Amid our quotidian concerns over furnace repairs and leaking roofs, vestry meetings, spiritual nurture, crisis counseling, community building, outreach and evangelization, social justice work, stewardship of the environment, and annual pledge drives (the list could go on for several paragraphs), we usually manage to remember that we are seeking faithfully to follow Jesus.
Our Orthodox sisters and brothers would remind us that we are offered more than following.
God endowed [us] with the gifts "according to His [sic] image", so [we] may ascend very high, so [we] may acquire with them a likeness to [our] God and Maker; to have, not an external, moral relationship with [God], but a personal union with [our] Creator."
--The Deification as the Purpose of Man's Life by Archimandrite George, Abbot of the Holy Monastery of St. Gregorios of Mt. Athos
Our friends at JN1034 remind us of the Orthodox teaching on theosis or deification, including a posting from yesterday. It is mostly ignored in the Western churches, much as the Trinity in the West is seen more as an intellectual challenge than as our Life, our Home, our Joy. Sigh.
This is the "Byz-[antine]" part of the BB typing this morning. I picked up a copy of the limited third edition of Archimandrite George's booklet from the Greek Festival at St. George's Greek Orthodox Church on Saturday. (Fabulous lamb! I remarked to my friend that the Greeks have had thousands of years to get lamb right.) And a nice icon of St George.
While imagining what a parallel to Christianity might be like in a parallel world for my fantasy fiction, I have emphasized the Christ-figure's role as opening the way for all people to unite with the Uncreated Light of God. There is less emphasis on being saved from sin because that is only a first step, it is not the central point. Union with God is the point, the purpose, the goal.
How different that is from the faith I was raised on. I find it incredibly sad to ponder how limited, short-sighted, and crippling the emphasis on sin and atonement has been in the lives of millions of people, and it grieves me. I am not rejecting the notion of sin, nor of its consequences and the necessity of dealing with it. It is all too real and our sorry world testifies to that daily. But all the talk about it is only, as I just wrote, a first step.
The first major spiritual crisis (reformation era) of my life was centered on asking "what are we saved FOR?" I was tired of hearing what I was saved FROM, it wasn't moving me or anyone else into God's future.
Fantasy fiction as critique of Western Christianity.
I think Marcus Borg is on the right track when he rejects the inadequacies of a [liberal] examplar and a [conservative] rescuer to see Jesus inviting us into a transformative journey in relationship with the living God. Transformation, metamorphosis, transfiguration, changing from glory into glory, becoming one with the Ultimate, with the Holy, with God.
--the BB
6 comments:
And I thought I had mystical leanings. I'm a pale copy next to you, Paul.
I've visited Santa Maria della Vittoria and seen this Bernini. One member of our group came up with another name for the sculpture, which shocked me a little, but I must admit that he had a point.
Grandmère, I am a lousy mystic. No discipline. But I am a true believer (in the non-fundie sense). I have had the merest tastes of being lost in the compassionate heart of God and that is the core of my theology.
I suspect your traveling companion's mind runs in the same gutters as mine and I could make a few comments now, but as you are a grandmother and my momma might reach down from heaven and slap me, I won't.
The angel seems to have a point too, but I won't go there either.
Mysticism definitely plays a significant role in both the pre-Christian and Christian eras of my fantasy fiction. But I don't preach, I just tell stories. One of the things that has fascinated me is watching my protagonist of the first tale evolve after encountered transcendant Light and total darkness.
Can we be touched by God and remain the same?
Je crois que non.
If theosis was only as easy as ecstasy. Estasy in Greek literally means a moving out of one's self. This explains the relapse of pleasure on St Theresa's face ... that as she moved out of herself, a greater One moved in. For those who've seen Michelangelo's Pietà in person (photos don't capture this), there's a faint-but-obvious smile on Jesus' face as he rests in his mother's arms, as if his ecstasy as a man was completed and the fullness of his divinity moved in. Jesus set the example for our theosis. Thanks for rekindling this topic, for the sake of us all.
Theosis is certainly more than ecstasy, as you rightly point out, JN1034. I was mingling topics here and not being precise. Thank YOU for keeping it before us in your blog, where we are all challenged not to settle for scraps when the Holy and Lifegiving Trinity graciously sets before us the Banquet of fully realized Life in God.
May we all grow in holiness through the gracious action of the Spirit in our lives.
Can we be touched by God and remain the same?
It would be difficult.
Sometimes the the experience of the presence of God is not even close to ecstasy. But once you've had the experience, no one can argue you out of it.
They can say that you're mad or deluded, or whatever, but I must say that doesn't get very far with me.
Being "lost in the compassionate heart of God" doesn't get us far, unless holy deeds follow.
You are right, Grandmère, as is your wont. Though I fail to see how one can understand oneself in that compassionate heart without seeing all others there and then acting according to that compassion, whence the holy deeds: acts of justice, mercy, and love.
Having said that, I must acknowledge the folks who claim to know the love of Jesus yes have trouble loving others. 1 John has a few things to say along those line. I fall short in loving, myself, but I have no intention of abandoning the struggle.
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