After the break is an introduction to Orthodoxy by Metropolitan Anthony Bloom given to teachers. What I find fascinating is how Metropolitan Anthony speaks about being Orthodox, being Christian, being and becoming Christ.
Perhaps it is in living in the Divine Life of the Holy Trinity and encountering Divine beauty: participating, restoring and offering all that is in this world as sacrament that we impart the experience that Metropolitan Anthony hints at.
Metropolitan Anthony's talk applies also to Orthodox Missiology and Ethos. It's often the temptation when we've been exposed to non-Orthodox or mega-Church ethos, to define the world in categories of the sacred and profane (ie. halal vs haram). There's often a need to 'crusade' or conquer in our missiological methods and focus on sensationalized displays of a packaged Christian "brand" and "ideology" that ultimately affirm secularism rather than affirm the Gospel (ie. Christian Rock is better than Secular Rock, Christian Trees are better than Secular Trees, Christian Chicken is better than Secular Chicken, Christian Beer is better than Secular Beer).
Public prayer is used as protest, mission is relegated to a numbers game, success is focused on relevance and utility, faith becomes about proofs and affirmations of the 'second storey'. Reductionism reigns as ideology of accessibility. Church is transformed into Corporation. Becoming and Being Christ (Theosis) is replaced with moralism and lifestyle choice.
May the coming year be one of restoration and re-learning of what is in our Orthodox Ethos, our humble and vast theology, our lived encounter with Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and our transformation into human beings through the Cross and Resurrection, as Saints, Holy, Blameless and Beautiful in the life of the Church, her mysteries and on going legacy to behold the Kingdom and our Lord. Je Nai Nan. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us sinners. Amen.
"You may, being teachers, be interested to know how we teach our faith. Well, I could put it in a nut-shell by saying, badly, because if what I have said in the beginning makes any sense to you, it is not by making children to learn doctrinal formularies or formal prayers or any such thing that you make a person into a Christian or an Orthodox. He must be introduced into an experience. And an experience can be caught as one catches the flu, it is an infection, it’s not something which can be conveyed in a sterile manner. So that what we expect is that in the family people should have a sense of worship. I do not mean, do special things. It’s not by praying before a meal or not praying before a meal that one conveys a sense of a sacredness of the event, but I remember one of our young theologians saying, “Everything in life is an act of love divine even the food, which we eat, is divine love that has become edible.” And if the food is prepared with love, if it is served with beauty, if it is shared with reverence, if it is treated as a gift of God, a miracle, and for people of my generation and that of my parents this attitude is easy because we have gone so often without any food and in hunger, that really a peace of bread or any form of food is an act of God or an act of human love. So that is an example. The same could be applied to everything which is the life of the home — the way parents treat children and children treat parents."
+ Metropolitan Anthony Bloom
Orthodoxy
http://masarchive.org/Sites/texts/1900-00-00-0-E-E-T-EN05-023Othodoxy.html
