Christianity

A Concise Description of Orthodox Christianity

"Christianity itself is a story, one that captured the West’s attention for almost two-thousand years. According to this narrative—as contained in Scripture and expressed by Church Fathers such as Irenaeus of Lyons, the Cappadocians (Basil and the two Gregories), and Maximus the Confessor—God created all men to participate in His divine life, i.e., for deification. He created them in His “image,” and they had to freely choose to grow in His “likeness.” The “Fall” was an attempt to achieve deification apart from God. After the Fall, man retained the image of God (though marred by sin), but no longer had the divine life dwelling in him. God’s redemption of man, over the course of many years, culminated in Christ’s death and Resurrection, which “conquered death,” redeemed human nature, and enabled man to once again fulfill his original call to participate in the divine life." -- Daniel Lattier, The 'Story' that Replaced Christianity is Collapsing, April 26, 2018, Intellectual Takout

The Beginning of Christianity

"I think that everything started… with the kerygma; with that kind of oral proclamation. That God sent his son to be incarnate, then to suffer for us, then to be resurrected. Everything was going around the mystery of the resurrection. This was a mystery, and nobody around at the time of Jesus could understand. Why? The Jews, first of all, believed in the resurrection -- actually the resurrection, the bodily resurrection, is a revolutionary idea, starting in the Old Testament -- but the Jews believed that this resurrection would happen at the end of time. The Greeks did not believe in the resurrection. That's why the failure actually of the first proclamation of Jesus in Athens by Paul, in Acts chapter 17, occurred. So, to think that these resurrection stories were fabricated is to be out of mind, because you didn't serve to anybody. So, the Christians truly believed in the resurrection of Christ because it happened in the midst of history. This is the galvanizing point, if you like; the energy; the seed of Christianity. It was transmitted orally and then because the apostles were dying now after 60 years, like we have Jacob [James], we have Peter, we have Paul, we have the destruction of Jerusalem and the exile of the first Church to Pella, not too far away from Jerusalem, that was leaving the Christians without having the testimonies fixed in writing. But Christianity didn't appear as a religion of a book. It appeared as a way of living. That's why the first title, actually, in Acts Chapter 9, verse 2 is The Way, Η Οδος." -- Fr. Eugen Pentiuc, The Bible In The Orthodox Church: The New Testament (Discovering Orthodox Christianity), YouTube, November 3rd, 2013. Link

What The World Seeks From Us Is Consistency

"What the world is seeking from Christians is consistency."

"The world is asking us to reveal the beauty of the Christian message by conscientiously living its principles, in the light of the Crucifixion and the Resurrection."

"The world is looking for us to reveal, in the course of our daily reality, the beauty, radiance, glory, and power in a life that has been made new in Christ."

"The world is calling upon us to radiate the presence of the Holy Spirit."

"It yearns for a living Christianity that bears witness to the mystery of the All-Holy Trinity’s Love."

"It longs for the virtual transformation of human existence and for a communion with the transcendent power of Love." -- Facing the World: Orthodox Christian Essays on Global Concerns, His Beatitude Anastasios Yannoulatos, Archbishop of Tirana and all Albania

Christ is Truth

"In Christianity truth is not a philosophical concept nor is it a theory, a teaching, or a system, but rather, it is the living theanthropic hypostasis - the historical Jesus Christ (John 14:6). Before Christ men could only conjecture about the Truth since they did not possess it. With Christ as the incarnate divine Logos the eternally complete divine Truth enters into the world. For this reason the Gospel says: 'Truth came by Jesus Christ' (John 1:17)." -- St. Justin Popovich

Christianity is Counter Cultural

"I think what we have to realize is that Christianity is counter-cultural. It is radically different. It is a continual change of mind. It is continual repentance, a continual sobriety which challenges even the most fashionable and almost universally accepted presuppositions and values of our cultures and times. Everything around is not necessarily able to be incorporated into the life of the Spirit. We are a little flock - a dynamic leaven. The Lord says to us, "Fear not little flock." We have to not be afraid to be different, not afraid to be looked down on, misunderstood, and even be ridiculed or suffer for being different." - Sister Aemiliane, An Interview with Sister Aemiliane of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross Monastery, Thebes, Greece

NB: In 2006 Sister Aemiliane visited St. George Church in Oklahoma City, and I had an opportunity to meet her. There is something very special and otherworldly about her. When she looks at you there is very much the feeling that she does not merely meet your eyes, but that she can look right into your very soul. I thought to myself, "This is what it is like to meet a true Saint."

An Interview with Sister Aemiliane

Christianity a Religion of Losers

"Deep failure, the failure of our lives, is something we occasionally contemplate in the middle of the night, in those moments of terrifying honesty before we get up and dress for success. Ecce homo, said Pilate. Behold, the man. This is humanity. And the facade of success we present to the world is commonly a desperate attempt to ward off this knowledge. At the beginning of Lent, Christians are reminded of this in the most emphatic of ways: know that you are dust and to dust you shall return. Those who used the period of Lent to give things up are invited to live life stripped bare, experiencing humanity in the raw, without the familiar props to our ego. This has nothing to do with the avoidance of chocolate and everything to do with facing the unvarnished truth about human failure. There is no way 100 top business leaders would endorse the cross. It is life without the advertising, without the accoutrements of success. It is life on a zero-hours contract, where at any moment we can be told we are not needed.

But here’s the thing. The Christian story, like the best sort of terrifying psychoanalysis, strips you down to nothing in order for you to face yourself anew. For it turns out that losers are not despised or rejected, not ultimately. In fact, losers can discover something about themselves that winners cannot ever appreciate – that they are loved and wanted simply because of who they are and not because of what they achieve. That despite it all, raw humanity is glorious and wonderful, entirely worthy of love. This is revealed precisely at the greatest point of dejection. The resurrection is not a conjuring trick with bones. It is a revelation that love is stronger than death, that human worth is not indexed to worldly success." -- Christianity, when properly understood, is a religion of losers, Giles Fraser, The Guardian, 04/03/2015, Full Article

Christianity is not a "Trap"

'With You, Lord, I will flee, that I may gain in You Life in every place. The prison with You is no prison, for in You man goes up into Heaven: the grave with You is no grave, for You are the Resurrection!(cf. John 11:25)" -- St. Ephraim the Syrian

That Same World Will Be Redeemed

"The world may mock, but a mockery is hollow laughter. The Christian faith teaches that the last laugh is on the world, because that grim old world, taking itself so seriously that even its laughter is a sneer, that same world will be redeemed. It will be made spanking new, whether it likes it or not, and if I know the world, and for better and for worse I am well acquainted with it, I wager that it will not like it at all, and will kick up quite a fuss before that consummation. But the end will not be a silent heat-death, or a shadowland below. It will be laughter as bright as the stars in their earlienst glory. It will be wholly unexpected, and wholly right; it will fulfill all times, and time itself, and the time after time. It will be as quiet as a still small voice, and will crack open the hardest material in the universe, the heart of man. It will still our questions, and stir our wonder with love. Nor can love allow the lowliest among us to be forgotten; not when Man himself sits upone the throne, Son both of Man and God. 'Behold,' says He, 'I make all things new.'" -- Anthony Esolen, Ironies of Faith: The Laughter at the Heart of Christian Literature