Fr Robert Taft in a retreat to Eastern Rite Catholic priests called attention to an honest embrace of their identity. His prayer can also be applied to Orthodox who might be tempted by methods and approaches that are from the pop-Christian and reductionist milleu. One gets the sense that Fr Robert Taft is encouraging an authentic witness and not senseless appropriation of things contrary to the Tradition, especially when such appropriation includes anti-eccelsial presuppositions or reductionist theology rooted in a trends of 'relevance'.
"Priests in the Russian and some other Byzantine-Slavonic traditions wear a pectoral cross inscribed on the back with an inscription that begins "Obraz budi— You be the image!" That is my wish and prayer for you today: that you in your ministry be the icon for others of what the Church wants you to be, by knowing, loving, and living your authentic tradition as the Church wishes it to be."
+ Archimandrite Robert Taft
May we be transformed and confromed into to that ancient beauty from where we were called from.
Glory to the Holy Trinity.
