The Ikon As Scripture - Some Random Thoughts

I've been reading a wonderful, eye-opening book by Archbishop Lazar Puhalo called the Ikon As Scripture. Noting my recent interest in iconography, our priest passed it on to me calling it his "new favorite" book and I can see why. I'm a little more than half way through it but I've already come across some pretty profound insights and so I thought I'd share them as I go. The most striking was the labeling of one my fondest childhood Sunday School room images as the "Antichrist". Recognize this picture? I think it hung on the wall of every Sunday school room I ever entered and served as thought fodder for those moments when staring at the walls suddenly seemed much more interesting than singing one more round of Jesus Loves Me complete with hand gestures. Archbishop Lazar labels it in his book " 'New Age' Cult Style Christ. A type of Antichrist" He goes on to explain that in this picture, "which [is] very popular at this time, we see, not the God-man, Jesus Christ, but a California cult leader. He is sensuous, sexual, beguiling - a combination of Robert Redford and Charles Manson. [This] portrayal represents everything that Christ is not, and nothing that He is. They are simply pictures of an antichrist - a pretender in the place of Jesus Christ." Holy Cow, he's right!! There is not much of the divine to be discerned from this image. It is wholly a human portrayal with nothing of the Divine within it. Archbishop Lazar is quick to point out that if Christ is ever portrayed as anything less than Human AND Divine, then the portrayal is heretical. It tells us a lie about the identity of Jesus Christ. He must never be portrayed as Divine without His human qualities or as human without His Divinity....chew on that one a while....

On a completely different note, I was also fascinated by his explanation of reverse perspective in iconography. I suppose this is elementary to anyone vaguely familiar with icons but to the novice it was a wonderful new discovery. Basically speaking, rather than the picture on the icon beginning at the flat surface of the icon and ending somewhere in the distant background, the perspective is reversed so that the image begins in the back of the icon and actually ends somewhere outside the flat surface within the personal space of the viewer. For example, in this icon of the raising of Lazarus, I become a rather distant observer of Lazarus' exodus from his rotting tomb. However, in this one I am included as a guest at the far side of the table at the Passover meal with Christ.

Here I am placed alongside Judas as he gives Christ the kiss of betrayal (and thus the Orthodox fast on Wednesdays to show their connection to that kiss through the sickness of sin as exemplified by Judas right before and after the Passover meal) and, probably the one that moved me the most was realizing that in this icon, I become one of the mourners, the reverse perspective of the icon placing me practically on top of Christ's prone body and as one with the women who mourned his death. If you're having trouble figuring this out, try following the lines of the background structures. They will usually point you in the right direction.

Another point that struck me thus far (and JT as well when I explained it to him the other day) is the placement of the Theotokos and the Christ icons on either side of the Royal Door of the iconostasis. Again, this may be an elementary understanding of any Orthodox practitioner but it was all new to me. Archbishop Lazar pointed out that the Theotokos, marking the beginning of our understanding of Christ's humanity and salvation on the left and the Christ icon on the right marking His second coming and establishment of His kingdom leaves the Now in the center of the Royal Door. Each time the priest comes between the 2 icons he is marking our faith as it stands in the now. The Theotokos represents the Alpha and the Christ icon represents the Omega - the Beginning and the End - so that all that happens for the sake of the church militant gathered for the Liturgy is the working out of our salvation in the Now. Just think about that next time you're at Divine Liturgy (assuming my layman's explanation of it makes any sense whatsoever).

The last point I wanted to share was regarding this icon which should look familiar to anyone who has stepped foot in an Orthodox church as it is generally found on the East wall overlooking the altar. The Theotokos of the sign is an icon which was originally found painted on the walls of the catacombs (thus the curved East wall over the altar) and overlooking the tombs of the saints. The altar for the eucharistic celebration within the catacombs would be set up under the watchful eye of the Theotokos and on top of a burial site of a martyr or Christian deceased. Thus, in the "modern" churches, the Theotokos overlooks the altar on which is placed the antimension, a cloth with the relic of a martyr sewn into it. I was struck by the connection, once again, between the modern celebration of the Liturgy and its ancient roots in the early Christian practices.

I'm sure there will be more insights as I finish this book (hoping to get through it before Pascha). I'm finding it a great way to explore Orthodox traditions and learn more about the Divine Liturgy.

Conversations with the Heterodox...

I'm still uncomfortable with the term heterodox. I suppose there's still enough of the Evangelical Christian in me to recognize that it's just not *nice* to tell everybody else they are wrong...but, well...truth is, if they aren't Orthodox, they just aren't orthodox. In the CEC we loved to throw that word orthodox around and we've since realized that none of us really had any idea what it *meant*. I've had many, many conversations with my friends and acquaintances lately since we've become catechumens. They generally go something like this:

So you aren't in the CEC anymore?

No, we're currently catechumens in the Eastern Orthodox church.

Silence...

Long silence....

We're going to a Ukrainian Orthodox church.

Do they speak English?

Yes. All the services are in English, although the priest is Ukrainian.

Oh. Is that Catholic?

You mean Roman Catholic?

Um, I guess. Is that like the Catholic church?

Well, it's what the Roman Catholic church was before they were Roman Catholic.

Really? (I can see the thought processes churning trying to imagine church history actually happening before the 95 theses)

Are they charismatic?

Here it's my turn to pause and smile to myself. Well, yes. It is the most charismatic church I have ever attended but it is not charismatic in any way I've ever experienced before in my life.

Hm. How so? Do they speak in tongues?

No, not generally, but the Holy Spirit is more "present" in the Divine Liturgy than I have ever before experienced.

Oh. Well are they bible believing?

Here I think to myself they *wrote* the bible but I try to say something more accessible like: Absolutely. They have been worshiping with the scriptures since the very time the canon of scriptures was being decided upon by the earliest church councils.

Do you see where this is heading? It's like two English speaking individuals trying to talk to each other in Spanish and Russian. We have a common language but it's of virtually no use here. The mainline Protestant has no context for understanding Orthodoxy and the Orthodox have no context for understanding the Protestant world. As a convert I sometimes feel like an archaeologist explaining an ancient truth to the modern world. American culture is so steeped in Protestantism and has such a short history (spend a moment in any European country and you'll soon feel like a babe as an American) that a Christian faith rooted in the beginning in remote Mediterranean cultures, continuing practically uninterrupted for 2, 000 years and not centered in the need to Reform and Rebel has no place in our mindset. But I want people to understand. I want them to see the beauty and the richness and the complexity and the simplicity of it all. And so the conversations will continue but I still don't like the word heterodox....

Presanctified Liturgy Revisited

I had enough yesterday. With Adora down for the count all three of the little ones are out of whack and there was constant screaming all day long (beginning at 1:00 in the morning for a half hour). It was really Tad's turn to go to Liturgy but he got home, took one look at my frazzled face and said, "You look like someone who needs to sit in a quiet church service." He couldn't see my backside go, my retreat was so hasty.

I got to Fr. Greg's house (nothing like Church in a Box revisited) and the ladies got to chatting about the new wall color and then Fr. Greg shooed us in to begin the liturgy and a few minutes into I realized I had to go...in that pregnant sort of way. Problem is, I *love* the Presanctified Liturgy. The tunes are beautiful and they flow on and on through the psalms. I couldn't bring myself to leave the room and relieve my now aching bladder. I would look ahead and think, "Oh, I don't want to miss that" and then a few minutes later I would think, "Oh, this part is so beautiful. I'll go after this." And then it got to the point where if I left Fr. Greg would have no catechumen to call forward for the prayers for the catechumens so I had to stay at least that long. Finally, I could stand it no longer. The people went through the prayers for the catechumens, I stepped back into my place and Fr. Greg chanted, "Depart all catechumens!" So I did....(but I came back...)

Blessed Wester to All

Since the Orthodox don't celebrate the Easter feast - Pascha - until next month, we decided to distinguish between the two by celebrating Wester with my family today. (East)er vs. (West)er - get it?! It was actually kind of nice to be able to separate our little family celebration from the larger family celebration. Our kids weren't already tired out, candied up and churched to death when we got to Muffy's house for the annual cousin's Easter egg hunt. It was a nice, laid back time - we did break our fast with ice cream for dinner. That was so tasty although the kids were a bit disappointed that they couldn't break their fast with some MEAT. We did call Tad's folks with our annual round of the Alleluiah song. The kids are getting much better at it and we now have enough voices to actually sound like a small choir. That's a tradition I've always loved and I hope at least one of our children will think to teach it to their family and call up their dad each Easter....

So for those of you on the Western calendar - have a joyous Easter season! For those of us on the Eastern calendar, we'll be slogging through 5 more weeks of Great Lent....

Orthodoxy Sunday

Last Sunday we had the rare occasion to have church canceled due to Fr. Greg's health. We enjoyed sleeping in a bit then went through the morning prayers together but it was a particularly disappointing occasion since we had been looking forward to our first celebration of the Triumph of Orthodoxy. We knew we were going to have to borrow some icons from church since we only have a small handful in the house but we wanted the children to at least experience processing with an icon and learning a bit of the Orthodox history. We had waffled a bit about going to a Pan-Orthodox Service in the evening but that was clinched when we found out we'd be missing out on our local celebration. So that evening we filled the van and drove about an hour south. We arrived a little late and ended up finding enough seats for all of us (sort of - we were still in two rows) right up front. This turned out to a be a real blessing since the children got an up-close look at the goings on.

There were about a dozen priests and a couple of deacons on the altar from many different jurisdictions. I didn't realize the import of this until afterwards when the hosting priest took the time to introduce each priest individually. There were representatives there from at least the Greek, Russian and Antiochian jurisdictions and others we can't remember. Of course, the Ukrainians would have been represented had Fr. Greg felt a bit better. The highlight was seeing each priest process around the perimeter of the church with their icons in hand. The procession was led by a couple of alter servers bearing candles and two altar servers carrying ornately decorated circular icons on poles - they looked quite a bit like iconopops to me but what do I know. I have to admit, though, that when I saw the back side of them as the procession climbed back up onto the altar I was literally left breathless at the cherubim pictured on the backs. The Orthodox think of everything.

One of these days I'm going to go to one of these services and not be either exhausted beyond myself or distracted by children for more than half the service so I'll eventually have a much better grasp of what is going on. But for this service I did gain a general sense of being surrounded by the great saints of the faith. When I saw those cherubim I knew something Heavenly and Holy was at play in the universe and I was awed and humbled to be a small part of it. The priests almost looked childlike as they carried their church's patron saints around in the procession. Their faces showed their love for the service and their gratitude that Orthodoxy and her icons have survived the trials of history.

Rite of Forgiveness and Cheesefare Sunday

We picked a doozy of a day for our first Sunday as catechumens. The children (well, most of them) enjoyed the attention it drew when we stepped forward during the prayers for the catechumens. They weren't sure which way to face (I'll have to tell them when in doubt in the Orthodox church, face an icon - it's bound to be facing east) but once we got all that figured out we managed to move in and out of our places fairly smoothly. Fr. Greg assured me on our way back to our places that we did *not* have to leave but could remain for the rest of the Liturgy. But the real focus of the day was yet to come. There were several things going on, not the least of which was the 1 hour time change which had us getting up earlier already. Also, since we rent space from a school, the school was in need of the room where we meet for Divine Liturgy and all had to be out and packed up by noon. This meant that Matins was canceled, and Divine Liturgy moved to a half hour earlier than usual in order to make room for Forgiveness Vespers and the Rite of Forgiveness.

It seemed to me that we were whipping through the Divine Liturgy. I don't know if Fr. Greg and the choir intentionally moved a bit faster or if the time constraints were weighing on people - or, maybe just maybe the Liturgy no longer seems as long to me - but it seemed like no time at all before the end of Divine Liturgy. We shifted directly into Forgiveness Vespers which is usually said in the evening but, as I said before, we were short on time and space is limited for this church in a box. It was difficult for me and for the kids to shift our focus to this short service since it occurred at a time when we would normally be heading for the bathroom and a snack. They were about half way through it before my mind made the shift and I was able to focus on the service.

Vespers was followed by the Rite of Forgiveness, a wonderful tradition that actually manages to allow time and ceremony for every member of the church to seek and grant forgiveness to every other member of the church. We were instructed to form a line and then stand in front of each person, beginning with Fr. Greg and his family, make the sign of the cross and a metania (sweeping the hand towards the floor in a semi-bow) then ask for the person to forgive any offense committed by you against him in the past year. They (hopefully) offer forgiveness to you and then repeat the process in reverse at which time you grant forgiveness and move on to the next person.

It was a beautiful time. JT and Ben participated reluctantly but made it through just fine. We waffled about whether or not we would require their participation and when it came down to it, I just silently prayed and gently guided them into the line in spite of the looks of desperation they were shooting me. Noah and Nate wandered around until somebody picked them up and carried them from person to person. John Michael and David tried to stick with it but I think the whole thing seemed very odd to them. Ruth was completely traumatized by all the expectations and did little more than stand next to me with "the stare" on her face. Miriam was precious. She stood on the other side of me and asked over and over again with great sincerity "Will you forgive me?" I just can't think of much she could possibly need forgiveness for and she was so full of the Spirit. Philip was the only one who latched on to the entire routine, down to the metanias (which he executed with quite a bit of grace I thought). We had it a bit easy (I hope) since we've only had but a couple of months to offend these people. Since this is done once a year, the ritual was to include any offenses committed over the past year. Many people came to us and asked, instead, to forgive anything over "the past two months", or "since the short time you've been with us". One friendly man used it as a learning opportunity to teach the kids to cross themselves like Orthodox instead of Romans (push, not pull). Unfortunately I think that got a bit confusing since most of them were confused anyway and he was facing them, so getting them to do his opposite was a losing battle. It seemed like such an intimate family time and I was so blessed that our family was included.

This also marked Cheese Fare Sunday and the last day to consume dairy before the Great Lent fast began today. Unfortunately, as a church we didn't celebrate Cheese Fare as we had Meat Fare - with a great feasting upon the impending forbidden foods - so we had our own celebration that evening, wiping out the remainder of our supply of Breyer's ice cream. I'm not too sure with what we'll replace it during Great Lent, maybe fruit salad.

Bible Study

After months of trying I finally made it to a bible study the other evening. The first time I went it had been canceled and we weren't on the notification list (that has since been fixed). Then we all got sick and then it was Tad's turn to try and then...and then...and then...our life seems to be filled with and then's. So finally I was able to go. Even at that, there were enough "and then's" to make me about 1/2 hour late but, well, it is an Orthodox bible study...I didn't miss that much I don't think. There were five other people sitting around the dining room table with our brand spankin' new Orthodox Study Bibles. One of the five was our hostess' grandmother who only spoke Ukrainian but had a wonderful, warm smile and wasn't happy until she had refilled my glass with water. At one point she was consulted in Ukrainian about an old Ukrainian proverb that Fr. Greg remembered but she didn't quite get the gist and shared a sung prayer about her guardian angel instead. I was just glad someone could speak with her and understand. I really love being in an ethnic community when their ethnic is showing. It made me slightly wistful (again) to think of my own PA Dutch heritage passing slowly away.

Now I've been to..I don't know...a gobzillion bible studies in my life. But this one had me stymied. Everything about Orthodoxy is so different from anything I've encountered in the church before that I figured my insights on the book of Galatians would be a bit off the mark. So I kept my mouth shut...until I was asked to read, that is. Now at that point I was a a bit stuck. The Orthodox prefer to chant the readings during Divine Liturgy with as even a tone as possible so as to keep the reader from relaying his own interpretation of the scripture. But what about in a bible study? Normally I would gather up all my lectoring and dramatic reading experience and give the listeners a nice flow of verbiage and inflection to chew upon. But what do I do now? I chose to tone it a down a bit but just was not able bring myself to read it in any kind of flat manner. I'm sure I'm the only one who noticed and cared but it brought home to me just one more little aspect of Orthodoxy.

Then we came to the end of the book of Galatians and the end of the evening's study. Fr. Greg announced, "Let us pray" and everyone stood up. They proceeded to chat for a few more minutes and I thought perhaps I had heard him wrong - maybe there wouldn't be a closing prayer after all - until suddenly everyone turned around and looked, I thought, at me. Now this was an interesting turn of events. I stood there awkwardly for a moment until it occurred to me that maybe it was the old everyone's-actually-looking-past- me-at-something-else trick. So I also turned to see the family's icon corner toward which all were facing in order to face East to pray. Aha! I mumbled along as best as I could all the prayers that are beginning to sound familiar and feel more like home. It was a good evening but next time I think I'd like to bring Tad along. It's good to have someone else feeling just as awkward and new alongside me.