a layman's thoughts ~ The Church is a Mystery of Eucharistic Community part II

     Why has there become confusion to these Holy Mysteries in the church? Why the divisions? Can Christ be in division? Can there be communion among conflict?

   There reason why is the Western insistence to try to rationalize these things and either explain the power there or remove it all together as unscientific. Our reason can then become something that replaces faith and creates our own strange reality. The Western issue arises somewhere after the dark ages, the influx of barbarian/Germanic philosophies that swept into the fall of the Roman West, and man's scientific method of discovering the world from the outside inward. Here we see the Renaissance and the Enlightenment and the move to Humanism and man becoming the measure of all things.

   The scientific method has its place, but we must remember that it should not be an end in itself. The rational method of discovering the universe should not be understood as being able to explain everything or to even explain God away like some have done using this tool. It is a tool, but not our savior.  It can become and does become a false god, an idol. Somewhere in the West the mysteries of God have been replaced with the reason of man and this has removed beauty from many of the West's Protestant churches. The story of scripture through iconography has been replaced by white walls as if history and Church Fathers and Saints are something to be forgotten. The power of Eucharist and Christ's presence has just become a thing to remember of old, lacking any real power of God, but an empty symbol.

   If we minimize the Powers of God, what are we messing with exactly? How do we cure our condition if we do not take our medicine? How do we heal the heart or nous of mankind? Will this be done through modern medicine and the pharmacy? Can the heart of man solely be cured this way? Yes, we should heal the body and ease our pains; however, it is the heart that is sick before God. We already know that the body is going to decay and die. What about the heart of man and its position before God? The Orthodox Church of Christ sees this issue very clearly and provides the Eucharist the way a hospital would give medicine. This medicine is for the heart. The mystery of Confession serves as a lifetime of removing the cancerous growths in our hearts so that we may partake of God's Uncreated energies, communion with God. When we mess with these gifts that The Church of Christ offers us, we are left with something other, different. We also cease to be in communion with each other and this is denominationalism, division at work. The Church of Christ cannot be divided.

   The Protestant Reformers set out to return to form, but what form? Was the Roman Catholic form accurate before indulgences and other faults that Luther and Calvin wanted to restore? But what was the real form? If the Roman Catholic Church had lost the form due to barbaric philosophies, political instabilities, papal authority, creedal novelties, and other theological issues, then how could it return to a form it did not have? An error can only be reformed back to error or a different type of error.

   The idea of sola scriptura presented  a challenge to Roman Catholic tradition. It was really the only avenue that the Reformers could take. What can fight tradition except our way is "by the book" the Bible is our authority. But it seems that this idea only created another issue, the idea of whose interpretation of Scripture will we go with? It seems that it traded the papacy for the papacy of the individual. The Eastern Church has always protected its Tradition or Life of the Church by both Scripture and Tradition (The Life of the Church). Each of these protects the other and interprets the other. Scripture without the Life of the Church can become something in letter only, while tradition without the Holy Scriptures loses the inspiration of the teaching that inspired the Saints and Church Fathers and the Holy Tradition. The heresies that came upon the Church where not defeated by scripture alone because the enemies of The Church used the same scriptures to argue their cases. What won out in the end was the Life of the Church inspired by the Life of the Holy Spirit. The Church lived its life and that life was The Church, and no false interpretation or sola scriptura alone could defend this.

   Its not to say that the Reformers may not have meant well, but it is really impossible to reform something when the original is not known. Talks between the Orthodox and the Reformers happened, but there was no consensus, as too many of the novelties of the Western church were too far along in the minds of the reformers. It seems true that Luther and Calvin probably believed in the importance of the Church Fathers, but at least the later Reformers and to the present have left these out and focused on Scripture alone. Can we really re-construct the church from the 16th century and now reform it with the influence of the 21st? Seems to me that this would be near impossible without the life of the past and how that life was lived as big "T" Tradition or the Life of the Holy Spirit. This does not come from a book alone for it is the Spirit that gives life. We do not live by letters or words, but by what those words point towards. The Presence of Christ illumines the Scriptures. The Scriptures themselves are man-made words, historical of course and elegantly beautiful, but in and of themselves are not Christ for we do not worship a book or letters. What the mysteries are and why they are important and have been important needs to be looked at again.

   The mysteries or sacraments are an essential part of the Orthodox Church of Christ. They are for us and for the "new man" in Christ. To trivialize these Gifts is to lose something beautiful and powerful that God wishes to share with man. Because what we have gotten in its place is science and our own intellectual powers working alone for the restoration of the universe. We have joined with the created and that remains in decay and death. Without God this painting is once again man made and in error and misses the mark. However, working with God's mysteries and our physical efforts in synchronicity, we who are created enter into the Uncreated glory of God and through theosis, we become Christ-like. But we need to do this in communion with one another and not as fragments or denominations. Christ is with us in communion and agreement not in disorder, schism, and chaos. These latter things are of the devil and darkness and work for disharmony. There is no disharmony in the Godhead, between the loving communion of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

  



Thanks to:


Christ God eternal
Fr. Photios
Fr. Dean
Brother Lawrence Janic
Clark Carlton
Jordan Bajis
The Church Fathers and all the Saints
and the Eastern Orthodox Church of which I am a small part


May God richly bless everyone to life Eternal and a good account before the awesome judgment seat of Christ. With the intercession prayers of the Theotokos, St Eugenia, St Athena, and all the saints. Amen