Posted by Dean Calvert
on 11/29/2008, 1:37 pm, in reply to "Ethnocratic Orthodoxy"
Hi Fr. Steven,
Long time no see!! Hope you are well.
Your post caught my attention, since I am re-reading the book The Byzantine Commonwealth: Eastern europe from 500 - 1453 by D. Obolensky.
In the chapter covering the mission of Cyril and Methodios to the Slavs, the author describes the "unresolved" tension that existed in Byzantium between the "conservatives" (whom he characterizes as wanting to maintain the exclusive use of the Greek language, owing to its inherent superiority over other languages) and the "progressives" (ie those who would welcome the use of foreign languages, and the resultant missionary work their use encouraged).
As I was reading this today, it occurred to me that, "You could make exactly the same observations today about the Greek church," which your post essentially did.
Some of the other reasons for the conservative reluctance to the use of Slavic are also probably still true today: a.) use of additional languages breaks the liturgical "monopoly" of the Greek clergy and b.) use of additional languages involves more work, because of the missionary work that it naturally propagates.
It never ceases to amaze me that much of the most successful missionary work ever conducted in the Orthodox world took place during the patriarchate of one man - St. Photios. It was during his ecclesiastical "reign" that missions were sent to the Khazars in the Caucausus, to the Bulgarians, to the Russians (200 years before St. Vladimir), to the Magyars, and finally to the Moravians. It's even more remarkable when you consider that this man was elevated from a layman to patriarch in about a week (makes Met. Jonah's rise appear almost glacial).
Although this issue has been resolved over and over again (in favor of Christianity, and against Classicism), it seems that this age old battle never fails to resurface. The devil must really like the odds of this one...and it is certainly not limited to the Greeks!
Fortunately for us, the numbers are in our favor on this one. Any parish foolish enough to think they can remain an ethnic outpost of Byzantium, Antioch or Moscow will soon find that they have a lot more in common with a Tyrannosaurus Rex than a living, breathing organism...ie. they will soon be extinct.
As Metropolitan Jonah's election illustrates, converts to Orthodoxy are adding the new life blood to this faith on this continent - just as Sts. Cyril and Methodios, as well as Sts Innocent, Raphael and Tikhon, intended. And I think we can be assured that they will have no patience for backward, close minded, ethnocentric thinking of the sort the Ottomans so cleverly and insidiously injected into the Church.
We have a bright future on this continent.
Best Regards,
Dean
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