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Freedom-Loving Orthodoxy
By John Couretas | July 4, 2008
In the May 2008 issue of The Word,* published by the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America, Gregory Cook looks at the ways Orthodox Christianity may “transfigure” America. “Orthodoxy has always been open to building on what is true and extant in any nation or culture,” Cook writes. “America should be no different.”
*Also republished here (non .pdf).
He quotes Metropolitan Antony Bashir:
Orthodoxy is a freedom-loving, democratic faith … it is at its best in our free America. If the best of Byzantium has survived, it is in the United States, and if there is an Orthodox political ideal, it is enshrined in the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.
Cook’s article, “Words We Live By: Orthodox and American Ideals in Foundational Texts” is an excellent reflection on what it means to be Orthodox in America and what America has given the Orthodox.
While we’re at it on this Fourth of July, read the Declaration of Independence. Can anyone not be moved by these words?
WHEN in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that ALL MEN ARE CREATED EQUAL; that they are endowed by their Creator, with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate, that governments, long established, should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to threw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain, is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object, the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these States. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
And, finally, here is a collection of quotations on freedom by Russian philosopher Nicholas Berdyaev. One of my favorites:
Man’s freedom is indissolubly linked with his obligations. Man’s freedom is not a claim, but a duty, not so much what he demands as what is demanded of him. Man must be free. God demands and expects this of him.
4 Responses to “Freedom-Loving Orthodoxy”
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July 22, 2008 | 8:54 am
My fear is the attempt by some Orthodox to “Americanize” the Faith. Being in a bountiful nation, it is easy to forget that Orthodoxy is about the ‘ascetic struggle.’ We Americans of today forget about the hardships endured by our forefathers who built this country.
We want everything on demand. We believe we deserve the “best.” We feel we shouldn’t have to suffer. The current population would have a horrible time dealing with the hardships of the Colonial period, the Westward Movement, the Great Depression, not to mention all the previous wars.
The ‘ascetic struggle’ prepares us for hardships we may endure in life. Fasting, confession, to name a couple of aspects, are downplayed in some jurisdictions.
Traditionalism is seen by some as archaic, beards, cassocks, etc. But yet we pride ourselves in American traditions.
Let us not take the path of the Roman Catholics whose rich traditions have become all but lost in this country. A ‘watered-down’ Orthodoxy is not Orthodoxy at all. It is simply Protestantism with icons.
July 22, 2008 | 10:09 am
DavidS, if we are living Orthodox Chrisitan lives, the concerns you express, while valid, will not materialize. The power of the Holy Spirit will Chrisitianize and transform what is of God while the rest will pass away. We need to enculturate the Tradition into North America, or rather allow the Holy Spirit to. We need to flee fast and hard from mere traditionalism, clericalism and ethnocentrism which are nothing more than idolotry.
I see a real fear amongst many Orthodox in this country that prevents us from actively and positively engaging the American culture from a Traditional understanding and faith. The weakness you comment on is being expressed within Orthodoxy in this country now by the desire to run home to the “Mother” Church and seek refuge there. We just can’t handle the “American experiment” Unfortunately, the various “Mother” Churches are encouraging such adolescent behavior because they want our money and frankly, that’s all they want in my opinion.
The American secular milleau is quite a challenge, but right now all we are doing is burying our talents and wringing our hands while our bishops dither. The Church will become an American Church (the encultrated or incarnated presence of the Body of Christ in North America) or it will become irrelevant.
July 22, 2008 | 7:44 pm
One could argue that looking at the degree of secularism in some of our parishes, the Orthodox Church has already been Americanized.
July 23, 2008 | 9:04 am
I am always suspicious when I here or see the term “freedom loving”. All to often that means, “I want to do my own thing” that execrable 60’s term for hedonism. In Orthodox terms freedom means be free from sin and the fruit of sin, death. Freedom is only obtained by the grace of God while living the life of the Church, i.e, participating in the sacraments, prayer, fasting, and almsgiving; loving God with all our heart mind, soul and strength and loving each other as ourselves. Freedom requires constant vigilance and the willingness to fight, to lay down one’s own life for one’s friends which includes putting one’s own desires last on the priority list. American’s are no longer “freedom loving”. We prefer the slavery of secularism and hedonism, even socialism masquerading as opportunity, choice, equality and justice. Personally, I don’t think American’s have ever been freedom loving in an Orthodox sense. American freedom has always been about economic prosperity and lack of hierarchical control—a pragmatic freedom in the context of a legalistic moral code roughly similar to Judeo-Christian morality.
There is a big difference between genuine moral integrity and legalistic moralism. As the legalistic moral code has eroded, our actual moral integrity has been revealed. So now we largely seek social confirmation of our individual desires in the forms of economic reward, political action and cultural approbation. Making genuine moral decisions that lead to freedom is attacked and ridiculed on every level of society. Of course, we in the Church are infected with the same disease.