Comments on: Remember thou art Mortal

By: Larry

Larry — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 21:46:05 +0000

I could hardly have said it better myself. ;-)
Though, I can’t entirely understand this sense of religion as a means to “get out of hell.” Thankfully those who trained me in the faith never had that attitude, in my childhood in my faith community the above belief seemed (as far as I remember ) to be a minority opinion.

By: Huw

Huw — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 15:28:40 +0000

You are dead on.

I think that’s where I’m finding the overlap of which I spoke in the original post: the overlap between Jewish, Christian and (at least in their understanding of Jesus) Muslim thought. It is “incarnational” in meaning even if the words never say the same thing: if we understand “incarnational” as meaning making manifest the communion of the Trinity in all the world.

So many folks (in the US, at least) understand religion to mean “avoiding an eternity in hell”. Even after 20+ years of claiming (O)rthodox/(c)atholic and liberal doctrines I still find myself using that very childish understanding - as I picked up from my fundamentalist childhood. I find myself to project that on others too. Just last night, listening to a Rabbi on YouTube, I heard him explain a prayer that is used every morning in Judaism - one that I’d used several times without understanding.

My God, the soul You have placed within me is pure. You created it, You fashioned it. You breathed it into me, You safeguard it within me, and eventually You will take it from me,and restore it to me in Time to Come. As long as the soul it within me, I gratefully thank You, LORD, my God and the God of my forefathers, Master of all works, Lord of all souls. Blessed are You, LORD, who restores souls to all.

And yet, having read that, I keep projecting “working to get out of hell” on Judaism because, according to my childhood faith, that’s what *all* religion is. And, so common is that sense, that when I talk to non-Christians about a Christianity that doesn’t include that “get out of hell” aspect, they think I’m making up something new rather than talking about something ancient.

If, on the other hand, proper religion is about restoring to humanity that level of communion that is ours by creation and divine intent - communion with the Holy One and with each other - then we have a common ground (dust) from which we arise and to which we return.

By: Larry

Larry — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 04:57:18 +0000

Well with your clarification of your use of “monastic” you have answered largely my objection.
I think your critique/observation of a failure to fully live into the incarnation and of “overcoming the world” seems to cut across all forms of Christianity I have had contact with whether Anglican, Lutheran Methodist (liberal or conservative) evangelicals, Catholics and Orthodox. Of course one may object to this if one either interprets overcoming the world in terms only of working for political justice or some form of withdrawal (into an exclusive sect) from the world.
I am coming more and more to see that catholic and orthodox theology to be the best antidote to what you are speaking of. Of course so many Catholics and Orthodox hardly have any more sense of what is catholic and orthodox than most Protestants I know.

By: Huw

Huw — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 16:55:33 +0000

I was perhaps unclear in my use of “monastic”. You are right, btw: regarding monastics in general. I agree.

But - for example - see those conservative Orthodox who see marriage as just “a different sort of monasticism”. Or those who insist that there is no option for adult Christians other than Marriage or Monasticism. These folks then read their mania backwards into the history of monasticism and see the same pseudo gnosticism in everything from Francis to Pachomious. It is easy - terribly easy - to drift two steps into gnosticism with most all Christian teaching.

On the other hand, there are many (Fr Schmemann, St Maria of Paris, etc) who do not fit this mould. Yet it is important to note that there are nearly *no* lay saints in any Christian Tradition other than Anglicanism ,and the number gets smaller as we come into the modern era. Some see this as evidence of the sinfulness of the world. I see, rather, a bias. Anyone living “in the world” - falling in love, having children, working at McDonalds, can’t be holy. I see this as a denial of the Incarnation.

I see “overcome the world” when rendered in a way to indicate without discrimination pretty much everything from the internet to the Simpsons to Jordache Jeans, to be be world denying and gnostic and, in that context, a good many (nearly but thank God, not *all*) of the Orthodox that I know fit it. And a good few more think they will fit it if they just try harder than they are now.

By: Larry

Larry — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 16:46:18 +0000

I have never found the monastic tradition either in reading or actual encounter with monks and nuns as world denying in the way you set up the dichotomy in this post.
Rather I see it in the latter camp you place the Liberal Broad Church etc. Though it is my experience that in fact many liberal broad church folks simply want to focus on the making the world better which is fine but not so much on the other stuff except as nice liturgical decorations.
Of course the conservatives you speak of in my sense of things are hardly orthodox or catholic in the beliefs and are what could much more be called \\\”Gnostic\\\”. But I would contend that both Orthodox and Catholic teaching is not world denying, and is often misunderstood because it requires not instantaneous comprehension but a life of living into it an effort many (perhaps) most who claim to follow the way of Christ have no interest in. Well that is my melancholic response on this second day of Lent. Catch me at another moment I may have a more sanguine response.