The Catalog of Good Deeds: Orthodox Theology

Showing posts with label Orthodox Theology. Show all posts

It’s unfortunate when we become so focused on the symptoms of a problem that we ignore its underlying causes. Some Christian rhetoric on same-sex marriage has done precisely that and has failed as a result to transcend the dynamics of conventional partisan politics. Instead of illuminating the unique glory of the life-giving union of husband and wife as an icon of the Holy Trinity and of the salvation of the world, the defenders of traditional marriage often merely skim the surface of public morality. The fundamental problem isn’t that increasing numbers of Americans approve of same-sex marriage; it’s that many Christians and others have forgotten the holiness and unique vocation of the man-woman relationship. Once we lose that key link, the possibility of thinking coherently—and faithfully– about human sexuality is gone.

In order to speak with integrity on marriage and family issues, we need first to take a sober look at the failure of the churches to equip our members to embody chastity and sexual purity, and thus to be a witness of holiness in stark contrast to the moral corruption so pervasive in our culture and world. Especially since the dawn of the sexual revolution, Christians have too often turned a blind eye to promiscuity, pre-marital sex, serial divorce and remarriage, and a hedonistic culture that excuses all things in the name of an individual’s pleasure and self-defined happiness. No wonder so many Americans seem to dismiss opposition to same-sex marriage as self-righteous hypocrisy and arbitrary discrimination. Those who tolerate—and at times even seem to condone—sex and cohabitation for unmarried men and women have little standing to criticize the prospect of legal sanction for gay unions. If there is no visible difference between how Christians and others handle these crucial life-shaping matters, why should anyone take seriously what we have to say? If we do not call heterosexuals to holiness, why all the bother about the much smaller population of homosexuals?

Likewise, we misdirect our energies when we speak of civil marriage in contemporary America as though it were identical to Christian marriage. Something accomplished before a justice of the peace and recorded at the court house impacts taxes, inheritance, and other legal matters, but cannot turn water into wine as a sign of the Kingdom of God. Holy matrimony does not simply grant civil sanction to the broken union of Adam and Eve, but heals and blesses their common life as a sign of the relationship between Christ and the Church. It is a calling, not a right, for anyone. Man and woman wear the crowns of the Kingdom as their love for one another finds its true fulfillment in the Lord. God created us male and female in the divine image and likeness, giving opposite-sex couples the unique ability to bring forth new life from their own bodies out of love for one another. Through this blessed union, parents and children become an image of the Holy Trinity, sharing a union of love that binds them together and enables them to learn to love Christ in one another. By the restoration of the primal unity of male and female in God, Christian marriage becomes a sign of the salvation not merely of two individuals, but of all humanity and of the creation itself. Perhaps that is why our Savior so often used the image of a wedding feast for the Kingdom of God.

Eastern Orthodox Christianity believes that man and woman are not interchangeable bundles of individual rights; instead, the two sexes play complementary roles in our common salvation. Jesus Christ and the Theotokos, the apostles and the myrrh bearing women, St. Macrina with her brothers Sts. Basil and Gregory, and so many other examples from Scripture, hymnody, icons, and the saints demonstrate the abiding mystery of the male-female distinction and relationship in our pursuit of theosis. The same God who creates us as male and female saves us in relationship to one another. Instead of abandoning biological distinctions as though our bodies were irrelevant and the two sexes identical, we look to the Lord, His Mother, and ongoing generations of holy men and women to teach us how to live faithfully in relation to one another as male and female. We deal here with a great mystery, as the Logos who spoke the world into existence also made us man and woman in the divine image. The male Son rose from the dead and ascended into heaven; and the female Mother who bore Him followed into the Kingdom at her Dormition. Even in the world to come, the distinction of man and woman will remain.

No, God does not call everyone to marriage, not even all heterosexuals. Yes, He invites everyone to holiness; preserving sexual intimacy for the blessed state of marriage between a man and a woman is part of that calling, as the Church has taught consistently for two thousand years. Nonetheless, holy people have—and continue to—struggle with temptations of all kinds. Through fasting and other forms of self-denial, nourishment by the Holy Mysteries of the Church, participation in healthy friendships and communities, and sincere confession and repentance when we stumble, all of us– regardless of sexual inclinations—find strength and healing to press forward to the high calling that is ours in Christ Jesus. The nature of one’s particular temptations is irrelevant; the point is to turn away from them and live faithfully.

Christian witness on these matters faces serious cultural challenges today. One hears that the growing support for same-sex marriage reflects positive portraits of homosexuals on both the small and the large screen, as well as the experience of knowing friends and family members who are gay. Straight people are apparently marrying at declining rates, while many gay couples enthusiastically seek legal recognition of their unions. Some people seem to be more impressed by the commitment of same-sex partners to one another than by that of the married couples they know. Appeals to the equal rights of individuals to the benefits of marriage, however defined, clinch the argument for many.

Until very recently, of course, no culture or world religion recognized same-sex relationships as holy, or even legal, matrimony. From the perspective of Orthodox Christianity the revisionist claims distort the truth about what it means to be man and a woman in God’s image and likeness. They endorse sexual expression apart from the loving, covenanted unity of male-female difference that alone is blessed to bring forth new life. They respond to the desires of individuals in terms of the categories of the corrupt world, not of the struggle of disciplining oneself in order to respond more fully to the divine eros. Though Christian and civil marriage are not identical, Orthodoxy will not embrace society’s official redefinition of the fundamental nature of marriage contrary to what God has established from the origins of the human race. The Church cannot bless same-sex unions as marriages, for that is not what they are. Sacraments restore persons and their relationships according to God’s original intention for us to be like Him; and He created us male and female in His image toward the end of our salvation.

Contrary to popular assumptions, this stance on marriage does not entail that we should condemn, judge, or shun people who are in intimate relationships with members of the same sex. Orthodox priests concern themselves only with the sexual and other sins named in confession or with the very rare scandalous situation that has to be addressed in the parish. And confession is not about condemnation, but forgiveness, healing, and growth, regardless of the sin confessed. Like the rest of us, those who struggle with same-sex attraction need guidance and support throughout their lives as they progress in holiness. Yes, all really are called to enter into the holiness of God, to become saints. A Church that honors King David, Photini, Moses the Black, and Mary of Egypt can ask no less. Like the Samaritan woman, all who suffer disordered sexual passions are more likely to respond to genuine expressions of compassion and respect that point them toward the living water that satisfies at a level deeper than physical desire. Yes, the Church must speak the truth about sexuality, but also about pride, self-righteous judgment, hatred, and gossip. And given the Lord’s definition of adultery in the Sermon on the Mount, none of us is in the position to look down upon others for sexual sin. After all, who doesn’t have disordered desires? And the vast majority of sexual sin is surely between people of opposite sex. We must be very careful with our words.

In our current cultural context, the witness of true Christian marriage simply must become visible, vibrant, and robust, if it is to be taken seriously by mainstream culture. All the more is our need to be vigilant in our parishes and families, in our friendships and neighborhoods and schools, in our choices of entertainment and attire, to form ourselves in chastity both in our bodily actions and the thoughts of our hearts. Of course, we never do that alone, but in communion with the Church and with the support of fellow strugglers who want to participate more fully in the divine nature.

The early Christians impressed even the pagan Romans with their care for the dying and their rescue of exposed infants. It’s time for the current generation of Christians to impress our society with the chaste love of man and woman as a sign of God’s covenantal fidelity in Jesus Christ. There is no better response to the challenges posed by the ongoing sexual revolution than the living icon of Christian marriage—of Adam and Eve healed and blessed as they wear the crowns of the Kingdom and bring new persons into the world out of their love for one another. That’s how God intends life to go on in His good creation. It’s precisely the differences between male and female that make the union of marriage life-giving, complementary, and a path to salvation. True marriage manifests the healing of our humanity in the image of God as man and woman. Our challenge is not only to say words about marriage, but to live them out in ways that draw others to Christ and His Church. That’s the most fundamental political action of the Christian community: to embody a life that conquers death, that heals our broken, corrupt humanity—body and soul, male and female. If we do that, we will address not just the symptoms of the moral decay of our society, but also its underlying causes.

By Fr. Philip LeMasters

Source: https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/easternchristianinsights/2012/06/02/male-and-female-in-gods-image/

Introduction

A great deal is made nowadays of "the technological revolution", as seen from both sides, those in favour and those who are very much against.

In the realm of Orthodox theology, however, is there really any essential difference between the age-old problem of technology and today's reality?

We could, of course, talk about the last century with the industrial revolution and all its consequences- social, political, moral, religious and so on.

When people speak of a new era in the history of mankind, of the third, technological revolution, are they not perhaps exaggerating the extent of the undoubted change in the conditions under which we live? Would it not be more realistic, instead of talking about a revolution, to recognize a process which began long before the industrial revolution and reached its culmination in the developments and consequences there of?

The basic feature which is new, however, in modern technology, is that it has turned everything on its head. While in former times people attempted to use science to improve their dominion over nature, it has now infiltrated into the very innermost laws of nature, with results likely to prove positive but also with terrible and limitless opportunities for intervention in these laws themselves. And where might this inversion bring us? To the further extension of these opportunities or to voluntary restrictions to ensure the sovereignty, dignity and survival of nature?

For this reason, the problem is not, in essence, , that of the relationship between Man and Nature, but rather that of our felicity in choosing among what might be infinite possibilities, so that we do not fall victim to the works of our hands. Why mention this? Because with justification we recall the words of Job: "She has hardened herself against her young, as though not bereaving herself, she has laboured in vain without fear" (Job 39:16). In other words, our era acts with harshness and indifference towards its children, as if they were not its own. And its indiscriminate and foolhardy attitude reduces every attempt and effort to naught, and, in the end, misfires.

Finally, it is not our function to note the revolutionary changes, but rather to point out to our contemporaries the true purpose of technology and to propose Orthodox theological and moral criteria.

Let us now see when technology begins.

A. Anthropology and Technology

Adam in Paradise was "naked in simplicity and artless in life" (Gregory the Theologian, PG 36, 632C), unclad and without "art". His call, his essential occupation was contemplation, gazing upon God, sought and found in supervision of the tree of knowledge. Which is why He made Man "a farmer of immortal plants" (ibid.), so that through agriculture in Eden, he would be constantly occupied with God.

Technology, therefore, makes its appearance after the Fall.

Adam's first-born son (Gen. 4:1-26), Cain, was a farmer; Abel was a shepherd; both of them, therefore, bound up with nature.

The third son, Enoch, became a mason and a builder of cities. Of the other descendants, Jobel founded the nomadic way of life. His brother, Jubal was the inventor of stringed instruments with the psaltery and harp. Thobel was a smith, forging iron and copper.

Finally, the son of God-fearing Seth, Enos, loyal to the name of God, set up the first public congregation, thus instituting the worship of God, so that all these technologist descendants of Adam could find both a place and means of gazing upon God and could work wherever they went, until they achieved dominion over the earth.

Through the blessings of God and wearisome toil, the gradual appearance of technology from agriculture through to industrialization thus provides Man with the opportunity to retain his position as lord over nature, despite the ancestral Fall. Technology is occasioned by Man's powers of reason and is a way of compensating for his weakness, as against animals, which have sufficient strength to survive, as against the forces of nature, the necessities of life (Gregory of Nyssa, PG 44, 140D-144AB) and so on.

We might mention here that for the ancients and for Scripture, no distinction was made between art and artifacts (technology), which, if they corresponded to the needs of our nature, could hardly be foreign or hostile to "beauty". Art precedes mechanics, being of greater necessity, while technology developed, not to serve the highest concerns of Man, but with the aim of greater production and profit.

In the course of its development, then, if Man is to live as overlord, technology in general must remain discreetly within a certain logical framework. It should not be an end in itself, but rather a disposition, a means to an end, and a conduit into the innermost laws and elements, not only of the earth, but of that which is above the earth. Because, according to Gregory of Nyssa, people have "an upright bearing, stretch up towards heaven and look upwards. In the beginning, these things and their regal worth are noted" (op. Cit.. PG 44, 140D-144AB).

B. Control Over Technology

The automation of the industrial age and, particularly, the information technology of the post-industrial age, together with the ecological crisis, pose a single question: Why should we be served by modern technology, which is a gluttonous idol of worship, a machine beyond our control? Why should the whole of our society be organized technologically, simply to feed the machine? A distinguished Russian hierarch (Filaret, Metropolitan of Minsk), for example, has revealed that the entire production of the enormous iron mines was put to no other purpose than to make new mining equipment for the same mines!

It is natural that the rapid progress in nuclear physics and in genetics should open up new scientific horizons, but also create problems and dangers for the human race, so it is obvious that there is an imperative need for moral intervention in the field of technology. What is worrying is the absurd and "carefree" optimism of many scientists and political agencies. According to them, technological development contains within itself the solution to the problems which it causes, and hence it ought not to be trammelled, so that "technical solutions" to the various problems can arise. For example, who can exercise control in an ideological regime, when they are deliberately seeking to create a type of technological man? The saying of Saint Paul applies here: "Let do us do evil, that good may come" (Rom. 3:8).

There are also those, on the other hand, who, using historical arguments and invoking our inability to predict the way in which inventions will evolve in future, reject all moral intervention.

Technology per se is not, of course, harmful, being the fruit of the reasoning and intellect of Man, who was formed in the image of God. But when, unrestrained and unbridled, it rushes headlong towards its destination, then it becomes Luciferous, though not bearing light but rather pitch darkness. The danger for us is the absence of accountability in the way in which technology is administered and exploited, a way which has as its aim the stifling domination of human life and the solution of problems by technical means, regardless of moral and metaphysical principles.

Finally, however, let us hear the voice of our Orthodox Tradition.

C. The Position of the Church Regarding This Particular Problem

The Church of Christ retains in unadulterated form the Orthodox Tradition, a real, unique force, on which it draws from its life and experience, as well as from a never-failing spring of asceticism and the voice of its treasury of monastic tradition, which is always profound and vital.

Monastic tradition can give applicable criteria of behaviour to the members of the Church as regards technology. The Church and monasticism are not hostilely disposed towards technological progress. On the contrary, monks over the centuries have proved to be powerful agents of scientific and technical invention.

In the Medieval West, the monks restored civilization, which had been destroyed in the barbarian invasions. The monasteries became focal points for the natural sciences, where mathematics, zoology, chemistry, medicine, and so on developed. The most important inventions of the monasteries formed the basis of industry. Likewise, through their reclamation of large tracts of land, the monks created the opportunity for agricultural development.

So that there would be no need for monks to miss services, our own saint Athanasios the Athonite built -- on the Holy Mountain -- a mechanical kneading device, which was driven by bullocks. This instrument, says the Life of the saint, "was the best, both in terms of attractiveness and art of manufacture" (Life of Blessed Athanasios on Athos, I, 179, Noret, p. 86, 1, 46). The same was true throughout the lands where Orthodox monasteries were established.

The Orthodox monastery always lived as an eschatological reality and a fore-taste of the Kingdom of Heaven, and was therefore also a model for an organized society with a way of life faithful to the Gospel, embracing human dignity, freedom and service to one's fellows.

Given this, the holy Fathers subjected technology in the monastery to two criteria, as Basil the Great characteristically remarks concerning work and the choice of technical applications.

a) Restraint

With this criterion in mind, those technical applications are chosen which preserve "the peace and tranquility" of monastery life, so that both undue care and torturing effort are avoided. Let us have as our aim "moderation and simplicity". For Basil the Great, technology is "necessary in itself to life and provides many facilities" (PG 31, 1017B), provided the unity of the life of the brotherhood is preserved, undistracted and devoted to the Lord.

In general terms, our watchword should be: "Let the common aim be the meeting of a need" (PG 31, 968B). And Saint Peter the Damascan adds: "For everything which does not serve a pressing need, becomes an obstacle to those who would be saved; everything, that is. which does not contribute to the salvation of the soul or to the life of the body" (Philokalia, vol. III, p. 69, 11. 32-34).

These principles are certainly not for monasteries alone. They could be guidelines for control over technology, unless we want to be exterminated.

b) Spiritual Vigilance

The most dreadful enemy created by post-industrial culture, the culture of information technology and the image, is cunning distraction. Swamped by millions of images and a host of different situations on television and in the media in general, people lose their peace of mind, their self-control, their powers of contemplation and reflection and turn outwards, becoming strangers to themselves, in a word mindless, impervious to the dictates of their intelligence. If people, especially children, watch television for 35 hours a week, as they do according to statistics, then are not their minds and hearts threatened by Scylla and Charabdis, are they not between the devil and the deep blue sea? (Homer, Odyssey, XII, 85)

The majority of the faithful of the Church confess that they do not manage to pray, to concentrate and cast off the cares of the world and the storms of spirit and soul which are to the detriment of sobriety, inner balance, enjoyable work, family tranquility and a constructive social life. The world of the industrial image degenerates into real idolatry.

The teachings of the Fathers concerning spiritual vigilance arms people so that they can stave off the disastrous effects of the technological society. "For the weapons of our warfare... have divine power to destroy strongholds" (2 Cor. 10:4), according to the Apostle Paul. Spiritual vigilance is a protection for everyone "containing everything good in this age and the next" (cf. Hesychius the Elder, PG 93, 1481A) and "the road leading to the kingdom, that us and that of the future" (Philotheos the Sinaite, Philokalia, vol. II, p. 275). Spiritual vigilance is not the prerogative only of those engaged actively in contemplation. It is for all those who are conscientiously "dealing with this world as though they had no dealings with it" (1 Cor. 7:31).

In the industrial era, people became consumers and slaves to things produced. In post-industrial society, they are also becoming consumers and slaves to images and information, which fill their lives.

Restraint and spiritual vigilance are, for all those who come into the world, a weapon made ready from the experience of the monastic life and Orthodox Tradition in general, one which abolishes the servitude of humanity and preserves our health and sovereignty as children of God.

By Archimandrite Aimilianos

Source: http://www.orthodoxytoday.org/articles5/AimilianosTechnology.php

- Jesus voluntarily and successfully fasted forty days in the wilderness and overcame the temptations of the devil, because Adam voluntarily yet unsuccessfully kept the God-commanded fast to abstain from the Tree of Knowledge after being tempted by the devil.

- Jesus rebuked Peter as inspired by the devil for trying to dissuade Him from going to Jerusalem to be crucified, because Adam gave in to the suggestion of Eve who was inspired by the devil to eat the forbidden fruit of the Tree of Knowledge.

- Jesus submitted His will to the Father in the Garden of Gethsemane, because in the Garden of Eden Adam disobeyed the will of the Father.

- Jesus was crucified on the wood of a tree, because the fall of Adam took place through a forbidden tree.

- Jesus' hands were pierced with nails, because Adam held the forbidden fruit.

- Jesus was crucified outside the walls of Jerusalem, because Adam was exiled from Eden.

- Jesus accepted curses and became cursed (Deut. 21:23), to reverse the curse of Adam.

- Jesus was naked on the cross and His garment divided among the soldiers, because Adam lost his innocence in Eden and was clothed with animal skin when exiled from Paradise.

- Jesus' mother was at the foot of the cross, because Adam partook of the forbidden tree with Eve who was the mother of the human race.

- Jesus was given vinegar mingled with gall to drink, because Adam ate the forbidden fruit of the Tree of Knowledge.

- Jesus was crucified in between two others who represented the way of life and the way of death, because Adam in Eden was presented with two trees that presented both life and death.

- Jesus unlocked the gates of Paradise for the penitent thief, because Adam shut the gates of Paradise.

- Jesus was stabbed on His side after He died, because after Adam was put in a deep sleep Eve was formed from his side.

By John Sanidopoulos

Source: bio-orthodoxy.com/2015/04/how-passion-of-christ-reversed-fall-of.html

Christ revealed to us that He will come at His Second Coming to judge the living and the dead. There is a well-known passage in Holy Scripture about the future Judgment, in which He will separate human beings, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, and after an exchange of words, the righteous will go "into eternal life" and the sinners "into everlasting punishment" (St. Matthew 25:46). In the Creed (Symbol of faith) we confess, "And He shall come again with glory to judge the living and the dead."

Before the Second Judgment the bodies of human beings will be resurrected. The first and second resurrections were mentioned earlier. The first resurrection is experienced through Baptism and Holy Communion, and the second resurrection is after Christ's Second Coming, so that the whole human being may live 'eternal well-being' or 'eternal distress.'

The iconography of the Second Coming of Christ shows what Paradise is and what Hell is.

"Please go and find the icon of the Second Coming, and you will see that around Christ are those who are in Paradise. They are in a golden light; the light surrounding them is golden. This same golden light, as it gets further away from Christ, begins to change color, and gradually, the further away it goes, it turns from gold to red; and in the red light are the damned. The saved see Christ in a golden color, and the damned also see Christ from a distance, but they see the Light of Christ as red, because for the former it is the glory of God and for the latter it is the eternal fire, outer darkness and 'the consuming fire.'"

From this point of view, therefore, we Orthodox Christians agree with the most liberal people in the world. No message can be more liberal than that of the Holy Fathers of the Church, who not only stress that, 'Son, we'll all go to the same place', as an old lady told me, but also emphasize that God loves everyone equally: the damned and the saved, the glorified and the saints, Angels and devils, good and bad, prostitutes and chaste...God loves all human beings equally, He loves everyone without distinction. From God's point of view, God saves everyone. He wants the salvation of all human beings, and he has preordained salvation for all.

How do we know this? Because even Hell is salvation (the human being is preserved) and Hell is a way of making perfect, but it is Hell and not Paradise. Because the one who is damned is incapable of progress, he is unable to accept progress towards perfection. Why? Because his conscience has been hardened, his heart has grown hard. He remains so egoistic and self-centered that his personality cannot develop from selfishness to unselfishness. Since he cannot develop anymore, he is perfected in his selfishness. Even Hell is evil for him. Although it is not punishment from God's point of view, it is punishment from the human point of view.

In other words, the man has remained uncured. Why? Because his heart needed to be cured, his heart or his nous (soul) was sick, and they did not receive treatment. But where does this treatment begin, how does it take place and how a human being secure it? In the Orthodox Christian experience, treatment begins here in this world."

In the Western (Roman Catholic and Protestant) tradition about Paradise and Hell, we see view that differ from the Orthodox Christian teaching.

"Augustine's teachings about absolute predestination Hell and Paradise were based on those perceptions that he had, his legalistic views about the Fall of man and sin, combined with his neoplatonic perception of Paradise. He introduced into Christianity the idea that Hell is the subterranean regions underneath the earth, where people go to be punished. Paradise is outer space.

In those days they believed that things that were immutable were beyond the heavenly bodies, where there is no movement and no development, and that here on earth is the place of testing. So if we are good boys and girls we shall go to Paradise above the stars and the sky; and if we are bad we shall go under the earth to be punished in the subterranean regions."

Paradise in the Western (Latin or Roman Catholic) tradition was connected with the soul's happiness and the satisfaction of its desires.

"In the Orthodox Christian Tradition there is nothing like this. Why? Because man's destiny is not happiness; it is not satisfaction of his desires. The Holy Fathers do not teach that God will become man's possession or that man can use God--let alone his fellow human being--for his own happiness.

The capitalistic foundations that exist within the philosophy of medieval feudalism originate from Augustine, but mainly from the ancient Greeks. The teaching about the pursuit of happiness (eudemonism) started from the ancient Greeks, from Plato and Aristotle, with some opposition from the Stoics and the Epicureans. In the Christian tradition of the West, however, Aristotle and Plato prevailed. These elements do not exist in patristic theology."

In our own Holy Tradition, the human being is eternally advancing to higher stages of perfection. For us history never stops There is the history of the saints and there is also the eternal history of man. The fact that Christ was Resurrected with His Body and that Christ is fully human until now and for ever and ever means that Christ, His Body and His human nature, is part of history. Has His Body not acted continually until this day? There has been a succession of actions; the energies of the Body of Christ have not ceased. So the Body of Christ is an inseparable part of history, which is a guarantee that history is eternal. History will not come to a halt; although a number of theologians who believe in Plato say nowadays that history will cease. No, history will not come to a halt. Why will history not cease? Because the Body with which Christ was resurrected will exist for ever, and we shall be resurrected with bodies. We shall not be merely souls in paradise. We shall be complete human beings.

Then Westerners speak about Paradise and Hell from the standpoint of justice. This is sociological interpretation of eternal life...

"...Holy Scripture uses the words 'light' and 'dark cloud' to describe the state of the just, and the words 'fire' and 'darkness' to describe the state of sinners. We know, however, that the light is different from the dark cloud that covers the light. And fire is the opposite of darkness, because fire chases away darkness and illuminates the surroundings.

This shows that there are not created words to express uncreated reality absolutely. The Eternal Divine Light and the Eternal Life are uncreated. They are the energy of God that is experienced by human beings as illuminating or burning energy, depending on their spiritual state.

"All human beings will see the glory of God, and from this point of view they have the same end. Everyone will certainly see the glory of God, the difference being that, whereas the saved will see the glory of God as sweetest light without evening, the damned will see the same glory of God as consuming fire, as fire that will burn them. It is a true and predictable fact that we shall all see the glory of God. Seeing God, that is to say, His glory and His Light, is something that will happen whether we want it or not. The experience of this Light, however, will be different for the two categories.

The work of the Church and the priests is not to help us to see this glory, because that will happen in any case. The work of the Church centers on how each one will see God. Not on whether he will see God. In other words, the task of the Church is to preach to people that the true God exists, that God is revealed either as light or as consuming fire, and that at the Second Coming of Christ all of us will see God. And it must prepare its members so that they see God not as fire but as light."

The Church does not send anyone to Paradise or to Hell, but it prepares the faithful for the vision of Christ in glory, which everyone will have. God loves the damned as much as the Saints. He wants all to be cured, but not all accept the cure that He offers.

Paradise and Hell do not exist from the point of view of God, but from the point of view of human beings. God will love everyone equally. He will send His grace to all, in the same way as He will send His grace to all, in the same way as He "makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust" (Saint Matthew 5:45). But everyone will not accept God's grace in the same way. Some will see God as Light and other as fire. The same will happen as with Holy Communion. For those who prepare themselves appropriately, Holy Communion is "for eternal life", but for those who have "not been purified, Holy Communion is for judgment and condemnation…"

"...When someone reaches the point of seeing the glory of God after having gone through purification of the heart and reaching illumination, this illuminated human being sees the glory of God as light. But when someone who has not reached this Light, he sees it as consuming fire. Instead of seeing God as Light, he sees God as consuming fire."

"We know that if an Orthodox Christian who does not prepare himself correctly and reaches the point that his heart is hardened, he will see God as a consuming fire."

"Contrary to Augustine's ideas about Paradise and Hell, according to the other Fathers of the Church in both East and West, Hell and Paradise are the same thing. There is no difference at all. When someone sees God's glory with unselfish love, he sees God as paradise, and this is paradise…"

"The uncreated glory, which Christ has by nature from the Father, is paradise for those who self-centered and selfish love has been cured and transformed into unselfish love. However, the same glory is uncreated eternal fire and hell for those who have chosen to remain uncured in their selfishness."

By Father John Romanides

Source: http://saintandrewgoc.org/home/2015/4/17/paradise-and-hell-according-to-the-orthodox-church

In his Centuries on Theology St. Maximus the Confessor refers to the nexus of the dualism of pleasure and pain, which, by any standard, is an important subject. This means that we cannot discuss Orthodox Theology if we fail to face this crucial point, because the transcendence of pleasure and pain is, precisely, a prerequisite for correct Orthodox Theology. As St. Maximus the Confessor says, the transcendence of pleasure and pain proves that man has cleansed his heart from the passions.

As we pointed out above, the whole of modern life is governed by pleasure and pain, since, in our age, enjoyment and the gratification of the senses dominate, while at the same time deep grief, an inner pain, prevails. In reality, modern man tries to escape pain through the satisfaction of sensual pleasure. All contemporary problems, such as AIDS and drugs, are to be found in this connection. This is why I believe it is extremely important to see this link between pleasure and pain, as elaborated by St. Maximus the Confessor.

a) The origin of pleasure and pain

The world was created by God in Trinity. The most perfect creature is man, for he is the apex of creation, the microcosm in the macrocosm. Analyzing the issue of the creation of man and its relation to the birth and the origin of pleasure and pain, St. Maximus says that God the Word who created man's nature, made it without pleasure and pain. "He did not make the senses susceptible to either pleasure or pain." He insists on this point by saying: "Pleasure and pain were not created simultaneously with the flesh."

While there was no pleasure and pain in man before the fall, there was a noetic faculty towards pleasure, through which man could enjoy God ineffably. But he misused this natural faculty. Man oriented the "the natural longing of the nous for God" to sensible things and thus "by the initial movement towards sensible things, the first man transferred this longing to his senses, and through them began to experience this pleasure in a way contrary to nature". The words "according to nature" and "contrary to nature" show the complete ontological change that took place in man and depict his fallen state clearly.

Of course, man did not invent this mode of operation of the faculties of the soul on his own, but with the advice of the devil. The devil was motivated by jealously against man, for whom God had shown special care and attention. It is interesting that the devil envied not only man but God Himself: "Since the devil is jealous of both us and god, he persuaded man by guile that God was jealous of him, and so made him break the commandment".

After the unnatural movement of the noetic capacity of the soul to sensible things and the birth of pleasure, God, being interested in man's salvation "implanted pain, as a kind of chastising force". Pain, which God, in His love for man, tied to sensual pleasure, is the whole complex of the mortal and passible body, that is the law of death, which has, ever since then, been very closely connected to human nature. In this way, the "manic longing of the nous" which incites the unnatural inclination of the soul to sensible things, is restrained.

This whole analysis by St. Maximus the Confessor in no way reminds us of Platonic teaching about the movement of the immortal soul from the unborn realm of the ideas, and its confinement to a mortal body which is the prison of the soul. This is simply because St. Maximus the Confessor, being an integral member of the entire Orthodox tradition, makes no distinction between a naturally immortal soul and a naturally mortal body, he does not believe in an immortal and unborn realm of ideas, and, obviously, does not adopt a dualistic view of man, according to which salvation consists in his liberation from the prison of the soul, which is the body. In St. Maximus' teaching there is a clear reference to the unnatural movement of the faculties of the soul and to the "manic longing of the nous", which draws the body into situations and acts which are against nature.

It is clear, then, that ancestral sin consists of the "initial movement of the soul" toward sensible things and in the "law of death" granted by God's love for man. Therefore, pleasure and pain constitute so-called original sin. Pleasure is the soul's initial movement toward sensible things, while pain is the whole law of death which took roots in man's existence and constitutes the law of the mortal flesh.

St. Maximus makes some marvellous observations. He states that the transgression (of the commandment) devised pleasure "in order to corrupt the will", i.e. man's freedom, and also imposed pain (death) "to cause the dissolution of man's nature". This means that pleasure causes sin, which is a voluntary death of the soul, while pain, through the separation of soul and body, causes the disintegration of the flesh. This was, actually, the work and objective of the devil, but God allowed the link between pleasure and pain. That is, He allowed death to come into man's existence on grounds of love and philanthropy, for pain is the refutation of pleasure. Thus, "God has providentially given man pain he has not chosen, together with death that follows from it, in order to chasten him for the pleasure he has chosen."

On several occasions, St. Maximus refers to "voluntary pleasure" and "irrational pleasure", as well as to "involuntary" and "sensible" pain. Pain balances the results of pleasure, that is, it subtracts pain, but does not completely revoke it.

Therefore, pleasure precedes pain, since all pain is caused by pleasure, and this is why it is called natural pain. For Adam and Eve, pleasure was without cause, that is, it was not preceded by pain, while pain, which is a natural consequence of pleasure, is an obligation, a debt, paid by all men who have the same human nature. This is what happened to Adam and Eve. For their descendants, things are a little different; the experience of pain leads them to the enjoyment of pleasure.

After the Fall and the entry of the law of sin and death into his existence, man is in a tragic state, because, even though pain reverses pleasure and annuls its active movement, man cannot reverse and eliminate the law of death which is found within his being, and this law brings a new experience of pleasure. "Philosophy towards virtue", namely man's whole ascetic struggle brings dispassion not in his will but in his nature, because asceticism cannot defeat death, which is found as a powerful law within man’s being. Herein lies the tragedy of man, who may cure pleasure and obtain inner balance through voluntary pain (asceticism) and involuntary events (external grief, death) but is unable to liberate himself from pain, which is determined by the law of death.

b) The purpose of Christ's incarnation

So far we have described how the link between pleasure and pain was established after the Fall. Pleasure was a result of the irrational movement of the faculty of the soul , with its natural consequence the coming of pain, along with the entire law of death. This combination of pleasure and pain became a law of human nature. Obviously, while living a life contrary to nature, man could not be delivered from this state which had become natural. Christ's incarnation contributed to man's liberation from this connection between pleasure and pain. St. Maximus the Confessor also makes some marvellous observations on this point too.

It was absolutely impossible for human nature which had fallen to voluntary pleasure and involuntary pain to return to the former state "had the Creator not become man". The mystery of incarnation lies in the fact that Christ was born human, but the beginning and cause of His birth was not sensual pleasure, for He was born of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, outside the human way of generation, and He embraced pain and death by His own free choice. For man, pain came as a result of sin, it was involuntary. While for Christ, who was born without sensual pleasure, pain was received by choice.

All humans born after the transgression, are born with sensual pleasure, which precedes their birth, because man is an offspring of his parents’ pleasure and, of course, no one is free, by nature, from impassioned generation provoked by pleasure. Thus man had the origin of his birth "in the corruption that comes from pleasure" and would finish his life "in the corruption that comes through death". Therefore, he was a complete slave to pleasure and pain "and he could not find the way to freedom". Humans are tortured by unjust pleasure and just pain and, of course, by their outcome which is death.

For man to return to his previous state and to be deified, an unjust pain and death without cause had to be invented. Death had to be without cause, not to be caused by pleasure, and unjust, not following an impassioned life. In this way, most unjust death would cure unjust pleasure which had caused just death and just pain. In this way mankind would enjoy freedom again, delivered from pleasure and pain. Christ became perfect man, having a noetic soul and a passible body, like ours, but without sin. He was born as a man by an immaculate conception and, thus, did not have any sensual pleasure whatsoever, but voluntarily accepted pain and death and suffered unjustly, out of love for man, in order to revoke the principle of human generation from unjust pleasure, which dominates human nature, and in order to eliminate nature’s just termination by death. Thus, Christ's immaculate conception as man and His voluntary assumption of the passibility of human nature, as well as His unjust death, liberated mankind from sensual pleasure, pain and death.

Christ's birth as man took place in a way contrary to that of humans. After the Fall, human nature has its principle of generation in "pleasure-provoked conception by sperm" from the father. A direct consequence of this sensual birth is the end, namely "painful death through corruption." But Christ could not possibly be ruled over by death, because He was not born in this pleasure-provoked way. With His incarnation, Christ offered a different principle of generation to man, the pleasure of the life to come, by means of pain. Adam, with his transgression, introduced a different way of generation, a generation originating in sensual pleasure and ending in pain, grief and death. Thus, everyone who descends from Adam according to the flesh, justly and painfully suffers the end from death. Christ offered a different way of generation, because, through His seedless generation (birth) and His voluntary and unjust death, He eliminated the principle of generation according to Adam (sensual pleasure) and the end which Adam came to (pain-death). In this way "he liberated from all those reborn spiritually in him".

The way by which Christ became incarnate and cured human nature reveals indisputably that He is wise, just and powerful. He is wise because He became a true man according to nature without being subjected to any change. He is just, because He voluntarily assumed passible human flesh, out of great condescension and love for man. This is also why He did not make man's salvation tortuous. He is also powerful, because He created eternal life and unchangeable dispassion in nature, through suffering and death, and in this way He did not show Himself to be at all incapable of achieving the cure of human nature.

By Metropolitan Hierotheos Vlachos

Source: www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2009/12/why-jesus-had-to-be-virgin-born.html

The purpose of the incarnation is the deification of man. "God becomes man to make Adam god" (Christmas hymn). "He became man, that we may become god" (Athanasius the Great). "God became a man and man became a god" (John Chrysostom). To the rationale of a moralist, the term "became god", as it is used by the Fathers, such as Athanasius the Great, is a scandal. This is why they talk about a "moral deification". They are afraid to accept that deification alters "by grace" to what the Triune God is "by nature" (uncreated, without beginning, immortal). Christmas is, therefore, directly connected with the Crucifixion and Resurrection, and the Ascension and Pentecost.

Christ the God-man carved the path that every saved person is called to walk, united to Him. The Annunciation and Christmas lead to Pentecost, which is the event of the deification of man in Christ, within, that is, the Body of Christ. If Christmas is the birth of God as man, Pentecost is the perfection of man as a god by grace. By our baptism we partake in the incarnation, death and resurrection of Christ, we too live "our own Christmas", our re-creation. The saints, who arrive at union with Christ, or deification, participate in Pentecost, and in this way they attain perfection and completion of the regenerated man in Christ. Ecclesiastically this means the realization of man, namely the fulfillment of the purpose of his existence.

No matter how tiring theological words seem, especially to modern man who is uninitiated in theology, it expresses no more than the reality of the experiences of our saints. Only within this ecclesiastical and Christocentric experience can Christmas be understood. Conversely, the weakness of the unregenerated man in Christ is led to give meaning to Christmas through the formation of myths. Those who have not tasted of the spiritual life, and thus unable to experience Christmas, create myths about it within the limits of imagination and fiction, losing its true meaning. As we shall see, this disorientation is always associated with the denial of the mystery, as well as the weakness to live it, which inevitably leads to its misunderstanding.

An initial mythological answer to the question of Christmas is given by heresy, which is the theology of reflection without experience. Docetism (from the Greek δοκέω [dokeō], "to seem"), the most terrible heresy of all ages, accepted God the Word as an imaginary illusion. Thus the presence of God within the world is a phenomenol reality. For this reason the Docetists of every age cannot tolerate, within the limits of their own reason, the incarnation and birth of God as man.

Becoming self-appointed defenders of the status of God, they are ashamed to accept something that God Himself chose for our salvation: the path of motherhood. That is, to be born of a mother, even if it is none other than the purest creature of all human history, the Most Holy Virgin. All these can be classed as "extremist" Orthodox (according to St. Gregory the Theologian), because Docetism leads to Monophysitism, which is the denial of the humanity of Christ. They are conservatives, keepers of forms, and easily scandalized. For all of them truth, reality and history are scandalous. While others reject the divinity of Christ, they deny His humanity. Yet Orthodoxy as Christianity in its authentic form, is the "most historic religion" according to the late Fr. George Florovsky. It truly lives in the energies of God for our salvation and accepts its realism like the Theotokos did: "Behold the handmaid of the Lord, may it be done to me according to your word" (Lk. 1:38)! "Like Pilate in the Creed", says a nice Serbian proverb. Because Pilate, the most irresolute official in history, is a real historical person, and he affirms the historicity of the Gospel. But in spite of the Docetists, God the Word "became flesh (man, that is) and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory (the uncreated light of His divinity)" (Jn 1:14). Because "in Him dwells the fullness of the godhead bodily" (Col. 2:9), that is, He is perfect God and perfect man.

The incarnation and birth of the God-man is a scandal for human wisdom, which self-repealingly and self-defeatingly hastens to characterize as "foolish" the mystery of Christ, which culminates in the death by crucifixion (1 Cor. 1:23). Is it possible for God to reach such a point of self-emptying, so that He dies on a cross as the God-man? This is a scandal for the wise of this world. For them the "gods" of this world usually have men sacrificing themselves for them, and not they who sacrifice themselves for humans.

How will they accept the mystery of Divine Selflessness? "For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son...for the salvation of this world" (Jn. 3:16, 17). In the limits of "rational" and "natural" theology, the divine element in the person of Christ is eventually lost and all that remains is the human element, misunderstood and misinterpreted. Because there is not a historical man named Christ, but He is the God-man. The union of God and man in the person of God the Word is "without confusion" and also "without division". Rational interpretations of the Person of Christ prove unreasonable, because logic is unable to capture what is "beyond logic".

The legal-juridical consciousness also experiences Christ as a scandal. It seeks social desirability for the incarnation and this ends in myth when not given over to the Divine Word. The Franks developed through their distinguished scholastic Anselm (11th c.) the myth of the "satisfaction of divine justice". God the Word took flesh to be crucified/sacrificed and thereby give satisfaction for human sin which offended God! The practices of the then Frankish feudal society was displayed (mythologically) by God, and this takes place in a Franco-Germanic fantasy of a Super-Emperor. But let John shout out: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son..." (3:16), and Paul: "But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us"(Rom. 5:8). "No!" the westerner will learn to shout back, for it is "to take revenge" and "seek satisfaction".

This is how another kind of "Christianity" was formed, which does not differ from being the product of myth-making, since it submits God to our imagination and superstitions. The rationalization and legalization of the divine-human mystery is the greatest threat to Christianity in history.

The religious (ritualistic) consciousness experiences the incarnation as a scandal, as it resorts to the religionization of the Faith. The meaning of Christmas is exhausted by ceremonies and loses its true purpose, which is "adoption" (deification). "That we may receive the adoption as sons..." (Gal. 4:5). It is the scandal of pharisaism, even if it is called Christianity.

The powerful experience the scandal since they are enemies of the "Child". Herodism! Those who "regard themselves as rulers" (Mk. 10:42), just as Herod, and who see the newborn Christ as a competitor and a risk to their interests. This is why he "sought the soul of the child" (Matt. 2:20). They misunderstand the true character of the royal status of Christ, which "is without end". Christ as King of all creation is its only true Lord, Creator and Savior, and not the Herods of this world, that ruthless murderer, who seek to keep their power.

Saint Gregory the Theologian offers the potential for a correct approach towards Christmas, a spiritual one that is: "Therefore let us keep the Feast, not after the manner of a heathen festival, but after a godly sort; not after the way of the world, but in a fashion above the world; not as our own but as belonging to Him Who is ours, or rather as our Master's; not as of weakness, but as of healing; not as of creation, but of re-creation" (Homily 38, "On the Theophany").

By Protopresbyter Fr. George Metallinos

Source: From the book Παρεμβάσεις Ιστορικές και Θεολογικές (Historical and Theological Interventions), έκδ. «Διήγηση», Αθήνα 1998. Translated by John Sanidopoulos.

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