Faith and Culture

This week I will talk about culture and faith; an issue that seems to be causing a lot of problems as the Orthodox Church is spreading out all over the world. I would like to start off by talking about why this specific problem plays such a big role in the Orthodox Church. You see there are about 400 million Orthodox Christians in the world. Those Orthodox Christians are separated by culture in to 19-20 churches. 5 of those (the older) are called Oriental Orthodox, about 79 million, and 14 of those (younger) are called Eastern Orthodox, about 321 million. One note I would like to point out, these 19-20 churches ARE NOT DENOMINATIONS, but they are cultural. Oriental Orthodoxy and Eastern Orthodoxy are the denominations being separated by a couple of differences in teaching.

These cultural distinctions came to be because the churches in the ancient world had several churches in an area which came to be called a Diocese, and over each of those Dioceses there were Bishops. Every country had its own style, and each of those countries later on had Patriarchs who were essentially Bishops that received the honor of overseeing the rest of the Bishops. So as time went on, each of the different countries became distinguished by its style, for example all the churches in Armenia came to be known as Armenian Orthodox. These stylistic differences did not change any type of the teaching; there was no difference in faith between all the Christians of the world.

A problem has arisen ever since believers of these churches first migrated to America and Europe. This problem is of evangelism and how many Christians that belong to these churches cannot identify the differences between culture and faith. Most of the Orthodox Churches’ cultures have completely changed up to become Christian ones such as the Greeks and the Armenians. Now we have all come to different countries which DO NOT BELONG to the cultures, and even if the case is we still live in those countries we MUST BE ABLE to identify the differences between culture and faith.

I have read about stories on how many Americans have tried coming to Orthodox Churches and left because of the “cultural differences.” This should not be an issue yet it is. And it seems that many of the Orthodox like the cultural benefit that their churches have. For example, Copts in Coptic Orthodox Churches and Indians in Indian Orthodox Churches. Sometimes it gets in the way and they make it very difficult for someone to convert to Christianity because of these cultural differences. But we must remember the fact that the Apostles which brought us our faith, the majority of the time shared no culture with us. The majority of them were Jews yet they preached to the whole world. Paul being the prime example of that, with Mark preaching in Egypt, Andrew preaching in Russia and Turkey, Jude and Bartholomew preaching in Armenia, Thomas preaching in India, and Peter preaching in Syria and Rome. It makes us think that it wasn’t easy for them to do what they did yet they did it because of the love and knowledge of Christ.

For the next part I like to ask a question. In the Old Testament (time period not section of the Bible) the language of the believers was Hebrew. In the New Testament what is the language? Naturally people will answer Greek, but that is wrong. The answer to that question is all languages. The whole point of languages came with the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11) because Mankind united for the wrong purposes, and God created Man in His Image, so He was fully aware of what they would have been able to achieve, so He confused their languages. With this it became very difficult to communicate and their minds changed instead of being of one mind, and all of these languages developed cultures.

In Acts 2, after the Holy Spirit came upon the Apostles, this was reversed and they started speaking in tongues and were of one mind. Everyone whom they preached to that day heard in their own language because the message is for Mankind, not for a culture. St. Paul the Apostle spoke concerning language, “So likewise you, unless you utter by the tongue words easy to understand, how will it be known what is spoken? For you will be speaking into the air. There are, it may be, so many kinds of languages in the world, and none of them is without significance. Therefore, if I do not know the meaning of the language, I shall be a foreigner to him who speaks, and he who speaks will be a foreigner to me” (1 Corinthians 14:9-11). The whole point of this verse is to emphasize the importance of language; that each one may be preached to in his own language and with easy words for that matter otherwise how will he be expected to receive the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

The word “Christian,” in Greek literally means, “The Nation of Christ.” And we are all one people who belong to one country, which is Heaven. Therefore, we don’t belong to any country on Earth, because we are sojourners. The Patriarch Jacob (Israel) answered Pharaoh and emphasized this point, “The days of the years of my pilgrimage” (Genesis 47:9). The Apostolic Church Father Mathetes wrote to Diognetus about the Christians saying that the soul is a type (symbol) of Christians who are sojourners: “The immortal soul dwells in a mortal tabernacle; and Christians dwell as sojourners in corruptible [bodies], looking for an incorruptible dwelling in the heavens” (Mathetes 6). So then this makes Christianity itself also a culture, so then how can we preach a culture which is actually not our faith. And in fact, two psalms prophesied that a new people would be born after the psalms were written, the first in Psalm 22, which talks about Our Lord’s Crucifixion says, “A posterity shall serve Him. It will be recounted of the Lord to the next generation, they will come and declare His righteousness to a people who will be born, that He has done this” (Psalm 22:30-31). And the second, “This will be written for the generation to come, that a people yet to be created may praise the LORD” (Psalm 102:18)

So we should remember that there is no difference between us in Christ as St. Paul said, “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:26-28). So we should not focus on the ethnicity at all and focus on the faith, because that is all that matters in the end, that we are Christians.

Glory be to God both now and ever and unto the age of all ages. Amen.