Piety, Processions, and Puppetry

This post is really just a string of ideas rather than a planned construction of coherent thoughts and I claim no authority beyond being a servant of Christ's Church who often fails miserably at his calling to be even that. Yet a conversation I recently had with a priest, shortly after witnessing the services of Holy Week and Pascha, got me to thinking a little about the liturgy of the Church and how, through it, we enter into the worship of God.

I love the multi-layered symbolism of the corporate worship of the Church. When we begin to explore it, there is so much that gives us the firm grounding from which to elevate our hearts to God. It is doctrine expressed and acted out, often in the most accessible way possible. Processions, prostrations, crossings, the opening and closing of the doors - some of these things speak to us immediately and have an obvious meaning. Yet some of them have depths of meaning that only come to us with time and being steeped in the Church's worship. For instance, at the old Paschal Vigil which we serve on Holy Saturday afternoon in the form of the Vesperal Liturgy of St Basil, we hear the reading from Isaiah, (the same one that provides the inspiration for the oft-repeated hymn, Shine, shine, O New Jerusalem), in which we hear:

And thy gates shall be open continually: they shall not be shut day nor night.

- Isaiah 60:11

So the doors of the iconostas remain open through Bright Week, and are not closed until the beginning of the Ninth Hour on Saturday of that week, for this is the week of thr renewal, when we celebrate most fully the conqeuring of all that separates us from the fullness of union with God.

However, I wonder at the nature of some of the things that have crept into Orthodox practice and the degree to which they are in keeping with the Tradition of the Church. One of the most powerful symbols of Great and Holy Friday is at Matins. After the fifth Gospel, which ends with Christ taking up his Cross and being assisted by Simon of Cyrene, during the fifteenth antiphon, the priest solemnly carries the large icon of the Saviour on the Cross from the altar and sets it in the midst of the church for the edificaton of the people. This becomes their focus as they hear the remaining Passion Gospels, which tell of the final events in the Passion of the Saviour, including his death. After the service, the people may come forward and venerate the icon, kissing the feet of their Saviour on the Cross.

Today is hung upon a Tree He Who suspended the earth upon the waters.
Today is hung upon a Tree He Who suspended the earth upon the waters.
Today is hung upon a Tree He Who suspended the earth upon the waters.
He who is King of the Angels is arrayed in a crown of thorns.
He who wrapped the heaven in clouds is wrapped in the purple of mockery,
He who freed Adam in the Jordan receiveth a blow on the face.
The Bridegroom of the Church is transfixed with nails.
The Son of the Virgin is pierced with a lance.
We worship thy Passion, O Christ,
We worship thy Passion, O Christ,
We worship thy Passion, O Christ: show unto us also thy glorious Resurrection!

- The fifteenth antiphon of Great Friday Matins

Yet a custom has developed in some places of setting up a plain Cross in the midst of the Church before the service begins, and the icon that is carried out at the fifteenth antiphon is of the corpus only. This often has holes pre-drilled in the hands and feet, through which nails are inserted, and the priest hammers the icon to the Cross during the service.

I have never seen this done in full so I cannot comment on it experientially. However, it seems to run contrary to everything that I have been taught about the place of icons in the doctrine and praxis of the Orthodox Church. Icons serve to focus the mind and heart on the holy one represented in the image.

For by so much more frequently as they are seen in artistic representation, by so much more readily are men lifted up to the memory of their prototypes, and to a longing after them; and to these should be given due salutation and honourable reverence (ἀσπασμὸν καὶ τιμητικὴν προσκύνησιν), not indeed that true worship of faith (λατρείαν) which pertains alone to the divine nature; but to these, as to the figure of the precious and life-giving Cross and to the Book of the Gospels and to the other holy objects, incense and lights may be offered according to ancient pious custom. For the honour which is paid to the image passes on to that which the image represents, and he who reveres the image reveres in it the subject represented. For thus the teaching of our holy Fathers, that is the tradition of the Catholic Church, which from one end of the earth to the other hath received the Gospel, is strengthened. Thus we follow Paul, who spake in Christ, and the whole divine Apostolic company and the holy Fathers, holding fast the traditions which we have received. So we sing prophetically the triumphal hymns of the Church, “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Sion; Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem. Rejoice and be glad with all thy heart. The Lord hath taken away from thee the oppression of thine adversaries; thou art redeemed from the hand of thine enemies. The Lord is a King in the midst of thee; thou shalt not see evil any more, and peace be unto thee for ever."

- from the decree of the Seventh Ecumenical Council

With that in mind, the traditional practice of placing the icon of the crucified Saviour in the midst of the people and their later veneration of it seems very fitting. However, I, personally, struggle with the idea of an icon being used as, if I may be forgiven, a theatre prop. I'm just not sure that this action of nailing an image of the Saviour to the Cross is in keeping with the Orthodox theology of the icon and I am not sure it is something that should be encouraged. If the honour paid to the icon is passed to the holy person represented therein, what are we doing when we hammer nails into an icon of the Saviour? In the quiet piety of Orthodox Christians, an icon, if accidentally knocked over, is often picked up quickly and kissed before being returned to its place of honour, because people understand what the image represents, even if the Saint is largely unknown. Yet we are speaking here about pounding nails into an icon of the Christ.

Even if we leave aside the matter of the nailing, I do not like the concept of the detachable corpus being placed on the Cross, and then taken down during the Vespers service and wrapped in a shroud to be taken into the altar, (which is the second half of this late practice). For the same reasons as the nailing, it seems not to sit well with the concept of the icon as an object of focus and veneration. My priestly interlocutor said to me that the Orthodox understanding of the icon does not extend to puppetry. It may seem a shocking statement to make at first but, having given it some thought, I find myself unable to disagree.

The Church's services have a drama of their own, in their shape and structure, in the way one element flows into another, which then overlaps with the next, in the readings, in the hymns, in the actions of the clergy and people - all of these things carry beautiful meaning and symbolism, and speak of the mystery of salvation into which we are to enter more fully through these services. If we think, for example, of the traditional Great Friday ceremonies, they are actually very restrained while being very rich. When we focus on the Passion of the Saviour at Matins, the Cross is set up in the midst of the people and censed. Before Vespers, the Cross is quietly removed because the focus of this service is not the Passion but rather the burial of the Saviour. There is no theatrical taking down of the icon of the Saviour's body from the Cross and wrapping it in a burial shroud. Where the Cross once stood, we now see the sepulchre of the Lord, on which is placed the plashchanitsa, which is an icon showing the body of the Saviour, often surrounded by his Mother and the Holy Myrrh-Bearers. It is carried out solemnly, and offered for veneration by the people. Offerings of flora and rose water are laid on it in honour of the Christ depicted. Then, during the Midnight Office of the Paschal Vigil, the plashchanitsa is removed from the midst of the people with the same solemnity with which it was placed there, and when the people go outside for the procession after the Midnight Office, the sepulchre is quietly removed, so that when the people re-enter the church, it is simply not there, having been replaced by an icon of the Resurrection.

So it seems to me that the mystical drama into which we are to be caught up is inherent to the services themselves and is not to be found in extraneous re-enactments of Christ being crucified, taken down from the Cross, or wrapped in a shroud.

Another historical example of this is the procession of Palm Sunday. A very late development in parts of the west in Orthodox times, possibly originating in France, was the custom of including the Holy Things in the procession on Palm Sunday. This was different from the custom known among Roman Catholic people today, of carrying the sacrament in procession as a sign of devotion. As it came to develop in Britain by the late mediaeval period, an elaborate portable shrine was constructed, on which would be carried the Holy Things. As this approached, the choir would sing antiphons hailing the coming Christ, reminiscent of the Hebrews greeting the Saviour with shouts and hymns as He entered Jerusalem, which would continue through the procession. This was not simply a devotion to Christ in the Mystery of the Eucharist, (although the extra-eucharistic piety, including such processions, is perhaps intrinsically questionable anyway), but rather seems to have been a theatrical re-enactment over and above the natural drama of the Church's liturgy, using the sacrament in a very unusual way.

How did this sort of thing creep into Orthodox custom? These things do not appear in the rubrics of the services but are simply pious additions which are largely unknown outside of Greek practice, so I wonder whether these are latinisations, (in terms of the way of thinking about how we worship rather direct borrowings of practice), that permeated the Greek church under Ottoman rule. I recall once reading that a number of Greek clergy during this time were trained in Roman Catholic seminaries. Whatever the origins, is it something that is in keeping with the way that we understand worship, that we feel worship, that we do worship? Is it something that we ought to continue? I don't think so, personally, but my saying so comes largely from gut feeling based on what I have been taught and what I have absorbed, and how it has moulded me over the past few years and is not something that I can argue academically. However, given the centrality of worship to the Christian life and the importance that has in transmitting the Faith to the innermost parts of our beings, I do not feel that the degree to which the way we worship affects our understanding of our own place in relation to Christ and within the life of his Church can be thought of too lightly.

Anyway, there my thoughts are. I don't know what, if anything, others make of them.

Our Father

Now it came to pass, as He was praying in a certain place, when He ceased, that one of his disciples said to Him, 'Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples.' So He said to them, 'When you pray, say: Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done On earth as it is in heaven. Give us day by day our daily bread. And forgive us our sins, For we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.'

- Luke 11:1-4

I love the Lord's Prayer but I know that, as with anything familiar, it is easy to come to disregard its significance and to treat is as something ordinary and commonplace. I have been saying these words now for twenty... something (cough) years and it is certainly a failing of mine. I have become more keenly aware of it since having been made a reader because now I am responsible not just for my own prayers but also for those who are gathered with me. When I lead the Trisagion prayers or the Hours, and I get caught up in the rhythm, I sometimes find myself rattling them off, but when I get to the Lord's Prayer, I am reminded of what I am saying, what the words mean, and to Whom I am addressing them, and it acts as a call back to the reverence and awe with which we must approach God.

The prayer is loaded with theological meaning which others will be far better at understanding or explaining than I, and there are numerous papers written on the subject. My focus is simply on the opening words and what they mean for us.

When we call upon God as "Our Father", we are claiming our place within the family of God, affirming our Baptism and our sealing with the Holy Spirit in Chrismation, through which we receive the adoption as children of the same heavenly Father and become joint heirs with Christ, into Whose Body we are grafted. In the Divine Liturgy, the priest introduces the prayer by asking that God may grant that, 'with boldness and without condemnation, we may dare to call upon Thee, the heavenly God, as Father'. We begin the prayer by signing ourselves with the Cross of Christ, and we prostrate ourselves towards the east, acknowledging that we share in the inheritance of Christ, and that it is only through God's grace and through no worthiness of our own that we may presume to call God our Father. We are mere temporal beings, of which the psalmist writes:

As for man, his days are as the grass, as a flower of the field, so shall he blossom forth. For when the wind is passed over it, then it shall be gone, and no longer will it know the place thereof.

- from Psalm 102

Yet the great God of heaven, the eternal God, Who is beyond space, time, language, speech, and comprehension, Who is Creator and Maker of all that is - this God adopts us as his children and calls us his sons and daughters through our Baptism into the Body of his Son. This is what we are saying when we dare to call Him Father. I find this astounding, and not something that ought to be taken lightly.

Therefore, brethren, we are debtors — not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs — heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.

- Romans 8:12-17

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace which He made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence, having made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which He purposed in Himself, that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth — in Him. In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, that we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of his glory. In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in Whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, Who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of his glory.

- Ephesians 1:3-14

In their treatises on the subject of prayer, Tertulian and St Cyprian of Carthage both express this link between Baptism and the ability to call upon God in prayer as Father. St Cyprian tells us that this was the first prayer said by the newly-baptised upon emerging from the font. They also emphasise the corporate nature of it: that we do not approach God in prayer as individuals but as part of God's family, through our common Baptism and our common faith.

Dearest brothers, we should turn our minds and understand not only that we call Him "Father, Who is in heaven," but that we add to this and say: "Our Father," that is of those who believe, of those who have begun to be children of God, sanctified through Him and restored by a birth of spiritual grace...

- St Cyprian, "On the Lord's Prayer"

It is for this reason that the unbaptised were, for many centuries, not permitted to even be present at the corporate prayer of the Eucharist, when the Church actualises the fullest possible expression on earth of the New Covenant in the Body of Christ, and its relationship to the Father. A number of the Church's canons very forcefully forbid us from joining in prayer with those who are not united with us in faith, and it is also the reason why, to this day, our catechumens, who have publicly affirmed their obedience to the Church, are dismissed from the Eucharistic assembly until such time as they are baptised. From the Liturgy of St James:

Let none of the catechumens, let none of the uninitiated, let none of those who are not able to join with us in prayer remain.

- The Dismissal of the Catechumens

We can see how serious it is when we stand with our brothers and sisters at the Eucharist and call upon God as Father. The placement of the Lord's Prayer between the Anaphora and Communion is no accident, and is common to most, if not all, ancient rites. One is the great offering back to the Father of all that He has given us, along with the saving death, Resurrection, and Ascension of his Son, and the other is our nourishment with that very risen and ascended Body and Blood of his Son and our communion with God and each other.



What does that mean for us? Have we lived in such a way as to strengthen that baptismal bond? Have we entered into prayer regularly? Have we looked after the physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of God's children? Are we really in such a state that we can, with clear conscience, easily say the Lord's Prayer? Or have we sinned and damaged that relationship so that we need to ask forgiveness of God and our brothers and sisters? Have we professed things contrary to the saving Faith? If so, then we should not be afraid to confess and receive absolution. These are the things to think about in our daily lives and when we come to Communion, and indeed whenever we pray. So if, like me, others of you find yourselves sometimes breezing through the prayers out of habit, or perhaps because you want to get them over with so you can get on with other things, perhaps we should let the words Our Father call us back and cause us to think about what we are saying, so that, once we have made our prostration, we may stand tall, adopted and redeemed, as "sons of light and sons of the day", and with boldness and without condemnation, call upon the heavenly God as Father, and say:

Our Father, Who art in the heavens,
hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come,
thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts
as we forgive our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from the evil one.

Questionable Gifts

The dome of Christ the Saviour Cathedral, Moscow

We have all been given presents that we wouldn't usually have bought for ourselves. Sometimes these are things that we love but the existence of which would never have occurred to us. At other times, they are things that perhaps don't find favour with our own personal tastes. In the latter case, there are usually ways of avoiding embarrassment and hurt feelings. It is usually no hardship to put an item on display among others when the benefactor visits, only for it to be quietly put away later, or to read at least part of a book and later comment on it.

What do you do, though, if the gift is an item that is actually offensive to all that you hold to be decent or true? What if it is a wall-plaque that expresses political ideas that you find reprehensible? Or perhaps an icon that expresses heresy? Could you, in good consience, display somethig like that in your home or place it in your icon corner among holy things?

The interior of the dome of Christ the Saviour is a notorious example of iconography that is doctrinally questionable, (to be restrained). Although this type of iconography expresses a clear contradiction of scriptural and patristic teaching, and has been condemned by a local council of the Russian Church (for it was in Russia that it began to spread, and was not a universal problem), and although recent years have seen such icons being corrected, when Christ the Saviour Cathedral was rebuilt in 2000, what is supposed to be God the Father was represented in the icon in its dome, just as it had been in the original cathedral. It is no secret that Russia went through some very difficult times, to say the least, during the last century. It seems that the rebuilding of Christ the Saviour was more than just the building of a church. It was a powerful symbol of the triumph of the Russian Christian identity over the godless authority that had tried to subdue it, and so was intended as an encouragement to the Russian people. Therefore, it was built as an exact replica of the cathedral that had previously stood on that site, and questions of the Orthodoxy of the decor seem to have taken second place.

Worthy a cause though this was, I must admit that this approach doesn't sit well with me, and I wonder what others think of the transference of this to the decor of private homes, the contents of icon corners, and so forth. Is there a distinction to be drawn between temporarily tolerating such things at home in order to avoid hurting a person's feelings and displaying them as permanent fixtures in public places of worship? My inclination is to say that, yes, there is a difference, and that, depending on what it is, I may be willing to lay my own concerns aside in order to spare the feelings of a well-intentioned giver. Having said that, if given a copy of the icon in that dome, or another similar to it, I'm not sure that I could bring myself to give the appearance of venerating it.

Any thoughts?

Calendar and Conscience

I do not intend for this to be a polemical post. My views on the use of the Meletian calendar by Orthodox Christians have been made known many times and in a number of places. Let it be sufficient for me to say here that, as things stand, I do not believe that it is in keeping with the life of the Orthodox Church.

I have been struggling with this matter for some months, especially since having been ordained as a reader. On the one hand, I wish to remain faithful to the canonical discipline of the Church while at the same time I do not wish to cause offence to my brothers and sisters - some of whom are good friends - who ask me to participate in services on the Meletian calendar.

I politely declined a kind invitation over the summer and simply attended, only vesting for Communion. Then, more recently, I was invited to be the reader at another Liturgy and initially declined politely. Then, realising that the Saturday reading would be the same regardless of the calendar used, I decided to be accommodating and read. On the kliros, however, it soon became apparent that the Saints being commemorated were not those of the day, and that I was expected to sing what were essentially the wrong troparia and kontakia.

In the end, and after some discussion with my parish priest, I have concluded that it is perhaps best for me not to participate in services on the Meletian calendar beyond my presence in the congregation. All of the other reasons aside, as its core, I feel that the unilateral adoption of this calendar by a substantial minority of Orthodox Christians has been the source of immeasurable and completely unnecessary division and pain within the Body of Christ, and I'm afraid that I could not maintain a clear conscience were I to take part in its use. This is no judgement on those who have been able to harmonise these concerns or who, out of necessity, are faced with a choice between the Meletian calendar or nothing.

Therefore, in keeping with the received custom of the Orthodox Church, and in obedience to my bishop, who has publicly expressed his thoughts about the Meletian calendar, I will only serve on the Orthodox Church calendar.

N.B. - This blog originally existed on a different Google/Blogger account. It was transferred to the account in which it currently resides using the "export blog" feature provided by Google. It seems that, in the transfer, the order of some of the comments on this post (and possibly others) has become confused. For the sake of clarity, please read the third comment before the second, which was the original order of their appearance.

The Conception of the Mother of God

And, behold, an angel of the Lord stood by, saying: Anna, Anna, the Lord hath heard thy prayer, and thou shalt conceive, and shall bring forth; and thy seed shall be spoken of in all the world. - from the Protoevangelium of St James
The feast of the Conception of the Mother of God is perhaps one of the most poorly understood feasts of the Church. This falls on the 8th of December on the Western Rites and on the 9th of December in the Byzantine Kalendar. In either case, it falls approximately nine months before the Nativity of the Mother of God in September. Each year we celebrate this feast and each year somebody asks what it is all about. That people have a yearning to learn more about this part of the Christian Mystery is, of course, encouraging, but it does reveal that it is one of the feasts that is not as readily understood as others.

My suspicion is that this may be particularly true among western converts to Orthodoxy. Many of us who have come to Orthodoxy from western traditions have known of the later Latin teaching of the immaculate conception of the Mother of God, which states:

...the doctrine which asserts that the Blessed Virgin Mary, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God, and in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, Saviour of the human race, was preserved free from every stain of original sin is a doctrine revealed by God and, for this reason, must be firmly and constantly believed by all the faithful.

Constitution Ineffabilis Dei, 1854

Whether we come from traditions where this was affirmed or repudiated, we have been affected by it, whether by overenthusastically embracing it or by overzealously throwing out the proverbial baby along with the bathwater.

Yes, we may remember from our days of exploring Orthodoxy that our understanding of ancestral sin is different from the Latin teaching of original sin, and that this means that the Conception of the Mother of God was, in this respect, just like the conception of any other human being. She was conceived in innocence, as indeed we all are, and her freedom from the guilt of sin at the moment of her conception is unremarkable in that respect*. We may know in our heads that this renders the teaching on the immaculate conception meaningless, for it is the solution to a problem that doesn't exist. We may also understand that because we do not believe that the sin of our first parents means that all human beings are deprived of a supernatural grace from the first moment of our conception, the angelic salutation of the Mother of God as being "full of grace" poses no doctrinal problem for us. We do not need to ponder on what is unique to her that could make this so because there is nothing in the nature of man that precludes this.

So where does this leave us?

Well, as a new convert from Anglicanism, I wasn't quite sure. I would get asked the question of my Anglo-Catholic friends, 'If her conception wasn't immaculate, then what was so special about it? Why celebrate it as a feast?' and I would usually not have an answer. Sometimes this was asked out of genuine curiosity. At other times it was asked in an attempt to highlight what they saw as an inconsistency between Orthodox teaching and Orthodox liturgical practice. The argument was that the existence of the feast in the Orthodox kalendar is evidence that we did once celebrate the immaculate conception but later changed for some reason, perhaps in relation to the disdain with which Blessed Augustine of Hippo is held in some quarters of Orthodoxy, and that we are now left with a meaningless feast as a result.

The sad truth is that this is simply evidence of just how much damage has been done by this teaching of the immaculate conception. The actual meaning of the celebration of the Conception of the Mother of God has been overshadowed to such a great extent that it has almost entirely departed from the consciousness of many Christians, who are left unable to see the point of the feast without this later teaching, and who, as a result, perceive that they have to choose between the two extremes of a) fully embracing the immaculate conception and the original sin on which it is based, and b) reacting vehemently against this teaching and refusing to celebrate the feast at all! Neither of these is acceptable to the Orthodox mind.

So where does this leave people who are coming from such backgrounds into Orthodoxy, and are faced with what appears to be an inconsistency between our belief and practice? It is not unreasonable that they may also wonder about this and ask similar questions to those posed by my Anglo-Catholic friends.

What follows is my own attempt at answering those questions.

At the very basis of Christian teaching is the understanding that nature, as we perceive and experience it today, is fallen. It is still inherently good as we are told in the creation story but it suffers from the effects of the fall. Nowhere is this more in evidence than in the state of mankind. We experience the effects of the fall in perceptible and unimaginable ways. We die, suffer from ailments, experience pain, hunger, and other discomfort. Some have chemical imbalances causing psychological problems. Our passions are also disordered so that many of us struggle with things that, properly, are a wholesome part of our existence and even theosis: food, properly a source of nourishment and enjoyment, is a temptation in many to overeat or undereat, often with deadly consequences; there are inclinations of the sexual passions to acts outside of the procreative marriage bond; there are inclinations and temptations to misdirect our emotions of anger and so forth, often to the point of violence and murder. These are all effects of the fall that affect us all in different ways and to different degrees. They are all ways in which mankind today is separated from complete theosis, from the full participation in the light, love, splendour, holiness, and life-creating energies of the Holy Trinity.


The Ascended Christ, taking our restored human nature back to the bosom of the Father.

The hope that we have in Christianity is the Incarnation. God became man. He fully took on the human nature in the Person of Jesus Christ, and, in that flesh, shared in our struggles, our sufferings, and grief. He had a physical body, just like ours, and felt pain and hunger and, ultimately, shared in our death. Having released the bonds of those righteous ones in Hades who had died before the Incarnation, He also conquered all those elements of the fall in his glorious Resurrection, while still in our flesh - still fully possessing the human nature. In the Ascension, He took that redeemed and restored human nature back into heaven, once again opening the way for us to follow and this we do, by being grafted into his Body, the Church, through Baptism, and being nourished by his Body and Blood, and through participation in the grace-filled life of the Church.

The post-Resurrection Body of Christ was still human, but what we are called to be rather than what we are. He was truly, physically present, but the Gospels tell us of characteristics that we know ourselves not to have. He appeared, seemingly from nowhere, and just as easily vanished from sight. He even showed the brilliance of what our deified bodies are to be at the Transfiguration on Tabor. We see evidence of this in some cases in the lives of the Saints, as they have, in their advanced states of theosis, even during their earthly lives in some cases, physical characteristics beyond what is the common fallen state of mankind. We hear of healing miracles, incorruptible relics, relics that give a sweet aroma, levitation, and even resurrection from the dead! The Saints truly participate in the energies of God and overcome these effects of the fall. Such is the call of all of us and this is at the very heart of the Christian Faith and, indeed, of our entire lives as Christian people.

Another effect of this fallennesss is barrenness. That the ability to procreate becomes diminished or even ceases in men and women, often after a certain age, is a sign of the separation of mankind from participation in the life-giving energies of God. Yet in the childless, elderly couple, the righteous Joachim and Anna, we see a foretaste, a foreshadowing, of the great Mystery of the Resurrection of Christ. Even before Christ is born, we see something of the effects of his conquering the fall, when the barrenness of his grandmother, the righteous Anna is overcome when the Mother of the Redeemer comes into existence in her life-bearing womb.

It is this that we celebrate on the feast of the Conception of the Mother of God. At different times, through repeated renewal of covenants, and in various ways, God revealed something of Himself to his people of various lands, tribes, and backgrounds. He spoke through prophets, sages, and bards for hundreds, even thousands of years, and, after all of this prophecy and prayer, and hopeful expectation, in the Conception of the Mother of God, we have the first sign of the coming of the One Who Is, Who comes to save us from the fall, from peril, and from death, and Who comes to give life. We see this same glimpse of Christ's triumph over lifelessness in the person of the Holy Forerunner and Baptist John, the last in the line of the prophets before Christ, through whose conception, (celebrated on the 23rd of September), the barren womb of St Elisabeth was opened. It is partly for this reason that it is the Mother of God and the Forerunner who are usually depicted on the Deisis icon.


Deisis triptych by the hand of Aidan Hart.

As with most feasts in the Orthodox Church, the best expression of the meaning of the Conception lies in the prayers and hymns of the feast itself, and is immediately recognisable as part of the restoring, healing, paschal Mystery of Christ.

This is clear from the hymns of the feast in the Byzantine Rite:

Today the bonds of barrenness are broken: God has heard the prayers of Joachim and Anna. He has promised them beyond all their hopes, to bear the Maiden of God by whom the Uncircumscribed One was born as mortal man, Who commanded an angel to cry unto her: Rejoice, O thou who art Full of Grace, the Lord is with thee!

Troparion for the Conception of the Mother of God, tone 4

Let the heavens rejoice this day, for Anna has conceived the Theotokos through God's dispensation, for she has brought forth the one who is to bear the ineffable Word!

Kontakion for the Conception of the Mother of God, tone 4

By no means is this unique to the east. From the western Divine Office, here is the final psalm appointed to be sung at first Vespers on this feast. Note its joy:

Praise the Lord, you children! Praise the name of the Lord. Blessed be the name of the Lord from this time forth and for evermore. From sunrise to sunset may the Lord’s name be praised. The Lord is supreme over all the nations; his glory is beyond the heavens. Who is like the Lord our God, Who makes his home on high, yet watches over the humble things in heaven and on earth? He raises the poor from the earth and lifts the needy from the dunghill, to seat him with princes, with the rulers of his people. He settles the barren woman in a home as a happy mother with her children.

Psalm 112

It seems quite unlikely that this psalm was chosen by coincidence. See also this excerpt from the Mass of the feast:

Let us celebrate this day
whereon piously we say
Mary was conceived.
Begotten is the mother maid,
conceived, created, channel made,
or pardon to the world.
Adam's primeval banishment
and Joachim's own discontent
there find a remedy.

from the Sequence at the Mass for the Conception of the Mother of God.

So it seems to me that the hymns and prayers of the feast in both east and west are replete with the theology of the Conception of the Mother of God as the first foretaste - a prelude - of the great bountines of the Lord's restorative and healing grace of which we can all partake. This is what the Church has celebrated since the establishment of this feast, long before the departure of the west into exploring ways around the problems caused by its understanding of original sin. This feast is a celebration of the grace, love, and bountiful mercy of God, and, without the need for recourse to late doctrinal developments that serve merely to obscure its meaning, Christians have great cause for celebration, prayer, and thankfulness on this day.

Let us all rejoice and praise the Lord, keeping holy day in honour of the Virgin Mary, for whose Conception the Angels are joyful, and glorify the Son of God!

- the office/introit for the Conception of the Mother of God

*For those unfamiliar with this distinction, Father Gregory Hallam offers this very good elucidation.

The Paschal Zadostoinik

Sung in Church Slavonic by the choir of the Valaam Monastery, this has to be the most beautiful rendition that I have ever heard of one of my favourite hymns of the Church. Tears were welling up as I was listening to this.

Here is the English translation, often sung to the same setting as in the video:

The Angel cried unto the lady, full of grace: 'O pure Virgin, rejoice! and again I say, rejoice! for thy Son is risen from the grave on the third day. And He hath raised all the dead.' O ye people, be joyful!

Shine, shine, O new Jerusalem! for the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. Dance, now, dance and be glad, O Sion! Do thou exult, O pure Theotokos, in the Resurrection of thy Son!

I find it inexpressibly moving to think that the mourning Mother of God, having endured so much and seen her beloved Son endure so much, was once again comforted by an angel, perhaps even the Holy Archangel Gabriel himself, who had first brought her the news that she, of all women throughout all the world and throughout all the ages, would be the fulfilment of Isaiah's prophecy of the sign. Indeed, the description of her as "full of grace" is a direct reference to this very event. Having been obedient to God's will throughout all of those trials, it seems fitting that she should learn of the Resurrection from the angel in a new annunciation. And so the story goes full circle, and the anticipation and uncertainty of the first angelic salutation, "Rejoice!" is fulfilled in the comfort and joyous victory of the second - "and again I say rejoice!"


The icon of Our Lady of the Sign (Isaiah 7:14), showing the Virgin who conceived and bore Emmanuel. The Christ is enthroned in a circle of the stars, touching on another hymn, in which we hail her as having a womb "more spacious than the heavens", for she contained the One Who Is, Whom the vast expanse of the universe could not possibly contain.

Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel. He shall eat butter and honey, that he may know to refuse the evil, and to choose the good.

Isaiah 7: 14&15

A friend of mine saw this text of this hymn and was moved, even to the point of entertaining the thought of the angels arguing among themselves over which of them would get to bring her the glad tidings of the Resurrection.

Of course, the Mother of God has what we are called to have, and is what we are all called to be, so the hymn doesn't stop with her but calls all of us to share in the joy and life of the Resurrection in the exhortation, "Shine, shine, O new Jerusalem!"

At the Vesperal Liturgy of St Basil on Holy Saturday - the "old" paschal vigil - we hear this reading from the prophecy of Isaiah:

Shine, shine, O Jerusalem: for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. For behold darkness shall cover the earth, and a mist the people: but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee. And the Gentiles shall walk in thy light, and kings in the brightness of thy rising. Lift up thy eyes round about, and see: all these are gathered together, they are come to thee: thy sons shall come from afar, and thy daughters shall rise up at thy side. Then shalt thou see, and abound, and thy heart shall wonder and be enlarged, when the multitude of the sea shall be converted to thee, the strength of the Gentiles shall come to thee.

The multitude of camels shall cover thee, the dromedaries of Madian and Epha: all they from Saba shall come, bringing gold and frankincense: and shewing forth praise to the Lord. All the flocks of Kedar shall be gathered together unto thee, the rams of Nabaioth shall minister to thee: they shall be offered upon my acceptable altar, and I will glorify the house of my majesty. Who are these that fly as clouds, and as doves to their windows? For the islands wait for me, and the ships of the sea in the beginning: that I may bring thy sons from afar: their silver, and their gold with them, to the name of the Lord thy God, and to the Holy One of Israel, because he hath glorified thee. And the children of strangers shall build up thy walls, and their kings shall minister to thee: for in my wrath have I struck thee, and in my reconciliation have I had mercy upon thee.

And thy gates shall be open continually: they shall not be shut day nor night, that the strength of the Gentiles may be brought to thee, and their kings may be brought. For the nation and the kingdom that will not serve thee, shall perish: and the Gentiles shall be wasted with desolation. The glory of Libanus shall come to thee, the Ar tree, and the box tree, and the pine tree together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary: and I will glorify the place of my feet. And the children of them that afflict thee, shall come bowing down to thee, and all that slandered thee shall worship the steps of thy feet, and shall call thee the city of the Lord, the Sion of the Holy One of Israel. Because thou wast forsaken, and hated, and there was none that passed through thee, I will make thee to be an everlasting glory, a joy unto generation and generation:

And thou shalt suck the milk of the Gentiles, and thou shalt be nursed with the breasts of kings: and thou shalt know that I am the Lord thy Saviour, and thy Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.

Isaiah 60:1-16

In the Resurrection of Christ, we see this prophecy fulfilled. The Church is the new Jerusalem, and the glory of the Lord has arisen upon us, just as Isaiah foretold. Death is conquered and life is set free, and it is our inheritance, for us to claim and in which we participate in the sacramental life of the Church - in the services, the Mysteries, the prayers and hymns, and in our communion with, and love for, each other.

In this brilliance of the Resurrection, and in keeping with Isaiah's prophecy that "thy gates shall be open continually, and they shall not be shut day or night" the doors of the iconostas in our churches are left open throughout Bright Week, so that we look through the open doors, which depict the Mother of God, whose entry into the temple is described in our hymns as "the prelude of God's goodwill and the prophecy of the salvation of men". We look through these open doors and we see the Reign and Kingdom of God. We see the eschatological nature of the life in Christ, whose kingship is symbolised by the Gospel Book and Holy Things enthroned on the Holy Table, beneath the icon of the Mystical Supper which depicts the heavenly banquet into which we are all called to be partakers.

You who have kept the fast, and you who have not,
rejoice this day, for the table is bountifully spread!
Feast royally, for the calf is fatted.
Let no one go away hungry.
Partake, all, of the banquet of faith.
Enjoy the bounty of the Lord's goodness!

from the paschal Homily of St John Chrysostom

This short hymn that we sing, aptly during the Anaphora, in the paschal season, is replete with the theology of the Resurrection and the whole Christian life, and I think that we would all benefit from pondering on these things at the next Liturgy in which we take part.

Shine, shine, O new Jerusalem, for the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee!

The Transfiguration of Our Lord

We look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, Who shall change the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of his glory. - Philippians 3:20-21

All ye who seek for Jesus, raise
your eyes above, and upward gaze:
there may ye see the wondrous sign
of never-ending glory shine.

Behold Him in celestial rays
Who never knoweth end of days;
exalted, infinite, sublime;
older than heav'n or hell or time.

This is the Gentiles' King and Lord;
the Prince by Judah's race adored,
promised to Abraham of yore
and to his seed for evermore.

To Him the prophets testify;
and that same witness from on high,
the Father seals by his decree:
'Hear and believe my Son', saith He.

All glory, Lord, to Thee we pay,
Transfigured on the mount to-day;
all glory as is ever meet,
to Father and to Paraclete. Amen.

Quicumque Christum - The Office Hymn at Vespers

I love the Feast of the Transfiguration, and shall be celebrating it tomorrow at the Parish of the Intercession of the Mother of God here in Manchester.

I'm ashamed to say that it was only last year that I began to properly understand the significance of the Feast, and yet I'm delighted that I now do. It had always been for me the cause of some confusion. Yes, Our Lord appeared in brilliance and two long-deceased key figures in the history of the people of Israel appeared along with Him, but what was the point of it all.

It is, of course, Christ's showing to us that He is the fulfilment of all things, and giving us a taste of the pure Light that is God, in which we are called to share, and which is the purpose of our journey of theosis/deification, and the whole point of our life and existence. Moses and Elijah's presence show Christ as the summit of both the Law and the Prophets, not called to replace them but to show their meaning in the splendour of their fullness in Him.

The disciples, who are with Christ, not having yet completed their theosis, are unable to look upon Him transfigured for they do not yet share in that brilliance, holiness, and life of the Trinity. I love the way the Transfiguration icons show them in various states of disarray, averting their eyes, tumbling down the mountain, falling to the ground. For them to behold that Presence would be destructive to them. We see the same thing in the Old Testament where contact with holiness means sure and certain death. Uzziah reaches out to prevent the Ark of the Covenant from falling and dies instantly because he lived before the Incarnation and Ascension, before the New Covenant, where completion of theosis was quite simply impossible. Only those in the Old Covenant who had met with God's favour were able to approach Him, and even then it was in veiled form, as a burning bush, or a voice from a cloud. Even then, for them to have been exposed to the fullness of the splendour of God would have been pain beyond what they could bear. This is hell - the brilliant Presence of God as experienced by those who have not accepted his grace to conform their hearts, minds, bodies, wills, and their entire being to Him. This bizarre concept that hell is somehow the absence of God is just too far removed from God's revelation of Himself to us and indeed from the belief and practice of the Church to be taken seriously.

O heavenly King, Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, Who art everywhere present and fillest all things; Treasury of blessings and Giver of life, come and abide in us, cleanse us from all impurity, and save our souls, O Good One!

- from the Trisagion Prayers

Whither shall I go from thy Spirit?
And from thy Presence whither shall I flee?
If I go up to heaven, Thou art there;
if I go down into hades, Thou art present there.
If I take up my wings toward the dawn
and make mine abode in the uttermost parts of the sea,
even there shall thy hand hold me.

- verses from Psalm 138

How can there be a place where God is not? Yes, hell is a separation from God but only in the sense of self-imposed rejection of unity and communion with Him, causing his Presence to be experienced as unbearable agony.

Yet with our the restoration of our human nature to the heavenly state at Christ's Ascension was the gate once again opened for us to follow, including all those who had died before the coming of Christ who, at his glorious Resurrection, pulled them from the jaws of death and Hades where they had been waiting.

Let no one fear death, for the Saviour's death has set us free.
He that was held by it extinguished it.
Having descended into Hades, He made Hades captive.
He embittered it when it tasted of his flesh.
And Isaiah, receiving this beforehand, cried out:
'Hades,' said he, 'was embittered when it met Thee in the lower regions.'
It was embittered, for it was destroyed.
It was embittered, for it was mocked.
It was embittered, for it was slain.
It was embittered, for it was cast down.
It was embittered, for it was bound.
It received a body, and met God face to face.
It received earth, and encountered heaven.
It received that which was seen, and fell upon that which was unseen.
O death, where is thy sting? O Hades, where is thy victory?
Christ is risen! and thou art cast down.
Christ is risen! and the Angels rejoice.
Christ is risen! and life lives.
Christ is risen! and not one of the dead remains in the grave.

- from the Paschal catechetical sermon of St John Chrysostom.

So in the Transfiguration, we have a foretaste of our calling, made possible by Christ's taking upon Himself our human nature, descending to our death and conquering it by his glorious Resurrection, and taking that human nature once more into the Presence of God. It is this destiny of ours that in which the Saints already share, and of whom Our Lady is chief, whose glorious Assumption we celebrate in a few days' time. May they pray for us.

A blessed Feast of the Transfiguration to all celebrating at this time.

O God, Who in the glorious Transfiguration of thine Only-Begotten Son didst confirm the mysteries of the Faith by the testimony of the fathers, and in the voice which came down from the bright cloud didst marvellously foreshow the perfect adoption of sons: vouchsafe in thy mercy to make us coheirs with the glorious King, and grant that we may be partakers of his glory. Through the same Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord, Who with Thee and the Holy Spirit, liveth and reigneth, God, world without end. Amen.

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us

The Incarnation of Christ, then, is God's supreme act of deliverance, restoring us to communion with himself. But what would have happened if there had never been a fall? Would God have chosen to become man, even if man had never sinned? Should the Incarnation be regarded simply as God's response to the predicament of fallen man, or is it in some way part of the eternal purpose of God? Should we look behind the fall, and see God's act of becoming man as the fulfilment of man's true destiny?

To this hypothetical question it is not possible for us, in our present situation, to give any final answer. Living as we do under the conditions of the fall, we cannot clearly imagine what God's relation to mankind would have been, had the fall never occurred. Christian writers have therefore in most cases limited their discussion of the Incarnation to the context of man's fallen state. But there are a few who have ventured to take a wider view, most notably St Isaac the Syrian and St Maximus the Confessor in the East, and Duns Scotus in the West. The Incarnation, says St Isaac, is the most blessed and joyful thing that could possibly have happened to the human race. Can it be right, then, to assign as cause for this joyful happening something which might never have occurred, and indeed ought never to have done so? Surely, St Isaac urges, God's taking of our humanity is not to be understood as an act of restoration, not only as a response to man's sin, but also more fundamentally as an act of love, an expression of God's own nature. Even had there been no fall, God in his own limitless, outgoing love would still have chosen to identify himself with his creation by becoming man. - Bishop Kallistos Ware (The Orthodox Way)

Wow!

This concept had never entered my consciousness before my journey on Northern Trains on my way into work this morning.

Just how prevalent is this idea (which actually works so well)?

I am gradually finding that ideas that I have held for so long are actually either confirmed, contextualised or appended to in Orthodoxy or by Orthodox thinkers. The beginning of this was the journey towards perfection, understanding of the fall and ancestral sin, which just made things begin to fit into place. Second was the understanding of evil in the world, which echoed exactly what I had believed for some time, and now thirdly is this wonderful idea about the Incarnation, which had never crossed my mind before, but which resonates so, so well.

It also takes care of that section of the text of the Exultet, with which I had always had difficulty:

O happy fault! O necessary sin of Adam, which gained for us so great a Redeemer!

Thank you, Bishop Kallistos.

The fullness of all Truth

Come, Holy Spirit: fill the hearts of your faithful,
and kindle in them the fire of your love.

'I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine. For this reason I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you. (John 16: 12-15).

This comforted me when I came across it. I had been questioning lately whether this is something that I want to do, especially as things are going so well at my current church. I am really struggling with the issues that will accompany leaving, and these are only the ones that I have thought of.

However, the text quoted above reminded me of the original reason I started out on this journey an has strengthened my resolve to continue it. I shall have to pick up the pieces at the time, and prepare as best I can for that, but I cannot compromise on this. Unfortunately, though I love my church and the people there, it is not an island and does not stand alone, but is in full communion with a wider church that embraces all that I cannot be part of.

This something that I must do. I think that another visit to my Orthodox priest to talk these things through is in order. As a former Anglican himself, he has been in a similar position, but much more so, as he was a priest of the Church of England before his conversion. I find this very comforting, as I do not have to explain my position in great detail before explaining my feelings: that foundational understanding is already there.

The four last things

Rest eternal grant unto them, O Lord; and let light perpetual shine upon them. May they rest in peace. Amen.

Lord, remember your servant Karol Wojtyla. May his soul, and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in + peace. Amen.

I have come across many prayers online for the deceased pope, and I have found it interesting to see the different things that people have been praying for. This clearly reflects the different beliefs that people hold about death and what happens.

Death, judgement, heaven and hell: I have never been sure what actually happens here.

The protestant idea of death being an instant ticket to either heaven or hell has never sat well with me. It seems too mechanical and so out of accordance with the rest of the Faith, and it also cannot be explained in the light of the scriptural references to hope in the resurrection of the dead, especially the examples of people praying for those who had died.

The answer to this seemed logical - purgatory, but then this also seems to me to be rather mechanical, and again doesn't sit well. Now I'm not saying that I must be comfortable with every aspect of the Faith in order for it to be Truth, for that itself would be a nonsense, but the idea of Purgatory, with its time measured in years strikes me as odd, as I have always understood that time is a constraint of this plane of existence, and does not apply to those who have departed this life. Purgatory, I believe, is also an addition that was added by the west after the schism, and so does not have the consensus of the whole Church anyway. All of the above considered, the Church Militant, the Church Suffering and the Church Triumphant is not something that I can embrace.

However, I have, a few times now, heard Anglicans refer to The Church Militant, the Church Expectant, and the Church Triumphant. I rather like this. It seems to acknowledge that the dead require our prayers, for they too were sinners, much like us, and require God's grace and forgiveness, but it does not place too fine a definition on what actually happens. This, I can embrace, but I am aware that this has come only from my reasoning and I am keen to find out what orthodoxy says about all of this.

I know that the Orthodox do pray for those who have died and that they reject the idea of Purgatory, but I am not sure what they actually do believe.

Any comments would be welcome.

Perfidious Jews?

Almighty everlasting God, who dost not reject from thy mercy even the perfidious Jews, hear our prayer which we offer unto thee for the blindness of that people, that, acknowledging the light of thy Truth which is Christ, they may be brought out of their darkness; through Jesus...
- from the Intercessions during the Mass of the presanctifed on Good Friday in the Sarum Missal.

Now I'm not the greatest fan of altering liturgical texts for the sake of political correctness where it apparently done for its own sake, but I'm sure that I would make at least one alteration in this particular instance.

What I was wondering is whether those Orthodox parishes of the western rite that use Sarum, would use this without amendment. I know that a few changes have been made in the version of Sarum that WRO churches use, but I don't know how far this extends: whether it is simply the main text of the ordinary and canon of the Mass, or whether it also extends to other liturgies such as this one.

Any comments welcomed.

My starting point

Update: 28/01/10 - As the title suggests, this post reflects my infancy in the Orthodox Faith and may not necessarily reflect accurately my current understanding.

I believe in one God: the Father almighty, Maker of heaven and earth and of all things, visible and invisible.
And in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of his Father before all worlds: God of God, Light of Light, very God of Very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made. Who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost, of the Virgin Mary, and was made man. And was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried. And the third day He rose again according to the Scriptures, and ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of the Father. And He shall come again with glory to judge both the quick and the dead, whose kingdom shall have no end.
And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord, and giver of Life, who proceedeth from the Father, who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified, who spake by the prophets.
And I believe one, Holy, Catholic and Apostolick Church. I acknowledge one Baptism for the remission of sins. And I look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Amen.

This is the Faith of the Church: the Truth to which we have been led and guided by the Holy Spirit, and affirmed by the first oecumenical Council of Nicaea in 325 AD and the Oecunenical Council of Constantinople in 381 AD. This is the Creed that is sung by the Church week by week and day by day at her Altars throughout the world.

This is the result of the Holy Tradition of the Church, which goes hand in hand with Sacred Scripture, which is part of that Tradition. Sacred Scripture is subject to the authority of Holy Tradition, for it by that Holy Tradition that Sacred Scripture was compiled.

The Holy Spirit did not cease to work in the church when the last full stop of Scripture was written, but the Church has grown and matured, having been guided by the Holy Spirit. Indeed, it was the Church that compiled the Bible, deciding which books ought and ought not to be included, and so the Bible is under the authority of the Church’s Tradition, and has become a part of that Church’s Tradition.

The Father sent the Son, by the power of the Spirit, to earth in human form. Here was the eternal God, the Word Supreme before creation began, humbling himself, condescending (in the truest sense of the word) to be human – fully human, yet remaining fully God. The Creator of the world became part of creation. This is best highlighted in the well-known Christmass carol, The Great God of heaven is come down to earth:

O wonder of wonders, which none can unfold!
The Ancient of days is an hour or two old.
The Maker of all things is made of the earth.
Man is worshipped by angels and God comes to birth!

The Word in the bliss of the Godhead remains,
yet in flesh comes to suffer the keenest of pains.
He is that he was and for ever shall be,
yet becomes that He was not, for you and for me. (H. R. Bramley)

This is the Mystery of the Incarnation, the very centre and basis of the Christian Faith. If the second Person of the Holy Trinity were to redeem humanity, then the second Person of the Trinity had to become human – and he did, in the person of Jesus Christ, taking his human flesh from a young girl, called Mary.

Out of all that He had made, in all time, Mary was the one whom God chose, from whom He would take flesh and become human, and without her ‘yes’, none of this would have been possible, for God, the God who gives us free will, does not force our choices.

Mary is the model and image of us, the Church, in our perfect state. At our Baptism, we, like Mary, give our yes to God. The Holy Spirit descends on us, as it did Mary, and we are given the charge of all Christian people to read and digest God’s word and to take it to the world. This Mary did, in a very literal sense. For nine months, the supreme Word of God grew within her, and she brought him forth to the world. She was present as He was sacrificed on Calvary, as is the Church as this same Sacrifice is made truly present at each and every celebration of the Mass. She died and was gloriously assumed into heaven, which is the promise made to each of us in our Baptism. Mary has gone before us, showing us the way. Thus, the Church is prefigured in Mary and her destiny is ours:

Wherefore let all faithful people
tell the honour of her name.
Let the Church, in her foreshadowed,
part in her thanksgiving claim.
What Christ’s mother sang in gladness
let Christ’s people sing the same!

As we sing, her prayer is rising
for her heart with us is one.
We with confidence will ask it,
that the mother from her Son
will obtain the full perfection
of his work in us begun
Hail Mary, hail Mary, hail Mary, full of grace!.
(Ye who own the Faith of Jesus: Fr V.S.S. Coles)

This is not because of anything that Mary earned, but very simply because God chose Mary and gave her the grace to perform this role in his plan of salvation, not because of anything that she said or did, but simply because it was God’s will - and so she is rightly called Theotokos, for she bore God. There are Christians who deny this, with little justification. Such objections have no grounding whatsoever in the Christian Faith, and ignore even the most basic of human relationships between a mother and her child. When Jesus was hungry, it was Mary’s breast that fed him, when, as a child, he fell and cried, it was Mary’s arms that embraced him, when he soiled himself, it was Mary who cleaned him, yet this was God! God made himself completely dependent on Mary for his very survival in the world that he himself had made. This is Incarnation! If God has given Our Lady such a place of honour, how can denying this be anything but blasphemy on our part?

Some try to diminish Our Lady's part in God's plan of our salvation by separating the natures of Christ, even going so far as to imply that there were two Christs – one human and the other divine, and that God cannot be born as humans are, that God cannot bleed and die, and so only the human Christ died on Calvary – not the divine Christ. They argue that Mary was the mother only of the human Christ and not of the divine Christ, and therefore cannot be said, in any true sense, to have given birth to God.

This was the same heresy that was presented by Nestorius so many centuries ago in 429 AD, and was quashed by the Third Oecumenical Council the following year.

This idea opposes the statements in the Creed, that Christ was:

very God of very God, begotten not made, being of one substance with the Father… who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost, of the Virgin Mary, and was made man. (The Nicene Creed)

St John tells us the same thing in his Gospel, when he writes:

And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of the father’s only son, full of grace and truth. (John 1: 14).

The human Christ and the divine Christ were one and the same. Therefore, it is nonsense to say that Mary did not give birth to God, the divine Christ.

If one does not acknowledge Mary as Theotokos, he is estranged from God.
(St Gregory Nazianzus)

God’s entire plan of salvation rests on the basic premise that it was God, who became human, who died on the Cross and rose again, so that when he would again ascend to heaven, he would take our human nature with him.

Jesus had to be both God and human in order for this to work: he had to become human in order to share in and redeem fallen humanity, and he had to be simultaneously God, so that when he returned to the heavenly state, he would take our human nature with him, thus opening to us the gate to eternal life sharing in God's divine nature. This is the second half of the mystery of the Incarnation. Yes, God became human, but through Christ’s Ascension, humanity also becomes deified, living eternally in the divine nature. This is our destiny and it begins with the Sacrament of Baptism. Christ has condescended to our level already. We die with him as we drown in the waters of Baptism, we rise with him from the waters of new life, and we gain eternal life by the merits of Christ’s Ascension. Birth, death, resurrection and ascension – the Mystery of the Incarnation.

It is through human flesh that God wrought salvation, and it is through elements of the created order that God gives us Sacramental grace: the waters of baptism, the sacred Chrism, made from the oil of the olive, the laying on of hands, simple bread and wine. Through the use of these simple creatures, which become sacred symbols, dedicated for divine use, the soul receives grace, and all made possible through the Incarnation. Under the Old Covenant, the focus was on the transcendence of God. Physical representation of God was forbidden. Contact with holiness meant sure and certain death at certain times in the Old Testament. However, in the New Covenant, the old order is done away with, God has condescended to become man, to become part of the created order, elements of the created order are used as windows into the spiritual in the holy images. God has opened up the way for our sanctification through that created order. Tertullian writes about this in the 3rd century, in chapter 8 of The Resurrection of the Flesh:

The flesh is washed, that the soul may be cleansed: the flesh is anointed, that the soul may be consecrated: the flesh is signed with the cross, that the soul may be defended: the flesh has hands laid upon it, that the soul may be illuminated by the Holy Ghost: the flesh is fed on Christ’s Body and Blood, that the soul may be nourished by God.

St Etherius writes:

We eat his Body and drink his Blood, that as it passeth visibly into our inward parts, so we may be inwardly united to him and transformed. For it is a sacrament and a mystery.

The pinnacle of this is the Divine Liturgy; the holy Eucharist, by which the entire saving work of God is made present.

Jesus, the Christ, called his Apostles, and gave them the solemn charge to preach to the peoples of the earth, to take to them the Good News of salvation, and to baptise them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. He gave them the Sacramental power to forgive sin in his name, and to be his Church in the world.

On the night before he died, Jesus performed for the first time, the fourfold action that the Church repeats at every Eucharist. He took bread, gave thanks, broke it, and shared it. He did this within the context of the greatest commemoration of God’s saving work for his people: the Passover meal. This fourfold action he performed, and taught us that by repeating it, the saving work of his Incarnation, death, Resurrection and Ascension would be made present, when he gave us the command: ‘Do this in remembrance of me’.

The word that we poorly translate as ‘remembrance/memory’ in English, in the Greek scriptures, is anamnesis. This is not a simple remembering, such as remembering where one has left one’s keys, but actually means a making present in the here and now, events of the past. This was a popular concept in Jewish/Greek culture, and would have been instantly understood to those present. It is this anamnesis that was believed to be taking place at each and every celebration of Passover, which is why every food, every word, every prayer has a symbolic meaning. The Jewish people celebrating Passover believe themselves to be really and truly present with their forefathers as the angel of death passes over them - they truly and really tread with the ancestors as they cross the Red Sea. This is the same word that Christ used in his command to us. It is not a simple "remembering" in the common understanding of the word in the English language today. Sadly, this concept has never really featured in western culture, and so we have never had a word for it in the English language. "Remembrance" is the best that we can manage, but we must understand that it is a linguistic shortcoming and not indicative that the Eucharist is a mere "calling to mind".

Therefore Christ’s command to ‘do this’ (taking, giving thanks, breaking and sharing) in remembrance of him was not a mere request that Christians should gather together for shared food and think of Jesus. It was a command to celebrate and make present the entire incarnational mystery of God's saving acts throughout history, by joining the whole Church in making the events of our Faith truly present, including Christ's sacrifice of himself on Calvary. The redeeming, salvific moment of the Christ’s Sacrifice of himself on the Cross, his Resurrection and Ascension are made truly present at the Altar at each and every Mass: Christ the Victim is made present (anamnesis) in his Body and Blood, under the appearances of bread and wine, and Christ the High Priest, in the person of the bishop, the successor to the Apostles, (or the priest, his sacramental icon and representative).

This is a celebration of the great benefits that we have gained by Christ’s Birth, death and Resurrection, but the Mass is also eschatological – it celebrates the Ascension of Christ and so looks forward to the end time, when we too, shall be raised to eternal life with Christ in glory.

This is what the Mass is about. There are those who would deny this, and again, with little justification. They claim that the Body and Blood of Christ are not truly present, but that the bread and wine merely represent Christ’s Body and Blood. This heresy misses the point of the last Supper and Christ’s crucifixion, and diminishes the entire work of salvation, and is a grave departure from Sacred Scripture and Holy Tradition, both of which support the Church’s teaching.

The whole of chapter 6 of the Gospel according to S. John supports this, especially verses 48ff, where Christ says:

‘I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live for ever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.’ (John 6: 48 – 51)

Those who argue that the bread and wine are merely representations of the Body and Blood of Christ claim that Christ was speaking figuratively, and that he did not actually mean that we are to eat his Body.

However, it appears that those present actually took these words literally, as St John tells us that this statement caused the Jews to question how this could be – how could this Jesus give them his flesh to eat? If Jesus had not meant this to be taken literally, and had concerns that they had misunderstood him, surely this would have been the time to correct their misunderstanding, but instead, when he sees their confusion, he goes on to say:

‘Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day; for my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. (John 6: 53 – 56)

Can we be left in any doubt? In the sixth century, St Caesarius of Arles writes:

When the creatures are set upon our holy altars to be blessed by heavenly words, before they are consecrated by the invocation of the holy name, the substance thereof is bread and wine; but after the words of Christ, they are the Body and Blood of Christ. What wonder is it if he can change by his word the things which, by his word, he was able to create?

In case any should think that this was a later teaching of the Church, we have the words of St Paul in his first letter to the Church at Corinth:

…the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took a loaf of bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, ‘This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.’ In the same way he took the cup also, after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.’ For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.

Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be answerable for the body and blood of the Lord. Examine yourselves, and only then eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For all who eat and drink without discerning the body, eat and drink judgement against themselves.
(1 Corinthians 11: 23 -29)

The meaning is clear: although the outward appearance is that of bread, we are exhorted to discern the Body of Christ, and to suggest that God is incapable of bringing this about is blasphemy.

After the Ascension of Christ, the Father sent the Holy Spirit to the Church at Pentecost, and it is the Holy Spirit that has led and guided the Church since then, through the oecumenical councils of bishops.

The Apostles and their successors initially established five patriarchates: Rome, Constantinople, Jerusalem, Alexandria and Antioch. These worked together, under the Spirit’s guidance, establishing the Christian Faith, and ordaining bishops and priests to continue this work until, in 1054, the Bishop of Rome broke from the Holy Tradition of the Church, and took it upon himself to accept a change to the Church’s doctrine (her understanding of the nature of God, at that!), without the authority of an Oecumenical Council. None of the other patriarchs was involved in this decision and none of them agreed with it.

This is the famous dispute over the filioque: the phrase in the Creed about the Holy Spirit, which means that instead of the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father, he proceeds from the Father and the Son. The other bishops and their churches did not believe this, but this is not the main issue. The Creed had been thrashed out and formulated according the Sacred Scripture and Holy Tradition, by all of the bishops of the Church, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Now, this one man makes a change, and in addition, states that he has the authority to make such a change. It is this that the rest of the Church primarily took issue with. No one man can change the teaching of the whole Church.

Christ promised his disciples who were to become the Church, the gift of the Holy Spirit, who would guide the Church into all Truth. And so we have Holy Scripture, the Oecumenical Councils, the daily worship of the Church, the writings of the Fathers, and all of the aspects of our Holy Tradition, which we understand to be the revelation of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, a departure from this inherited Tradition is a rejection of the Holy Spirit, and constitutes, not the formation of a separate "branch" within the Church, but a separation from the Church.

Thus, in the eyes of the Orthodox, the Bishop of Rome and the Church of the West went into schism, although the Bishop of Rome taught that it was the rest of the Church that, by not following him, had become schismatic. This western Church became known as the Roman Catholic Church, and it is this church that gave birth to the Protestant reformation, which was theological, political, and bloody and caused nothing but division, but most importantly, has given rise to the idea that any person, in his reading of Scripture, can formulate the Truth.

The Church of Rome rightly denies this position, hence the animosity to this day that exists between the Roman church and Protestant groups, but this idea could have only originated in the church of Rome, because the core reason that the Roman church separated from the East was because its own bishop had done the selfsame thing: he had reinterpreted Sacred Scripture without the guidance of the Church’s Holy Tradition. The only difference was that he had taken a large portion of the faithful with him. There are now numerous Protestant factions, some with their origins in the Reformation, some which have sprung up later, but all of which are based on the idea of primacy of the individual conscience or the individual community. Therefore, an Orthodox Christian, or a Roman Catholic, arguing a theological point, would take both Scripture and the Church’s Tradition into consideration and would argue that ‘The Church teaches…’, whereas a Protestant would read the Bible himself, work out his own version of the ‘truth’, and argue that ‘The Bible says…’.

To my ears, the idea that anybody, or any small group can work out Truth for itself is nonsense. It fails on more than one point.

a/ Firstly, it fails to take account of the Holy Tradition of the Church, and so presumes that Scripture alone can lead to the Truth. The fact that it is often members of protestant communities who argue that we should return to a model of the early Church is testimony to this rejection of the guidance of the Holy Spirit over the past 2000 years.

b/ If one congregation can work out Truth for itself, and so can another congregation, then how is a core difference between these ‘truths’ explained? In ‘Christian charity’, they may say to each other, ‘We believe x, and you believe y, and although they are mutually exclusive, we have both reached our conclusions by prayer and our reading of the Scriptures and so both are the Truth’. No! I cannot accept this. Christ prayed for unity, but he promised Truth. Christian Unity is a noble thing worth striving for, but not at the expense of Christian Truth, otherwise that unity is based on fallacy, and where does thta leave us?

c/ How much more arrogant can mankind be? How can one person believe that his tiny little mind can process and understand the great Mystery that is the eternal God? The Church as a whole does not make this claim, and She has the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

As previously mentioned, the church of Rome rejects this individualistic approach, as it is not Catholic (i.e. not universal, but individualistic). However, the church of Rome has its origins in just this sort of approach, and to this day, retains the filioque as part of the Creed, as do most of the western churches and protestant ecclesial communities.

Not only that, but the church of Rome has made numerous alterations to its teaching of the Christian Faith since the schism of the 11th century, and all without the consultation of the Orthodox churches. The climax of this occurred in 1869, when the Vatican Council of the church of Rome declared that the Bishop of Rome, when pronouncing ex cathedra (from his seat, or rather, by virtue of his office), on matters of faith and morals, is infallible. This further flew in the face of the Orthodox Churches, and caused further divisions in the Roman Church, with the formation of the breakaway group, known as the Old Catholics, which still exists to this day. It also caused further tensions between the Roman church and other ecclesial communities in the west, thus hindering reconciliation.

It would appear that the only Churches that have retained the balance between Sacred Scripture and Holy Tradition, and so have been preserved from doctrinal error, are the Orthodox Churches. Only Orthodoxy appears to embrace the fullness of the Faith that I believe that Christ gave to his Church, with the development and maturity that has been brought by the Holy Spirit.

I initially wrote this, with much difficulty, as a cradle Anglican – a member of one of those churches that have their roots in the church of Rome - but so much of my faith seemed more conversant with that of Orthodoxy than of Anglicanism that I found myself in a position where I no longer felt at home within the church that had nurtured me and my faith from a very young age. Indeed, I could no longer recognise it as part of the Church while retaining any integrity. I prayed and read and studied and spoke with people about this, and with time, the Holy Spirit found me where I was, and moved me to where God wants me to be.

Much of the historical information in the above may not be completely accurate - this was originally written as a series of my musings in one afternoon, and I just typed as the thoughts came to mind. It is only later that I tidied it up a little, but this was never intended to be an essay or for publication. I have updated it over the months as my understanding and journey have developed, and so this is a work in progress. I find it useful to refer people to when they ask for my prspective on certain issues.

I intend to post my musings here as time goes by and as my journey progresses. I hope that those who read it can contribute as they feel appropriate.

In Christ,

Michael.