Filed under: Orthodoxy, Quotes | Tags: Alexander Schmemann, Church, Eastern Orthodoxy, Tradition
“From the religious point of view, nothing is more harmful than to live by illusions in an artificially recreated past, seeking in ‘ancient, venerable and colorful rites’ an escape from a prosaic and burdensome present. Such a religious attitude, quite common in our days, openly contradicts the Christian faith, which is aimed at transforming life and not at supplying religious substitutes for life. To understand this study as an appeal simply to restore the past is to misunderstand it, for there is no simple restoration, nor can there ever be. Equally harmful, however, is the attitude which rejects the past simply because it is past, which, in other words, accepts at its face value modern rhetoric about the radical ‘revolution’ in man’s worldview that makes it impossible for him to ‘continue’ in any ideas of the past. If we do not believe that the Holy Spirit guides the Church today as He guided her yesterday and shall guide her until the end of the world, that Christ is ‘the same yesterday, and today, and forever’ (Heb. 13:8), then obviously we do not believe in the Church, and she is either a precious ‘cultural heritage’ to be preserved or an archaic past to be discarded.
If, however, we believe in the Church, then the study of her past has only one goal: to find, and to make ours again and again, that which in her teaching and life is truly eternal, i.e. which precisely transcends the categories of past, present and future and has the power to transform our lives in all ages and in all situations.”
Alexander Schmemann, Of Water & The Spirit, 149-50.
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Christ is Risen!
I think it was Fr. Schmemann who declared “Thank God I am Orthodox”. Holy Orthodoxy is by nature apophatic and so is the overarching metaphor — by holy design.
Just as our salvation is revealed, so too, is the Lord revealed — there is this inner dimension to the eternal kingdom that is too easily missed if we are not “right” with God (cf. 1 Peter 1:5–13).
“He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.” (1 Peter 1:20)
Comment by Micah 7 May 2010 @ 11:42 am