An Orthodox Problem?

 This is a shot of my adopted daughter being baptized into the Orthodox Church at an orphanage in Ukraine.   The mass baptism is an annual event at orphanges and a fond memory for my now 17-year old. 

But it is also the last contact she had with the church that is synonymous with Ukrainian culture.  I spent two months in this fascinating country and as someone who had read about and already attended many Orthodox liturgies in my hometown, I was excited to have the privilege of visiting some of the most sacred sites in the Orthodox Church.  

I will always cherish the memory of going to the Monastery of the Caves and St. Mikhail’s Monastery in Kyiv, and attending daily liturgy at the Church of the Transfiguration in Odessa. 

But it was disappointing to see that in orphanages and other rescue missions, Orthodox Christians were nowhere to be seen.  I’ve heard the reasons for this:  lack of funding, an overwhelming burden that makes it impossible to help so many in need, the years of opression, and the explanation that evangelicals are able to do it because they’re backed by well funded ministries.  

These may be true to some extent, but the fact is that millions of dollars are being spent to restore Orthodox temples and new churches are dotting the landscape in every region, so pleading poverty is not convincing.      

I know of four missionaries who serve my daughter’s old orphanage full-time, along with many others who visit regularly.  One of the full-time missionaries is a Southern Baptist who’s been there since the Soviet breakup, there’s a young woman from a non-denominational church, and a Presbyterian couple that has moved to Ukraine permanently to minister to these abandoned children.  

Ukraine is indeed missionaried to death.  When we arrived at the airport in Kyiv we ran into a team of 40 para-church volunteers doing short term work at an orphanage.  It is unfair to dismiss them as do-gooders who are just going to spread the good news.  In my experience, I found them to be deeply committed individuals and families who are seeking to share the love of Christ in word and deed.  

The orphans take notice of this.  My older daughter spent 11 years in the orphanage and her Orthodox baptism is only a cheerful memory.  She has absolutely no desire to seek out Orthodox Christians in America.  The only Christianity she ever learned about was taught by Protestant evangelicals who have to continually raise money from individuals (not well funded ministries) to keep going.   

More importantly, the only Christian love she saw in action was by evangelicals, both American and Ukrainian.   I think most Orthodox leaders would agree that the overall lack of commitment to outreach has been a problem and that it is beginning to improve.  

Yet when I see the discussion that takes place on blogs and in Orthodox broadcasting, very little seems to be devoted to recognizing and remedying this glaring weakness.  Is this an inherent weakness of a Church that takes such justifiable pride in its beautiful liturgy, but fails, or refuses to see what is happening outside its walls?    

Now that I’ve been taking a harsh inventory of my fellow evangelicals for the past week I thought it was fair to raise an issue that has never been satisfactorily resolved for me.  

A Divine Moment

Being the only non-sick person in my family, I took advantage of the opportunity to attend Divine Liturgy this morning.  It was my first visit to an Orthodox Church since last summer in Ukraine and it was wonderful to understand the liturgy. 

I almost left before communion was served to give my aching back a rest, but I stuck around and I’m so glad I did because I witnessed one of the most lovely and beautiful things I’ve ever seen in church. 

The first person to step forward was a mother with her new born daughter, who had been baptized yesterday.  The baby girl was the very first to take the bread and wine!  I’ve seen small children taking communion before, but this moment was special as I came to grips with the powerful fact that this act was confirming that this tiny infant is a Christian!

“But she doesn’t have a personal relationship with Christ,” I could hear myself thinking. She slept through the entire sermon and doesn’t understand the doctrine of regeneration, justification, or adoption! 

But she had something I didn’t.  That tiny baby was joined to the body and blood of Christ, and I am now beginning to understand that she, and all other baptized believers in that room, are all part of His church-body, the pillar and foundation of truth.   

She will never have to agonize over whether or not she is saved, or whether she is an elect member of the body, and she will not have to base the quality of her worship experience upon the quality of the sermon. 

As I’ve struggled with my withering spiritual life of late, the simple act of witnessing a baby taking communion today filled my heart with love.     

Blogging and Being

 The level of thought and discussion in the Orthodox convert blog world is high and I discover incredible new journals daily.  I’ve never encountered so many intriguing people! You are poets, humorists, hard-core readers, and all people who are dead serious about the ancient faith of Christianity.       

My blog has been up less than a week and I’m just blown away by all the kind, loving and insightful comments and emails.  But as exciting as it’s been to sit down in front of the computer lately, it occurs to me that there could be a downside to sharing all my feelings ala Oprah style.   

My biggest criticism of evangelical practice is rampant Me-ism.  I self-righteously sneer at them, but I must confess that I’ve been consumed this week with ME, and specifically my blog!  I’ve been sober for 13 years and I definitely recognize some self absorbtion with a tendecy toward addiction in all this.  

I just read something on “Notes From a Common Place Book” that nails it for me:   

 There is something of a cottage industry among Protestant converts to Orthodoxy. For some reason, we all feel compelled to share our particular “conversion story.” This is understandable, human nature being what it is. In all probability, however, our time would be better spent remaining quiet, and learning how to actually be Orthodox, rather than pontificating on how we had “figured it all out. 

I don’t offer this as a criticism of others because you have all inspired me and I’m sure many others who never comment or start their own blogs.   But this quote is a good warning for me.  At least I think I should strive to pray one-tenth of the amount time I blog!   

An Honest Look Within

An inevitable result of casual style worship services and happy-clappy churches is the inability of those churches to deal with suffering.  Some evangelical leaders are taking note, such as Michael Patton of Dallas Theological Seminary.  This man knows terrible pain, as his sister committed suicide four years ago, followed by his mother suffering a debilitating stroke, and under the crushing burden of it all, his father has succumbed to alcoholism.  

Patton still manages to crank out one of the best blogs around, and he recently described the results of a tour of various evangelical churches:  

The pews are filled with people who are weak and totally unestablished in the faith. Most really don’t know what the Christian message is outside of “Jesus loves you and wants you to have a wonderful life.” Many claim Jesus, serve Him, and lift up their hands in praise, but what happens when someone or something challenges their faith? Where are they going to turn? To the shallowness of the entertaining commercials or out of context self-help lessons? Where will they go when the foundations are destroyed?

I could go on but this experience has confirmed to me the desperate shape that the modern church—the Evangelical church—is in and the need that we have for renewal. When things get tough (and they will), who will people turn to? Where will people go when the entrainment, laughter, and fun serve no purpose?

May God grant us a mindset to give people their true needs, not their felt needs.

This is something that most evangelicals don’t have to deal with until tragedy strikes.  When it does, something just feels wrong when you go to church and sit next to someone drinking Starbucks.  

Do Orthodox “Know The Gospel?”

One of the most impressive, and refreshing things about the Orthodox blog world is that debates and disagreements are typically conducted with a generous spirit.  There’s an old fashioned sort of hospitality and openness you don’t see elsewhere. 

In the past year I’ve sent lengthy email messages to three leading Orthodox writers concerning controversial matters and much to my surprise, all three wrote back with friendly, helpful, and very long responses.  

One of those was from author Matthew Gallatin, whose “Searching For God In A Land Of Shallow Wells” is the best conversion book I’ve come across.  I confessed to Matthew that I was concerned that I didn’t “hear the gospel” preached in the Orthodox Churches I had visited, and referenced a highly criticle article in Again Magazine by Orthodox theologian Bradley Nassif.  Nassif charges that many Orthodox churches comprised of evangelical converts are “revolving doors” where they are simply not fed the gospel.  He goes on to make this startling claim:

The most urgent need in world Orthodoxy at this time is the need to engage in an aggressive internal mission of spiritual renewal or outright conversion of our clergy and people to Jesus Christ. All of us—bishops, priests, and people—need to make the Gospel crystal clear and absolutely central in our lives and in our parishes.

That’s some pretty strong stuff.  This guy has some huge cojones claiming that some Orthodox Clergy aren’t even converted!  Ancient Faith Radio’s Kevin Allen conducted a hard-hitting and sometimes testy interview with Nassif about the article you can listen to here.

 I am most grateful for Matthew Gallatin’s response (imagine getting an email like this from John Piper!).  Gallatin first discussed the issue with his Priest.  Here is a small excerpt:  

In fact, as Father and I talked about the lapsed converts we have known, we agreed that the real key to their leaving was that none of them ever really embraced the full liturgical life of the Church.  They were unable to shed their evangelical mindset regarding worship. They were looking for a Sunday morning “power hour” to get them enthused and spiritually fortified for the week.  None of them attended services outside the Sunday morning Liturgy.  

In my own conversations with these folks over the years, I got the clear impression that church for them still remained a place to go for personal inspiration–and then just whenever they felt like they needed it.  They decided to be Orthodox because they’d read Church history, or because they fell in love with icons and incense and liturgy. But they had never given themselves over to the phronema–the “mind”–of the Church.  They didn’t understand that the rich liturgical life of the Church is not just a spiritual supermarket where we can purchase spiritual fulfillment when we feel we’re running low.  Our comprehensive liturgical worship life is our job.  It is a communal “work of the people.” That’s what “liturgy” means.  Our joining as often as possible in worship is not some legalistic requirement.  It is our essential preparation for the life of continuous worship we shall live in heaven.   

These people were hearing the Gospel as loud and clear as it can be proclaimed, and to a depth that they would never hear it in an evangelical church.  Plus, there were all the catechumen classes and Bible studies.  So why weren’t they being spiritually nourished? 

The bottom line is that what they either didn’t understand, or were unwilling to shoulder, was the tremendous responsibility that comes with being Orthodox.  To be an Orthodox Christian is to be immersed in a loving relationship with Christ.  It’s a love that makes great demands on all parties.  In short, it’s a lot of work.  Sooner or later, you have to get down to business.  It’s not about self-fulfillment.  It’s about self-denial.  

The Temptation of the Songbird

 In my initial post I wrote about the problem of the vanishing men syndrome (VMS) in evangelical churches.  More specifically the problem seems to be afflicting men in their late thirties on up based on my observations.  

Something occured to me today during our worship service that would never show up in a survey, but since it occurs to me, I wonder if other men aren’t also similarly afflicted.  Because I’ve decided to be anonymous on this blog, I can be honest here. 

I notice that my mind tends to wander during “praise and worship.”  For those not familiar, “praise and worship” in evangelicalism means congregational singing.  We have several different bands that lead, and in every case, at least one young woman singer.  All of them are quite young and attractive.  If the band does six songs overall, averaging four minutes for each song,  you are looking straight at them for 24 minutes, and not surprisingly, my eyes tend to be drawn toward the prettiest site.   

I don’t know who the young woman is in the above picture, but she’s a Christian singer I found online. Check her out. She’s beautiful and I think it is fair to say that she looks sexy in the shot.  I don’t think that’s an accident.   Most of the songbirds who sing in the praise bands listen to these singers, and perhaps entertain thoughts about becoming a CCM star too.       

So, what’s a poor schmuck supposed to do? 

There I am, trying to “worship,” and I’m having impure thoughts about the songbird!  This isn’t something that comes up in conversation with my male friends at church, but I’m guessing that I’m not the only one.  

Compounding the problem is the overall aesthetic of “casual” worship.  In the summer, we have college girls wearing shorts and flip flops to church.  This kind of thing can drive a guy in his forties nuts.  It would not surprise me if it was a contributing factor to the VMS.

Now understand, I’ve been faithful to my wife for 13 years and don’t suspect I’ll be stalking any of the songbirds at church any time soon.  But it is bothersome and sometimes burdensome to deal with the distraction.     

I think we would all be shocked if we knew how big of a problem that internet porn is in the church.  Because I’m open about my recovery from alcoholism, many men have confided to me about their struggles with pornography.  It can’t help when a forty year old guy who has been praying all week to be delivered from his porn addiction, goes to church and is confronted with the temptation of the songbird.   

This is another reason why I find the unchanging ancient liturgy so appealing, and logical.  In Ukraine, no women are allowed inside the church without wearing a head covering.  Women singing in the choir are off to one side or completely out of sight.  I know that head coverings for women are not observed in most American Orthodox Churches, but I can appreciate why Paul wrote about this, and why it is still practiced throughout much of the Orthodox world.    

The Babushkas of Ukraine

Like most buildings in Ukraine, the bank was not air conditioned and the lights were dimmed.  It was an unusually hot July afternoon and I had already been waiting in line for 15 minutes.  Everyone was getting grouchy, when something remarkable happened. 

 People started making room for someone who was evidently trying to get to the front, and sure enough, a cane-carrying Babushka emerged from the mass and hobbled right up to the teller, while everyone obligingly stepped aside.  

I stood there thinking, “Hey….you cut!”  Interestingly, not one person complained.  I later learned that deference to Babushkas in Ukraine is expected, and it was one of the many lessons I learned from these desperately poor, but dignified people.    

In the excellent Bradt Travel Guide, Andrew Evans pays a nice tribute to these tough women: 

“No other demographic group in Ukraine has endured as much as these women.  After the devastation of the war, they spent their 20’s and 30’s rebuilding the country, and the rest of their working years keeping the USSR going.  They retired just in time for Ukrainian independence and then watched their entire pension repeatedly devalue.  Today, they are left with no other choice but to go back to work…many will sell roasted sunflower seeds, flowers, herbs and anything else out on the street.”   

One refused to let me tip her for the stunningly beautiful flower arrangement I paid two dollars for.   If you want a flower that they don’t think is fresh enough, they will send you down the line to buy it from another Babushka! 

 When I began attending liturgies, I soon realized how vital their Orthodox faith is.   For an American evangelical accustomed to padded chairs, it was stunning to observe 80 year old Babushkas standing in one spot for more than two hours.  Frequently I couldn’t make it for more than one hour! 

One afternoon in Odessa I sat in the beautiful park surrounding the recently renovated Church of the Transfiguration and watched one Babushka after another stop in front of the church, face the icon of Christ, and pray out loud while crossing herself.     

They would make their way to their spot on the street, and begin creating gorgeous flower arrangements.  I am in awe of these ladies who have lived through the worst persecution the Christian Church has ever known and have remained faithful.  

Now I’m back in my suburban evangelical church which emphasizes having a “personal relationship with Christ.”  How pitiful and sinful it is that many of my fellow church members would shake their heads and say that the Babushkas of Ukraine don’t “know the gospel” and regrettably, are not saved.  

This is just one reason why I am a restless evangelical.  The smug self confidence on display and the readiness to judge other professing Christians makes me ashamed.   May God have mercy on them.   

  

   

The Problem

Sometimes I wish I had never heard about Orthodoxy.  I would probably still be grumpy and occasionally satisfied in the evangelical Church, but I would not be aware that there is something out there that is so radically different, and the best part – unchanging.  

It would be so much easier to stay put.  I keep telling myself that if I just recommit to, and get more involved in my church, I’ll get over this period of dryness.  I’ve tried it a number of times and it does seem to work for awhile.  But when I start talking to other men in my church in a gut-level, honest way, I soon discover that they are similarly depressed. 

On Sunday I worked the nursery and had a long talk with a woman who told me her husband was “taking a break from church for awhile.”  That’s code for “he just can’t take it anymore!”  

So I looked around during “worship” and was stunned to notice just how few men were present in their late 30’s and 40’s.  We have close to one-thousand in attendance every Sunday, and there’s plenty of young men, but they don’t seem to stick it out into their middle years.  Where are they going?  In his controversial book of 2006 called “Revolution,” George Barna’s research indicates that many of them are just dropping out while continuing to think of themselves as active Christians. 

There’s alot of talk in my East Coast city of house churches, and “family integrated churches” that meet in homes.  And of course the emergent church  seems like it’s here to stay as well, offering refuge to burned out twentysomethings, longing for something more authentic and traditional.  

The recent cover story in US News and World Report indicates that there are tens of thousands of us who long for a return to tradition.  Sometimes I want to scream!  But I also realize that leaving the evangelical church to become Orthodox is a serious matter, and I admit to being more than a little frightened by it all. 

I welcome your comments and shared experiences of those who’ve traveled my path.  Please pray for me to have extreme wisdom.