From CS Lewis’ The Great Divorce. Lewis, having taken a bus ride from hell to heaven is being guided and instructed by George MacDonald. The question of what will be in the end comes up. Will all be saved? +++ âYe can know nothing of the end of all things, or nothing expressible in those terms. It may be, as the Lord said to the Lady Julian, that all will be well, andâŠ
Noise. The sound of the world around us generally qualifies as little more than noise. Almost nothing advertises itself as unimportant or something to be attended to later. The insistent cries of everything often raise the demands for our attention to a deafening pitch. âDo this! Read this! Buy this! Remember this! Believe this!â The world constantly presents itself to us as though it were teetering on the apocalyptic brink of disasterâŠ
Orthodox Christianity often seems inherently conservative. The unyielding place that tradition holds within its life seems ready-made for a conservative bulwark against a world all-too-ready to forget everything that is good or beautiful. There are subtle but important distinctions that make this treatment of Orthodoxy misleading and can lead to the distortion of the faith and an almost reverse image of our true salvation. Orthodox Christianity does not seek to preserve somethingâŠ
Reading discussions about life after death, it is easy to get the impression that people actually know what theyâre talking about, that perhaps they have been there, seen what goes on and therefore authoritatively opine on the nature of things. But, the truth is that we mostly donât know. We have a few things given to us in Scripture, and even those few things are often somewhat cryptic or uncertain. I willâŠ
The Orthodox pray for the departed. The most pressing prayer within the liturgies appointed for this purpose is for God to forgive their sins. We say, âFor no one lives and does not sin, for You only are without sinâŠ.â This is easily misunderstood, but it goes to the very heart of the mystery of our relationship with God. The same sentiment, interestingly, is offered in the prayers for the living. TheâŠ
The world ended last Sunday (Pascha). No. You werenât âleft behind.â But you might not have noticed. And our not noticing is, strangely, at the very heart of our problem. It is also at the heart of the Christian faith. What I am describing is the âapocalypticâ character of Christianity â the fact that it is a revealing of something hidden. And this is not a âone-timeâ revelation. It is the moment-by-momentâŠ
âIf only I had knownâŠâ These are, not infrequently, the words of an apology. They are also an explanation of why we are sometimes the way we are. Ignorance is, in the mind of the Fathers, a major cause of sin. Of course, if sin is understood in a legal/forensic framework, then ignorance would be nothing more than a form of innocence. Not knowing is excusable in most cases. But the teachingâŠ
If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart? -Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago Solzhenitsyn puts his finger on theâŠ
Orthodox Christianity is deeply associated with the word âmystery.â  Its theological hymns are replete with paradox, repeatedly affirming two things to be true that are seemingly contradictory. Most of these things are associated with what is called âapophaticâ theology, or a theology that is âunspeakable.â This same theological approach is sometimes called the Via Negativa. This is easily misunderstood in common conversation. An Orthodox discussion takes place and reaches an impasse. Inevitably,âŠ
A utopian vision gave birth to America. The âpilgrimsâ who came to New England in the 17th century, imagined an ideal state, defined by their radical âpurificationâ of society and the Christian Church. Their dreams of a new world were constantly thwarted in England by the reluctance of the greater body of Protestants to embrace their extreme vision. Englandâs Reformation fell far short of their imaginings. In 1640, the English cousins ofâŠ