Road from Emmaus

Does the Church merely provide religious lubrication for secular pursuits? All too often it does, answers Fr. Andrew Damick in his latest “Road to Emmaeus” podcast. The belief that “evangelism is not something the Orthodox Church does, or should be doing” is the overwhelming opinion of many Orthodox believers who have been “asleep for centuries.” This is compelling stuff, bracing in its frankness, and hopeful in that way that speaking the truth provides hope.

Part 2 of a lecture on evangelism given on March 7, 2010, at St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Cathedral in Bethlehem, PA, at a gathering of the Fellowship of Orthodox Christians of the Lehigh Valley.

Listen to Part 1.

Fr. Andrew references an evangelistic pamphlet in his talk. Download it here and print.

Theology is an unwelcome guest at international symposiums on environmental concerns which are largely occupied by data crunching in the service of politicians, international corporate interests, and environmental celebrities, says Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick, in Part 1 of his podcast This Holy Earth – Ecological Vision In The Cosmic Cathedral. But without a vision, the people perish, and data crunching cannot create vision. A technical “objectivized” approach to the environment where we understand creation as something detached from inner meaning and human participation — as something extrinsic to the human person — is impoverished Fr. Andrew argues. Sometimes the prescriptions are framed in a moral framework which gives the work an illusion of meaning, but fear is the engine that drives that machine.

There is a lot to listen to in this podcast and Fr. Andrew has obviously has given this question a lot of thought. The ideas he weaves together (solid and coherent, btw) need to be expanded, amplified, and put into a book.

Listen here: