A week or so ago, I asked a friend to take a look at the Ochlophobist's remarks on the recent events at Ravenna. His first question to me, after reading the post, was "Are you going to 'dox'?" A mirthless laugh passed my lips. "I've given up trying to find the true church," I said.
Being an Eastern Catholic is often a depressing enterprise. In my few years as a communicant, I've seen a microscopic parish split in bitter internecine warfare. I've seen a vibrant monastery hounded out of its own Eparchy by a clueless chancery. I've seen liturgies where even the clergy seemed to have no idea of what was going on. Why, I often wondered, did I even bother showing up?
There was time, a few years ago, when the thought of dox-ing was attractive. No more nagging doubts about Popes. No more frustration with what I perceived to be lax praxis. No more re-arranging of the deck chairs on the iceberg. If I were Orthodox, I thought, I could just go to church on Sunday and not worry.
Sharing these thoughts with a trusted advisor, he recommended that I spend more time among the Orthodox. As I did so, I saw a mirror image of the Church I was already in... parishes obsessed with ethnic concerns from the old world, clueless celebrants muddling their way through liturgies, petty divisions. In the affair d'Estonia in 1993, I saw a hierarchy just as obsessed with power as Jack Chick's wettest dream.
It is only because of the vagaries of time and space that I even have the luxury of considering the question of the true church and where it might be found. There wasn't a "St. Joseph Catholic Community" down the street in some village in Asia Minor 1500 years ago or "Sts. Boris and Gleb ROCOR Parish" in the next town over in medieval France. Until very recently, nobody even had to worry about the question. You just went to church.
In the end I decided that I would just have to hope that God would not make my salvation contingent on unraveling a 1000 year old spat between East and West. I'm not smart enough to figure it out. I don't know who is. So, I've given up trying to find the True Church (TM). I shall fight no more forever. To paraphrase the monks of the Holy Mountain, Uniatism or death!
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2 comments:
That's right.
Anyone who doesn't want to compromise will be burned at the stake!
-I've seen a microscopic parish split in bitter internecine warfare. I've seen a vibrant monastery hounded out of its own Eparchy by a clueless chancery. I've seen liturgies where even the clergy seemed to have no idea of what was going on.-
Welcome to the Kingdom of God! LOL!
-In the end I decided that I would just have to hope that God would not make my salvation contingent on unraveling a 1000 year old spat between East and West. I'm not smart enough to figure it out. I don't know who is. So, I've given up trying to find the True Church (TM).-
Yup. My same decision as a Latin rite who became confused by the heady intellectual battles in the East-West fight. I'm just going to go Mass, pray, give alms, fast and hope for mercy.
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