The Hersey of Clericalism

In short, clericalism is de facto denial of the Church as the Body of Christ, for in the body all organs are related and different only in their functions, but not in their essence. And the more clericalism “clericalizes” (the traditional image of the bishop or the priest – emphasized by his clothes, hair, e.g., the bishop in full regalia!), the more the Church itself becomes more worldly; spiritually submits itself to this world…Fr. Alexander Schmemann, Taken from his Journals, Page 310.

Growing up I was taught that a liturgy can never be celebrated without the active presence of the laity. As I began to ponder this point it began to make sense to me. However, I did not see it the other way around, which is to say, if we do have the laity but the "priest is not present" then the celebration of the liturgy cannot go on. This understanding is simply not true. It is the people who make up the church and it is the gathering of the people that allow for the celebration of the liturgy to take place.

What is clericalism? Clericalism is the idea that elevates ordained priests to some "higher" position within the church. People are sold on the fact that priests are not "normal humans", that they possess special "powers" acquired on the day of ordination, and based on the power given to them are separated from the rest of the church community. I do believe these ideas may be correct in some instances. I also believe the priests receive divine grace from God however in understanding what this means we have overturned the definition and misunderstood the priesthood entirely.

Many believe the liturgy is something that the priest "does". The priest becomes the provider of services (i.e. Liturgy, Baptisms, Marriages etc) and the people come to partake of these services because somehow the work of the priest allows them to be present for the liturgy or baptism etc. This is simply a misunderstanding that breeds the culture of clericalism that is alive within many church communities today. Even the language and attitudes people have towards these services deepen the divide between community and individualism which gives life to clericalism. For example, people "order various services" (i.e. Baptism) by making an appointment with the priest and make sure to invite there "close" friends and completing the service in isolation of the wider community. Everything that church provides and gives is bestowed on behalf of all and for all. Individualism and isolation is the starting point of empowering the priests to a level that deems "special status", while somehow the laity is on a "lower" level than the priest. Some people do understand they must participate in the life of the Church when they involve the entire community. But many lay people treat the church as a shop of spells and the priest is the one dispensing them.

Contrary to what you may believe, priests do not possess anything that the church does not possess. The royal priesthood, which is mentioned at large in the book of Hebrews and 1 Peter (2.9) applies not only to the priest but to all who are in the body of Christ. The body of Christ can be partaken of by all who come and see and taste from the bread which gives life to all. Therefore, the priesthood cannot "exist" outside of the church, instead, the priesthood is a quality based on what the church has given to us and in giving us the body of Christ we are then called to be the priesthood for the life of the world. If we understand the priesthood as a natural way of life, given to us by the church, then the liturgy also become the function of the church as a way to restore life and not something that is performed for 3 hours on a Sunday morning. The Liturgy is the life of the church in union with Christ and not a product produced by the clergy and purchased by the laity. The liturgy has no price! The liturgy is the gathering of the people united in love which is lived out for all who come and taste the beauty of all that is good.

Sadly, the way religious services are organized today is reduced to a show at the expense of the laity. Private prayers are done out of sight not allowing the laity to participate in the active service. Of course, the people should be praying during the service, and we usually conclude that this is how the people are active in the service. Consider the following: if a priest is not serving and is simply praying in the church during the liturgy officiated by another priest, we say the priest is not serving, even if he takes communion. This is the status of the laity in our churches: they are not serving.

It is true that a priest cannot serve the liturgy alone, but the "where two or three are gathered together" clause requires only one chanter in addition to the priest and this fulfills the rule. Imagine if we require a larger group in order to celebrate the liturgy. People would feel responsible to be in church in order for the liturgy to take place. The laity would feel a sense obligation to be in the church in order for the liturgy to take place. Think of the liturgy as a family gathers for a dinner. Can the dinner take place if one member of the family is not present? The dinner can proceed on but it would not have the same feeling. Everyone would be talking about the one missing family member. Can this rule also apply to the liturgy? If we can change our mindset about the liturgy, beginning with the process of the faithful coming together, with God's children answering the call of the Father and gathering like olive shoots around His table (Psalm 128:3), alive, growing, producing fruit, and connected to one root. The idea that the liturgy begins with my willful act of manifesting my membership in the church by gathering together with my family in Christ for the common work of the liturgy may become more real for the laity.

Faith: The Place of Mystery

I've been reading Brene brown's book "The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who you Think You're Supposed to be and Embrace who you Are".  Dr. Brown is a social worker and is a research professor at the University of Houston. This book focuses on vulnerability, courage, worthiness, and shame, shared ten guideposts on the power of wholehearted living-a way of engaging with the world from a place of worthiness. I recommend this book to any who's felt down at any point in life. This passage on faith touched me and I hope you enjoy it as I did.
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I've come to realize that faith and reason are not natural enemies. It's our human need for certainty and our need to "be right" that have pitted faith and reason against each other in an almost reckless way. We force ourselves to choose and defend one way of knowing the world at the expense of the other.

I understand that faith and reason can clash and create uncomfortable tensions-those tensions play out in my life, and I can feel them in my bones. But this work has forced me to see that it's our fear of the unknown and our fear of being wrong that create most of our conflict and anxiety. We need both faith and reason to make meaning in an uncertain world.

I can't tell you how many time I've heard the terms having faith and my faith in my interviews with men and women who are living the wholehearted journey. At first I thought that faith meant "there's a reason for everything". I personally struggled with that because I'm not comfortable with using God or faith or spirituality to explain tragedy. It actually feels like substituting certainty for faith when people say, "There's a reason for everything".

But I quickly learned from the interviews that faith meant something else to these people. Here's how I define faith based on the research interviews:

Faith is a place of mystery, where we find the courage to believe in what we cannot see and the strength to let go of our fear of uncertainty. 

I also learned that it's not always the scientists who struggle with faith and the religious who fully embrace uncertainty. Many forms of fundamentalism and extremism are about choosing certainty over faith. 

I love this from theologian Richard Rohr: "My scientist friends have come up with the things like 'principles of uncertainty' and dark holes. They're willing to live inside imagined hypotheses and theories. But many religious folks insist on answers that are always true. We love closure, resolution and clarity, while thinking that we are people of 'faith'! How strange that the very word 'faith' has come to means its exact opposite". 

Faith is essential when we decide to live and love with our whole hearts in a world where most of us want assurances before we risk being vulnerable and getting hurt. To say, "I'm going to engage wholeheartedly in my life" requires believing without seeing. 

Brene Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who you Think You're Supposed to be and Embrace who you Are. Pages 90-91.  

What Does it Mean to Forgive?

"Forgiveness is not an occasional act, it is a permanent attitude". Martin Luther King Jr.

The following is passage from Jean Vanier's book, "Becoming Human". This section is taken from the final chapter on, "Forgiveness".
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To forgive is to break down the walls of hostility that separate us, and to bring each other out of the anguish of loneliness, fear, and chaos into communion and oneness. This communion is born from mutual trust and acceptance, and the freedom to be ourselves in our uniqueness and beauty, the freedom to exercise our gifts. We are no longer contained and held back by fear, prejudices, or the need to prove ourselves.

So the sense of belonging that is necessary for the opening of our hearts is born when we walk together, needing each other, accompanying one another whether we are weak or strong, capable or not. This belonging will not bring feelings or superiority if we are walking towards inner freedom. It will not seek to exclude but to include the weak, the needy, and the different, for they have a secret power that opens up people’s hearts and leads them to compassion and mutual trust. This belonging becomes a song of gratitude for each one of us.

Of course, all this takes time. But are we not all called to take this journey if we want to become fully human, to conquer divisions and oppression, and to work for peace? If each one of us today begins this journey and has the courage to forgive and be forgiven, we will no longer be governed by past hurts. Wherever we may be-in our families, our work places, with friends, or in places of worship or of leisure-we can rise up and become agents of a new land. But let us not put our sights too high. We do not have to be saviours of the world! We are simply human beings, enfolded in weakness and in hope, called together to change our world one heart at a time.

Jean Vanier, Becoming Human, Forgiveness, Pages 162-163.    

The Path to Freedom

"Being human is difficult. Becoming a human is a life long process. To be truly human is a gift." Abraham Heschel

The following is a passage from Jean Vanier's book, "Becoming Human". This section is taken from the chapter, "The Path to Freedom".
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To be free is to know who we are, with all that is beautiful, all the brokenness in us; it is to love our own values, to embrace them, and to develop them; it is to be anchored in a vision and a truth but also to be open to others and, so, to change. Freedom lies in discovering that the truth is not a set of fixed certitudes but a mystery we enter into, one step at a time. It is a process of going deeper and deeper into an unfathomable reality.

In this journey of integrating our experience and our values, and of what we might learn we listen to others, there may be a period of anguish. We need to find links between the old and the new, links that will permit the integration of new, consciousness-expanding truths into what we already know and are living-our existing certitudes. As human sciences develop and the world evolves, we are called to grow into a new and deeper understanding of the source of the universe and of life. As we participate in this, our sense of the true expands. Freedom is to be in awe of this source, of the beauty and diversity of people, and of the universe. It is to contemplate the height and breadth of all that is true.

Freedom is to accept that when we belong to a group, a race, a tribe, a family, a community, a religion, that none of these are perfect, that each has its limits and weaknesses. Every community of humans has its light and its darkness. We are all part of something greater than ourselves. We all flow from a source that is unfathomable and we are all journeying towards it, carrying with us the light of truth and love. Each of us is called to be in communion with the source and heart of the universe. The infinite yearnings of our hearts are calling us to be in communion with the infinite. None of us can be satisfied with the limited and finite. Each cone must be free to follow the Spirit of God.

And this freedom is for love and compassion, to give our lives more totally and more freely to others. It is the freedom to be kind and patient. This freedom does not seek personal honours; it believes all, hopes all, bears all, and endures all. Freedom does not judge or condemn but understands and forgives. Freedom is the liberation from all those inner fears and inhibitions and that we need to ask forgiveness of those we have hurt.

There is a freedom that I sense exists but that I do not have. I cannot always describe it but I do want it. I sense I still have a long road to walk in order to reach this freedom. I see the goal but I am not yet there. I love and want it but sometimes I am frightened on the road I must take.

I am frightened of the disappearance of my walls of defense, sensing that behind them there is an anguish and a vulnerability that will rise up. I see that I still cling to what people think of me and am fed by the way people love, want, and admire me. If all that fell away, who would I be? But that is where freedom lies, the freedom to be rejected, if that is the path I am to take in order to live more fully. Is that not the freedom that Jesus announces in his charter of the Beatitudes, when he says, “Woe to you when people speak well of you”?

Jean Vanier, Becoming Human, The Path to Freedom, Pages 117-119.

Beauty Will Save the World-Part 2

Firstly, we must respect all human life (those who are rich and those who are poor) because just like the rich build our society the poor teach our society. Secondly, the quote points to a central theme within humanity; the struggle and tension between physical and spiritual beauty in the midst of suffering. In the midst of trial and suffering how can one see beauty clearly? Beauty is a path leading to the truth but the modern world is disfigured and trapped in darkness. How can we overcome this train of thought? Authentic beauty unlocks the desire of the heart, the craving to know, to love, to unite with others and to reach beyond our capabilities. If we acknowledge that beauty touches us closely, that it sores us, that it has the ability to open our eyes, then we rediscover the joy of seeing and most importantly to grasp the profound meaning of our existence. This is portrayed in the life of the idiot. The saving power of beauty could not overcome his sickness, but nonetheless illumined his vision, “What matter though it be only disease, an abnormal tension of the brain, if when I recall and analyze the moment, it seems to have been one of harmony and beauty in the highest degree-an instant of deepest sensation, overflowing with unbound joy and rapture, ecstatic devotion, and completest life?” In the midst of his suffering, he saw, in a paradoxical manner, the heart of reality.  

The fight for beauty is a battle of the soul and is linked to the crisis of faith. Dostoevsky indicated this tension in his epic, The Brothers Karamazov, “The awful thing is that beauty is mysterious as well as terrible. God and the devil are fighting there and the battlefield is the heart of man”. What looks beautiful might not be beautiful, and what seems terrible, such as a dead body, may show true beauty. Dostoevsky manifests this tension by placing the idiot in the midst of his suffering and insanity to speak the line, “Beauty will save the world”. Beauty is understood only in paradox. How can we see beauty in that which is good? We won’t appreciate beauty if we see it in good actions. However, when we encounter suffering or maybe death, it is at those moments that we begin to appreciate and clearly see beauty. As an individual dies we remember all the good moments and events he or she enjoyed when they were alive. Beauty that begins to develop from the deepest and darkest point of the heart is the starting point of authentic beauty. 

For good or bad, beauty has power. This power is not found in materialism and secularism but rather it is a power that illumines the path toward truth and goodness. If beauty does not point toward the truth and the good, it becomes divorced from our beings. It becomes a darkness, which makes human beings turn on each other. The Idiot demonstrates this when he said, “Such beauty is real power…with such beauty as that one might overthrow the world”. This beauty can be found in every simple act done with our fellow human. From eating a meal to talking to the stranger on the bus, beauty has the power to save humanity from utter destruction. When beauty sheds its light in the right direction, it saves the world, not overthrow it. It is in suffering that we find joy. The realism of suffering is scandalous (Christ on the cross), but suffering represents itself as an opportunity (Christ rose from the dead). We must learn to work with each other to overcome the darkness imposed by the deceptive beauty the world throws our way (materialism etc). In contemplating the suffering of Christ, in particular, we see a beauty which starts with Christ taking on our fallen nature and overcame the darkness. Christ suffering leads to the resurrection, a resurrection not done as a selfish act but rather as a redemptive one. This explains why the icon of the resurrection is always showing Christ rising from the dead holding in his hands Adam and Eve. It is a challenging beauty, but a powerful one-with power to transform our own suffering and lack of beauty. It is a beauty that scares us and makes us vulnerable and ultimately is the same beauty that will save the world.

Dostoevsky was a Christian philosopher, and a person who contemplated the mystery of man. Even as a religious individual he allowed himself to grow as a free-thinker and a powerful artist. Being a religious man, a free-thinker and an artist were not differentiated in him and did not exclude one another, but penetrated all his thoughts and works. In his beliefs, he never separated truth from good and beauty. In his artistic creativity he never placed beauty apart from good and the truth. I agree with how Dostoevsky intertwined these three topics because these three lived only in unity with each other. If we separate the good, truth and beauty, they all become an indistinct feeling, a powerless surge; truth becomes empty words; beauty and good become nothing more than a mere idol. These three, understood in unity, form one absolute idea. The human body, having been revealed and become God, fitting into itself all aspects of Christ-becomes the greatest good, the highest truth, and perfect beauty. If Christ is understood as the perfect human, the one who personifies all that is good, beautiful and true, then we are called to live and to be held in the same standard as Christ. Truth is good, perceived by the human mind; beauty is the same good and the same truth expressed in living form. The full expression, the end, the ultimate goal, and being united to God-already exist's in everything. This is why Dostoevsky said that beauty will save the world. The world and life comes in full circle to its creator. If beauty saves the world then all that is beautiful and good is expressed in truth through humanity.  

Beauty Will Save the World-Part 1

"Unless we look at a person and see the beauty there is in this person, we can contribute nothing to them. One does not help a person by discerning what is wrong, what is ugly, what is distorted. Christ looked at everyone he met, at the prostitute, at the thief, and saw the beauty hidden there. Perhaps it was distorted, perhaps damaged, but it was beauty none the less, and what he did was to call out this beauty" Metropolitan Anthony Bloom

The Great Russian writer Fydor Dostoevsky wrote, “Beauty will save the world”. I never thought much of this. Going to seminary challenged my way of thinking and the more I was challenged the more I was forced to think outside the box. I began to read more of Dostoevsky’s works and came to the conclusion that this challenge is not to be feared but embraced. At first I thought this idea was romantic, something expressed by such sentiments as “there’s beauty in everything, if we would only stop and appreciate the beauty around us.” This idea suggests there is a divorce between the world and ourselves. Today, I realized what Dostoevsky meant; beauty is the paradigm of our life. Beauty is not an influence that is found outside of human life; it is the principle which characterizes all that we do. Everything we do must be done with beauty. From the moment we wake up to the moment we sleep we must see the beauty in everything. This does not mean we are trying to make our waking up and going to sleep “beautiful”, rather, it has to do with the way in which we execute the task; the way we live every minute as we do what we do. It has to do with being attentive to the activity at hand, acting without being concerned with how we look as we act. Acts of beauty are innocent, not concerned with appearances or the perception of peoples' thoughts; it is not concerned with being treated fairly, with showing off or making impressions. I would even go as far as to say that it is not even concerned with acting out of certainty that this action “is God’s will”. Beauty is simply making the beautiful gesture. All that we do and say is beautiful. Why? 

If we look to the starting point of scripture we see this is the paradigm that is given. God created everything and he saw that it was good. All that was created was good and God let it be. Beauty is at the centre of all God’s creation. Beauty is where God is present. As I was cleaning the putrid washroom at work, I suddenly realized that I must do this seemingly repulsive work as a beautiful gesture. This is the only free action available to me. If I act out of resentment (because others are not cleaning the washroom like I am), or anger (because no one takes care of the washroom), then I am a slave to myself and my work will be exhausting. The opposite of this can also become a form of slavery also. If I work out of a sense of pride (I’ve got to make the washroom look good) or cleaning the washroom because it is my duty ("God expects me to do it" and somehow this will make me a good person), I am still a slave to myself. The only way to go about this task with joy, as a free human being, is to work in the presence of God realizing God is present in all. This is how beauty will save the world. When we realize we are free and doing actions by living for others. All my actions and thoughts become a beautiful gesture and if humanity comes to this understanding it is then the world will be saved through beauty. The paradigm is found in living for each other. If we can see that we are created in the image and likeness of God, it is then that we will realize that beauty will save the world.            

Dostoevsky spoke these words in his classic, The Idiot, because the struggle between humanity’s understanding of good and evil was ever-changing during his time (19^th century). Dostoevsky used the main character from the book to speak this line. Out of the mouth of the idiot, comes a clearer vision of beauty and reality that those around him did not see. His clarity and way of thinking heightened even in the midst of his sickness. Can the words of an idiot set the tone for our response in the modern world? In a world that is characterized by its madness, maybe only the idiot is sane. It seems that we must trust him, now that the words of an idiot have become the stepping stone to everyone’s salvation. In a world that has largely rejected the ability to reason to know the truth and the moral order toward the good, this is the time to show humanity how beauty can save all. Beauty and its simplicity can show both the intellectuals and the uneducated that we are all created equal and created in order to live for one another. This quote is significant for many reasons. 

To be continued...

The New Year: The Mystery of Time

Now the clock strikes twelve on New Year’s. And as long as it strikes life for twelve short seconds stops and pauses, and everything as it were focuses on what is now to begin, posing and responding to the same torturous question: what is this – another step towards a meaningless end and disappearance, or the unexpected flashing of a ray of renewal and new beginnings?

Protopresbyter Alexander Schmemann

On New Year’s Eve we feel the mystery of time more powerfully than at any other time. We feel, in other words, that its flow – in which we live and in which everything constantly vanishes as the “past” and constantly places us face to face with the unknown future – essentially contains within itself the main question that everyone is called to answer with their lives. 

“Vain gift, chance gift – life, why have you been given me?” asks the poet [Pushkin] in his immortal line. Indeed, it is enough for one moment to turn away from the cares that absorb us, enough mentally to stop the ceaseless waterfall of time, disappearing into the abyss, in order for the question “Why is life given and what is its meaning?” to rise from the depths of the subconscious, where we normally hide it from ourselves, and stand before us in all its implacability. 

I was not, now I am, and I will not be; thousands of years passed before me, and thousands will come after… On the surface of this unimaginably infinite ocean I am but a fleeting bubble, into which a ray of life flashes for a split second, just to be extinguished and disappear then and there. 

“Vain gift, chance gift – life, why have you been given me?” What, in comparison with this only honest, rueful question do all the loud theories mean that seek to answer this with tiresome theoretics of a “bright future”? “We will build our new world. He who was nothing will become everything” [from The Internationale]… The most naïve, gullible, and dull-witted person cannot but know that all this is a lie. For both the very one “who was nothing” and the one who “will become everything” will disappear from the face of the earth, from this hopeless mortal world. 

Therefore, regardless of whatever we were taught by pathetic prophets of a pathetic happiness, only one real question stands eternally before man: does this ever-so-brief life have any meaning? What does it mean, when compared with the boundless abyss of time, that this flash of consciousness, this ability to think, rejoice, and suffer, this extraordinary life that, however seemingly futile and random, is still looked upon by us as a gift? 

Now the clock strikes twelve on New Year’s. And as long as it strikes life for twelve short seconds stops and pauses, and everything as it were focuses on what is now to begin, posing and responding to the same torturous question: what is this – another step towards a meaningless end and disappearance, or the unexpected flashing of a ray of renewal and new beginnings? In response come words from an infinite loftiness and an infinite profundity: That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. But as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His name… And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth… And of His fulness have we received, and grace for grace (John 1:9-12, 14, 16). 

These are the words of the Evangelist John the Theologian in the very beginning of his Gospel. They are thoroughly imbued with the joy, confidence, and love of a man who has seen the light of true life, about which it is said that it shines in darkness and was not overcome by the darkness (John 1:5). Listening attentively to them, the very same joy, the very same confidence, and the very same love begin to be kindled in our own souls. Time is powerless if this light shines above us. Life is not vain, life is not chance, but is a gift from on high, from God, about Whom the same John the Theologian said that in Him was life, and this life was the light of man (John 1:4). And every man that comes into this world is once again set alight, is once again gifted this life, and the love of God is addressed to each one of them, and to each one of them is addressed God’s commandment: “Live!” Live, in order to love! Live, so that your life will be filled with love, light, wisdom, and knowledge! Live, so that in your life darkness, meaninglessness, and eventually death itself will be overcome! For eternity already shines through this world and through this earthly life. This gift of life in the world and with the world is given us that eternal life with God and in God may become part of us. 

Yes, suffering, doubt, trials, the bitterness of separation – all these have fully become part of our lot. How often we are weakened in this battle, and give up, and fall, and change! How often we are scared and lonely, how often we lose heart when we see how evil and hatred are triumphing in the world! But the One Who gave us this life and granted us freedom taught us to discern good and evil; He gave us the loftiest of all gifts: love. For He said, and continues to say: In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world (John 16:33). We, too, can overcome in this very world, and in it our lives can shine with that same light that once flashed forth and continues to shine – that light that the darkness has not overcome. 

The clock strikes… Let this mysterious future come to us; for, whatever it might bring with it, we know and believe that God is with us, that Christ has not orphaned us, that He is faithful that promised (Hebrews 10:23). Here are the marvelous words of 

Vladimir Soloviev:

Death and time reign on earth,
Do not call them your masters;
Everything, whirling about, disappears in the haze
The only thing fixed is the sun of love.

Yes, this is our calling, our freedom as children of God: not to call “masters” those things whose dominions have been destroyed, and not to close ourselves from access to the Sun of love, faith, and hope.

The holiday will soon be over, and routine, labor, fatigue, and depression will begin. But let us not permit the daily routine to overpower ours souls! Just as sunlight penetrates through closed shutters, so too let the light of Christ, through this mysterious holiday, become present in our daily lives, rendering our entire lives an ascent, a communion with God – a difficult but joyful path to eternal life. For the Apostle John said: For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life(John 3:16).