Originally posted on CopticNN
I am going to start this piece by saying something crazy, I
am Orthodox because it is truth. I am not Orthodox because it is fun, I am not
Orthodox because it is convenient, and I am not Orthodox because it suits my
lifestyle. I am simply an Orthodox Christian because it is the fullness of the
faith, found inside the living and apostolic Church as guided by the Holy
Spirit. This is the greatest strength of the Church and the greatest weapon of
the Church when confronting challenges in expressing the faith to others.
For many Christians around the world the expressing of faith
to others is done through adapting the worship or making changes in expression
to accommodate for a change in the audience, seeing many traditions as being
outmodes or subjective, Though as mentioned in our previous article, this can
often serve to only weaken to the resolve of someone seeking the faith as they
would see it undervalued by those inside. In the same manner that one would not
destroy or vandalise a priceless artifact, we would not dismantle or undermine
the traditions passed down if we see them as apostolic or given through Christ
himself to the world. This leads us to the question of the value of the faith’s
apostolicity and historical significance in dialogues regarding faith and how
these are indeed the greatest tools in the arsenal of the evangelist in the
postmodern religious landscape.
Firstly if we speak of the historicity of the Church, we are
speaking of its role in the history of Christianity from the life of Christ to
today. This is something that many Christian communities cannot address, having
their origins in schisms and splits from other communities or from the Church
itself, since it is difficult to justify one’s belief as Christianity in the
most traditional sense when ones founder rejected this faith. In the same
manner many religions have strayed so far from their own historical origins
that they are almost meaningless as an historical faith, such as western
Buddhism which many see as an ‘alternative lifestyle,’ rejecting many of the
foundational or traditional praxis or ethics for the sake of promoting itself
to the new-age movement in the western world.
However this places Orthodox Christianity in a unique
position, keeping its origins clear and its historical values and faith close
to it. In this manner it is a beacon and living expression of the faith of the
early Church, something many seek in this world of replicas and individualism,
something I myself was drawn to. The historical veracity and continuance of
apostolic tradition is a vital aspect of the Church in the world today as this
is spoken of as vital in scripture. St Paul teaching in 2Thess 2:15, “stand
firm and hold fast to the teachings we passed on to you, whether by word of
mouth or by letter.” For many this simply means the words given in scripture,
however from an orthodox perspective this can apply to the praxis, ethics and
doctrines given by the fathers alongside scripture and its interpretation,
allowing Orthodoxy to breathe in the world as a living expression of the faith
of the Apostles themselves. In this way, Orthodoxy appears to those who seek
the living expression of this faith.
In a similar manner the Apostolicity of the faith itself is
important when expressing the Orthodox faith to others. If one is seeking the
faith of the apostles they will seek the faith which accords with the faith
taught by the Early Church, in this way they will be drawn to Orthodoxy. The
English Catholic Saint John Henry Newman stated, “To Be Deep in History Is to
Cease to Be Protestant,” and he was right in this. To discover the aspects of
faith which were expressed in the Church at the time of the Nicene fathers and
not find them in ones own Church or amongst those Christians visible in your
life can be devastating to ones faith, in the same manner that one would feel
ashamed to discover their parents had deceived them regarding their identity.
In this manner, Orthodoxy is unique in not having this crisis of identity
amongst Christians today.
In this same way, Orthodox Christianity can be seen as
amongst only a few faiths which has not liberalised or culturally warped its
doctrines. If we are to compare it to examples in Judaism, where we see the
destruction of the temple and emergence of rabbinical Judaism then later the
rise of the Chassidic movements, we see a gradual shift from anything
resembling the Jewish faith two thousand years ago. In the same manner Islam
has failed to be able to express its faith in the modern world in the opposite
sense, enforcing doctrine without justification, which is again against its own
historical praxis of incorporating Hellenic philosophy as seen in places such
as early Baghdad and Damascus. Both of these serve as examples of how Orthodoxy
has been able to present itself as a doctrinally, and in its ethos, the living
Church of the apostles, a vital point of emphasis for one explaining why
Christianity is a historical and Apostolic Faith.
So what is the message here? It is a simple one. Do not see
the Church’s history as a burden or something which cannot be a point of value.
Many seeking the Church today will find solace in its historical viability and
clear representation of the apostolic faith as proof of its heritage in a
religious marketplace fully of diverse yet unrooted traditions. As Christ
himself Said of the faith of his Apostles, “on this rock I will build My church,
and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.” In the same way we must
say that on the rock of the faith of the Apostles we must found our own
evangelism, and if we do this then the gates of hell can never prevail over our
work.
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