Transcript

Fr. Steven Tsichlis: Welcome to Orthodoxy Live! This is Fr. Steve Tsichlis, and I’m the pastor at St. Paul’s Greek Orthodox Church in Irvine, California. Fr. Evan isn’t with us tonight. He’s taking a well-deserved vacation, so I look forward to taking your questions and calls about our faith, and you can call in. The number is 1-855-AF-RADIO; that’s 1-855-237-2346.

Now, a number of you have already called in this week and left questions for Fr. Evan. He asked me to take all the hard ones, but I think what I’ll do is I’ll just take them in order. So the first question that was received was from Tim, who I believe is from Saskatchewan in Canada.

Tim: Hello, Kevin. My name’s Tim. I’m from Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, and my question involves John 3:16. I’ve heard the welcome interpretation of that verse, that God so loved the cosmos, the world, not the world of humanity but the world of all creation, that he gave his only-begotten Son. I love that interpretation; it gives a lot of hope to me, but I’m wondering why, then, does John the Theologian follow up with, “that whoever believes in him would not perish, but have eternal life”? It seems like it’s not just a misrepresentation of the Greek word, cosmos, but following up on staying in context of that verse. So I wonder if you could speak to that. What does it mean that “God so loved the world that he sent his only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in him…” and just looking at that whole context of that verse. Thanks.

Fr. Steven: Tim, that’s a really good question. Actually, I noticed that you’re asking Kevin Allen that question! I think maybe he should be forced to answer that question on his next program. Anyway, listen, it would be really helpful, I think, for us if we looked at reading that passage in light of Romans 8:18-23, because I think what we would say as Orthodox Christians is that the redemption of the human race and the redemption of the entire creation really can’t be separated. Again, if you’ll bear with me. St. Paul will say:

For I consider the sufferings of the present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us, for the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God, for the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it (in other words, us, we human beings) in hope that the creation itself would be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, we groan inwardly as we wait for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.

So I think if you take a look at that passage from St. Paul, what he’s clearly trying to say there is that our redemption as human beings is very much connected with the redemption of the entire cosmos. So for us… And by the way, the word that’s used there, “creation, ktisis,” is a little bit different word than what’s found in John 3:16, but we are bound together, we are part of the created order, and we are in fact the “priests of creation,” Fr. Schmemann used to say.

I think another way we could take a look at this passage and kind of look at it in terms of the Scriptures would be to read the prayer of Azariah that’s found in the book of Daniel and that we sing on Holy Saturday morning. If you read that passage or if you’ve heard it sung on Holy Saturday morning, it talks about the whole creation blessing and praising God. The sun and the moon and the stars, angels, rain, dew, falling snow, ice and frost, seas, rivers, and oceans, all the people of the earth, the priests of the Lord, the spirits and the souls of the righteous—there’s a kind of cosmic hymn of praise that’s welling up from the cosmos, from the ktisis, from the creation. And it’s a hymn of praise that we as human beings in a certain sense are responsible to conduct.

So when we read that passage in John 3:16, we have to understand that our redemption and the redemption of the entire universe are intimately connected and that Christ has come not just to save the human race, but every rock, every tree, every stone, every star, everything in the created universe. And this kind of really connects in some ways with some of the ecological messages that the current Ecumenical Patriarch, Bartholomew, has been making through the years. I hope all of this makes sense, and I hope that in some way I’ve answered your question.

Let’s take a look at another question someone has asked. This, I believe, is Anton from Chino Hills in California.

Anton: Hi. My name is Anton, and I am calling from Chino Hills, California. My question is: What are the latest efforts in the attempts to unify the Eastern Orthodox churches with the Oriental Orthodox churches, such as the Coptic, the Ethiopian, the Syrian, and the Armenian. Thank you.

Fr. Steven: Again, that’s another very, very good question. Anton, more has taken place in the last 50 years to bring Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox Christians together than has taken place in the last millennium. Already in 1964, there were informal talks that began between the Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox; basically theologians began talking, and that resulted in a joint statement that actually was published in 1964. It reads in part: “On the essence of the christological dogma”—in other words, who is the Lord Jesus—“we found ourselves in full agreement”—Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox theologians are saying they found themselves in full agreement—“through the different terminologies used by each side, we saw the same truth expressed.” In other words, the truth that Christ is both fully human and fully divine, the word of God made flesh, as John’s gospel says.

Now, this document was signed by three of the most well-known Eastern Orthodox theologians of the last century: Fr. Georges Florovsky, Fr. John Romanides, and Fr. John Meyendorff. Those informal discussions among theologians continued for another 20 years until 1984, and then the unofficial dialogue, so to speak, was laid aside, and the official dialogue began in 1985. And that dialogue produced a couple of agreed statements what had already been said in 1964, but adding recommendations encouraging our churches to do things together at the local level. All over the country, those things are beginning to take place.

I can really only speak about Orange County, and I think that it’s important for you to know that every year for the last eight years there has been an ecumenical service of prayer for Christian unity that’s involved both the Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox, as well as Roman Catholic Christians. That service normally takes place around Pentecost. In fact, that service took place here in Orange County at St. Luke’s Antiochian Orthodox Church in Garden Grove just last Friday night. Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox Christians are very active together, working in a program called FOCUS. I’m sure you’re aware of the Fellowship of Orthodox Christians United to Serve; it’s a program that serves meals to the homeless in Orange County, among many other ministries that take place here. I would say that, really, that program would be sorely lacking if the Coptic Orthodox were not involved. Certainly folks from my parish and from Coptic Orthodox churches like St. Marina’s parish in Irvine have worked together to serve the poor in Orange County.

We also have a monthly book club at St. Paul’s that meets. We actually have been meeting now for 12 years with both Eastern Orthodox, Coptic Orthodox, and actually Roman Catholic Christians. The three churches in Irvine have gotten together to read books about living the Christian spiritual life together and trying to discern how we can not only learn about each other but how we can become friends and how we can be moving forward, doing things together in the name of Christ. So there are a lot of good things that are going on, and I would encourage you, actually, since you live in Chino Hills, which is not that far away from Orange County, to see if you can get involved in some of these things. It’d be well worth your while to do so.

Yes, I see we have a live call from Scott. Scott?

Scott: Yes, hello, Fr. Steven.

Fr. Steven: Hi! What’s your question tonight?

Scott: Christ is ascended!

Fr. Steven: He has ascended indeed. In glory!

Scott: Absolutely. I’m interested in learning some biblical or New Testament Greek, but I’m having some trouble finding sources that provide sort of a fuller explanation. I’ll give you two examples of what I mean. I’ve heard Fr. Evan talk about the word anamnisis which is the word that Christ uses that’s usually translated “remembrance” when he instituted the Eucharist: “Do this in remembrance of me,” but according to Fr. Evan it has a larger meaning of to making it a present reality, not just to recall a past event.

Fr. Steven: That’s correct.

Scott: Knowing that since helped me a lot at Pascha. I feel like it’s opened up more of the services of the Church to me. It’s helped me quite a bit. The other word that sparked my interest was just the word “eucharist” itself. And our men’s fellowship at Holy Trinity here in Little Rock, is reading Fr. Schmemann’s book, For the Life of the World, and he uses that word “eucharist” in a lot of different ways, beyond just the normal translation of “thanksgiving.” So I was wondering if you could point me to some places where I could go that could help me get more of this sort of fuller understanding of the Greek words. I have a Greek-English interlinear Bible, but it’s a little hard to break it open with the sources I’ve got.

Fr. Steven: Well, let me ask you, at Holy Trinity, who is your priest there?

Scott: Fr. Joseph Bittle.

Fr. Steven: Fr. Joseph Bittle—does he know any Greek?

Scott: I assume he knows a little bit. I actually did go to him and ask him about it, and he gave me William Mounce’s Basics of Biblical Greek. I’ve been working through a little bit, and it’s pretty interesting, but it…

Fr. Steven: Are you familiar with a book that was written many, many years ago by a man named Barclay? It’s just simply called New Testament Words, and what he attempts to do there is take a number of Greek words in the New Testament and just kind of explain them, explain what they mean and what their deeper meanings are. The book is called William Barclay’s New Testament Words. Barclay was, I believe, Scottish Presbyterian, but basically the book is fairly sound, so if you want to learn more about a variety of Greek words and how they’re used in the New Testament and the meanings that kind of lie behind those words… So, for example, the word logos is normally translated as “word,” so: “In the beginning was the word… En arche en o logos…” “Logos” has a history, both in Greek philosophy and in Judaism, for that matter. So it’s helpful to know that history and that background, because it actually means much more than just simply “word” in our sort of modern English, American 21st century sense. And actually, Barclay’s book will kind of break that down for you and expand on that.

Scott: Okay, great.

Fr. Steven: So look on the internet for William Barclay’s New Testament Words. It’s not expensive, but it’s a pretty good book. A pretty good place to start, actually.

Scott: Okay, thanks.

Fr. Steven: Actually, when we have Greek festivals, and I do church tours there, just to stir people up, I say to them, “If your priest or minister doesn’t know Greek, don’t believe a word that he says about the New Testament.” So, anyway, it’s important to know the Greek, at least for the New Testament.

Scott: It’s true. At least we have the Fathers if we don’t know the Greek. Thank you very much.

Fr. Steven: All right. Take care. God bless!

So if you’d like to call in, it’s 1-855-AF-RADIO, 1-855-237-2346. Now, I think that there is a question from Ben in Kentucky?

Ben: Hey, Fr. Evan, this is Ben in Kentucky. We know each other well. My sisters go to your church there in Colorado. I just wanted to ask the question: How does Orthodoxy see itself in relation to other religions and other beliefs? Do we believe that we are the sole truth or, oftentimes I hear priests say we know where truth is; we know where it isn’t—but how do you reckon both of those statements? That was my question.

Fr. Steven: Ben, that’s a really good and a very complex question! In fact, a whole show could be devoted just to that one question itself. First, I guess what I should say is that we as Orthodox Christians would say that it’s only in the Person of Jesus Christ that the fullness of the truth is to be found: the truth about God, the truth about the world, the truth about us as human beings, the meaning of life, the answer to death, sin and redemption, suffering, good and evil. We think that this fullness of truth has been revealed to us, it’s been given to us, by Jesus, through Jesus, and in Jesus, in whom all the fullness of God dwelt bodily, as St. Paul says in his letter to the Colossians. So that’s the very first thing we need to understand. As Orthodox Christians, we would always say the fullness of the truth has been given in the Lord Jesus, and that fullness of truth has been preserved most faithfully in the Orthodox Church.

Now, today, Sunday, June 1, is actually the feast of St. Justin the Martyr. St. Justin died—he was executed for being a Christian—in around the year 155, 156, 157, in the city of Rome. He was called not just simply the Martyr but also the Philosopher. One of the things he talks about is that there may be seeds of truth in other religions. “Seeds of truth,” that phrase in the original Greek is spermatikos logos. So, for example, in ancient Greek philosophy—Socrates and Plato—he would say that there are glimpses of the truth that Jesus Christ has revealed to us fully, already present in ancient Greek philosophy. In other words, the seeds of the truth may be found in some of the most unlikely places, but the fullness of the truth is found only in Christ.

Now what’s interesting is that that’s actually a very biblical approach to things. St. Paul basically takes this approach when he preaches the Gospel to the Athenians on the Areopagus near the Parthenon. By the way, the Areopagus is still a place that you can go and visit to this day if you go on pilgrimage to the city of Athens. What I’d like to do for just a moment is take a look at the book of Acts, and in particular it’s Acts 17:16-33, because I think it would be good for you all to kind of hear how St. Paul approaches doing mission work. He talks here… It says here… Let’s see… I have to open up the page; forgive me.

Now while Paul was waiting for Timothy and Silas in Athens, his spirit was provoked within him, for he saw that the city of Athens was full of idols. So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons (the devout persons being those Gentiles who worshiped one God and were interested in Judaism) and the marketplace (the agora) every day. He also conversed with some Epicurean and Stoic philosophers. And some people said, “What does this babbler want to say?” Other people said, “He seems to be a preacher of foreign divinities,” because Paul was preaching Jesus and the resurrection.

And they took Paul, and they brought him to the Areopagus. (It’s a little hill near the Parthenon.) “May we know what this new teaching is that you’re presenting? For you bring some strange things to our ears, and we wish to know therefore what these things mean.”

And then the book of Acts goes on to say all the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there would spend their time in nothing but debating and telling or hearing something new. So here’s what St. Paul does. St. Paul, standing in the midst of the Areopagus, says:

Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you’re very religious, for as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription: To the Unknown God. What therefore you worship as unknown, this is what I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by men, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. And he made from one man every nation of mankind, to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling-place, that they should seek God, and perhaps grope their way towards him, and find him. And yet, he’s actually not far from each one of us, for in him we live and move and have our being. And even some of your own poets have said: For we are indeed his offspring.

Now, what’s interesting there to me is that St. Paul debates people not only in the synagogues but in the open marketplace, the agora. He debates with Epicurean and Stoic philosophers, and it’s clear that first he establishes common ground. In fact, those quotes, “in him we live and move and have our being,” that’s actually a quote from an ancient Greek philosopher, Epimenides, and then the next quote that he has, “for we are indeed his offspring,” is actually from an ancient Greek poet, whose name was Aratus. And what he’s saying is that the unknown god that the Athenians worshiped, he’s there to tell them who that unknown god really is, because the full knowledge of who God is has been given to us in Christ Jesus. And what they know only in part, St. Paul is saying he knows in full.

That whole approach to missions, that’s exactly the approach of some of the great missionaries of the Orthodox Church. That’s how St. Innocent of Alaska carried on his missionary work. Christ as the fulfillment of the beliefs, the myths, that were found among the Native Alaskans he was seeking to bring to the faith.

Note that St. Paul says, “Human beings search for God; human beings grope their way towards God.” Groping is something that we do when we’re either blind or we’re standing in the dark, and we can’t really see our way before us. It’s interesting, because you know that in the Scriptures, especially in John’s gospel and his letters, the Lord Jesus is described as the light of the world. So we actually believe that Jesus Christ has come to shine that light into our darkness. And all the other religions of the world—Greek philosophy, ancient polytheism, Hinduism—these religions are us, if you will, groping our way towards God, trying to find God. And we believe that God has actually come looking for us; that’s what differentiates Christianity from every other religion in the world. We believe that in the Child born in Bethlehem of Judea, the word of God was made flesh, and he has come looking for us.

Now of course the problem is we don’t often want to be found, because if we get found, if we recognize that God has come looking for us and we recognize who he is in Jesus Christ, it means that our whole life has to change; everything is different from that point on. You might ask the question: Why is it that we as human beings seek God? Why has religion been a part of every civilization in history. As Christians, I think we would want to say, because, as it says in Genesis, we’re created in the image and likeness of God; because, as it says in Ecclesiastes, God has set eternity in our hearts. So we as human beings, we’ve always known that there’s something or someone more, that we are somehow incomplete without God, without something to worship.

It’s just simply a fact that if we don’t worship the one, true, and living God, we will find someone or something to worship. In biblical times, idols of wood and stone, in 21st-century America maybe the tendency is more to worship ourselves, and that’s probably the most extreme form of idolatry. The word “ego” is a Greek word, ego. I always like to tease people that we Greeks did invent that, after all.

Now, I hope that this is helpful, because I want you to understand that other religions in and of themselves are not… they’re not evil. People who practice those religions are not evil. They just simply don’t know what we know, and we have to share the fullness of the truth with them. It’s important for us to do so. We have to know our own faith and live our own faith so well so that, just simply by looking at us, they can catch some glimpse of who Jesus Christ is. Again, this is a really complex question; we’re really just scratching the surface. We’ve not even really talked about any of the great religions of the world like Islam and Hinduism and Buddhism and so forth.

So let me do this. I’m going to recommend some books to everyone that maybe you could take a look at. The first book I’d like to recommend is by a man named Fr. John Garvey, and Fr. John is an OCA priest, and he’s written a book called Seeds of the Word: Orthodox Thinking on Other Religions, and that’s published by St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press. “Seeds of the Word,” that’s the Greek spermatikos logos that St. Justin the Martyr, the saint whose memory we celebrate today; that’s his phraseology, actually. So that book is a good book for you all to look at.

There’s another book by Fr. Alex Goussetis; he’s a Greek Orthodox priest in Pennsylvania, and the book that he has out—again, this is very simple, very straightforward—it’s called Encountering World Religions: An Orthodox Perspective. Since I’m actually sitting in Kevin Allen’s house, I probably should give him a plug. If you look at his Illumined Heart programs—I think it’s the Illumined Heart program 161; Kevin Allen actually interviewed Fr. Alex about his book and about dialogue and relating to people of other religious traditions, other religious backgrounds and evangelism. So that would be something good for you to listen to.

The third book is actually the most recent of the three that I’m going to recommend, and it’s just simply Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy. It’s by a priest, again, out of Pennsylvania, Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick, and he is actually, I believe, an Antiochian priest. So I think those would be very good books for you to look at. It talks a great deal about other religions and our relationship to those other religions, and the search for truth that really in some way all human beings are engaged in.

Let me just remind you, if you have a question, please call. 1-855-AF-RADIO; that’s 1-855-237-2346. Let’s see. We have Philip from Pennsylvania, a Roman Catholic who spoke to an Orthodox priest who told him that a signed paper stating Catholicism is a heresy is a requirement to convert. So is Philip on the air?

Woman: He’s not. He hung up.

Fr. Steven: He’s not!? That rascal! [Laughter] Well, Philip, I don’t know if you are interested in becoming Orthodox; I don’t know if you’re a catechumen. I don’t have a lot of the background here that I’d like to know, but basically, certainly we as Orthodox Christian disagree with a number of things that are taught by the Roman Catholic Church. So, for example, we would say that the dogma of Vatican I, that the pope is infallible when he speaks in matters of faith and morals—Orthodox Christians just simply cannot agree to that. We actually think that that is the wrong teaching.

We also have some problems with what in Roman Catholicism is called the immediate ordinary jurisdiction of the pope. In other words, the pope has immediate authority over every bishop, every Roman Catholic Christian in the world. And in Orthodoxy we’re set up in a very, very different way, so that, for example, the Patriarch of Moscow cannot tell the Patriarch of Jerusalem what to do; the Patriarch of Jerusalem can’t tell the Patriarch of Constantinople what to do. We actually all have to get together and talk about it. Sometimes, as you know, that means that we Orthodox are very slow in responding to anything. But at any rate, we take a more conciliar approach to the life of the Church.

We also, of course, have the addition to the Creed, that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father “and from the Son.” There’ve been a number of statements that have come out, ecumenically, about this particular addition to the Creed that was made basically in the middle to the late sixth century, some 300 years after the text was actually written. For us, again, that teaching is simply the wrong teaching. We would say that that teaching is based on John 15:26, where it’s very clearly spoken that the Holy Spirits proceeds from the Father. Now, we also do believe, of course, that the Holy Spirit is sent by the Son and through the Son into the world, but we think that the Holy Spirit proceeds only from the Father. Again, that’s a whole question around Trinitarian theology.

So you would have to, as an Orthodox Christian, have to say that you agree with the Orthodox teaching and disagree with the Catholic teaching about those things. Are those things heresies? There are some Orthodox theologians and Orthodox saints who would say that those indeed are heresies; there are others that are hopeful that perhaps through discussion and some other things we can clarify those statements and kind of come to an understanding of what they mean and what the original—I guess I’d say what the original intention of that stuff is.

So, for example, with the filioque clause in the Creed, we have to admit that St. Ambrose of Milan, St. Augustine of Hippo taught the filioque. They taught that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father, and yet, technically, they are long before the schism took place between Orthodox and Roman Catholic Christians. We also know from St. Maximus the Confessor, that he actually says that there is an Orthodox understanding of the filioque clause in the Creed. So we look to some of these ancient Fathers and some of the other Fathers who insisted otherwise, like St. Photios, who basically said that the filioque clause is just a complete heresy; it’s completely wrong; it’s the false teaching.

We as Orthodox Christians, I think, need to sort that through ourselves, looking at the consensus of the saints, East and West. And that’s something that we have to do our homework on. However, Philip, if you are listening, as a Roman Catholic, if you were interested in becoming Orthodox, you would have to say that you reject the dogma of the filioque, you reject the dogma of papal infallibility, and there’s some other things, too, that do divide us, Orthodox and Roman Catholic Christians. But, thank God, because Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew did meet in Jerusalem just this past weekend.

I understand it’s time for a break, and so, ladies and gentlemen, we’ll be back in a moment. Let’s call in if you can. It’s 1-855-AF-RADIO; 1-855-237-2346. We’ll be right back.

Fr. Steven: Good evening, everyone! This is Fr. Steve Tsichlis. Fr. Evan is taking a well-deserved vacation tonight, and so I’m sitting in for him. I am the pastor at St. Paul’s Greek Orthodox Church in Irvine, California, and I was kindly asked to take his place tonight. So we’ll see what we can do. Call in, again, if you can. It’s 1-855-AF-RADIO, 1-855-237-2346.

Now, Fr. Evan had a number of you call in earlier in the week, and actually you asked questions; you left questions for him to answer. I think as I mentioned to you, he asked me to answer all the hard ones! I don’t know if I can do that, but at least I’ll try and answer a few. So I believe we have another question coming up.

Travis: My name is Travis from Denver, Colorado, and the question is on the unity in the Orthodox Church in America and jurisdictionalism. I’ve been a catechumen for about a year now, and I left the Protestant world doing church planting. I left it for the unity that I saw and the beauty of the Eucharist and the history behind it, but when I got here, it seems as thought the Church in America looks no different than the Protestant church. Obviously, there is the Eucharist; there is a lot of unity. I’m not discrediting that, but when you look at the jurisdictions and the ethnic backgrounds that come into play here, it makes me want to just leave. Anyways, I was just wondering your thoughts on the Orthodox Church in America and what we can do to help change the direction that we’re going in, as lay people or as converts or priests, whoever. Anyways, I appreciate your time, and I look forward to your response.

Fr. Steven: Travis, that’s one of the most difficult questions to answer of all. You know, our jurisdictionalism as Orthodox Christians here in America is just simply stupid, sinful, and wrong. That’s all I can say. It’s sinful, stupid, and wrong; it’s not the way things are supposed to be. You know, I did not really understand how other people view us until I had already been a priest for five years. It was way back in 1988. I was a priest serving in Seattle, and those of you who are old enough to remember remember that 1988 was a pivotal year. It was a year in which Mikhail Gorbachev and Perestroika, the restructuring of the former Soviet Union, were underway; Christianity was being allowed new freedoms that had not been allowed in more than seven decades. At that time, in Seattle, what was called the Greater Church Council of Seattle, which was an ecumenical organization composed of Roman Catholics and Protestants primarily, had wanted to start an ecumenical program to support the emerging Russian Orthodox Church in Leningrad, emerging after so many years of persecution. Of course, Leningrad today is St. Petersburg, but at that time it was still Leningrad.

We had an ecumenical service of prayer, basically a vespers service at St. Demetrios Greek Orthodox Church in Seattle. And we had a program that was printed up by the Church Council of Greater Seattle. I was looking at the last page of the program, and I was completely horrified, and I realized how stupid and sinful we really have been, because on the back of that program it listed all the different Christian denominations that had participated in the Seattle-Leningrad sister churches project. It listed, for example, in alphabetical order, churches like the Episcopal Church, the Lutheran Church, the Presbyterian Church, the Roman Catholic Church, but it also listed as separate denominations the Antiochian Orthodox Church, the Orthodox Church in America, the Greek Orthodox Church. It was very clear that everybody around us saw us as different churches, as different denominations, rather than expressions of one and the same church. Again, that is just simply our sinfulness; it’s not the way things are supposed to be.

Now, there are a number of reasons for that historically. I’m assuming that you know that most of the Orthodox churches in this country were founded originally by immigrants who wanted the Church and brought the Church ultimately with them, but they were not coming to America as part of a missionary movement. They were coming because they were fleeing persecution; they were coming because they were seeking a better life for themselves and their children, but they weren’t really, first and foremost, concerned about establishing the Church in this country. It was not a mission movement, like Sts. Cyril and Methodius going up, oh, a thousand years ago and meeting with the Slavic peoples, learning their language and translating the Scriptures and the liturgy into the Cyrillic alphabet, sort of the ancestor of modern Russian.

The Church here did not come as a missionary movement. It came, sort of, I’d say, on the backs of immigrants, who love the Church, who when they got here realized they needed a church, and who built the churches that we have today, actually often at great sacrifice. The church that I served in Seattle was built by Turkish immigrants of Greek background who in fact came to this country as a result of the exchange of populations after the first World War, when in fact what happened was that most of the Christian population of what we today think of as Turkey was completely eliminated. All those ancient Christian churches in the book of Revelation, like Smyrna, like Sardis—all of those people were completely displaced and became refugees. Some of them came and eventually settled in Seattle, where they established the church that I served.

They established that church by doing things like taking out second mortgages on their homes. They made every possible sacrifice to establish a church, to have a church, to baptize their children, to marry their children, to baptize their grandchildren, to grow towards their Savior, Jesus Christ. So our church came as an immigrant church. The other thing that happened wasn’t till World War I and World War II and all the dislocation that took place. But all that stuff is over and done with today, and we as Orthodox Christians need to look to our bishops and to our clergy to lead us towards unity.

Now, most recently something called the Assembly of Bishops has been formed, and it’s replaced what used to be called the Standing Conference of Canonical Orthodox Bishops, and basically it’s an attempt for all of us as Orthodox Christians, of whatever jurisdictional background we are, to work together on a variety of different projects. And it’s out of that kind of cooperation that International Orthodox Christian Charities has emerged, that the Orthodox Christian Mission Center has emerged, and Project Mexico has emerged, and all of these programs that we do together that are so wonderful and so beautiful.

So what can you do as an individual? You can certainly encourage your priest and your bishop to work together with other Orthodox jurisdictions to do whatever is good and right and true to bring about unity for all the Orthodox in America. You can yourself get to know all the different Orthodox churches in your area. Find out who the priests are, find out who the bishops are, meet with those lay people. In Seattle, when I was a priest there, every Wednesday night during Lent, for example, we celebrated the Presanctified Liturgy together, all the Orthodox in the city, and we went from church to church, with a different priest celebrating the Liturgy, not at his own parish, but at another parish. And then afterwards we’d all get together; we’d have a presentation in the parish hall, and we’d have dinner together, a lenten meal together. And we got to get to know each other, and that’s something that’s really, really important. Get to know all of the Orthodox in your area: all of their churches, all of their clergy, all of their bishops, all of the laity. I think that’s probably the best thing that you can do for now.

I believe there are a couple of other questions?

Alex: Hello, Fr. Evan. Christ is in our midst. My name is Alex. I live in Baltimore, Maryland, and I attend Holy Cross in Linthicum, Maryland. My question has to do with discerning a vocation to the priesthood. To me it seems that there are several perspectives being expressed in the Church today on this topic which are not consistent with each other. One perspective is that a calling to the clergy is something which happens specifically through the Church and in particular by the bishop. Another perspective is that one should sort of discern an inner voice from God, either calling them to the priesthood or to something else. A third perspective I’ve encountered is sort of super-rational, that excludes any sort of mystical experience of an inner voice, a calling that one discerns within their hearts. The last perspective I’ve read is in the writings of St. John Chrysostom, who gives the opinion that even if many, many people were to importune a young man to become a clergyman, he should really ignore all of them and search his own heart. This to me seems more like sort of listening for this inner voice.

I would like to know what you believe the Orthodox Church’s teaching is on this issue, and I think that there are many other young men in our country that would like some clarity on this. Thank you very much.

Fr. Steven: Well! That is really an important question. You know, I guess what I’d say is that it’s not one or the other; it’s not the bishop, and it’s not the little inner voice in your heart and in your mind. It’s really more of a combination of both. I would say that, if you read, and apparently you have read St. John Chrysostom, On the Priesthood, you know that one of the things he says in there is that a man should run away from the priesthood; he should not want to be a priest, and, in fact, if you really, really want to be a priest and you would do anything to be a priest, then you probably should not be a priest.

That’s probably hard for you to hear, but I guess what I would say is that, yes, we do need to listen to that inner voice, but that inner voice has to be confirmed by a number of other people. It has to be confirmed, first and foremost, I think, by our spiritual father. Since you mentioned to me that you go to the Church of the Holy Cross in Linthicum, Maryland, I’m assuming that your priest is Fr. Gary Mathewes-Green, and if that is the case, in fact, you need to go to him and speak with him. And if you’ve not gone to confession with him, you need to go to confession with him. You need to talk to him about what you feel you’re being called to do in the life of the Church. And he will guide you. He will guide you. He will confirm your vocation, or he will say to you, “You know? You need to look at this, and maybe you need to think about doing something else.”

The other thing I guess I’d say is that, yes, it also has to be confirmed by your whole community. It has to be confirmed, of course, by the bishop as well. And there are people I know who feel a calling to the priesthood, but who have been denied, for example, seminarian status at Holy Cross because it was not felt by their bishop that they were ready—psychologically, spiritually—to be priests. And I think that we need to look at the priesthood as something that’s very, very demanding, psychologically and spiritually. I think most young men, when they first start thinking about the priesthood, they think about all these very wonderful, beautiful, amazing things: standing before the altar of God, celebrating the Divine Liturgy with the angels.

I think that a lot of times, though, people don’t really think in terms of the details, the sort of daily, nitty-gritty of life in a parish that every pastor, all the things that he has to deal with… So, for example, most pastors, at least at seminaries, are not well-trained to be marriage counselors, and yet, to be honest, that’s one of the things that priests are called upon to do a great deal. You have to not only know the Bible, you have to not only know the Fathers and the saints and the Ecumenical Councils and the teaching, you also have to be able to be good with people; you have to love people, in all of their sins, in all of their faults, with everything that’s wrong, not just everything that’s right with them; with everything that’s wrong with them.

And then you need to be able to look at yourself, clearly and openly, and see what’s wrong in yourself and where you need to grow and where you need to improve. It’s absolutely essential that the priesthood be thought of as something that… It’s not just something you have once you’re ordained. It’s something that you grow in. And in fact, in the canons of the Church, it talks about the fact that men should not be ordained a deacon until they’re at least 25, and men should not be ordained as a priest until they’re at least 30. And when you look at when those canons were enacted in the ancient world and you realize that, at that time, the average lifespan couldn’t have been more than 40, you realize that what’s really being called for there is maturity. You’re looking for men who are mature. And that really is something that comes only with time, with discernment, with the practice of the spiritual life, with a spiritual father, with theological education.

I never want to minimize theological education. You have to go to seminary. I’ve seen too many young men say to me, “Father, I don’t need to go to seminary to be a saint,” and that’s true; you don’t. But you should go to seminary if you want to be able to teach other people some of the basics of the faith, especially in this culture, at this time, here in America, where there are so many demands put on people by the secular culture around us but also by Evangelical Christians, all kinds of other Christian groups, all kinds of other religious groups, non-Christian groups: Hindus, Buddhists, everybody. We need to know who we are, who they are, and how to respond to them and how to share the Gospel with them. And a lot of that really takes place at the seminary. You kind of have to look at the seminary, really as a place of discipleship. You know, the disciples spent three years with the Lord Jesus, learning what it meant to be his disciples. They were sent out, which is actually what the word “apostle” means: to be sent out. They spent three years learning to be his disciples, and we need to, I think, as Christians, as young men, we need to plan, if you will, to spend three years at a seminary, learning what it means to be a disciple of Jesus Christ.

So, again, if you can call in, it’s 1-855-AF-RADIO, 1-855-237-2346.

Jacob: Hi, Fr. Evan. This is Jacob from St. Louis, Missouri. My question for you today deals with prayer and the invocation of the saints. I hope you will be able to help me understand and see the merit of the Orthodox teaching on this point. As a Lutheran I’ve learned that, while my tradition does not deny that the departed saints are praying for us in heaven as they await the resurrection on the last day, we do not believe, teach, or confess that a Christian must or ought invoke the saints by addressing a prayer to them. Rather, prayer is directed to God alone.

I have asked Orthodox friends who actually converted from the Lutheran faith and even Roman Catholic friends to explain this practice to me. Often, they explain the practice by likening it to asking a friend to pray for you. Now, while I certainly have no trouble asking friends to pray for me and I see some appeal to the idea, I fail to see how such a request constitutes prayer. Is invocation of the saints in Orthodoxy simply a request for the departed saints to offer up prayers on our behalf, or is there more to it? Does Orthodoxy believe that the saints have an ability, once they’ve departed this life, to somehow grant or answer the prayers of the saints in the Church Militant?

My impression and guess is that the Orthodox would say, no, the power isn’t with the saints themselves; only God can answer prayers, and so sometimes he sends departed saints to do that, but then again, I’m speculating; I don’t know. Does Orthodoxy require the Orthodox lay person to invoke saints, or may one be Orthodox and still be uncomfortable with the practice? Does Orthodoxy consistently speak of prayer and this just general, broad sense of communication between saints, whether living or departed? What resources do you suggest for better understanding this Orthodox teaching on the invocation of the saints, and, for me in particular, its history in the life of the Church?

I read the popular introductions to Orthodoxy—Timothy Ware, etc.—but don’t know where to look for something a little heavier and more informative in substance on the matter. Thank you for your time and in advance for your insights and thoughts. I hope and pray that God will continue to bless you richly. Thank you.

Fr. Steven: Wow, Jacob, that’s a lot of questions! That’s a lot of questions. You know, I’m from St. Louis, so I’m wondering if you say you’re from Lutheran background if you’re Lutheran, Missouri Synod, background, because I actually took some classes at Concordia Seminary in St. Louis many, many years ago.

How do we as Orthodox Christians understand invocation of the saints? And can someone be an Orthodox Christian and still feel, I think you used the phrase, “uncomfortable with that idea” of the invocation of the saints? The short answer to the second part of the question is no. You have to be comfortable with the invocation of the saints before you can fully enter into the life of the Orthodox Church. We believe very strongly in the communion of the saints. That is to say that we are united in one body, that the Church is both visible and invisible, and that the saints are very much present among us and with us whenever we gather for worship; whenever we celebrate the Eucharist, the angels and saints are present with us. So for us, that sense of the saints’ presence is really part and parcel of understanding what the body of Christ is, what the Church is, and who we are in relationship to the body of Christ.

I guess what I’d say is that the phrase, “saints,” of course, just in the New Testament, is used not just simply to describe those particular men and women that the Church has canonized, has held up specifically as examples of what it means to be a real and authentic follower of Jesus Christ; that word’s also applied to just everyday folks like you and me. And actually, even in the liturgy that’s the case.

So, for example, when the priest is celebrating the Liturgy, at a certain point in the service, he picks up what’s called the Lamb—it’s the piece of bread that we believe has become and will become the body of Christ and be given in Communion to all the faithful there present. The phrase in Greek is very, very compact. The priest says, “Proskomen (pay attention, listen up) ta agia tois agiois,” in the original text. A lot of places, that’s translated as “the holy Gifts for the holy people of God,” and that’s actually more of a prayer phrase than a literal translation. Ta agia does mean “that which is holy,” literally the bread and the wine, for sure, that we’re about to receive in Communion, but tois agiois not just “to the people of God,” although that’s one way to understand it; it literally means “to the saints.” So at that point in the Liturgy, the people who are present are being addressed as saints. So we think that, in invoking the saints, we are just simply being part of the one, living body of the Church.

“Invoke” means to call upon, and certainly we ask the saints to pray for us, and certainly we believe—and your instinct is right in this—that God acts through the saints. That’s very clear, for example, in the Acts of the Apostles, where people even seek to fall, to lay themselves so that when Peter passes by, his shadow will fall upon them. So that whole idea of the invocation of the saints is key; it’s absolutely key to understanding and to being an Orthodox Christian.

Recommending different things for you to read about this: there is a booklet called “Prayer and the Departed Saints” which contains a little bit more in it than does Bishop Kallistos (Ware)‘s The Orthodox Church. There are some other things that you can read, too, both on the internet and in booklets put out by Conciliar Press and other Orthodox presses. But I guess what I would say is that Orthodox Christians have a very palpable sense of the presence of the saints, both living and departed, and that that is something that is essential to the Orthodox faith.

So hopefully I’ve answered at least part of your questions, a number of your questions. Thank you for calling in.

If you’d like to call with a question, the number is 1-855-AF-RADIO, 1-855-237-2346. Thank you!

Q1: In some of the spiritual literature of the Church, a great deal of emphasis is placed on attaining theosis. If one does not attain theosis in this life, are they doomed to hell?

Fr. Steven: Well… [Laughter] A lot depends on what you mean by “theosis.” Theosis is a process, first of all; it’s not just simply an attainment. It’s not like you “get” theosis the way you, I don’t know what, buy a hamburger at McDonald’s. Theosis is a living-out of the Christian faith from the moment that you enter the life of the Church until the day that you die. It’s a struggle to become ever more Christ-like, ever more filled with the Holy Spirit, ever more open to the direction of God. So if you have not attained theosis, will you make it into heaven? To be honest, again, Orthodox Christians don’t pass judgment on other people; we think that that’s God’s business and not ours. If you read the Philokalia, if you read other spiritual books, one of the things that is said over and over and over again is not to compare ourselves with other people, not looking at other people and saying, “Oh my gosh, they’re holier than I; they’re further along the path of theosis than I am.” That kind of thinking is actually very deadly to the spiritual life.

I guess what I’d say is that my recommendation to you would be not to worry about that. Go to confession on a regular basis. Receive Communion on a regular basis. Seek Christ. Live your life in a pure fashion. Do the things that you know you need to do. Desire to be a saint; want to be a saint; want to be holy—and everything else will follow after that.

God bless you all. I think I’m being waved to by Colleen: “This is the end of the show, Father! Please be quiet!” So listen in next week for Kevin Allen!