I’ve been thinking since my last post about the virtue contrasts between the early Christians and the Greeks, the Stoics in particular. I’d mentioned that the Greeks privileged self-control while the Christians gave love pride of place…

Socrates died the ideal Greek death. Self-composed, stoical, and philosophical. While his students grieved and wept, Socrates calmly drank the hemlock that would kill him.

Jesus, by contrast, sweats blood in the garden of Gethsemane. Jesus resists death and is in agony as he faces it. A far cry from Socrates.

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“The beginning of theology is not the card catalogue, but doing battle with the passions. And the end of theology is not becoming a professor, but becoming a saint.”

Macrina Walker meditates on theology in the west here. Good thoughts, including:

The West tends to think of theology as a mental activity. Probably this is because the people to whom the West gives the name theologian live in the academy. Theology is a science practised in the hall of sciences, and even if an individual theologian is also urged to have faith commitments in his or her heart, and to be active in service to the poor, the only reason for calling these people theologians is because of what they think about. Worship is taken to be either an expression of believe, or an instrument for the creation of belief. And only if that believing requires a tune-up clarification does theology enter the picture.

Quoting Fr. Alexander Schmemann: “It is indeed the original sin of the entire western theological development that it made texts the only loci theologica, the extrinsic authorities of theology, disconnecting theology from its living source, liturgy and spirituality.”

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The skeptic who in the face of missionary Christianity says, “Yes, but what about all those good Hindus who lead decent lives and don’t believe that Jesus is the only one?” is not really expecting to become a good Hindu or even to be friends with good Hindus. Certainly this skeptic does not plan to get involved at all in the problems of differentiating between good Hindus and bad Hindus but only to back away from the call of Jesus, who has always admitted that if we entrust our life to him and his cause, we will never be proven right until beyond the end of the story and cannot count on being positively reinforced along all of the way. What is thus stated in the form of a general rejection of all particularity in favor of a vision of universal validity is, when more deeply seen, more particular and more negative; namely, a specific pattern of avoidance of the particular claims of Christian loyalty in its continuing risk and uncertainty.

— John Howard Yoder, A Royal Priesthood: Essays Ecclesiological and Ecumenical (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994), 112-13. (via inhabitatio dei)

Ariely points out that adaptation can be slowed or even prevented through intermittent exposure to the underlying stimulus — that is, if you take a break, the emotional sensation comes back with nearly full force.

Here’s where our intuitive response is really wrong: we have a tendency to indulge our pleasures without respite, and to take frequent breaks from those things that make us miserable. This is exactly backwards. If you want to maximize your pleasure — a great dessert, the delight of furnishing your first real apartment after graduation, a wonderful new relationship — you should trickle it into your life, with frequent breaks for your adaptive response to diminish. If you want to minimize your pain — an unpleasant chore, an awful trip — you should continue straight through without a break, because every time you stop, your adaptive response resets and you experience the discomfort anew.

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My short response got long, so I’m posting it here.

Our parish was founded about eleven years ago by a priest and a three families from California. We had inquirers’ meetings in homes for a few months, then set up a chapel and began having daily services. Because there was a core community who were already familiar with this kind of sacramental community and worship, there was something for us inquirers to come and be immersed in from the beginning; from day one we had a common ethos. I think trying to start a congregation from zero would be vastly more difficult.

Common worship: We pray Matins and Vespers pretty much every day. Our biggest service is Great Vespers on Saturday evening, together with Matins and the Liturgy on Sunday morning. Folks stay after Vespers to speak with the priests (confession) so after a 45-minute service you’ll have an hour or two of people chatting outside or downstairs while the children run around having fun. Sundays we finish up around 11:30ish, then we have a potluck meal and coffee, and again we spend a while enjoying each other’s company. The shared experience of worship and common spiritual struggle is one of the strongest centripetal factors in our parish community.

We don’t have children’s church. The littles stay in the service with us. Often a family will arrive, hand off their babies and toddlers to the various godparents, and pick up their own godchildren before finding a place to stand for the service. When babies get noisy, we take them outside for a few minutes, then right back in; they learn early that worship services are a natural part of life. And they learn to sing at the same time they’re learning to talk.

Community: Many of us choose to live within walking distance of the temple, so we’re apt to show up on each other’s doorsteps or see one another when we go for a walk. We have one another over for meals frequently, along with folks from outside our community. One of our “core values” is hospitality, so we often have friends-of-friends staying with us.

Mission: We don’t do “evangelism” as a discrete category of action or ministry. But at any given time you’ll find our members interacting in the local art scene, the skater community, the symphony, with moms at the YWCA, in job placement and roller derby and ESL, leading rafting expeditions… all the normal healthy things real people do. Every one of those relationships exposes people to Christians being off-guard — if we’re living up to our hype, that means folks are seeing how genuine Christians treat one another. And pretty much all of these kinds of interactions have resulted in people encountering our web of relationships, becoming interested in our uncommon tradition, and eventually committing to our God in baptism.

Those of us who are former Evangelicals, or have been “witnessed” to, don’t appreciate sales pitches for Jesus; if everyone were an evangelism-target, then we’d never have real relationships with anyone as persons.

Leadership: We have several presbyters and deacons, plus cantors who run the services. The clergy have day jobs, and in the church they provide spiritual direction, help with teaching, and work at the altar. A parish council worries about the money and pays the bills (or so I assume since the lights are still on.) There’s a Sunday choir who lead congregational singing at major services, a ladies benevolent group that looks for charitable projects to support, a small food bank, a primary school, and a number of craftsmen, farmers, teachers, winemakers, web workers, and others who come up with ideas and put them into action. (Leadership is having an idea and making it happen. Nobody needs permission to lead something :-)

I hear a lot of Christians talk about building leaders. From our perspective, that may be skipping a step. Since we practice making disciples, not converts, our goal is holiness and wholeness for each person in the parish community, or who is coming into it. We concentrate on teaching people practical skills for the spiritual warfare of owning their bodies and wills; being intentional and present in the moment; and restoration to balance and inner stillness. There isn’t a point where we graduate and now we’re a spiritual adult. If the process of restoring souls and renewing minds is working, then we ought to see individuals naturally finding their stride and discovering ways they can serve (i.e. lead).

Fads and Fixtures: Ten Deadly Trappings of Evangelism

by Joe Carter

“Virtually all the people on Time magazine’s list of ‘The 25 Most Influential Evangelicals’ share at least one glaringly significant trait,” says Phillip Johnson, “For the most part, these are the fadmakers.” Phil goes on to list a number of “cheerleaders for whatever is fashionable”, including the usual suspects such as Rick Warren and Tim LaHaye, and explains why their programs are fads:

Not one of those movements or programs even existed 35 years ago. Most of them would not have been dreamed of by evangelicals merely a generation ago. And, frankly, most of them will not last another generation. Some will last a few short months (like the Jabez phenomenon did); others may seem to dominate for several years but then die lingering deaths (like Bill Gothard’s movement is doing). But they will all eventually fade and fall from significance. And some poor wholesale distributor will be left with warehouses full of Jabez junk, Weigh-Down Workshop paraphernalia, “What Would Jesus Do?” bracelets, Purpose-Driven” merchandise, and stacks and stacks of “emerging church” resources.

Like Johnson, I’m concerned about the way in which evangelicals tend to embrace whatever trends and kitsch happen to be hot sellers at “Christian” bookstores. But while Johnson laments that most of the “stuff you are currently being told you must read and implement will soon seem as hopelessly out of date” I take comfort in knowing that most of this stuff is nothing more than a passing trend. It is not the dernier cri that will soon be gone that concerns me but the faddage that becomes a fixture. Fads still receive scrutiny while fixtures remain largely unquestioned.

The following are ten fixtures of evangelism that I find particularly harmful. None of them are inherently pernicious (well, except for #10) but they have a tendency to be used in ways that are counterproductive to their intended purposes.

#1 Making Converts — I’ve always felt uneasy about the idea that Christians should be seeking to make converts. Am I wrong in thinking that the making of converts is a task associated with Islam, rather than Christianity? Perhaps I have a flawed understanding of the Gospel, but I always thought the purpose of evangelism is not to make converts but to make, as Christ commanded, disciples. Indeed, my primary complaint against each of the other nine methods on this list is that they are usually ineffective in instigating true conversion much less helping make true disciples.

#2 The Sinner’s Prayer — The gates of hell have a special entrance reserved for people who thought that they had a ticket into heaven because someone told them all they needed to do was recite the “sinner’s prayer.” I’ve searched through the entire New Testament and can’t find an example of anyone who was “saved” after reciting such a prayer. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that such prayer is worthless or that it can’t be used by the Holy Spirit. But salvation is not obtained by reciting a magical incantation as many, many, “Christians” will discover after it’s far, far, too late.

#3 “Do you know Jesus as…” — In the fall of 1987 I began my freshman year of college. I was far from home, overwhelmed and lonely on a campus of 20,000 students. While sitting alone in the cafeteria one afternoon, an older student walked up, smiled and asked if he could join me. I was starved for conversation and thrilled to have the company. He sat his tray down in front of mine and took a seat as I prepared to engage him in a heady discussion of his choosing. Politics, philosophy, science. I was mentally preparing for anything he threw at me.

Glancing up from his plate of spaghetti, he asked, “Have you accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior?”

For a few seconds I was stunned, completely at a loss for a response. “I’m, yeah, actually I have.” I finally managed in reply.

“Oh,” he said, visibly disappointed. “Okay, that’s good.” He wore a look of minor defeat. He had chosen the wrong table; no soul would be won for Christ over this lunch. We chatted politely while I finished my burger. He ate quickly and excused himself. After that lunch, I never saw him again.

This is one question that needs never be asked for it shows (a) you do not know the person well enough, (b) the answer is yes and the person is a lousy Christian, or (c) the answer is no in which case you just activated their Fundie-alert system and caused them to switch their brains into ignore mode. Instead of asking about a “personal savior” you might want to simply try to get to know the person.

#4 Tribulationism — Ask a non-believer to give a rudimentary explanation of “the Rapture” and chances are they can provide a fairly accurate description of that concept. Ask the same person to give a basic explanation of the Gospel message, though, and they are likely to be stumped. The reason for this curious state of affairs is that evangelicals have promoted what I refer to as “Tribulationism” — an overemphasis on eschatology that overshadows the Gospel. I’m sure that somewhere in the three dozen novels that comprise the Left Behind series the Gospel message is presented. But there is something horribly wrong when the greatest story ever told is buried beneath a third-rate tale of the apocalypse.

#5 Testimonies — Several years ago, during a job interview for a Christian organization, my prospective employer asked me to tell him my “testimony.” The fact that I was a Christian apparently wasn’t enough. I had to have a good conversion story to go along with my faith. Now you may have a great story about how the hound of Heaven” chased you down and gnawed on your leg until you surrendered. No doubt your story would make for a gripping movie of the week on Lifetime and lead to the making of numerous converts (see #1). But the harsh truth is that your story doesn’t much matter. You are only a bit player in the narrative thread; the main part goes to the Divine Protagonist. In fact, He already has a pretty good story so why not just tell that one instead?

#6 The Altar Call – In the 1820’s evangelist Charles Finney introduced the “anxious seat,” a front pew left vacant where at the end of the meeting “the anxious may come and be addressed particularly — and sometimes be conversed with individually.” At the end of his sermon, he would say, “There is the anxious seat; come out, and avow determination to be on the Lord’s side.” The problem with this approach, as theologian J.I. Packer, explains is that,

The gospel of God requires an immediate response from all; but it does not require the same response from all. The immediate duty of the unprepared sinner is not to try and believe on Christ, which he is not able to do, but to read, enquire, pray, use the means of grace and learn what he needs to be saved from. It is not in his power to accept Christ at any moment, as Finney supposed; and it is God’s prerogative, not the evangelist’s, to fix the time when men shall first savingly believe. For the latter to try and do so, by appealing to sinners to begin believing here and now, is for man to take to himself the sovereign right of the Holy Ghost. It is an act of presumption, however creditable the evangelists motive’s may be. Hereby he goes beyond his commission as God’s messenger; and hereby he risks doing incalculable damage to the souls of men. If he tells men they are under obligation to receive Christ on the spot, and demands in God’s name that they decide at once, some who are spiritually unprepared will try to do so; they will come forward and accept directions and “go through the motions” and go away thinking they have received Christ, when all the time they have not done so because they were not yet able to do so. So a crop of false conversions will result from making such appeals, in the nature of the case. Bullying for “decisions” thus in fact impedes and thwarts the work of the Holy Spirit in the heart. Man takes it on himself to try to bring that work to a precipitate conclusion, to pick the fruit before it is ripe; and the result is “false conversions,” hypocrisy and hardening. “For the appeal for immediate decision presupposes that men are free to “decide for Christ” at any time; and this presupposition is the disastrous issue of a false, un-Scriptural view of sin.

My friend Jared Bridges has pointed out another reason for me, as a Baptist, to despise the term “altar call”: We don’t believe in transubstantiation and we don’t burn offerings, so we have no need for an “altar.”

#7 Witnessing — Evangelism ain’t Amway. It is not a form of Multi-Level Marketing in which you get extra credit for the number of people in your network and you don’t get a great commission for the Great Commission. If you want to sell something door-to-door make it Amway products not the Good News.

If you want to be a more effective “witness for Christ” then start by doing what Christ did and love other people. Start by loving the “unlovable” — the smelly, unbathed men down at the mission, the annoying kids at church, the bonehead who cuts you off in traffic. Yes, you need to tell people about the Gospel. But that is evangelism, not “witnessing.” In the context of the Christian life, “witness” should be a noun more often than a verb.

#8 Protestant Prayers — Last week one of my fellow coworkers, a young Catholic man, was asked to open our meeting with a prayer. Without hesitation he began reciting the “Lord’s prayer.” Afterward I joked that, having come up with such a fine prayer, he might want to write it down for future use. What I didn’t say what how his recitation of the prayer made me uncomfortable.

First, I’m not used to hearing prayers that don’t contain the word “just” (as in “We just want to thank you Lord…”) so it had an odd ring to it. Second, it seemed to violate the accepted standards for public prayer. I had always assumed that praying in public required being able to interlace some just-want-to’s in with some Lord-thank-you-for’s and be- with-us-as-we’s in a coherent fashion before toppping it all with an Amen. Third, I thought that prayers are supposed to be spontaneous — from the heart, off the top of the head — emanations, rather than prepackaged recitations. If it ain’t original, it ain’t prayer, right? Can I get an amen?

But where did this idea come from? We have entire books to teach us how to pray yet Jesus managed to wrap up the lesson in less than forty words. Why isn’t that prayer good enough for evangelicals to use? Why do our prayers sound nothing like His example? (And if you are wondering what prayer is doing on a list of evangelistic fixtures then we are really in trouble.)

#9 The Church Growth Movement — Sadly, this has moved from fad to fixture. Think I’m wrong? Ask the next person you see to define that phrase. In fact, ask the next 100 people you see. Let me know if you find anyone that tells you they think the church growth movement is a movement in the church to grow disciples. (If you do find someone who says that then smack ‘em upside their head with a Scofield for they’re a Purpose-Driven Liar.)

#10 Chick Tracts — Chick Tracts are a tool of the devil. That fact — and yes it is a fact — is not changed just because you know a guy who knows a guy who heard testimony about a guy who said the Sinner’ Prayer after finding “The Long Trip” on the floor of a truck stop restroom.

The term evangelism derives from the Greek word evangel — “good news.” So it’s rather odd how so much evangelism appears to be about “selling” Jesus and hoping that you can convince the unsaved heathen to buy into salvation. This was the way I had been taught during Vacation Bible School classes at the First Baptist Church of Fire and Brimstone. Pass out Chick tracts, recite the canned “how to get saved” speech, get them to say the sinner’s prayer. Above all, close the deal. They may die at any time and their souls would be lost to eternal damnation if I didn’t “make the sell.” By the age of eight I was a cross between Billy Graham and Willy Loman.

Whenever I began to seriously read the Gospels, though, I noticed something strange. People constantly flocked to Jesus despite the fact that he never passed out a single tract. He would walk up to people and say “Follow me” and the next thing you know they’re giving up their lives to follow him around the countryside.

The people responded to Jesus the way they did because he is God. He is what our hearts have always been seeking. When we come face to face with him we may accept or reject him. But we can’t not know him. Calvin claimed that there is an awareness or sense of God (sensus divinitatis) implanted in all people by nature. The context of this universally distributed belief being rather minimal: there is a God, He is the Creator, and that He ought to be worshiped. The Gospel, though, fills in the essential details.

We evangelicals don’t need tools of evangelism. We don’t need fads and fixtures. We don’t need anything more than the Gospel. For that is one fixture of our faith that will never go out of style.

(Note: The last time I posted this article, I ended up caving into peer pressure and admitting that maybe this stuff ain’t all that bad. Two years later I find that I conceded too much. I’ve modified my stance a bit and clarified a few points of contention. But I really do believe that these “fixtures” have become detrimental to the making of disciples. Am I wrong? I’m open to hearing counter-claims.)

Considering that his book “Misquoting Jesus” explored the issue of variant readings in New Testament manuscripts it may be surprising to some that Bart Ehrman’s book itself contains millions and millions of variants.

Following are some examples of the variants:

On p. 13 reference is made to “Timothy LeHaye and Philip Jenkins” as the authors of the Left Behind series of novels. However, the authors of the series are Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins. Thus, error 1. Tim has never published as “Timothy,” error 2. his last name is not LeHaye but LaHaye and error 3. Jenkins’s first name is not Philip but Jerry.

On p. 110 error 4. “Timothy” is used as LaHaye’s last name.

In the index Timothy’s name is error 5. again spelled as “LeHaye.”

On p. 110 Hal Lindsey’s name is error 6. misspelled as “Hal Lindsay.”

On p. 70 Desiderius Erasmus is error 7. misspelled as “Desiderus Erasmus.”

…[snip]…

Now, if you are paying attention—or are you like me and simply cannot afford to pay attention? :o)—you may be thinking 1) that is only 16 errors, 2) they are mostly merely misspellings, 3) they do not affect the contents of the text and certainly do not affect any major point which the book seeks to make.
As for 2) and 3); thank you for noticing as this is precisely, word for word, how many of us feel about Bart Ehrman’s criticisms of the New Testament manuscripts.

As for 1) how do 16 equal my assertion of there being millions and millions of variants? Well, let us learn some methodology, the sort that allows Ehrman claim, “Put it this way: There are more variances among our manuscripts than there are words in the New Testament.”

I do not know how many copies Misquoting Jesus has sold but it is reported that “Within the first three months, more than 100,000 copies were sold.”

The way it works is as simple as it is deceptive: you multiply the 16 variants by how many times they have been reproduced. As the 16 have been reproduced 100,000 (in three months alone) you multiply these and so the total of variants in Misquoting Jesus equals: 1,600,000.

And that, boys and girls, is how Bart Ehrman manages to make sensational claims that gain him notoriety and quite a few shekels.

Keep reading…

This post is written mainly for the benefit of atheists who think that the “God Hates Shrimps” retort does anything to undermine or expose the belief, held by evangelical Christians, that the Bible teaches that homosexual practice is a sin.

In the previous sentence, I used the word ‘benefit’ deliberately. Not only does an atheist holding a “God Hates Shrimps” board completely fail to trouble any evangelical Christian with half a clue, it actually portrays the atheist in a very bad light. Such a person is demonstrating that, on the one hand, they haven’t bothered to find out the first thing about why Christians believe that homosexual practice is a sin, and yet on the other, they think that they have a three-word killer argument that will bring 2000 years of Christian teaching to its knees in embarrassed confusion. In short, any evangelical Christian with half a clue will read those words as if they said “My ignorance is surpassed only by my arrogance”.

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To his excellent study of the Hebrew and Greek biblical texts, I’d only add one thing as a specifically Orthodox perspective.

Christians after the age of the apostles use the scriptural condemnations of same-sex activity to express and explain this portion of the Church’s understanding that these relations are a distortion (i.e. sin) and cause spiritual damage. The consensus of Christian practice from first century to the first half of the twentieth is itself the Tradition in this regard. Orthodox Christians don’t construct a sexual morality from scratch by tying together Bible passages. That’s not necessary when the mind of the Church already reflects millennia of consistent abhorrence of these acts — as well as stern but compassionate pastoral support for those repenting from them.

A related article: The Gay Invention: Homosexuality is a linguistic as well as a moral error. (Touchstone Magazine)

Bishop Provenzano offered his blessing for Caroline Church to use this creed during all liturgies on Mother’s Day, and invited the class to share it.

What did the kids come up with? This:

We believe in the Eternal, Sacred, and Mystical God, the Creator of all, who is powerful and all-knowing, who listens, loves, and forgives, and remains willing to be merciful and giving.

We believe in the Selfless, Divine and Human, Rebel Jesus, our Savior and BFFL*, who was a wanderer, healer, teacher, and storyteller. Although He died, He is living today.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the mysterious breath of God, the friendly ghost and mighty wind, who is our comforter and protector.

We believe in God’s Holy Church. It invites and welcomes us home as God’s family. It is traditional, yet intimate. It is a place of learning and worship, where we are given discipline and structure while being fed with holy food and drink.

We believe in believing and learning, in prayer, mercy, and forgiving. We believe in miracles, beauty, and music. And we believe that we matter.

The tame God described in this creed reminds me of a scene in Neil Gaiman’s novel American Gods. The gods Woden and Ishtar, sitting in a coffee place in San Francisco, are arguing over whether anyone actually remembers or worships them. He calls to the waitress.

“I was just wondering if you could solve a little argument we were having over here. My friend and I were disagreeing over what the word ‘Easter’ means. Would you happen to know?”

The girl stared at him as if green toads had begun pushing their way between his lips. Then she said, “I don’t know about any of that Christian stuff. I’m a pagan. ”

“And tell me, as a pagan, who do you worship?”

“Worship?”

“That’s right. I imagine you must have a pretty wide-open field. So to whom do you set up your household altar? To whom do you bow down? To whom do you pray at dawn and dusk?”

Her lips described several shapes without saying anything before she said, “The female principle. It’s an empowerment thing. You know?”

“Indeed. And this female principle of yours. Does she have a name?”

“She’s the goddess within us all,” said the girl ith the eyebrow ring, color rising to her cheek. “She doesn’t need a name.”

“Ah,” said Wednesday, with a wide monkey grin, “so do you have might bacchanals in her honor? Do you drink blood wine under the full moon while scarlet candles burn in silver candleholders? Do you step naked into the seafoam, chanting ecstatically to your nameless goddess while the waves lick at your legs, lapping your thighs like the tongues of a thousand leopards?”

“You’re making fun of me,” she said. “We don’t do any of that stuff you were saying.”

…

“There,” said Wednesday, “is one who ‘does not have the faith and will not have the fun,’ Chesterton. Pagan indeed. ”

When he was 11 years old, Yevgeny Rodionov received from his grandmother a little cross on a chain. He wanted to wear it to school, but his mother, a devout atheist, warned him against it, since the communist authorities frowned on such things. Yevgeny wore it anyway and refused to ever take it off. When Yevgeny grew, up he enlisted as a soldier in the Russian army.

When he was 19, he was violently taken hostage by Muslim Chechen rebels. They kept him hanging by his wrists in a basement. He was left days without food and was severely beaten. He did not take off his cross even at the hardest moment of beastly tortures. The Muslims ordered Yevgeny and several other Russian prisoners to deny Christ and convert to Islam. Unlike most of his fellow prisoners, Yevgeny refused to betray his Savior and was beheaded by his torturer, Ruslan Khaikhoroyev, on May 23, 1996.

The Muslim executioner told his mother, “Your son had a choice to stay alive. He could have converted to Islam, but he did not agree to take his cross off.” Yevgeny’s mother, Lubov, was able to recover her son’s body to give him a proper burial. After seeing her son’s boots in a shallow grave full of four dead soldiers, she would not believe it was him until she saw his cross still around his neck. She found his head later.

Veneration of this Holy Martyr has been spreading and pilgrims are flocking from miles away to venerate his miracle working relics. An Icon that was made of Yevgeny has begun weeping myrrh. Yevgeny’s father died shortly after the return of his son’s body, not being able to live with the torment of loosing his son. Yevgeny’s mother, who never before set foot in a church, put off the world and is now an Orthodox Christian believer, saved by the example of her son, the Holy Martyr Yevgeny Rodionov.

(via Death to the World)

The following quote (of St. Seraphim of Sarov) is framed and mounted in the narthex of my parish. I first obtained the quote from my Archbishop:

You cannot be too gentle, too kind.

Shun even to appear harsh in your treatment of each other.

Joy, radiant joy, streams from the face of him who gives and kindles joy in the heart of him who receives.

All condemnation is from the devil. Never condemn each other…

Instead of condemning others, strive to reach inner peace.

Keep silent, refrain from judgment. This will raise you above the deadly arrows of slander, insult, and outrage and will shield your glowing hearts against all evil.

I am continuously puzzled by the fact that people are frequently unkind and just as frequently not gentle. I cannot point to myself as a model in this – I know my transgressions and my sin is ever before me. But it nevertheless remains a puzzle.

As I ponder the human heart I can see that judgment comes easily to many of us. And most people who are harsh in their judgments of others are just as harsh in their judgment of themselves. It’s as if we had a Freudian Super-Ego living inside our heads judging everything in sight. Of course, this gives us no peace and robs us of compassion.

More…

The King Beetle On A Coconut Estate from the album “It’s All Crazy! It’s All False! It’s All A Dream! It’s Alright” by mewithoutYou. Download the song for 99 cents at Amazon.

About this song, Billy Kangas writes:

It’s a story about some beetles that are trying to figure out what fire is. The song is really a parable about trying to know God. I have to say I started weeping when I heard it, and I’m not sure why. The ending chant is “why not be utterly changed into fire?”

Meanwhile, from the Sayings of the Desert Fathers:

Abba Lot went to see Abba Joseph and said to him, “Abba, as far as I can, I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace and as far as I can, I purify my thoughts. What else can I do?” then the old man stood up and stretched his hands towards heaven. His fingers became like ten lamps of fire and he said to him, “If you will, you can become all flame.”

…on which topic, if you have time, do read St Seraphim’s conversation with Motovilov.

We could take a cue from Orthodoxy, whose priests stand with their backs to their congregation, leading a liturgy that is neither clever nor impassioned, but simply beautiful, like stone smoothed by centuries of rhythmic tides. It’s an austere ritual, in the sense of — there’s nothing new here; it’s sublime, in the sense of — creating a clearer view into Heaven. The priest can be any priest. Who he is, what he looks like, how he speaks, and what he thinks matter little. He hasn’t written the service that he officiates. It isn’t about him or his prowess. He’s an interchangeable functionary draped in brocaded robes, obscured by incense, and, as such, never points to himself, a flawed human, pointing ever and only to the Perfection of the Mysterious Divine. That is the role of every priest or preacher — invisibility, while making God seen.

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Part 1

Part 2

More information at paradisekids4africa.org.au