For he knows how He formed us; He remembers we are dust. As for man, his days are like grass, As a flower of the field, so he flourishes; For the wind passes through it, and it shall not remain; And it shall no longer know its place. But the mercy of the Lord is from age to age upon those who fear Him and His righteousness upon children’s children. To such as keep his covenant and remember his commandments, to do them. The Lord prepared His throne in heaven and his kingdom rules over all.
Psalm 102/103: 14-20 OSB
The western mindset insists on immediacy. A sense of urgency for impact, measurable growth, and immediate gratification are all hard wired into the western psyche, and I am no exception. If I had to guess what lies at the root of the issue, it stems from habitual, ingrained materialism that believes that algorithms and scientific method can produce answers for every tangible issue.
The emphasis here is on the word “tangible.” Truth as statistical facts, reality as what can measured, big pictures as what can be accomplished, small details as what can be managed, outcomes based on efficiency, cause and effect as constant experiments…all examples of things that are constituents of our collective consciousness. But is our existence fulfilled by analogical constructs and mathematical calculations?
The reality is that humans are physical—that is true—and tangible reality is important, but we are also completely spiritual. Every logical and scientific answer is shot through with the imperceptible reality that the presence of God is hidden in all of it. It is the spiritual that trips us up because we can’t prove it with our methods and logic, when the principle of Occam’s razor would be sufficient. There is an insidious and arrogant pride that infects us which fails to permit our minds to see a flower simply for its beauty, for example. To the western material mind, the flower is beautiful, yes, but it is a means to an end, rather than the flower is beautiful and it is a means to an end.
In my experience the same can be applied to our religion. For the modern westerner, faith in Christ is a means to an end—the avoidance of judgement resulting from the guilt of sin and the punishment of eternal suffering. Faith in Christ is beautiful, yes, but it is a means to and end, just like the materialist view of the flower. Once I have achieved the end of accepting Christ’s saving work, I must turn my attention to the saving of others.
For the Orthodox, faith in Christ is the end, not the means. Christ’s work was sufficient to defeat death and out of love reclaim humanity for eternal life. I enter into that salvation immediately upon baptism, and my Christian duty is to repent conscientiously and continuously and participate in the eternal life that begins now and continues after my physical body reposes. The differences are subtle, but for me it represents a tectonic paradigm shift. The striving to “do enough for God” is ended, and the focus becomes an effort toward being united to Him through my spiritual struggle, through prayer, confession, the sacraments, and worship. In that effort, his life flows out of me and into the environment in which I dwell. He does the work of saving the world, not me. All of my hope is now in Him.
In the past, worship was a means to fill the proverbial tank so I would have something to fuel me as I went out into the world, like boxes that need to be ticked off as things accomplished so that the next task may be undertaken. The importance of coming to church and of fellowship was emphasized because we “can’t run on an empty tank,” a phrase that I often heard. Now, worship is an end itself—my service to God, and repentance is the removal of inhibitions to that service, so that I can see Him more clearly—so that theosis can be my end.
You might be asking yourself what this has to do with pilgrimage, but it does. Throughout our meanderings in Serbia and North Macedonia, at every turn there were two things that stood out to me: the first was the riot of color from wild flowers that were cast over the landscape, and the second was the frequent sight of churches and crosses that had stood for hundreds of years. I could not escape the scripture that says, “All flesh is grass, and all man’s glory is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God abides forever.” (I Peter 1:24-25)
These churches were established by kings, despots, and rulers, but they were built by the faithful who lived in the surrounding villages. No expense was spared to make them strong and beautiful and the painting of the icons that covered the interiors of the buildings took expertise and many years to accomplish. They were done by believers who were struggling to pray, to worship, and to experience theosis, just like myself. The names of most of these have passed into obscurity and some are glorified as great Saints. To the western mind, one might ask about the practical nature of all the labor and expense to build such things, but to this convert, it absolutely matters. The echoes of the faithful call out from the very foundation stones to invite us to the Great Feast. Their beauty has not faded, though the flowers have fallen. They have become one with the One whose Word stands forever. Their labor to build and to serve in the temple of God is a sanctifying, holy work.
As I was coming to a new understanding in the Orthodox Christian faith, I began to understand the beauty that is invested in the physical structures and accoutrements of the houses of worship. Every detail, from the priestly vestments to the utensils and candlesticks, the icons and the architecture are intended to satisfy the spiritual need that we all possess for beauty and draw our attention to its Author. Our Creator is the source and means for all beauty in the world, and if we disregard that in our worship, we are declaring physical beings to be merely tools to be used for some end that doesn’t really apply here on earth. Why then would Christ teach us to pray, “on earth as it is in heaven?” That our spirits are not separate entities from our bodies—we are not canisters containing a life-force—our bodies need what our spirits need—union with Christ, the source of all beauty. Our compulsion to create beautiful objects and buildings with which to surround ourselves, to devote things precious and costly to the service of God, is a natural response of the human made in His image. As a result the things made to this end tend to endure and stand the test of time, barring hostile intervention.
In this pilgrimage to the Balkans, I felt a deep appreciation for the slowness of it all. Their history is long and complex and deeply Christian. The elements of the culture are derived from time and tradition and rooted in faith, and it feels solid and durable despite political turmoil and upheaval. There was a sense of “We have this, and we will carry on,” as opposed to what I perceive in my own culture, which feels as if we are constantly trying to improve upon and dispose of the past. Rather, there was a sense of adding to and preserving the already-present beauty of their heritage derived from faith. There is not a prevailing sense of immediacy, as I first mentioned, but rather an entering into the eternal plan which happens to include time.
From my observation, where western ideology prevails upon culture, there is a loss of tradition. Because of our need for things that are temporal and immediate, we see in our society an increasing hunger for a return to things that are ancient and traditional. We are looking for what will sustain the spirit, to breathe life into algorithms, to see God in scientific processes, and not to explain away things that cannot be explained except by miracles. We yearn for the eternal that lasts, heals, and satisfies. The Orthodox Church continues its upward call in a world that continues to “advance” and yet remains the same as when it was first handed down. It continues to welcome sinners into the beauty of its havens, the holiness of its practices, and the truth of its teachings in timelessness and beauty.
If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. (Colossians 3:1-4)