to God http://www.stmaryofegypt.org/life.aspx

The Prayer of the Optina Elders

2011-04-04T13:28:00.000-04:00

O Lord, grant that I may meet all that this coming day brings to me with spiritual tranquility. Grant that I may fully surrender myself to Thy holy Will. At every hour of this day, direct and support me in all things. Whatsoever news may reach me in the course of the day, teach me to accept it with a calm soul and the firm conviction that all is subject to Thy holy Will. Direct my thoughts and feelings in all my words and actions. In all unexpected occurrences, do not let me forget that all is sent down from Thee. Grant that I may deal straightforwardly and wisely with every member of my family, neither embarrassing nor saddening anyone. O Lord, grant me the strength to endure the fatigue of the coming day and all the events that take place during it. Direct my will and teach me to pray, to believe, to hope, to be patient, to forgive, and to love. Amen.

On Cofession

2011-04-02T19:52:00.000-04:00

“Learning to know spirituality helps us to realize the relativity of time. The path to eternity “where there will be no more time” begins in spirituality. In the experience of spirituality the partitions and walls that separate our present from our past will be taken down. Spirituality reunites us. We are reunited with our departed loved ones and our life with them, with our childhood and with treasures long lost.“Then something else, something new becomes possible, changing one’s past, changing one’s own past self, as if one were washing away the dirty traces of our falls and betrayals. We are told “All is possible to those who believe”. I remember how Father Seraphim Batiugov used to say, “A time will come, in your inner life, when you will begin to heal your past.””Fudel, Sergei. Light in the Darkness. Crestwood New York: St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1989., pp. 45-46I’ve been asked by a few people to post my sermon (on Confession) from last Sunday (March 20, 2011). Since I don’t write them out, I will try my best. I took Sergei Fudel’s interesting concept of the relativity of time in relationship to repentance and applied it directly to the great healing sacrament of Confession.We have a lot of hokey psycho-babble out today that talks about inner healing and healing the past, so it is always risky to use this kind of language. Moreover, what we find in the “new-age-y” world of therapy—even when it speaks of healing the past—never addresses the issue of repentance. The world of modern therapy wants to provide healing without having a true diagnosis of the disease. Thus, it is usually only partially successful, at best.Orthodoxy addresses suffering through the lens of sin. Pain, suffering, death itself has come into the world because of the warping effects of sin—that primal alienation from God that leaves all things twisted from their original intent. Healing can only come once that reality is acknowledged. Indeed, the healing of the universe, accomplished only in Jesus Christ, has been made possible because “one man died for all” that all might live in Him, (see 2 Corinthians 5:14ff). This faith in the healing power of Christ’s death and resurrection—His triumph over the power of sin and death can only be meaningful if it is acknowledged and personalized in our own lives. This is where confession comes in.We are often tempted to see confession as a mere enumeration of offenses. We approach the mystery of forgiveness with a laundry list! This, all too common, attitude breeds a sense of dread in us—not about the overall corrosive power of sin in our lives, but about the details and particulars of individual acts. We fail to see the forest not only for the trees, but for the individual leaves! And in so doing, the power of confession to heal us gets lost in the minutiae of the details. We need to take a new approach.When one goes to the doctor for a potentially life threatening disease, it is important to trace out the development of symptoms, yet no one would ever expect us to recall the exact moment we first noticed them according to the clock. Nor would the extreme details about what the first boil, or sore, or swelling, or pain looked and felt like be necessary. In fact, such detail might well get in the way of a good diagnosis. There is such a thing as too much information!In diagnosing a disease, knowledge of the symptoms is vital, but, in the end the most important thing is the treatment. This always involves the cooperation of the patient. If we refuse to take the medicine, or show up for the treatment, we will only get sicker. The analogy to illness and healing of the body with illness and healing of the spirit is virtually complete.When we come to the priest for confession, we first have to remember that it is not he who heals us, but God. The priest merely prescribes the medicine, which is almost always prayer, faithful attendance at Church Services, receiving Holy Communion, and rigorous self-reflection. Sin, as a disease, has many symptoms, but it always leads in the same direction—toward spiritual alienation and, if untreated, spiritual death. Describing the list of details about what we have done is far less important than identifying the underlying illness. For instance, most people shudder at the idea of confessing sexual misdeeds. Covering them up with outright denial, of course, would be ludicrous and only make things worse. But, there is no need to describe in detail the acts committed. It is enough to say that one has succumbed to lust in most cases, or, to admit to having looked at images that provoked lustful thoughts and actions. The precise details of what one saw or did are not necessary. The symptom has been revealed, but the actual illness may be quite different from what we first imagine. Lust, like most other appetites (gluttony, for example), often emerges from misplaced passion—from a form of idolatry! Our focus turns from the real source of life and joy (the Kingdom of God, which fills everything, if only we have eyes to perceive it in our midst) toward things which cannot fulfill us. Lust, gluttony, and other forms of greed arise when we attempt to fill ourselves with something other than Christ. They are the moth eaten “treasures of this world” that pass away, but leave their ugly marks on us in the meantime. When we confess them, we are acknowledging particular ways in which our lives have gone awry, but the solution, the prescription we are given for healing, will always be practical. We will be asked to replace those idols with what is true and lasting and we will be given specific methods to help us—prayer, fasting, faithful attendance at Church, receiving Holy Communion, and, of course, the avoidance of the things that tempt us. We will be told that in so doing we will not only be freed from their power in the present, but mysteriously freed from their power over our past. How can this be?The past, like the present, is a matter of perception. While there are real, concrete, events that mark specific moments in history (our own personal history along with the broader scope of history), it is the interpretation of those events that is always problematic. First, we often get the “facts” themselves wrong. (Think about how often we have had a fight with our spouse or a friend over the plain details of “what happened”). Then, there is the meaning or motivation behind events. This is far more difficult to get at than the events themselves. One of the symptoms of sin, however, is the “blame game”. Whether or not we have the “facts” right, we blame someone else or some extraneous condition to justify our wrongdoing (or failure to do what is right) and re-interpret the situation to remove the fault from us. Using medical analogies again, this is misreporting the symptom, and it is very dangerous. It is only when we recall our own fault in the matter at hand that the consequences can be clearly examined and healed. Once again, we need to understand our own role, the disposition of our own heart, in any occasion for sin and not the role of others. We must reach the point where we understand that, though there may be “reasons” for what we did (or failed to do), they are not excuses. We must come to the place where we no longer want to hide behind excuses. We must simply want to be made well and are willing to take the spiritual medicine necessary to accomplish this.Here we are speaking of the human heart; the place where all sin and all healing begin. The true medicine of repentance and confession must be effective here, in the heart, if it is to effect a change in our lives. Once we have described the symptoms of our spiritual illness (our sins—in word, deed, thought, “things done and left undone”) we can come to understand their causes and in understanding them, begin to change them.Why did I do such and such, say such and such, think such and such,(or fail to do such and such)? What was the disposition of my heart in all this? Was I filled with lust, greed, gluttony, pride, envy, etc.? Why was I like this? What can be done to avoid this in the future?It is at this point where the past can actually be changed. When we understand who we were and why we were the way we were in our sinning, we can mysteriously change and transform—not just now, but then. This is a mystery that surpasses our normal, worldly, understanding. It is a mystery that allows us to delve into the seemingly immutable past and, by the power of Christ’s death and resurrection, to be healed. The trajectory of sin and alienation that began “then” is disrupted, undone, washed away, healed. But all this requires very hard word and very strict honesty. And it is only very rarely accomplished all at once.The healing process generally takes time and great effort. Just as one would not normally expect one chemotherapy session, or one radiation treatment to cure a cancer, one cannot expect one confession to cure a condition of habitual sin (the repeated behaviors, states of mind, etc.) that we find most troubling. The rare singular action that requires confession and is never repeated is just that—rare! Most of us suffer from repeated patterns of behavior, thought, words, etc., which will need to be repented of and confessed over and over, until they grow weaker and weaker and ultimately fade away. In Great Lent we hear the story of St. Mary of Egypt, who struggled day and night for almost twenty years with her overwhelming passions—and this was in the desert, far away from any chance of fulfilling them! Likewise, we will continue to struggle with ours in whatever “desert” we have to inhabit to overcome them.Why is this? It usually takes a while to get sick, and it takes a while to get well. After repenting and confessing we may feel marvelously free from the power of the sins that trouble us, but then we fall back—as if pulled by some terrible gravity toward the very thing we are seeking to escape. It is only when we come to anticipate this that we can also come up with a plan to resist. And this anticipation, itself, is a sign of healing. Once we become vigilant in recognizing the signs of our spiritual illness returning, we can be quick to seek help—through prayer, confession, and the conscious reception of Holy Communion (the medicine of Eternal Life).Can you see a pattern here, one which unites past, present, and future?Vigilance in the present reduces the power of sin in the future and is based on an honest understanding of our past. Once we get this, real healing is possible. Of course, we cannot do it alone. One of the greatest of all sins is pride—the idea that we can somehow make ourselves well without any external help. The hyper-individualism of our culture contributes mightily to this. We expect that once we learn a “skill” we ought to be able to use it without further instruction or improvement. The fact is that in the so-called, “real world”, as well as in the truly real world of the spirit, this attitude is just plain stupid. In the spiritual life it is exceedingly dangerous and opens us to all sorts of trouble. Any real skill is only honed with practice and constant striving to improve. Almost always it requires some kind of coaching and instruction. The very best know that they can get better and are constantly looking for guides who can help them. We must do likewise if we intend to improve our spiritual lives—which are directly concerned not with skills pertaining only to the here and now, but to eternity.The Church, through the grace of God in Christ, gives us confession as the means of expressing our repentance, of acknowledging the symptoms of spiritual sickness and for moving on toward real healing—of the past, the present, and the future. We are given guides in our spiritual literature, the gospels first and foremost along with the rest of Holy Scripture. Our priests are trained to give spiritual guidance in confession, and sometimes are given a deeper grace of wisdom to help even further. While a true spiritual “father” or “director” is relatively rare (and these can include women, too, often elder nuns in well-established communities), even our regular parish priests may act as “doctors” of souls and can provide the medicine of spiritual healing. If this is truly there for our taking, why would we not avail ourselves of such a great gift?

Christian Holiness: Moving From Anger and Fear to Love

2011-04-02T19:50:00.000-04:00

"Christian holiness is love; lack of love is lack of holiness. The nature of love is unfathomable, because it is divine; but we do know one thing, if there is pride there is no love. Love is a humble disregard for oneself, a giving up of oneself for others, for God, and for God's children."Sin, on the other hand is "remembering oneself" and forgetting others. It is self-satisfaction, sometimes coarsely sensual, sometimes spiritually refined. Therefore all sins are, in a greater or lesser degree, a renunciation of love, a greater or lesser pride and conceit" (Sergei Fudel, Light in the Darkness, pp. 64-65)I am always amazed when I look at anger in myself; it is almost always the result of some kind of struggle for power—whether it is being angry at another driver for “cutting me off” or at another person for “being defiant”. Both emerge from a terrible pride of place—an assumption of superiority and precedence, whether of position or authority. Anger almost always has its roots in pride.Of course, I am referring to the anger that emerges out of one’s ego. There is such a thing as holy, or, righteous anger which exists on behalf of someone wronged, but that is a very dangerous place to go. We often pretend that our anger at someone or some situation is the result of a wrong being done that needs being fixed when in reality we are only asserting ourselves (“remembering oneself”, as Sergei Fudel puts it).Whenever there is a struggle for power we can be sure that evil is present, the more so when it is portrayed as a struggle for righteousness. Power struggles and the anger that accompanies them are always based in fear. We are afraid of what will become of us if we back off and let go. We fear that we will be “walked on” and suffer disrespect from our enemies (though, out of pretence, we may not be honest enough to refer to our antagonists as enemies). True righteousness, grounded in true love, is never concerned with power, per se, and it is never concerned with “self”. True righteousness, grounded in love, is fearless and, therefore, it is selfless. To be “angry and sin not” (Ephesians 4:26) is to remember that we “belong to one another” (Ephesians 4:25) and that without one another we are empty.Power struggles exist in the world because of the malice and pride of the evil one reflected in ourselves. Power struggles in the Church are never “of the Church” and never “of God”; they are always satanic and everyone who participates in them is participating in the devil—not Christ. This is true on the parish level and on the grander level of the dioceses and national churches. We must remember that such things are never “of the Church” even though they may take place within the “Church enclosure” (again, a very clear image from the writings of Fudel). Insofar as we partake of them, we abandon communion with Christ; insofar as we repent of them and reconcile with one another, we partake of Christ and are restored to love. It really is that simple.

Cheap Grace vs Spiritual Struggle: The Cross in Orthodox Life

2010-03-11T13:45:00.002-05:00

Imagine, for a moment, that you are a young man or woman just out of college or grad school. You've composed a wonderful resume and have gone through a slough of interviews and, now, you've just been hired by a prestigious company. It looks as if you will have the career you've always dreamed of.

Now, imagine you arrive for your first day of work only to met by the boss who says, "Why are you here? We hired you didn't we? Go home and wait for your paycheck!"

There is something wrong with this story, don't you think?

In real life, when someone is hired by a prestigious company, it is usually with the understanding that he or she will start at an entry level position and will have to work very hard to prove that he or she is capable and worthy of the position. Only then can there be any hope or expectation of a promotion.

So, why is it that some people believe that once they have "accepted Christ" and confessed the saving power of His cross they no longer have any real work to do?

Such thinking is contrary to nature and unfounded in the Scriptures! Being a Christian--certainly being an Orthodox Christian means knowing that once we are united with Christ and have accepted Him as our Savior the real work begins. It is not enough to be "hired" (brought into the Church), we have to "prove" our worthiness through our actions. And to act rightly we have to acquire the necessary skills--learned through fasting, prayer, almsgiving, and constant repentance. The grace of God is freely given, but it isn't cheaply maintained!

When we contemplate the Cross of Christ, we are reminded that the salvation of the universe, and our own personal salvation, was purchased at a price--the price of the innocent blood of Christ, who carried the weight of the universe, from the beginning of time until the end of the ages, on His shoulders. We, who would be His disciples, are told explicitly that we must take up our own cross and follow Him.

Yes, He will bear the weight of our cross, too. He will help us when we stumble and fall, but He will still demand that we put in the effort. We cannot simply expect to "collect" without working!
Again, this is grounded explicitly in the Scriptures---in the words of Jesus Himself!

In the end, who would want cheap grace? Who wants anything that is cheap and easily attained? We value and revere those things that are won through hard work and the labor of love. The Cross teaches us the price of love and the work set before anyone who would call himself a Christian.

Fasting and Giving Thanks

2009-11-12T10:22:00.003-05:00

As we prepare for the great American feast of Thanksgiving—and the mania of the “holiday season” let’s think about what we are truly grateful for and Who it is we await as we prepare for the Nativity of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

First, Orthodox Christians prepare for the Feast of the Nativity by fasting for 40 days in anticipation. So, beginning November 15, we are called to withdraw from all those good and tasty foods being placed in front of us by a world that has the whole season backwards (and has basically forgotten what is really being celebrated in the first place). In practice, many Orthodox do not fast over the Thanksgiving holiday. Some do not begin fasting until after it has passed. And in some traditions the fast is not strictly kept until the last couple of weeks (beginning after St. Spyridon’s day---December 12—among some of the Greeks).

The truth is, the Advent Fast can be exceedingly difficult to keep in terms of food. Unlike the Great Fast in Lent, there is a competing general festival within the larger culture. Does this mean that we are given a dispensation from fasting? Absolutely not! But we are called to think more deeply about what fasting is truly about. It is NOT primarily about food. This is made very clear in the Scripture readings that lead up to Great Lent. Fasting from certain rich foods is meant to make us conscious of something far more important—our need to be freed from the “earthly cares” and desires that hold us down and keep us form thinking about the what truly matters, the things of eternal life. Every feast of the Lord is about “ultimate things”, about eternity, about salvation and we need to take time to prepare ourselves to accept and enter into the true meaning of the feast. To do so we need to remove ourselves from the distractions of this world. And this is especially hard during the Advent season.

So, what are some techniques we can use to successfully counter the cultural push to celebrate and spend to the point of distraction? Perhaps this is where the great American feast of Thanksgiving can help us out. After all, what we are grateful for tells us something about our relationship with God.

My list runs like this:

Of course, I am profoundly grateful to God for my family—for Prifteresha Luanne and Emily and for my extended family. I’m grateful for meaningful work—first and foremost as a priest of our Holy Orthodox Church, but also for my work as an educator at the school where I work to support my ministry.

But my deepest thanks is to God for giving me this life to live for Him and in Him as an Orthodox Christian believer. For, in the last analysis, everything I have is from God and must be offered back to Him in thanksgiving and praise and everything that is true and meaningful must ultimately have eternal connotations. Certainly, love does—those whom I love bear His image and likeness and have been made for eternity. And my work, if it is at all worthy, is directed toward the wellbeing of others and has an impact on their eternal destiny.

That leaves out some things, too. There are clearly things in my life that I can do away with—things that distract me from eternal life and tie me to this world. It is those things (some of which are edible!) that I can and should put aside in preparation for the Holy feast of Christmas. And if, in my weakness, I am not completely successful, then I must offer them as well to my God in thanksgiving. If there are truly things that are unworthy of a Christian (thoughts, words, deeds), then not only do I need to fast from them, but I must repudiate them as a matter of salvation.

So, fasting and our national feast of Thanksgiving can and must go hand in hand. After all, this is exactly how the church has always made things that are outside the tradition, but are good and worthy, a part of the living tradition and experience of the faithful. So, lets make our Thanksgiving a truly Orthodox one—not concerned with food and drink in and of themselves—but with the praise of God from Whom all good things proceed. And let’s continue throughout the Nativity season, doing our best to fast rightly from foods that we should avoid in the Advent season, but always, no matter what we eat, giving thanks to the One who became One of us for our sakes and for our salvation.

The Utilitarian Road to Hell, or, Auschwitz with a Happy Face: The Value of a Person

2009-07-23T21:04:00.002-04:00

In the New York Sunday Times Magazine this past Sunday (July 19, 2009) there was an article by the famous (or, infamous) ethicist, Peter Singer. Singer is a professor at Princeton University and is well known for his stand on "animal rights". Dr. Singer has stated on numerous occasions that there are times when an animal's rights outweigh those of human beings--for instance in a fire it might be more ethical to save the life of a well trained seeing eye dog and leave a new born infant, retarded adult, or Alzheimer's patient in the inferno to die. The dog, in this case, would have greater "utility" to society than any of the aforementioned human beings.

In his article this past Sunday Singer actually comes off sounding considerably less controversial--at first glance. He does not vent against human "speciesism" and does not mention animals at all. His whole point is to advocate for the rationing of health care (the article is titled, "Why We Must Ration Healthcare". Before I go on to explain why I believe that Singer's rationale is an example of the diabolical nature of utilitarian ethics, I will let him speak for himself. The following quote is taken from the article:

“As a first take, we might say that the good achieved by health care is the number of lives saved. But that is too crude. The death of a teenager is a greater tragedy than the death of an 85-year-old, and this should be reflected in our priorities. We can accommodate that difference by calculating the number of life-years saved, rather than simply the number of lives saved. If a teenager can be expected to live another 70 years, saving her life counts as a gain of 70 life-years, whereas if a person of 85 can be expected to live another 5 years, then saving the 85-year-old will count as a gain of only 5 life-years. That suggests that saving one teenager is equivalent to saving 14 85-year-olds.”

Thus, the value of a human life can be calculated quite precisely in terms of "the value of life years saved". The math makes sense and many people would (are) tempted to accept it as a reasonable basis for making medical decisions.

But, wait, the mathematical value of a human life is not just measured in the number of years lived, it has a quality value, too--which can also be quantitatively measured:

“Health care does more than save lives: it also reduces pain and suffering. How can we compare saving a person’s life with, say, making it possible for someone who was confined to bed to return to an active life? We can elicit people’s values on that too. One common method is to describe medical conditions to people — let’s say being a quadriplegic — and tell them that they can choose between 10 years in that condition or some smaller number of years without it. If most would prefer, say, 10 years as a quadriplegic to 4 years of nondisabled life, but would choose 6 years of nondisabled life over 10 with quadriplegia, but have difficulty deciding between 5 years of nondisabled life or 10 years with quadriplegia, then they are, in effect, assessing life with quadriplegia as half as good as nondisabled life. (These are hypothetical figures, chosen to keep the math simple, and not based on any actual surveys.) If that judgment represents a rough average across the population, we might conclude that restoring to nondisabled life two people who would otherwise be quadriplegics is equivalent in value to saving the life of one person, provided the life expectancies of all involved are similar” (emphasis mine)

Once again, the math makes sense and a lot of people will--perhaps with some discomfort--accept it as a reasonable demonstration of rational rationing of health care. In a few sentences, it seems, Dr. Singer has dismissed two millennia of Christian ethics. He writes off the "infinite value of each human life" as being mere "feel good" rhetoric that has, at best, symbolic value and, at worst, can be "deeply unethical".

To be fair, Singer would be one of the first to admit that the core value of utilitarian ethics--the greatest good for the greatest number with the least amount of suffering--might still cause immense suffering for the few (how ever they are defined). He does not attempt to hide the full impact of his belief system from anyone--himself included. And President Obama, when he suggested that it might be better for an 85 year old in need of surgery to be given pain-killers, seems to have been taking a very similar stand. Of course, we can be sure that such extreme honesty will be tempered in the future with all sorts of qualifications--mostly to pacify the sort of politician who needs to affirm his or her personal value for all human beings while affirming that for budgetary purposes lines have to be drawn to save the tax payer's money. (They are the same politicians who oppose abortion personally, but will vote for appropriations to pay for abortions because they respect a woman's "right" to choose.)

It goes without saying that utilitarian ethics are a great evil from an Orthodox Christian perspective. Our Lord Jesus Christ clearly stated that we will be judged according to how we treat "the least of our brothers and sisters"--not as a class of people, but as unique human persons. On the Day of Judgment we will not be asked questions about "life years" and "quality years"--we will simply be asked how we treated Martha, Kwasi, Timothy, and Maria; in others words, how we treated unique human beings with names and faces.

For Christians, ethics is never about numbers but about people. Human beings can never be reduced to classes and quantities--one would have thought that the monstrous regimes of the twentieth century would have taught us that much. Yes, each and every person is of infinite value which is why every system that attempts to quantify the value of anyone according to his or her age, condition, social status, intelligence, or "utility" (not to mention, race, gender, religion, 'orientation', or anything else) is ultimately profoundly evil.

The sad thing is that this world view is rapidly being eroded even among those who say that they are believers. Decades of indoctrination in the public and private schools of this country, the two faced deceitfulness of our political leaders, and the paradoxical destruction of the value of the person even as we uphold the "rights" of the "individual" has left most Americans very poorly equipped to argue against the rationalizations of men like Peter Singer. And, perhaps the bottom line is few of us really want to when we look at the cost--the price of resistance. For most of us it really is about the money--even if we are too squeamish to say so. That's why Singer's theories will probably win the day and well will continue on our (not so long) march to charnel house.

But...what if we were to just say No? This might all be turned around if one of the biggest voices in our society was to speak up loudly and clearly...and really, just say "NO!"

Stay tuned.

The Utilitarian Road to Hell, or, Auschwitz with a Happy Face: Introduction

2009-07-21T21:09:00.002-04:00

This is the first in what will be a series of meditations from a theological, polemical (defense of the faith against hostile opponents), and political perspective on the proposed new National Health Care system and its philosophical roots in a system of ethics called "utilitarianism".

An 18th century philosopher named Jeremy Benthen stated, “It is the greatest good to the greatest number of people which is the measure of right and wrong.” Others have him stating, "the greatest good to the greatest number with the least amount of suffering". This worldview has essentially become the dominant world view in the United States and Western Europe since the end of World War II (at the latest). And it is a world view that is leading us quickly down the road to a living hell for millions of people (who do not have the good fortune of being in the majority). Why is this? Stay tuned and you'll find out!

The Communion of Saints

2009-06-13T20:56:00.002-04:00

Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. (Hebrews 12:2)

An acquaintance of mine, a Protestant woman, who was well disposed towards Orthodoxy once told me that she had no problem at all with Orthodox theology except in two areas--the veneration of the saints and the kissing of icons. She said that no matter how hard she tried to understand it, it still looked idolatrous to her.

I responded by asking her what she felt when she looked at a picture of her (long deceased) parents.

She asked me, in turn, whether I had misunderstood what she had said. I said, "No, I heard you just fine, but in order to really answer your question I need to know what you feel when you look at a picture of your parents--or for that matter your grandchildren."

"Well, love, I suppose--but what has that got to do with saints and icons?"

"When you look at those pictures do you find yourself thinking about the paper and ink?"

"No, of course not! But what are you trying to say?"

"When you look at those pictures and feel such strong emotions toward the people represented in them it isn't because they are printed on Kodak paper or were taken with a digital camera or whatever. The medium that was used to print them is the last thing in your mind. It is what they re-present that matters. It is the reality behind them that draws your attention and inspires those feelings of love. Well.... that is exactly what icons do for us Orthodox. They remind us of people we love, members of our family who have gone before us but who are still very much with here with us."

"I never thought about it like that before.... That's quite interesting. But still, you pray to those people in your icons!"

"No. We ask them to pray for us. There is a big difference between praying to someone and asking their prayers. We Orthodox pray to God alone, but we freely ask for the prayers of the Mother of God and all the other saints."

"That's not scriptural. You can't expect the dead to hear you....why it's almost pagan!"

"I think Jesus put an end to that when he spoke of in St. Mark's Gospel where He said that God is the God of the living, not the dead."

"But wasn't He speaking of the Resurrection?"

"Yes, but He was also speaking of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob--who had not yet risen from the dead. The point is that the dead are alive in the Lord. And I think that it is safe to say that the veil between this world and the next is much thinner than we sometimes think. At any rate, our relationship with the saints and our kissing of their images in icons is a family relationship--a communion between those of us here on earth and those who have gone ahead of us. The saints we venerate are great examples of Christian virtue and faith, but they were--and are--human just like us. We ask for their prayers in the same way that we ask for prayers from one another in this world and we love them in the same way that we love one another here. It is all very real to us. Those icons are not idols--they represent real people--and the God who became a human being for our salvation."

"Well, I'm not convinced...but it certainly puts things in a different light to think of it that way."

"That great cloud of witnesses that St. Paul writes about in his letter to the Hebrews really are all around us--those are the very words of scripture. So, when we paint them on the walls of our churches and put them on our iconostases and put them up in our homes--all we are doing is confirming what the scripture itself teaches."

"Maybe I'm half convinced--but its hard to forget a lifetime of being taught that icons and statues are idolatrous."

"Just look at those pictures of your parents and grandkids when you get home....you'll understand."

Seeing but not perceiving, hearing but not understanding

2009-06-09T20:04:00.003-04:00

"Therefore they could not believe, because Isaiah said again: "He has blinded their eyes and hardened their hearts, lest they should see with their eyes, lest they should understand with their hearts and turn that I should heal them" (John 12:40)

We just finished studying chapters 40-57 of the prophet Isaiah--by far the most quoted prophet in the New Testament. I have also just finished reading the prophet Ezekiel in my own course of readings and what has struck me in both these prophets is their use of blindness and deafness as a willful spiritual quality of human beings when they are confronted with God's truth. It doesn't matter whether we are speaking of the ancient Israelites, or the Pharisees of Jesus' day or the purportedly Christian leaders of our society today--when confronted with an inconvenient truth that goes against the prevailing cultural prejudices they choose blindness. It isn't that they can't see--they choose not to see.

For instance, our self avowedly Christian president chooses to ignore the massive preponderance of pro-life teaching in both the Old and New Testaments in order to support a woman's right to "choose" to destroy her child before it is born. All the prophets cite one of the most heinous crimes of Israel before it was finally punished with exile into Babylon was the killing of innocent children. Why were these murders committed in Israel? In order to assure the well being of a household, a community, a harvest--in other words for the same reason the murders are being committed today (a woman's future, education, vocation, emotional health, earning power, independence--and also for a man's freedom from responsibility, independence, earning power, and so on). The justification for the immolation of infants in ancient Palestine was psychologically and spiritually exactly the same as it is for the immolation of infants today. But our "Christian" leaders choose to blind themselves to the facts and to deceive themselves into pretending not to understand.

But, like the guilty child slayers of Israel, they cannot really get away with it. They must either admit in the end that they support one of the most unspeakable crimes of all--the wanton destruction of innocent children, or they must altogether abandon the pretence of being Christians. The good news, if one can call it that, is that it is becoming less and less important to pretend to be a Christian in this society and I suspect that politicians will soon feel free to abandon such pretences altogether. So we wont have Presidents and members of Congress who fell obliged to tell us they are Christians while defending the most horrifying of all the crimes an adult can commit. It will be safe to just come right out and say that they understand very well what they are doing and can see very well where it is leading and they don't care one way or another about what Christianity and the Scriptures have to say about it. They will then have attained the refreshing honesty of the communists and national socialists of the last century who were willing to say they were hard hearted s.o.b's and be proud of it.

It is better for the Church to have to contend with sworn enemies than to have to endure the wolves in sheep's clothing who have been tearing apart Christ's flock for the past two generations.

Oh, yes, but when they finally go down--as they most assuredly will--you can bet they will say with all the good national socialists, "we didn't know what was happening....we were deceived...we didn't understand where it would lead...."

In the end, God is a respecter of freedom of choice....all choice....and He will permit the wicked to go to the uttermost extreme of their wickedness in order to manifest His righteousness, mercy, and truth. But no one can say--or at least no free adult in this country can ever say, "we didn't know....we didn't see....we didn't understand what was happening around us."

I would rather that the wicked would repent and be saved and that our civilization would turn itself away from the path we are taking. But if we will not repent then I pray that our leaders will stop pretending. One of the gifts of the current regime is that that day is fast approaching. The convenient mask of Christianity is fast being dropped in the face of a revolutionary attempt to co opt what little remains of an overtly Christian culture. The voices of the false prophets of atheism, abortion, euthanasia, and every perversion will finally attain their place as not only acceptable but true. And no one will have to be ashamed to be blind anymore--until the whirlwind comes.

Sacramental Marriage, Civil Marriage & "Family Values"

2009-05-22T13:34:00.004-04:00

Marriage and family values. They used to be positive and uncontroversial terms. No longer.

The first thing we need to do is establish that what the Church means by marriage is very different from what the state means when it uses that term. Likewise, we need to make it very clear that "family values" is not a euphemism for "anti-gay".

A great deal of the problem we face in the debates of the decades long "cultural war" that has raged in this country is the twisting of words and terms into euphemisms for things that are very different from what they appear to describe. "Pro-choice" has come to mean "Pro-abortion", "liberal/progressive" has come to mean intolerant and anti-traditional, "adult" can often mean pornographic, and "enhanced interrogation" means torture.

Likewise the matter of "marriage"--a term that has been reduced to mean a sexual relationship in which the partners have legal claims to one another's property and persons--inheritance, medical decisions (under certain circumstances), etc. Now, on one level, this is what marriage has always meant--to the State. But it is most definitely NOT what it means to the Church. The problem is that when believers and secularists get into arguments over the issue, they are talking past one another.

For the state, since ancient times, the venerable institution of marriage existed to establish clear lines of inheritance and authority within a family unit. And for centuries this understanding worked relatively well for Orthodox and Roman Catholic Christians whose understanding of marriage was quite different than the State's. The State's limited and concrete concerns and the Church's supernatural and mystical concerns were able to coexist harmoniously within the context of a single term.

The truth is that this coexistence ended a long time ago--long before the advent of "gay marriage".

Since the nineteen sixties, with greatly eased divorce laws in most Western countries, it has become increasingly common for individuals to marry and divorce--sometimes multiple times, or, simply to live in a sexual relationship without even the pretence of "legality". We are speaking about heterosexual relationships here. In many cases the children of two or three (or even more) marriages/relationships might live in the same household with an ever changing kaleidoscope of "mothers" and "fathers". Serial monogamous relationships, with or without legal blessing, have become 'normal' in most American communities--even in purportedly religious parts of the country like the "Bible Belt" of the deep south.

Any complementarity between the State's idea of marriage and the Church's has long since eroded away. The debate over "gay marriage" and the soon to come debate over "plural marriage" (don't believe me--just wait!) is merely the natural result of a deeper crisis that extends back at least a half century.

The best thing the Church could do at this point is to separate itself entirely from the State when it comes to discussing the various forms of civil unions that the states recognize and concentrate on coming up with a clearer explanation of sacramental marriage, which will at the same time clarify our position on the meaning of gender and family structures. To state that we have our work cut out for us is to put it mildly!

The first thing we need to do is to literally divorce ourselves from the State! By this I mean that Orthodox clergy ought to petition their bishops to be advocate a complete separation of the sacramental/mystical marriage that is performed in the Church from the civil union that is performed by the State. Our clergy should not operated as agents of the state! As is common in Europe, let those who wish to "marry" according to the state's notion of the term do so at a local courthouse or town hall. If they wish to enjoy the blessing of the Church, then let them make arrangements with their priests to have a sacramental union. If we were to do this we would move in the right direction of letting the public know that what we mean by marriage and what the State means by marriage are not one and the same. But, if most people continue to get married in Churches by pastors who are also acting as State agents by signing marriage certificates and attesting that State regulations have been lawfully applied, how can we blame anyone for being confused about the difference between the two fundamentally different (an now even opposed) understandings of what is happening? Of course, some religious denominations are in full sync with the State and will be happy to continue to act as its agents. They are not Orthodox.

The next thing we need to do is to educate our own people on the "mystery" of marriage--which is described as an image of the relationship between God and the Church in both the Old and the New Testaments. The "husband" image of the God of Israel in the Old Testament to His (often unfaithful) wife is made even more explicit in the New Testament where the enfleshed God in Christ is seen as the Bridegroom of the Church (Ephesians 5). Understand that human marriage and human sexuality are images of a deeper divine mystery. One of the great crises of our times for the Church is to explain that gender has MEANING and that this meaning is rooted in Divine self revelation. Part of the problem is that the Church has never had to clearly explicate this understanding because it was not under attack. Now it is and, as we had to deal with issues of the divine/human natures in Christ and the Threefold Oneness of God in the past, so now we will have to more clearly explain the mystery of gender today.

Fundamentally, the mystery of marriage in Orthodox Christianity is rooted in the mystery of a paradox--that of otherness and sameness in union. Clearly men and women are equally human (the same), but they are also mysteriously "other". This is not only an obviously physical fact, but a spiritual fact. We are "psycho-somatic" beings--we partake of both matter and spirit--on every level. The current age's attempt to reduce everything to material determinism in one direction and individual choice in the other, aside from being insane, has obscured the mystery of unity and differentiation between creation and the uncreated (God) and among creatures--particularly among human beings. St. Paul speaks of the union of a man and a woman in marriage as a "great mystery" (or, a "great sacrament").

Likewise, the order (taxis) of "headship" in a family--husband/wife; father/mother/children is rooted in the order of the Trinity, where the Father is "first" and "source" while being equal to the Son and the Holy Spirit. This, too, is a "great mystery/sacrament" which is virtually unacknowledged and untaught by most Orthodox pastors when they prepare men and women for marriage. Why? Perhaps because we don't understand it ourselves because we have absorbed the pseudo-scientific theories we were indoctrinated with in the schools and because, like everyone else, we are creatures of the times. The seminaries in this country certainly haven't been up to the task of confronting this issue--perhaps the fundamental pastoral issue of the age.

So, what about "gay marriage", the politics of "gender identity", and "family values"?

Well, the first is simply non-existent within the mystical framework of Christian marriage (like polygamy and other "choices"). We need to stop fighting about it and get out of the business of being State agents. If the State wants to recognize multifold forms of what it calls marriage then we might bemoan the fact that it causes some confusion to untrained ears and get on with the business of distinguishing between Orthodox Christian marriage and state sanctioned civil unions (homosexual, heterosexual, and multiple).

The second (gender identity) is a subject worth and Ecumenical Council! But we need to start challenging the prevailing "science" with some real theology here. Writers like Father Thomas Hopko, former dean of St. Vladimir's seminary have begun to tackle this issue and we can expect more to arise as time goes on.

The third (family values) is intimately tied in with the first two, but the ultimate model for any and all relationships among human beings is that of the Holy Trinity. In no place is this more true than in marriage and the family.

So, in the end, we need to reformulate the debate within the context of our own community of believers and accept the fact that the non-believing (or barely believing) world outside the Church has an entirely different agenda. If we debate the issues on the terms of those outside the community we will always come out looking like fools.

Does this mean that we are to drop out of the public debate? Absolutely not. We simply need to reframe it and be explicit about what we are doing. At this point we are talking about mission and conversion--which is to say, doing the business of the Church. Again, it is a matter of taking charge of the debate using our own terms and norms and conveying this to our own people and to the world at large.

Church & State

2009-05-21T21:16:00.002-04:00

The Orthodox Church has a very long history of engaging the state. In the Byzantine period there was a symphony between the secular power and the Church. In fact, there was no such thing as the "secular" as we understand it today--the entire society was "religious"--but there was a definite balance between the political power of the state and the spiritual power of the Church. This symphony continued into the Russian imperial period until the Church was forcibly submitted to secular power under Peter I ("the Great"). After this the spiritual power of the Church was increasingly marginalized. The situation became infinitely worse after the Communist Revolution.

Now, no one in the 21st century United States would ever imagine a "symphony" between the secular political power and the Orthodox Church. We are virtually invisible to the government (and, unfortunately to the majority of the citizenry). Yet, we have the unique freedom to address the state in open and uncensored criticism. In a real sense, it is our duty to do so.

Does this mean that we are always a voice in opposition? No, not always. But I submit that most of the time we will be. And this is the way it should be. Even in the so called "Golden Age" of the Orthodox polity--in Byzantium and Pre-Petrine Russia--the Church was most often a voice "calling in the wilderness". What was it calling the state/society to do? To repent, of course!

The Church always has a political message--but it is not one "of this world". The Kingdom we proclaim is the Kingdom of God, not of any human being or any political party, per se.

That being said, given the position taken by various political parties and leaders, it can be fairly admitted that some parties and leaders are more closely aligned with Orthodox values (family, sanctity of life, etc.) than others. But NO political party or leader represents the Church in its entirety.

In this country, in recent decades, the Republican Party has stood for moral values that are more closely aligned with the Church's values in the areas of sanctity of life and family. That could change in a moment, so it could never be said that the Republican Party is the Church's party. On the other hand, the Democrat Party could one day return its roots as the supporter of the weak and upholder of the common people (weak as in infants and pre-born babies, common people as in the family men and women who make up the back bone of any healthy society). One never knows.

In the meantime, the last thing we can afford to do is to retreat into a "safe" corner and refrain from political engagement. Whenever the Church has become disengaged from politics, either due to laziness or by force, the result has been disaster both for society and for believers.

A Disengaged Church?

2009-05-21T18:19:00.002-04:00

Sensible Joe has published a response to my latest political 'rant'. While his lesson on state versus federal constitutional law is correct, it misses the point. We are facing a sudden tidal wave of state and federal legislation and juridical decisions that are very much in sync with the new regime.

Can President Obama be personally blamed? Of course not! No matter how ubiquitous his presence and opinions he can't be blamed or praised for everything that happens. But he, like George Bush before him, is both a symbol and symptom of the times.

As for withdrawing into the "acceptable" Church corner of social welfare, I think not! The Church is called to be present in both the social and political spheres. After all, Jesus was.

Thanks for writing, Joe. I've been away from the blog for awhile and neglected to publish your response.

Dissenting opinions are always welcome!

"Put not your trust in princes, the sons of men"

2009-05-01T18:09:00.002-04:00

We have been bombarded lately with the liberal press's "100 days" propaganda, "celebrating" the first 100 days of our "historic" president. It all feels very un-American and the president's own press conference on the occasion was just another reminder that the "campaign" to convert America continues.

What are we celebrating and to what do we need to be converted?

Well, over the last one hundred days the harvesting of human beings for body parts has been once again made legal (fetal stem cell research), several states have legalized 'gay-marriage', euthanasia has been legalized in Washington state, incredibly vast sums of money has been poured into the "Economic Stimulus Bill"--while the regime still pretends that there will be no middle class tax increases, and the list continues.

Oh yes, and there is the swine flu scare--which no one can blame on the President, though one suspects that a lot of his groupies expect that he can fix it, too.

The good news is that men like Arlan Spector (and we can hope women like Olympia Snowe) are removing themselves from the Republican Party and becoming the Democrats they really are. Those are exactly the kind of "converts" that we on the right can rejoice to see join the fold of the Party of "Choice" and Profligate Spending.

The liberal/socialists are making quite a bit of hay over what they see as angst in the Republican Party over its sudden demise. Perhaps they have never read the Mark Twain's response to his own obituary--"The reports of my demise have been greatly exaggerated". Ditto. We are not dead, yet--far from it. It is only a matter of time before the 52% (not 82% as the left seems to think) who voted for "change" wake up to what that really translates into--death and taxes, and a lot of both.

Oh well, that's just my opinion.

THE "REAL WORLD" AND THE RESURRECTION

2009-04-18T11:38:00.004-04:00

Sometimes in the Church we hear talk of the "real world"--meaning the world outside the Church, I suppose. This is a most unfortunate term because it gives a false impression of the Church's teachings about reality--the one we live in currently and the one that will be ours for all eternity.If the "real world" is all about what people do when they are not in church then what is done in church is by definition, "unreal", and thus, unimportant. At best it is a feel good game that may be alright for me but utterly unimportant for someone else. This is, basically, the attitude of most people in the Euro-American "West" today--including many who call themselves devout Christians. It is, for believers, an absolutely disastrous mentality.

Why?

The answer is painfully obvious. It puts the life in Christ on the same level as soccer, yoga, going out to dinner, or having a drink with friends. It is a trite and banal attitude about the meaning of existence—one fit for a consumer society, and you can’t get more banal than that!

The “real world” for the Orthodox believer is, first and foremost, the life we live in Christ which is most clearly and beautifully portrayed in the life we experience in the Church. All of the events we have participated in during the services of this Great and Holy Week, and especially of the events we shall enter into in the Resurrection liturgy tonight, have brought us in touch with “REALITY” as it is on the deepest level.

This is not a matter of opinion—fine for me, but maybe not for someone else; it is a matter of FACT. Otherwise, it is of no matter—no consequence—at all. We have not, over the course of Holy Week, merely joined in playing our parts in a well beloved play, or watched a sentimental seasonal movie in order to get an emotional “high”. Rather, we have entered into reality—true reality, which is as far removed from the pseudo-real world of individualism and consumerism as heaven is from hell. In fact, the events of this week have made it clear to us that the so called ‘real world’ out there is very much hell bent. It is in love with promises that can never be fulfilled—whether those of politicians or, of the merchants of things or, the purveyors of “spirituality” without God. The politicians promise us a brighter future, if only we follow their plan, the salesmen promise us joy through accumulating their ‘stuff’, and the purveyors of “spirituality” promise us cheap salvation without effort. In short, they all promise unreality in the guise of what is real, they promise paradise and deliver an insatiable hell of striving without ever achieving.

The experience of Holy Week and Pascha shows us another way—one that does not make saccharine promises of easy accomplishment and self satisfaction. The Way of the Cross—which anyone who wishes to experience the Resurrection must follow—is a way of sorrow in terms of the pseudo ‘real’ world, but it is ultimately the way to true joy. By following in this way we find that, ultimately, this is the world of ghosts and vapors, constantly dissolving into nothingness, while the really ‘real’ world that is coming is solid and clear and beautiful. It is the Risen Christ who passes through walls and locked doors as if they were so much fog; it is the resurrected world that we Christians long for, a world purchased through earthly struggle and grief but, once won, imperishable and eternal.

Does this mean that we can have no experience of real joy in this world—that it is only about dragging along our cross without any remission from our grief? Of course, not! Through the cross, we are taught, joy comes into the world—this world! So, no, it is not all about tears and sorrow. Holy Friday turns into Pascha; the fast into feasting, tears into laughter. It is because we know that we have become inheritors of a Kingdom that is real in a way that nothing in the creation we now experience can ever be real that we can rejoice. The grief of life in this world, the insatiable urges of our mortal nature, are swallowed up in a joy that cannot die. We can embrace the Lord’s Pascha for the gift it is—not the promise of a politician, as salesman, or a cheap guru—but one that transcends, even as it embraces, the pain of the loss of health, strength, loved ones, and life itself. The unfading light of the Resurrection shines into this ghostly and transient world and promises that someday we shall, indeed, become real and solid and that the very flesh we bear—so fragile and ephemeral—will itself become solid and eternally beautiful in a way we can’t even comprehend until the Day itself dawns on us.

Do not ever speak of the “world” outside the Church as if it were the real thing. It should be our greatest heartbreak that so much of our time is spent under the power of its illusions and delusions. It is the chimera of that world we need to leave behind in order to receive the gift that never ages—the gift of Pascha, the Unending Dawn of the Real World that is even now upon us if we have but “eyes to see”.

The End of the World

2009-04-11T21:11:00.003-04:00

As we enter into Great and Holy Week the Orthodox Church considers the "Last Things". In the Western Churches, and in the Orthodox Western Rite, this is the theme of Advent--the Pre-Christmas Season. But, in the East, it has always been the theme of Holy Week.

What will the end of the world look like?

The Church spends very little time discussing the images of an apocalypse--mostly because those images are very much secondary to the real theme of the end--that of Judgment. In a sense, it can be said that we have been living in the "Last Days" since the awesome events of our Lord's crucifixion and resurrection--when the "sun hid its rays" and the moon and stars cloaked themselves in darkness (to use the images found in the Church's hymns and iconography for Great and Holy Friday). Since then the world has merely been on pause between the Lord's first coming and His final return. History, at least from a Divine perspective, has ended. Everything has been accomplished (as the Lord said from the cross).

Seen in this light, it makes no sense to try and read the spiritual equivalent of tea leaves in order to discern how close we are to the final moments. In fact, each and everyone of us is only a few years at most from the Judgment Day. We shall all face our Judge when we draw our last breath. The images of the Bridegroom services which are celebrated at the beginning of Holy Week are a constant reminder of this. We are called to be prepared so as not to be "shut out from the Kingdom".

So, in the end it really doesn't matter whether the stars fall from the sky above us or if an atomic war breaks out or armies meet on the plain of Megiddo. Whether we go in the company of billions or by ourselves, quietly or in the midst of the tumult of war, we all face the Judge of the World and will be held accountable for ourselves.

How odd it seems, from an Orthodox Christian perspective, that so many books are written trying to discern when the end will come. How silly to work oneself up over the predictions of the Mayan calendar or some other such thing! The Lord has already spoken--two thousand years ago--that "NOW is this world judged" and everyone it it, each and every moment of our lives.

If that doesn't compel us to acquire a healthy and holy fear, then all of the books and prophecies in the world are useless.

The message of the coming week is clear: Be prepared, repent, and know that the Judge is already at the door. "Blessed is the one He finds awake and ready" when He comes.

Newsweek's Semi-Annual Anti-Christian Cover Story

2009-04-08T14:40:00.002-04:00

We ought to be used to it by now--the Christmas and Easter editions of "Time", "Newsweek", and the rest of the liberal ilk. We can generally expect an article about why the Jesus we proclaim as the Son of the Living God (because He did so first) was instead just a new age guru who arranged his own execution through Judas (the only disciple who truly understood him), or a misunderstood Rabbi who would have been appalled at the very idea of "Christianity", or who faked his crucifixion and married Mary Magdalene(or, his "beloved disciple", John!). and ran off to Paris.

We ought to be used to it, but it still gets under my skin. Perhaps it is just because the editors of those magazines don't have the guts to insult other major religions on such a regular basis (perhaps out of a well founded fear of the world-wide reaction if they did so).

This year Newsweek has proclaimed, through the voice of a self described "devout, though deeply flawed" Episcopalian on their staff, that the final decline and fall of Christian America is well under way. They even have the data to prove it! That's not to say that there aren't a few interesting points in the article-- its just that most of it is silly opinion under the guise of actual news reporting (or, worse yet, research!).

Americans have always been notoriously strong on religious (now called 'spiritual') feelings and short on theological reflection. The old Church as Social Club has been replaced by Sports as Social Club, etc.

Newsweek's obituary for American Christianity is vastly overdone. It might be more interesting and instructive to the reader if they would come out with articles about the thriving religious communities in this country, Christian and otherwise, at the various holy seasons of the year and allow the people in them to express the hope and joy they experience as part of them.

But that would mean an end to editorializing by ignorant (and pretty much uninterested) reporters for the sake of the actual story. Not likely in today's left wing press.

O, Lord and Master of my life....

2009-03-27T10:58:00.012-04:00

" O, Lord and Master of my life! Do not give me a spirit of sloth, despair, lust of power and idle talk. But give, rather, a spirit of chastity, humility, patience, and love to Your servant. Yes, O Lord and King, grant me to see my own transgressions and not to judge my brother, for You are holy to the ages of ages. Amen"

The Prayer of St. Ephrem is, perhaps, the quintessential Lenten prayer. When you think of it, it should be the quintessential prayer for each and every day of our life. For, in just a few sentences, it expresses the heart of what it means to be a Christian.

"O, Lord and Master of my life..."

We immediately call to mind that our lives are not our own but that we belong to God. Contrary to the philosophical, political, psychological and ethical theories centered on the needs, rights and desires of the "sovereign self" that one can find in just about any bookstore today, we are not autonomous beings and we are most certainly not the "captain of (our) souls--the master of (our) own destinies". We are always dependent creatures--never independent. Deprived of oxygen not a single one of us can live for more than a couple of minutes, no matter how great our intellect, will, or physical courage. Our 'creatureliness' makes us by nature to be dependent on others, and most especially, to be dependent on God. It is when we finally accept this that we can turn to Him as "Lord and Master" and hope to acquire the treasures necessary for eternal life.

" Do not give me a spirit of sloth, despair, lust of power, and idle talk...."

The Greek form of the prayer (the original--or, at least the oldest version we have) implores that God should not give us a spirit of sloth, despair, lust of power, and idle talk. Some of the later versions ask Him to "take from" us those vices. The original version is more striking because it, (like the famous lines in the Lord's Prayer which ask, "lead us not into temptation"), reminds us that God has made us free and will give us over to our inclinations if we will not repent. Think of Pharaoh, whose heart was hardened against Moses and the people of Israel; he was not a good man whom the Lord led astray, but a vain and prideful man whom the Lord "gave over" to his wickedness until he went down in defeat and humiliation.

In St. Ephrem's prayer we are asking specifically not to be handed over to some very common sins. Let's look at them more closely.

Sloth is the state of spiritual laziness, the ennui or boredom and lack of purpose that seems to have become a hallmark of modern life. We are constantly seeking to be entertained, stimulated, distracted. These are symptoms of sloth, the condition in which a person does not take responsibility for his or her own state of consciousness (and conscience!).

Despair is the state of futility or hopelessness; it is the "I give up" mentality that whines that we are not in control of our own thoughts, desires, and habits. Note that this is very different from the false sense of "being in control" that our society so values. It is an inner, rather than outward, state. Despair allows us to make the excuses we use when we fall into sin, the "I can't help myself. It's just the way I am" mentality (spoken outwardly or inwardly) that says we are beyond change and, thus, beyond all hope. Don't be mistaken, this is no small sin; it is one of the very greatest because it blocks the way to repentance. A despairing person may feel remorse by she or he cannot summon up the energy to repent.

Lust of Power is the desire to "be in charge", the "control freak" in us that demands that we "are the captain of (our ) own ship, the master of (our) own destiny"--and not only our own, but everyone else's too! We often think that this sin is requires a position of great power--an important job as a corporate executive, a political leader, or something of the kind. But lust of power can and often is practiced by the parent who tries to micro manage his or her children's lives, the spouse who must always make the plans and give the commands, the small time manager who cannot leave others to make the simplest decisions. We clergy are very often guilty of this one!

Idle talk is not just gossip, though it is certainly that, too. It is all the wasted, silly, meaningless words we utter in the course of a day--the "conversations" that do more to hide our true selves than to reveal them (though we often have reason not to want our 'true selves' to be revealed!). How many office conversations have to do with sexual relationships (0ur own or someone elses) that in themselves are ungodly and demeaning to both partners? How many mean spirited digs do we get in about co-workers under the pretense of 'discussing' a project or job at hand? How often do we murder the reputations of our fellow parishioners by gossipping about their habits, faults, and human short-comings? The psalmist urges us to 'set a guard' over our lips, but how difficult it is to do!

Now, for the positives, "but give, rather, a spirit of chastity, humility, and patience to Your servant". Just as God will give the wicked over to their desires He will also give those who truly desire to be good over to goodness--though it will come with effort. Both evil and good require work. Our goals and desires are not accomplished without effort. Even despair is a habit of the heart and soul that must be cultivated. One cannot have it without screening out the beauty and goodness of God's creation.

Chastity is very far from being a matter of sexual purity alone. It is certainly that--the purity of refraining from sexual relationships outside of marriage and the unselfish and loving enjoyment of them within a Christian marriage is an essential. But, all too often, our understanding of chastity stops with sex, which is profoundly sad. True chastity is a way of being, it is the 'purity of heart' that Jesus spoke of in His sermon on the mount. To be chaste means to approach all things with a 'clean heart' and a 'right spirit' (Psalm 51). It excludes gluttony, sexual lust and perversion, deceit, gossip, and all the other vices. The spirit of chastity is truly beautiful because it refuses to allow anything twisted or sinful to reside within us. It doesn't deny that those things exist; it simply does not make excuses for them--in ourselves.

Humility is another Christian virtue that is greatly misunderstood. Americans do not hold it in high regard because we often interpret it to mean one must "act like a doormat" and allow herself or himself to be "stepped on". True humility means to have a proper sense of our mortality, our limitedness, our status as creatures. Humus in Latin refers to the earth we walk on, the elements from which we are taken and to which we will one day return. It is the profound recognition that we are not self-sufficient and that our hopes rest not in our own accomplishments and strengths but in the love and mercy of God.

Patience is another virtue that is often honored in the breach by modern Americans. We are a people who want things to happen "yesterday". We don't like to wait for anything; our whole culture is geared toward action. We create "labor saving devices" so that we can find other things to do! But Jesus tell us, "in patience you posses your souls" (Luke 21:19). Indeed, we cannot even begin to make spiritual progress until we admit that we are in it for the long haul, meaning for the rest of our lives. There are no quick fixes in the spiritual path, no easy "enlightenment". Orthodoxy rejects the idea that a simple declaration of faith in Jesus is enough to save us (for, again, as the Scripture teaches, even the devils believe--but to no good end). To be a follower of Jesus is to patiently carry our cross to the end. This means that we accept the fact that our life will be one of constant struggle with many set backs. The only way to make it through is to plod ahead, patiently, day after day knowing that we are never left alone in our struggles. The Lord is with us along with the entire company of saints and our guardian angels. And we are given the great grace of sacramental confession and absolution when we fall. All that is required of us is repentance and patience that, with God's help, we will be triumphant in the end. The greatest danger is giving up (the spirit of sloth and despair).

Love is perhaps the least understood of the virtues. The word is so misused that we have almost forgotten its true meaning. We say we love our car, our house, our various possessions. We confuse mere sexual attraction and fornication with loving another leaving the greatest of the virtues dispossessed of its beauty and depth. Christian love always involves a relationship that requires giving up something of oneself for the sake of another. It is profoundly sacrificial and absolutely never concerned with self satisfaction. Clearly, this eliminates the vast majority of situations that modern people associate with "love". Our contemporary understanding of the term usually involves first and foremost self fulfillment and self satisfaction; love, in this case, is about what one gets not what gives. This is the absolute opposite of what is meant by love in the New Testament. When St. John declares, "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son" (Jn 3:16), he is declaring what God gave to us in Christ; he is setting the stage for the great mystery of the Divine Self-sacrifice for the sake of our salvation.

Love requires a response--either positive or negative; we can embrace the One who loves us or spurn Him but cannot remain indifferent because the Divine Lover will not go unanswered. Likewise, those who claim to love God must also love their neighbor (which the gospels have shown to mean everyone). Those who don't (or at least aren't trying to) are liars. This commandment is even more powerful when it comes to those who are closest to us. In America today over half of all marriages fail. People who declared that their love was so deep that they wanted to be united for the rest of their lives often abandon each other within a couple of years. Why? Obviously because they understood marriage in terms of what they could get, not what they could give but for what they could get. For when the guaranteed day arrives when they realize that their partner is incapable of giving them everything they desire, they abandon the relationship, (though it is questionable whether any real "relationship" ever existed in the first place). Marriage, as anyone who has been in one for a long time knows, is far more about giving--and forgiving-- than with taking.

Yes, O Lord and King, grant me to see my own faults and not to judge my brother. For You are holy unto the ages of ages. Amen.

The final lines of St. Ephrem's prayer take us back to Jesus'steaching about fault-finding, where are told to "remove the plank from (our) own eye" (Matthew 7:5-7) b efore we go about taking the "speck" from an other's. Orthodox spirituality is very serious about the need for each person to acknowledge his or her own sins. In the prayer before communion we speak of ourselves as "first among sinners" and this is not hyperbole. We are called to believe it! Why? Because we can only be responsible for repenting of our own sins. We can only work out our own salvation and no one else's (Philippians 2:12-18). Our broken nature, however, makes us want to concentrate on "improving" others--our spouse, our children, our students, our fellow workers, the people in our parish and so on. It is so easy to see their shortcomings and so hard to acknowledge our own!

But the gospel makes it abundantly clear that if we do not learn to point the finger at ourselves we, like the Pharisee in the parable of the Tax Collector and the Pharisee, will find ourselves locked out of the Kingdom. Our attitude towards the faults of others must always be to look within ourselves. It doesn't mean that we excuse evil, but we look for the first (and ultimately the only place) where can actually do something about it. And, if we practice the habit of self examination, we will generally discover that what we hate in others can be found in ourselves. Do we call someone else neglectful? Where are we being neglectful ourselves? Do we call someone else manipulative? How are we attempting to manipulate others and so on.

The very last reminder in the prayer is of God's holiness. He is the only truly "good" one and, just as we began the prayer by acknowledging Him as "Lord and Master" we end it by proclaiming that He alone is set apart (the true meaning of 'holiness') from sin. The Christian confession that Jesus is God, the eternal and only-begotten Son, reminds us that there is only One good enough and strong enough to save us from the multitude of sins that we commit both "willingly and unwillingly". The only hope we have for moving from the sinful spiritual states described in the first part of the prayer to the righteous state of the latter part is through uniting ourselves to Christ and His Church, remembering that the Church is the 'school-house of salvation" according to the Fathers. Our lessons are life long and we will not master them completely in this world. Our "homework" each and every day of our life is to keep trying.

Personality Cults

2009-03-24T17:49:00.002-04:00

As an unreformed and unrepentant conservative Republican, I don't find it hard to fault the new president's politics. As an Orthodox Christian I am appalled by his stands on virtually all moral issues. That isn't surprising. I expected as much.

But I'm becoming increasingly disturbed by the personality cult that seems to be growing around him. I've lost count of the books and magazines at Barnes and Noble that bear his image. No, not Newsweek and Time (one would hardly expect otherwise from those bastions of the left). Its that he is staring at us from everything else--from gourmet cooking to dog-grooming magazines. And it doesn't seem to be slowing down at all. ESPN fawns over his opinion about basketball, and late night TV talk show hosts vie to have him share his words of wisdom with them.

Granted, the man loves to talk and he can be as eloquent as he is loquacious--even if there really isn't much content to what he is saying.

But this national obsession over him is beginning to worry me. Maybe it goes back to the open air rally at the Denver Stadium at the end of the Democrat Convention--complete with fireworks and a semi-presidential seal. It just doesn't feel American. Mass rallies and post election campaigns to organize the masses remind me of darker times and places where the "leader" became a cult in and of himself.

I hope I'm wrong and it all ends soon. If nothing else Americans have notoriously short attention spans and we can merciless to those in power--witness poor "W". Still, it is all very disconcerting.

A Truly Sad Story

2009-03-18T09:32:00.003-04:00

I heard a very sad story on NPR (that bastion of politically correct reporting). It seems that a baby giraffe died while being born at the Roger Williams Zoo in Providence, Rhode Island the other day. A sad story, because it is always sad when a creature dies before it has the chance to live. But what is truly sad about this story is that the commentator referred to the "baby" giraffe.

In NPR's world,a woman having an abortion in the last days of her pregnancy would not be news-worthy (unless there was some "right wing" opposition to the process). There be no sad story about the death of her baby. Instead, she would have exercised her "right" to "choose" and her "fetus" would not be mentioned at all, much less be given the dignity of being referred to as a living creature that tragically lost his or her life before it began. It would, of course, be inconceivable to refer to the victim of such a procedure as a baby of any kind (animal or human).

The death of a baby is a tragedy--even if it is a baby giraffe, or a puppy, or a kitten. A story about someone deliberately killing a baby giraffe, puppy, or kitten would certainly be newsworthy and cause for public outrage (justifiably, too). Killing baby humans, clearly isn't--at least in the world of the dominant illiberal press.

Is there something wrong with this picture?

Why Orthodoxy?

2009-03-14T15:01:00.012-04:00

I'm often asked why I became Orthodox. People don't expect a "Fr. John Daly" to be married with a child just graduating college; most Fr. John Daly's (and there are quite a few of them) are to be found in Roman Catholic parishes. Few, if any, have children and, at least if they are in the Latin rite (the one most people identify with Roman Catholicism), none are married.

Thus, it isn't at all uncommon for someone to ask me if I became Orthodox so I could be a married priest. I suppose such a question would seem reasonable to many Americans who have difficulty understanding the venerable practice of celibacy among Western clergy. Personally, it would be a grievously sinful thing to abandon one's faith in order to be ordained in another simply in order to get around celibacy. Only modern Americans could think of such an action as anything other than profoundly dishonest (and dishonorable)!

Others have asked whether or not I wasn't one of those Catholics who had been "turned off" by some of the changes in styles of worship and music since the Second Vatican Council. Again, the answer is, "No". There have been many changes in Roman Catholic practice since the Council that I think are less than healthy, but in recent years there has been a significant movement back towards healthier and more grounded liturgical and spiritual practices. Both Pope John Paul II and the current Pope Benedict worked mightily to restore 'order' to the Roman Church. Again, it would have been reprehensible to leave because I was offended by some of the silly liturgical antics of the clergy during the Mass. As to the far more devastating scandals that erupted over the past decade (long after I had converted to Orthodoxy)--they are heartbreaking reminders of the power of sin to reach into the depths of the Christian community. But to leave one Church for another because of the evil actions of some of its ordained ministers would have indicated a rather shallow and unrealistic understanding of the universality of wickedness. In other words, sinful actions abound everywhere and the scandals that have erupted among evangelicals and Orthodox are no less appalling than those that arose in the Roman church.

So if it wasn't for reasons of marital status, liturgical aesthetics, or moral scandals, why did I leave the West for the (predominantly) Eastern Orthodox Church? The simple answer is that I was searching for the same eternal goodness, truth, and beauty that philosophers have been talking about at least since the time of Socrates. I was looking for the unchanging faith of the Apostles without all the trappings of the legalism and individualism of the West. Neither Roman Catholicism, with its absolutist political structure and juridical legalism, nor Protestantism, with its emphasis on individualism and lack of church consciousness had what I sought. For quite some time I wondered if it existed at all.

First, I must share some of my own religious history. True to my Irish name, I had been baptized and brought up in my childhood in the Roman Catholic church. My family was "mixed", however. My mother had been brought up in a fundamentalist/evangelical home in Oklahoma and my paternal grandmother had been brought up a New England Congregationalist. My grandmother made a whole-hearted conversion to Roman Catholicism when she met and married my grandfather, but my mother resolutely refused to become Catholic for deep theological reasons. She was always respectful of the Roman Church and attended mass with the family on a weekly basis. She simply could not bring herself to assent to doctrines she really didn't believe in. In a way she was a role model to me for making the "good confession". I came to understand that conforming to a belief that one truly didn't accept was in itself sinful. Still, as a child I was deeply intrigued by the beauty and majesty of the high mass we usually attended at our local parish. Even after my parents' marriage soured and we stopped attending church together as a family, I continued to go on my own--right up until my early teens. It was then that the full force of the Post Vatican II reforms hit our parish and, seemingly overnight, we went from a very formal liturgical life to one full of tambourines and guitars. It hit me hardest in Holy Week, when I was fourteen and the old solemn procession of the sacrament to the singing of "Pange Lingua" was replace by a sort of trot around the church to the singing of "They'll Know We are Christians by Our Love". It struck me that if something so profound could be turned into something so silly it probably wasn't all the profound to begin with--at least in the minds of the people who were in charge of worship.

In all fairness, I might well have been able to ride out the "Silly Seventies" and the following decades of liturgical darkness in the American Catholic church had I been less inclined toward theological thought in the first place. Once the door to questioning opened (encouraged by the iconoclastic young priests of the period) it was nearly impossible to shut. The very core elements of the faith no longer made sense to me. How could Jesus really be the Messiah if the world continued to be so manifestly wicked and lost? It seemed to me that Christianity itself was grounded in falsehood. For the next several years I wandered through a spiritual wilderness. I seriously considered converting to Judaism (they, after all, were still waiting for their Messiah); then I tried out various Eastern and New Age spiritualities. Ultimately, I found myself cautiously and very selectively re-considering Christianity. In the college town I was living in there was an Episcopal Church with an excellent choir and a profoundly intellectual rector who gave very compelling sermons. It seemed as if I could have my cake and eat it too. I found the beauty of liturgical worship accompanied by a theologically "free-thinking" attitude to doctrine. It was only a matter of time before I was formally received into the Episcopal Church and not too much longer after that before I petitioned the diocese to send me to seminary. In the fall of 1983 my wife and I found ourselves at the General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church in the Chelsea section of Manhattan.

If someone were to predict that I would find my true spiritual home in Orthodoxy when I entered the Episcopal seminary back in 1983, I would have thought they were crazy. I was already married, I loved the liturgical richness of Anglican worship, and, while I was becoming more and more uncomfortable with some of the stands the Episcopal Church was taking on issues like abortion and sexuality, I was one of those people who believed that the church was broad enough to include every opinion quite comfortably. In fact, it was life at the seminary itself that led to the crisis that would finally bring me to Orthodoxy.

By my senior year at the seminary, in 1986, that growing discomfort had turned into full fledged horror at what appeared to be a wholesale rejection of the theological and scriptural traditions of the Christian Church. This was a bit of a paradox; I had entered seminary as a fairly liberal Episcopalian (though I was already moving toward more 'traditional' belief). Within two years I had become convinced that the trajectory of the Episcopal Church was dreadfully wrong. And it as all because of the excellent education I was receiving about the teachings and practices of the Early Church and the way that the Holy Scriptures had been read and interpreted at various stages of church history! I faced the same set of questions I had as a teenager in my old Roman Catholic parish--if the foundations of the Church's faith and tradition were one thing and the current practice was entirely different, something or somebody was wrong, either at the start or somewhere along the way. In the past I had opted to believe that the story was flawed from the beginning, but by this point in my life I had become convinced once more that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the Only Savior of the world. I could not turn my back on Him a second time. So, the obvious conclusion was that somewhere along the way at least some Christians had consciously chosen to pull away from the true Church.

I had no interest in pursuing the various Protestant denominations--none of them seemed close to the early Church they professed to have recreated 1500 years plus after the fact. Even the most basic knowledge of the liturgical and sacramental beliefs of the real early Church proved that much. When I considered the Church of Rome, I found myself facing the same questions I had before. If all power resided in the hands of one man, no matter how good and holy, there would always be room for confusion and error. The Protestants had had that much right; they simply came to the wrong conclusions about what to do about it. Here is where I felt close to despair. If the early church had held fast to the "faith once delivered" how could it have disappeared from the face of the earth. It was the combination of a research paper assignment given by my professor of theology and the undergraduate courses I had taken in Russian and Byzantine history that led me to my first Orthodox liturgy.

My theology professor had assigned us to write a paper on another religious 'denomination'. Seemingly out of the blue it occurred to me to write about Orthodoxy. I figured that if any Christian 'denomination' had kept the original early Church perspective it would be the Orthodox. That seems self evident now, but it certainly wasn't the case back then. In my courses on Byzantium and Imperial Russia the image of the Orthodox Church was almost always presented as backward, superstitious, and opposed to all things modern. Western textbook writers had pretty much uncritically swallowed Gibbons' ( the famous author of "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire") scathing attack on the Byzantines as a virtually irredeemable perversion of civilization. Orthodoxy was at the heart of Byzantine life, so it was portrayed in very negative terms; it was always on the wrong side of every dispute. The same was true for the Russians--merely a northern and even less civilized version of Byzantium. In short, I hadn't been predisposed to look for anything positive in Orthodoxy until I was driven to consider it in despair of hope anywhere else!

It was in the midst of Great Lent that I found myself in St Nicholas Cathedral of the Russian Orthodox Church on 97th Street in Manhattan. I wasn't sure that I would be welcome and my nervousness was only increased when I entered the cathedral--much darker than the Western churches I was used to. Men and women stood mostly apart in separate parts of the Church. The choir sang beautifully in Slavonic, but the melodies were very different from Anglican or Gregorian Chant. The order of the liturgy (I didn't realize that it was a hierarchal liturgy with a bishop) was virtually incomprehensible to me. But about half way through I remembered the words ascribed to the group sent out by Prince Vladimir to observe the liturgy at Hagia Sophia in Constantinople a thousand years before, "We did not know whether we were in heaven or on earth, so great was the beauty of that place". I did not understand everything that was going on around me, but I knew that I was having a glimplse of heaven and, against all logic, I knew that I had no choice but to become Orthodox. It really was that simple--and that complicated.

I began to read everything I could about Orthodox Christianity. I tackled the writings of Vladimir Lossky (something I wouldn't normally advise a neophyte to do!) and dreamed about the Trinity. I bought Orthodox prayer books and recordings of Orthodox music. My poor wife was in a panic--all this time and expense to go to an Episcopal seminary only to become Orthodox!

For awhile I pretended to myself that I could adapt Orthodox beliefs to fit an Episcopalian existence. I don't think I really believed it. I certainly kept returning to that interior certainty I had felt in the cathedral that I must become Orthodox, but I was afraid of the consequences of actually leaving the Episcopal Church. I had many friends in the Church, there were still things I loved (and continue to love to this day) about it. In my uncertainty, encouraged by my diocesan bishop, who thought I would grow out of my infatuation, I was ordained to the diaconate and priesthood of the Episcopal Church. I enjoyed a very happy three years as a curate at a large Episcopal parish in New England--except more and more often I found myself preaching sermons in opposition to abortion and theological syncretism (the blending of traditional Christian beliefs with distinctly non Christian beliefs). In the process I exasperated the poor rector of the parish who constantly found himself having to explain his young curate's atypical (for a New England Episcopalian) opinions to the more liberal members of the community. In the end, it was clear that there was no place for me in the Episcopal Church. My wife, after not a few tears over yet another disruption to our lives--which now included our infant daughter, slowly came to understand Orthodoxy and find in it the solidity that she had never found in the Episcopal Church (she had never converted).

In the autumn of 1989 we were received into the Orthodox Church and I was soon ordained a deacon and, after a year of "re-tooling" at St. Vladimir's Seminary, to the priesthood. During Holy Week 1992 I was sent to St. Nicholas parish in Southbridge Massachusetts where I became rector and where I have served ever since.

So, in the end, after twenty years what have I found? Why did I become Orthodox? And why have I remained Orthodox? (The first and the second questions are not entirely the same).

I have long gotten over the initial stage of 'convertitis'--in which I felt I had to define my Orthodoxy against everything I had known before. Being Orthodox is far more than not being Roman Catholic or Episcopalian. Indeed, if that were all it was, I would be terribly impoverished. I am part of a community of believers that makes up at most 1% of the population and which is often identified with cultures not well known or well respected by most other Americans. Becoming Orthodox has not been a move up the social ladder!

In becoming and remaining Orthodox I have acquired a new and tremendously refreshing understanding of God's creation--one that really isn't easily accessible in the main line western faith traditions. In fact, I believe that the spiritual groping of many Americans that leads them to various kinds of New Ageism and the adoption of "Eastern" religions (Buddhism, Hinduism, etc.) is none other than the desire to find what is already present in Orthodoxy.

Orthodox Christianity is immensely positive in its understanding of humankind and of the meaning of life. It takes very seriously the cancerous power of sin and the fact that no one can be saved except through union with Christ. But, it does not see the human race as a "mass of perdition"--completely lost to God through Original Sin. Indeed, Orthodoxy celebrates human freedom, specifically our capability to freely respond to God's grace. There is nothing imposed on us from outside. The gift is offered and it is for us to accept it or decline. This is a VERY different world view from the strict Augustinian one of the West (and Calvinist Protestantism in particular). On the other hand, we are not at all acceptable as we are--we must repent of our sinful desires and behaviors and the Holy Scriptures and Tradition of the Church is very clear as to what those sinful behaviors and desires are. Orthodoxy is not for libertarians!

The Orthodox world view is deeply sacramental. All of creation (as St. Paul so beautifully expresses in Romans 8) is called to be included in the Resurrection. The entire universe has been created by God and is intended by God to find redemption in His Kingdom. Matter is good and blessed in its original intention and in its final disposition. God uses and transforms the material universe to participate in our salvation. Bread and Wine truly become the Body and Blood of Christ our God (as is clearly attested to in the Scriptures and was never doubted until the schisms of the Western Church in the 15th century). Water is sanctified to become the material means of salvation in baptism. Oil is blessed for healing, and so on. We do not see the world as an opposition between spirit and matter with spirit being good and matter indifferent or evil. In fact, a world view that condemns or ignores the material dimension is heretical.

Orthodoxy truly believes that human beings are made for communion with God; that the created and the Creator can and must have direct communion with one another. There is no other explanation for Jesus Christ. "God became a man", says St. Athanasius and many other Church fathers, "so that man might become god". This teaching of theosis ('becoming divine') does NOT mean that we become additional persons of the God-head (an infinite multiplication of the Divine Persons). We are and forever remain creatures, but we are creatures who are made to share in the grace, love, and goodness of God (in His "energies", as St Gregory Palamas put it).
This is indeed the high calling of the Christian. For Orthodox the "humility" of God in Christ was not a means of paying back the Father for His just outrage at human rebellion, but a means of restoring and healing our alienated nature from within. This teaching, too, is very different from the mainline teaching of the West and very much more positive.

Finally, Orthodox expresses itself through a real COMMUNITY of faith. We do not rely on a central authority figure and most definitely do not believe in any kind of individualistic "me and Jesus" relationship. Our unity is expressed in our common communion with the faithful bishops of the Church (our spiritual fathers and leaders of the local churches). It is their common adherence to the faith and traditions of the apostles that holds the church together--along with the testimony and assent of ALL the faithful people. Yes, there are bishops who abandon their role--but they are rejected and expelled from the body of the faithful. Likewise, there are lay people who reject the faith and practice of the Church, but they, too, are expelled from the Body--either through formal excommunication or by means of apostasy (leaving the Church for another religious or political ideal). The Community of the Faithful, the Church itself, is always unassailable by her enemies. It needs no "reformation" because it is united to the one who is ever "faithful and true", Jesus Christ.

This last understanding tends to inhibit legalism. We have our fair share of people who would like to interpret the Churches canons (traditions and customs surrounding fasting, etc., for example) in a legalistic way, but in the long run they can't make much headway because Orthodoxy is naturally 'holistic'. You can't really take just bits and pieces of it and elevate them to "most important". You have to accept the Orthodox faith as a whole, which means understanding in all humility that it is infinitely more than our own personal "take" or opinion on any particular thing.

Finally, Orthodoxy affirms life. Our God is the God of the living, the God who destroys death and bestows Resurrection "on the fallen"--both the spiritually and the physically dead. There is no place in Orthodoxy for the ideologies of death--be it abortion, euthanasia, war, capital punishment, and so on. We refuse, as a Church, to ever endorse death as a means of promoting life--the obscene foolishness of such a thing is obvious throughout our tradition of worship, prayer, and evangelism.

These are the things that made me Orthodox and these are the things that keep me Orthodox--though I could add a great deal more to them! And this is my answer to those who ask me why I converted. To those outside the Orthodox Church who read this and say they, too, agree with what is written here, I suggest that you learn more about what your own tradition teaches. You will find that, though there may be much in common between your tradition and Orthodox in a number of particular points, in the end it will not add up. Orthodoxy, by definition is the fullness of the faith "once delivered". It is not the negation of everything else, but its fulfillment in Christ.
So, "come and see". You will not regret the journey.

The Real Problem with Stem Cell Research

2009-03-10T17:12:00.004-04:00

Our new president and the left wing media (just about the whole show in this country, with a few notable exceptions) is rejoicing in the new-found freedom to harvest stem cells from human embryos--destroying them in the process. Of course, this is a horrendous thing--the destruction of innocent human life for the purported purpose of helping others. Even a child can understand that the destruction of one human being for the benefit of another is always a crime against humanity as a whole.

But that isn't the beginning or the end of the ethical crisis we are facing here. Even those embryos that will not be destroyed in stem cell research (at least for now) are morally problematic.

The fact that there are millions--perhaps hundreds of millions--of human embryos frozen in various scientific and medical facilities world wide points to a much deeper crime, one that most of us are loathe to admit. Human beings are being produced to satisfy the wants of others. For the most part they have been produced so that couples who would be otherwise childless may have children.

Whats wrong with that, you ask? The very same thing that is wrong with any act that turns a human being into a product--whether slavery, or child pornography, or any other form of involuntary servitude to the will of another.

Those embryos exist in a state of suspended animation, their lives on hold until someone else decides what to do with them--whether to destroy them or bring them to term. The latter choice, of course, is better than the former. But the mere fact that they were conceived not for their own value as persons created in the image and likeness of God, but for the desires (often presented as emotional "needs") of others is wrong--profoundly wrong. People are not commodities. Never, ever. And this is the heart of the problem we are facing when we discuss embryonic research.

THE FAITH THAT HAS ESTABLISHED THE UNIVERSE

2009-03-08T18:58:00.005-04:00

As the Prophets beheld, As the Apostles taught, As the Church received, As the Teachers dogmatized, As the Universe agreed, As Grace illumined, As the Truth revealed, As falsehood passed away, As Wisdom presented, As Christ awarded, Thus we declare, Thus we assert, Thus we proclaim Christ our true God and honor His saints, In words, In writings, In thoughts, In sacrifices, In churches, In holy icons.

On the one hand, worshipping and reverencing Christ as God and Lord. And on the other hand, honoring and venerating His Saints as true servants of the same Lord.

This is the Faith of the Apostles. This is the Faith of the Fathers. This is the Faith of the Orthodox. This is the Faith which has established the Universe.

Every now and then I will meet an Evangelical or Fundamentalist Protestant who will tell me that the Orthodox veneration of icons is idolatrous. When I encounter such persons I feel, on an emotional level, the same way I would if someone were to make insinuations about my mother or in some other way insult a beloved member of my family. I have to tell myself that these people are speaking from ignorance--ignorance of the Scriptures (which they claim to know so well), ignorance of Jesus Christ (with whom they claim a personal relationship), and, of course, ignorance of all things Orthodox.

I usually take a deep breath and say something like, "We Orthodox believe that Jesus is God. He is God Incarnate, the Emmanuel that Isaiah spoke of in the Scriptures". That usually leaves them a bit taken aback. "Well, what do you mean? We believe that Jesus is God, too." "Then you must believe that it is possible to make an image of Him--since He is also human and had a human body". At this point they usually begin to stammer something about the second commandment and try to shift the discussion to the most blessed Virgin Mary and the saints.

Again, I refer them to the scriptures--especially the Prophet Isaiah. What was forbidden in by the second commandment was the creation of any image of God because He had not yet appeared in the flesh among human beings. Even now, it is not possible to create an image of the Father or the Holy Spirit. Neither of them became incarnate. And for that matter it is not possible to portray the infinite Deity of Christ. What we can show is the human appearance of God--one of the Trinity in the flesh. But the prohibitions against idolatry are always directed against the creation of images that represent falsehood. The idols were images of false gods and demons--snares and deceptions that led away from the worship of the Only True God.

Icons of our Lord Jesus Christ are hardly idols--unless one wishes to say that He is not really God in the flesh. Indeed, if He is not who He said He was, then we are guilty of the worst kind of idolatry! But we believe that He is God-with-us, Emmanuel. And thus we can portray him and offer Him right worship through venerating images of Him. Now, only a great fool would believe that the worship we offer is of wood and paint! We are worshipping the one who is represented by wood and paint--the reality, or, archetype that is portrayed.

Occasionally, one of my Protestant accusers will give a grudging nod to the possibility that there is something to this, even though he or she may find it distasteful. "But what about Mary and your other saints", they demand, "you don't think they're God, do you?" And I immediately respond, "Of course not! Who would ever accuse us of such a thing? We portray the Mother of God and the saints as members of the living Church--as members of the family of believers who have gone before us but continue to live in Christ. We honor their images as examples of Christian holiness."

At this point I will ask them if they carry any pictures of family members in their wallet, or keep some at home somewhere. It is a rare person who does not. Then I ask them if looking at those pictures gives them any sort of emotional feeling. Again, it is a rare person who will deny that looking at a picture of a grandchild or of a loved one who has since passed away raises profound emotions of love, joy, happiness, or sadness or a mixture of all these things. And I explain to them that they understand icons very well--even if they won't admit to it.

Of course, it is possible to "idolize" those images of our loved ones. But most Christians would find such behavior strange and unnatural. I'm not convinced that a lot of non Christians--people who have lost faith in God--don't idolize the images of earthly 'gods'. Witness the idolatry of political leaders--even here in America today, but serious Christians know better. And our Evangelical/Fundamentalist critics know exactly what I am alluding to.

The image, as St. John of Damascus wrote at the height of the attack on icons by the Imperial government of the Byzantine Empire during the 7th and 8th centuries, represents the prototype. If the prototype is Christ, then the image is worthy of 'worship' because Christ is being worshipped. If the image is of the Mother of God or one of the saints, it is worthy of 'veneration' (or honor) because those persons are worthy of honor and love because of their faithfulness to God and His Church.

The key word in all of this is 'love'. We honor the images because we love the ones portrayed in them. They are part of our family and as living members of the Church (because our God is the God of the living not the dead--as the Lord Jesus Himself has taught) they merit the kisses we bestow upon them.

In our churches we are surrounded by icons--each one representing a member of our family. We know their stories and we firmly believe that they know us. For those who say they don't "get it" we say, open your wallet and look at that person you love so well and then tell us you don't understand.

FRAGILITY

2009-03-06T15:56:00.002-05:00

Recently a teacher at our school experienced an especially heart-breaking loss in her family. A little girl--three years old--was sick with a fever, a pretty typical thing this time of year. Her parents thought it was a just an ordinary virus and put her down for a nap. She never woke up.

Some years ago, my own brother, a healthy, funny, and fun-loving man stepped out to cross a street on a dark night and was hit by a car. He died instantly. He was just forty years old.

We can all come up with stories like this, stories that cause us to raise our voices to heaven and ask, "Why?"

Who could possibly offer the parents of that little girl comfort in the face of what happened? To this day my mother counts the cards and phone calls her children make to her on her birthday, on Mothers' Day, and Christmas--and she subtracts the ones that don't arrive from my brother. Her heart is permanently broken.

These incidents demonstrate the awful fragility of human life. We are so easily snuffed out, "like the grass on the housetops" we flourish for a moment and then we are gone, as the Psalmist proclaims. One moment we are there amidst our loved ones and the next we are being lowered into the earth never to be seen or heard from again. At least in this world.

And this last remark leads us to the particular hope of the Orthodox Christian people--a hope that proclaims in spite of our terrible fragility we are not merely dust. By becomming one of us God, in Christ, has also taken upon Himself our fragile nature and united it to His own immortal and infinitely powerful nature. In the drama of His Passion, Death, and Resurrection He has shown us that in the end we do not simply wither away like the grass on the housetops. Our voices will one day be heard in the midst of our loved ones again--and then there shall be "no more tears or crying....but life eternal".

Why is it so important to hold to an Orthodox faith in Christ? Because nothing else will suffice. Nothing else will guarantee that we are more than just dirt, food for the worms.

When someone says that it doesn't really matter what you believe they are not telling the truth. If someone says that you can be a Christian and deny that Jesus is God and that He rose bodily from the dead, they are lying. If someone says the body is just a shell and what really counts is the soul, they are preaching heresy.

Why? Just ask the grieving mothers of this world. The only hope they have, the only hope any of us have, of touching, hearing, seeing those beloved, fragile children ("fathers, mothers, brothers and sisters....") who have gone before us is grounded in the FACT that He is Who He said He is.

What those mothers want, what we all want, is to know that our fragility will not last forever; that someday we shall be solid and strong and that nothing will ever separate us from one another or from God ever again.

The Criterion of Truth

2009-03-04T13:31:00.000-05:00

What would you think if you heard two people having a fierce argument about addition facts? I mean, a real knock down, dragged out battle over whether 1 + 1 really equals 2? What about a spit flying rant over the multiplication table? Or, (this one is a bit more esoteric), whether e actually equals mc2?

For most of us such an argument seems inconceivable outside the walls of an asylum. People simply don't fight over addition, multiplication, or Einstein's equation about mass and the speed of light.

Why? Because we accept them as facts. Oh, we may ask questions about why and how mathematics or physics work. In fact, if we are good students, it is often because we ask questions. But we generally don't debate the answers once we have learned them. We simply accept them as true.

This is clearly not the case with theological truths--especially in the Post Enlightenment West. Theology and religious dogma are dealt with as something utterly different from mathematics. Math is facts; theology is opinion--at least in the minds of most Europeans and Americans.

Yet in most of the world and for most of history this has not been the case at all. Far from being a matter of mere opinion, what one believed about God was considered to be the highest truth. And if there were opposing beliefs, they were understood to be as wrong as saying 1+1=4, or 5x5=10. Theology was about facts, not opinions. One was either right or one was wrong.

Now, I can hear you saying--"But it is easy to demonstrate 1+1 by counting out a couple of objects and 5x5 by setting up five groups of five. How do you demonstrate the Trinity, or, prove the divine humanity of Christ?"

And, in truth, we are talking about two different kinds of truth--one concrete and easily demonstrated, the other based on faith.

And yet, many if not most "enlightened" people today subscribe to all sorts of "truths" that cannot be demonstrated except by faith.

Let me illustrate this point more clearly. The vast majority of Americans and Europeans believe that without question "all men (people) are created equal". It is a political, social, and moral given. And yet it can be easily demonstrated that not everyone is equal at all in terms of strength, intelligence, wealth, or a whole host of other sets of criteria. People are manifestly NOT equal--except in the eyes of God. Many of the most vociferous proponents of equality are quick to deny the equality--even the humanity--of those who are politically inconvenient. The previous entries on the issue of abortion are examples that support my assertion.

Still, if you ask most people if they believe that "all men are created equal" they will say, "yes". And their "yes" is grounded in faith alone. They believe because they've been taught to believe and it would seem as outlandish--not to say outrageous--to imagine an argument raging between two political candidates over equality as it is to imagine a debate over math facts.

Equality is considered a fundamental fact in our political and social system even when we demonstrate just the opposite in our actual actions with increasing frequency. We do this, by the way, by redefining who is a person. If certain people are not persons because of their developmental status, value to society, or ability to defend themselves we can still pretend we believe that all people are equal; its just that some people are no longer people!

At any rate, our criterion of truth for the equality of human beings like our criterion of truth for theology is based on faith. In the case of human equality this faith was originally based in a divine revelation. That all human beings are fundamentally equal is a faith statement grounded in the Christian belief that human beings are made in the image and likeness of God and that God became a human being Himself to reveal their full value. Once the foundation for believing that all people are equal is no longer accepted as a fact (meaning, once what we believe God is reduced to mere opinion) then all the beliefs that are based on that foundation begin to totter. This is why it is possible to assert the words, "all people are created equal", while at the same time depriving whole classes of human beings of their most basic rights.

As Jesus taught, a house built without a foundation (or which has been moved off its foundation) will be easily swept away in a flood. In the case of this society, the deluge has already begun.

Oh, by the way......

2009-03-04T08:48:00.000-05:00

That "safe" abortion method that the NARAL people are referring to is 'partial birth' abortion in which a late term baby is partly delivered (feet first) while an instrument is inserted into its skull so that the brain may be sucked out, the skull collapsed and the corpse removed.

Its even worse than a horror movie.

Who said there were no more barbarians? Today they wear Prada or Armani suits.

Choice?

2009-03-03T20:14:00.000-05:00

The following is from the NARAL (National Abortion Rights Action League) explanation of the "Freedon of Choice Act"

Freedom Of Choice Act (FOCA)

Following the Supreme Court’s closely divided decision to uphold the first‐ever federal ban on abortion1, it is clear that the stakes have changed and the right to choose is facing a new level of assault. That’s why the pro‐choice community is working to guarantee the right to choose through the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA) – a measure that will codify Roe v. Wade’s protections and guarantee the right to choose for future generations of women.

• Recognizing that a woman’s right to choose is being chipped away both by the courts and state lawmakers, the pro‐choice community – led by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D‐CA) and Rep. Jerry Nadler (D‐NY) – is working to enact a federal law2 that would restore the right to choose as expressed in 1973 in Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton.

• Since Roe v. Wade was decided, a woman’s right to choose has been systematically eroded by anti‐choice legislators in states around the country. In fact, more than 500 anti‐choice measures have been enacted in the states since 19953, essentially rolling back this fundamental right for many women.

• With a woman’s right to choose already in a precarious state, President Bush’s appointment of John Roberts and Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court further threatens the constitutional protection for reproductive rights – a threat immediately made evident in the Court’s ruling in Gonzales v. Carhart and Gonzales v. Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

• In the Carhart decision, the newly reconfigured Court – with Bush’s appointees Roberts and Alito casting decisive votes – upheld the first‐ever federal ban on a safe abortion method – with criminal penalties for doctors.4 More troubling, the decision effectively reversed Supreme Court precedent and rolled back key protections that were guaranteed by Roe v. Wade, including the long‐standing exception safeguarding women’s health.

• Dissenting in Carhart, Justice Ginsburg called the majorityʹs opinion "alarming," and stated that "[f]or the first time since Roe, the Court blesses a prohibition with no exception safeguarding a womanʹs health."5 Further, she said, the federal ban "and the Courtʹs defense of it cannot be understood as anything other than an effort to chip away at a right declared again and again by this Court."6

• By enacting FOCA, we will establish a federal law guaranteeing reproductive freedom for future generations of American women. This guarantee will protect women’s rights no matter who occupies the White House or is in control of Congress.
January 1, 2009 1 Gonzales v. Carhart and Gonzales v. Planned Parenthood Federation of America, 550 U.S. 124 (2007).
2 S.1173, 110th Cong (2007); H.R.1964, 110th Cong. (2007).
3 NARAL PRO‐CHOICE AMERICA FOUNDATION, Who Decides? The Status of Womenʹs Reproductive Rights in the United States (18th ed. 2009), available at www.prochoiceamerica.org/whodecides.
4 Carhart/PPFA, 550 U.S. 124 (2007).
5 Carhart/PPFA, 550 U.S. 124 (2007). (Ginsburg, J., dissenting).
6 Carhart/PPFA, 550 U.S. 124 (2007). (Ginsburg, J., dissenting).

It's worth publishing the entire "FAQ" sheet partly because it reveals the psuedo intellectual nature of the far left (note all the footnotes). More important, it reveals how carefully people who do wicked things disguise their actions under euphemisms (basically nice words to cover up ugly actions--another good example being "Final Solution")

In the NARAL "FAQ" sheet the word abortion only appears once, otherwise we hear only of the "right to choose", "reproductive rights" without any explanation of what the "choice" involves and whose rights are denied.

The comfortable, mostly white, upper middle class women who make up the bulk of the NARAL membership would take umbrage to be compared with other (in)famous advocates for mass killing of the past century. Still, that is precisely what they are--advocates for mass murder under the name of "choice".

Now, most Americans are loathe to deny others their freedom to choose--and this is precisely why the abortion lobby cloaks its intentions under the banner of "freedom" and "choice". Who wants to oppose "freedom"--it is enshrined in our Constitution? And who wants to be denied the right to choose for him or herself the basic structure of his or her life?

Indeed, our system of government is based on John Locke's "natural rights" theory that everyone is entitled to life, liberty, and property (or, as Jefferson put it, "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness"). We are naturally appalled when those rights are infringed upon.

The problem is that abortion involves only one person's choice on a matter that always--always-- involves the violent death of another. Most Americans w0uld not support anyone who would claim such an unqualified "right" over another human being. Thus, the requirement for the euphemism, "choice". Abortion is simply a "choice"--like chosing the flavor of an ice cream cone, or, the color of one's clothing, or one's religion...etcetera. The fact that it is the supreme violation of the first right recognized in the Declaration of Independence--the right to life--is never, ever, mentioned. How could it be? Who would be for it, if the ugly truth were actually told?

It is bizaare that in this country "pro choice" means to be in favor of taking the life of an innocent person (without any choice on his/her part). It is even sicker that, on the rare occasions that the proponents of this "right" actually own up to what they are for, it is to deny the rights of their victims by denying their humanity.

Sound familiar? Over 100 million people died in the last century because evil regimes denied them their rights because they were Jews, or Christians, or members of the wrong class, and so on and on and on. In America nearly 40 million have died since 1973 because they were deprived of their humanity by the fiat of a court and the well financed campaigns of special interests.

The new president, a man of great eloquence and pursuasiveness, is an unabashed supporter of "choice". No one would compare him to the demagogues of the past--Hitler, Stalin, Mao, or, the Interhamwe of Rwanda. It would be unfair and unjust to do so. Germans, Russians, Chinese, and Rwandans who were caught up in the holocausts of the 20th century were deceived by the power of unscrupulous dictatorships and held hostage to brutal political organizations. Things are different here. Our demagogues are, for the most part, men and women of sophistication, well spoken and well educated. They do not have the power of a tyrant behind them. They have proven that euphemisms alone are enough to persuade (or lull) a free people into becoming accomplices of the greatest holocaust in human history. The Nazis, at least, tried to hide what they were doing behind barbed wired and far from the public eye. In America it is being done without shame and for all the world to see.

Let's try this again

2009-03-03T18:38:00.000-05:00

A few years ago we at St. Nicholas hosted the first Orthodox blog in Southbridge. It was a bomb!

In recent weeks our sister parish's priest (Fr. Peter Preble at St. Michael's) has shared some great information about the blog he has started up on the hill. Maybe it is time we started again, too!

Of course, Fr. Peter is much more tech savvy than yours truly--so there is no competition here. :)

Our blog this time around will aim to be a bit more--let's say--interesting.

The only theological opinions you will see expressed on this page will be be Orthodox, but as the profile admits, I won't hesitate to be as controversial as possible when it comes to politics and other opinion, in general.

So, let the games--or blog--begin!