parresia

The Illumined Heart

Some excerpts from a very worthwhile read

Frederica Mathewes-Green has written a small book (about 100 pages) called The Illumined Heart. My beautiful wife borrowed if from our church's library, and after I picked it up last night for a glance, I found that I couldn't put it down.

If you are at all interested in the historic faith and how your current church compares to that faith, if you are at all questioning the practices of your current church or the practices of your current lifestyle, if you are at all seeking a closer relationship with Christ, or even if you are simply looking for a very easy to read synopsis of what Orthodox Christianity is all about, then I believe reading this book might just be your chance.

I thought I'd include a couple passages here.

...It's because times change that we should especially take notice of that which stands the test of time. The voice of Christians of the early centuries deserves our special attention, indeed special respect, because they had an advantage we don't. Those believers lived closer to the time of Christ, in the same cultural milieu and using the same pool of languages. They were descendants of the first believers, the martyrs and missionaries; the history of the church was the history of their own family and neighborhood. They wrote the Scriptures, in fact, and so they were able to understand them better than we can. Imagine giving today's Paris newspaper to a native of the city, and giving it to an Alaskan 1500 or 2000 years from now. Whose interpretation will be more accurate?...

...We modern Christians are often unaware of this part of our faith story. Many of us know the Bible, then skip a thousand years to the medieval era, or fifteen hundred years to the Reformation, leaving the initial period a blank. We do the same thing geographically, picturing Christianity as a faith restricted to western Europe. But Christianity began in the Middle East and spread in both directions at once, and our history takes place in eastern Europe as well, and Asia, India, and Africa. Its richness stretches all the way back to the first century, and if filled with vibrant heroes, preachers, events, and miracles whose stories we have never known. We modern Christians are victims of amnesia; we have forgotten the powerful tale of where we came from...

...Let's begin by thinking about how change happens-- what enables it to occur, and what limits it. Change is possible when the source of authority approves change. In the early church the leadership model was one that diffused authority among everyone, everywhere, in all times, as St. Vincent proposed above. This made it very difficult to change-- there wasn't a central office building where you could send letters of protest, or hold a demonstration...The faith was expected to be something that arose among all believers everywhere, under the living guidance of the Holy Spirit. Church leaders didn't develop or edit the faith, but were like museum guards, responsible only to protect the treasure and pass it on intact. [italics mine]

...In western Europe there was a subtle shift: Leaders became more like museum curators. They gradually moved into a larger teaching and interpreting role, and the common people assumed a role that was correspondingly more receptive, and less that of equal participants...

...Our story in western Europe is more familiar. When the Reformation arose five hundred years after the Great Schism, it was prompted partly by renewed controversy over the top-down leadership model. But at this point the once-universal idea that there existed a common deposit of faith had been lost. The hope of returning to a simple, Bible-based faith was now complicated by the need for someone to explain what that faith was. Soon many gifted leaders were offering differing interpretations, and followers aligned with one or another as they found them most convincing. Instead of one leader there were multiple leaders, and there was no longer a common, grass-roots faith. [italics mine]

Certainly there is some historical simplification in the manner of her story-telling, but I think the core of what she states above needs to be shouted from the rooftops.

Posted by jeremy stock at March 14, 2003 08:17 AM