about tearing them all down. This is the mistake of our present political and cultural wars. It is finding the balance which leads to a flourishing of life. This balance can be seen in our theology of the Trinity. The three Persons of the Trinity are distinct but not separate. They are One and yet Three. It can also be seen in the Incarnation, where the border between the divine and human is kept. It is a border which unites yet preserves the integrity of each. In its most abstract and ultimate sense, Orthodoxy’s theological approach to borders reflects the Trinity, in which that balance resides and originates. When we set a healthy boundary in a relationship or between our work and private life, we are imprinting a mark of the Holy Trinity on the world. We are in a sense imitating God. And that is what all of creation was meant to be and what our labor as the Church, the body of Christ acting in the world, is meant to bring about, a reflection of God as Trinity–which is merely to say love itself. Many of our societal problems concern borders, as with problems in our personal lives. Where we’ve failed to set proper boundaries in our relationships, issues of abuse or isolation emerged. Where we’ve failed to set proper boundaries to our profession, it harmed our family or led to acts of corruption. There is a boundary between my money and my employer’s money. Our leaders often have not set proper boundaries to their public service and have failed to discern their interests from those of the public good. We’ve erected walls to keep some people poor and to isolate us from each other, and therefore we are ignorant and afraid. We have even failed to properly erect a border around human life to guard its sanctity. Many of the theological questions that challenge us today are questions of borders. Who is saved? What are the limits of the church? What are the roles of women in the church? The challenges to parish life and ministry are also questions of borders concerning how we approach outreach, and how we receive converts. When we change the way we do ministry, it gives rise to a question: What is the border between the church and the world? jacob's well
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Change is almost a dirty word to us Orthodox, yet we have and must continue to change lest we set a border so secure from the pollution of the outside world that we succumb to the fate of all those who build their borders too high: death. It’s true that we are “in the world and not of it,” but we are still in the world. Our goal as a church is not to hide from or defend ourselves against the world, but to conquer it and transfigure it. Moreover, we must remember that the borders we erect are not permanent. They must change as the environment around them changes or they become obsolete and useless, like some ancient city wall which no longer encompasses the breadth of the city. Unless it is expanded, it can no longer hold off the barbarians. We ought to heed the lesson of the cell. When a membrane is too impermeable, we starve; too porous, and our contents spill out. If we think that we have nothing to learn from the culture, philosophies, or religions around us, then we starve (and betray our Orthodox heritage of doing such things). If we imitate and blindly incorporate the current trends in thought or culture, we risk making ourselves indistinguishable from the world and blending in until we disappear, repeating the mistakes of some other Christian traditions in our own time. We must find a way to preserve the integrity of our own tradition while learning from and engaging with the world. Then we can hope to offer something that is Good News while avoiding the foible of answering questions no one is asking. As the Church (and in our individual lives), we ought to strive for borders that are incarnational: ones that unite us while also making us more uniquely ourselves.
REV. MATTHEW BROWN is the editor-in-chief of Jacob’s
Well and is studying for a PhD in theology at Fordham University. He is the rector of Holy Apostles Orthodox Church in Saddle Brook, New Jersey.
OPPOSITE: Santa Sofia (1891) John Singer Sargent
