Special Features A Tremendous and Wonderful Opportunity by Fr. Jonathan Ivanoff Summer 2016
We are all familiar with the story. St. Paul, in Athens, telling the Athenians that they really did believe in the God he preached, they just didn’t know it, yet. And, seemingly, it worked: they were willing to return another day, to hear more, to continue the dialogue. Today, we find ourselves as citizens of a New Athens, where “wisdom,” “reason,” and the pursuit of “rationality,” “logic,” “fact,” and “science” would appear to reign supreme, and where, further, there are a plethora of “gods” and a disbelief in the supremacy and nobility of faith. Even “belief ” and “truth” are considered relative. This has had tragic results in the souls of those who live in the New Athens. They don’t know what to believe in, what to adhere to; they are willing to question everything but don’t know how or in what to believe, in what to put faith, respect, loyalty. And they are, as they say, not “religious” but “spiritual.” They can’t quite define what that spirit is, but whatever it is, they have it.
who, when asked to what religion they belong, reply, “none.” They may actually believe in “god” but they’re not sure who or what kind of God it is. But most know this much: It’s not the god they grew up with, it’s not the god of their childhood or their family’s “god.” They’ve left that god; they no longer like him, believe in him, or want anything to do with him. Or her. Or it. Whatever. But this is just the beginning for us: They’ve never really met the Christian God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. They’ve never had an encounter with the Living God. They’ve met imitations, maybe, and poor ones at that, but never the real thing. So we, Orthodox Christians, who have seen the True Light, who have found the True Faith, worshipping the Undivided Trinity, we Orthodox can make that connection. We can introduce them to the “Unknown God,” the one they’ve always known, but have never known; the one they’ve never met, but who has always been there.
This gives us, Orthodox Christians, a tremendous and wonderful opportunity to share the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We know what that “spirit” is, and we know what it is not. And since they do not know how to define it, what it is, or how they relate to it, we need to provide those definitions for them.
How? Talk to them. Ask them lots of questions: “reporter” questions (who, what, where, when, and, especially, why?), and most of all, do a lot of listening. Part of the problem most of the “nones” have is that far too many people are too quick to judge, to condemn, and to excuse and dismiss, and far, far too few are willing to listen to them, to engage them, to talk to them, calmly, lovingly, willingly.
The largest increasing segment of the religious landscape in America today are the “nones” – those
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Why I Say “Yes” to Christ by Steven Christoforou
We see the world as it was meant to be in the light of Christ’s victory over death. We see it in the fragrant, myrrh-streaming bones of the saints. We see it in the transformed lives of the saints, whose every word and deed radiates the reality of the Resurrection. We see it in the acts of love, great and small, which sustain an otherwise dry and barren world. And I see it in my own life, which makes far more sense in Christ than apart from Him. So I say “yes” to Christ because no temporary pleasure can compare to the eternal joy of the Resurrection; because, no matter my doubts and struggles, the same unfading Light shines through the darkness. And the darkness will not overtake it. v
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Steven Christoforou is the Director of the Department of Youth and Young Adult Ministries of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. See his podcast at: Be the Bee.
