Father this hahs nothing to do with the subject of the video but i was wondering what your view is on what the Russian orthodox church is doing with regard to the Puttin administration and making of icons of Joseph Stalin?
@MrBrendaneoin22 It is the ultra nationalists, what in America would be called the "ultra rightwing" that are making icons of Stalin, not the Church. However, the alliance between the Russian Church and Putin is very unhealthy and put the Church in a compromised position that is dangerous for it.
When Christian evangelicals and fundamentalist interpret scripture they do it to make a political point whether they know scripture in full context or not
"...[T]hose who... have not yet attained perfection and dispassion should guard themselves from being preoccupied with the reasons in nature... When the mind is still passionate it cannot see the immaterial and spiritual reasons hidden in the shapes and beauty of physical nature... They remain on the physical level of admiring and being filled by the corruptible beauty of nature only... a condition which many naturalists of the past and today are suffering." St. Nicodemos the Hagiorite
That may be true, but it should not hinder us from trying to convey the Gospel to people living in the world, and even to those not yet Orthodox Christians. We cannot allow ourselves to become Manichean about the question. One cannot convince people that God created the universe while at the same time lying to them about the processes and the timeframe. The creation, with all its beauty and mystery is, according to God, at least, "very good." Did he create the beauty of the universe in vain?
@allsaintsmonastery The materialist accounts of nature are themselves lies, which obscure the true beauty and goodness of the creation. Someone who looks at the beauty of nature in a purely carnal or passionate way is in fact not looking at the beauty at all.
You are sounding more Gnostic all the time. The hatred of the material world is, of course, Manechean, not Christian of any form. If you hate the beauty of the handiwork of our God, then I can only pity you for your blasphemy and your Gnosticism. Evidently you do not believe that God created the beauty of the universe, that there is only some invisible universe that can be loved, and God's beautiful creation must be dispised. That is what you are saying, at least.
@avantibarbari You can make an ideology of the matter if you wish, but the Scripture says nothing of the processes of Creation. We have an ultra-brief summary needed for us to understand our place in it. Again, nowhere in Scripture are quarks, leptons, hadrons, neutrinos, gluons or star formation mentioned. The billion year process of the shaping of planet earth is not mentioned, nor the 4 billion years of ocean and continent formation, or the epoch of dinosaurs, etc, before man was created.
@allsaintsmonastery All of which is besides the point. There are deeper forces in the process of Creation than can be measured or speculated about by modern science.
This actually has its birth in William of Ockham and the Scholastics, with an emphasis on nominalism and rationalism. The modern conservative Evangelical doesn't know the real origins of his thinking, that he is in fact thinking much like a medieval Catholic monk! This kind of worldview was actually alien to the authors of the Scriptures. They thought about things more intuitively- and we actually still think like this in our day to day lives (eg., everybody knows what a "sun-rise" is).
In fact, Archbishop Lazar's approach is just as much a product of scholasticism as that of Protestant fundamentalists. When he says that the book of Genesis says nothing about the creation, it is because he views the spiritual and material realms as completely separate. He adopts a rationalistic approach to the visible and accepts revelation to explain the invisible only.
Perhaps so. We live in a "Scholastic" world, though, those ideas have won for describing empirical reality. The point is, religion is what you do more than "a scientific description of how it really is". The flipped-out side, I've argued with half-educated Fundies who think that God has sperm becaues the Virgin Mary became pregnant (I guess they forgot about the Holy Spirit). This overly literal mode of thinking is an issue. I'm Anglo-Catholic Anglican, BTW... not Orthodox.
Sometimes people take their sense experience too literally, at the detriment of other forms of experience. As soon as we approach "empirical reality" as a sphere divided from the spiritual, we are working in an illusion. The whole literal vs. metaphorical debate arises from the assumption (by both sides) that everything 'real' must be explicable in terms of sense experience- the fundies have not escaped this either, hence the "God has sperm" absurdity.
Evidently you did not pay much attention to what I said. The book of Genesis tells us all about the purpose of Creation; it does not give us a detailed or scientific explanation of it.
No where does the Scripture tell us the details of the Creation. Hydrogen, Deuterium, the formation of stars, the origens of microwave anistrophy: none of this is talked about. All we are told is that God called all things into being according to his will, and we are given a symbolic summary of the events. We have no science expositions in Scripture, we are told what is necessary to know: God created it. The rest, science reveals to us. Don't get to hysterical.
@allsaintsmonastery No hysterics needed. You said, "[The scripture] is not revealing to us anything about the creation of the universe or the earth." I'm glad to see though that you've changed your position.
I have not changed my position at all. The Scripture tells us nothing about the creation. We are only informed that God created all that exists, but we are told nothing at all about the process of creation. That is not what the Scripture is about. We are informed about the condition of man, how we came to be in that position, and what needs to be done about. There was no need for a scientific essay about the creation, and none is given. To bad for fundamentalists.
The urge to distort modern science to conform to scripture= creationist fundamentalism. The urge to reinterpret revelation to conform to modern science= scientific fundamentalism. And I'm afraid His Eminence is engaging in the latter. What the "creationists" share with the Dawkinites is an assumption that modern science is neutral. In fact, as it rests on a basis that is either dualist or fully materialist, it is neither neutral nor objective.
(cont'd) It is not surprising then that scientists, acting perfectly scrupulously, but beginning with the principle that we can know about matter and the natural world only what is measurable or empirically observable, would reach "discoveries" that point away from the active presence of the divine in nature. The spiritual is considered completely separate from the natural- this is dualism. And His Eminence reflects this dualism by claiming that the scripture says ~nothing~ about the creation.
(cont'd) The otherworldly Gospel regards the present world as phantasmic- in this case, the poetry of the "rising sun" is more true than the earth's rotation. Claiming that the Genesis account is wholly metaphorical (an approach the Fathers rejected) and assuming that God's revelation can be proven through modern empiricist techniques (as"Creationists" do) are two sides of the same coin. Both naively accept the precepts of modern science, and it is this attitude that is "de-evangelizing" youth.
Science has to remain neutral. If science operated on metaphysical presuppositions then it would be ideology, not science. One must also avoid interpreting Scripture on the basis science. I agree that Creationism is "de-evangelising" modern youth. I deal with these questions at universities several times a year. Of course, I am also perfectly comfortable with Evolution and I can see no conflict between it and the Orthodox Christian faith.
Modern science does, in fact, operate on metaphysical presuppositions. It assumes that observable phenomena are not permeated with spiritual forces, or, if they are, these forces are not relevant in understanding observable phenomena. Modern science therefore begins with a strict dualism. As for de-evangelizing youth, many would reasonably ask "what's the point?" when confronted with a faith that is nothing but metaphor and psychology.
I am still not sure that I see your point. I do not see a conflict, where you evidently do see one. I do not see "nothing but metaphor and psychology" in Orthodoxy. I do see an inhumanity that can develop in people whether believers or not, and it arises mostly from fear and ignorance, and a desire to force an ideology on others: be that ideology Americanism, democracyism, religiosity, atheism, scientism, egoism, Nicholaitanism, hyper-moralism, or whatever.
In fact, I had asked Dawkins one time why he was so vehement in his anti-Christianism. He indicated that it was the outrageous attacks and statements of Christian Fundamentalism that made him respond "in kind." He really does consider Fundamentalism to be dangerous to medical science, and in fact, so do I. Our job is to make it clear that one does not have to choose between cranky fundamentalism and Dawkins. Faith is not harmed by truth.
well it seems true that creationist fundamentalists are fueling the rise of an atheist movement led by the likes of Richard Dawkins. If you thought you only had a choice between these two options, who wouldn't go with Dawkins!
Father this hahs nothing to do with the subject of the video but i was wondering what your view is on what the Russian orthodox church is doing with regard to the Puttin administration and making of icons of Joseph Stalin?
MrBrendaneoin22 4 months ago
@MrBrendaneoin22 It is the ultra nationalists, what in America would be called the "ultra rightwing" that are making icons of Stalin, not the Church. However, the alliance between the Russian Church and Putin is very unhealthy and put the Church in a compromised position that is dangerous for it.
allsaintsmonastery 4 months ago
@allsaintsmonastery thanks for the reply Father
MrBrendaneoin22 4 months ago
When Christian evangelicals and fundamentalist interpret scripture they do it to make a political point whether they know scripture in full context or not
session9100 9 months ago
"...[T]hose who... have not yet attained perfection and dispassion should guard themselves from being preoccupied with the reasons in nature... When the mind is still passionate it cannot see the immaterial and spiritual reasons hidden in the shapes and beauty of physical nature... They remain on the physical level of admiring and being filled by the corruptible beauty of nature only... a condition which many naturalists of the past and today are suffering." St. Nicodemos the Hagiorite
Cherubicon 2 years ago
That may be true, but it should not hinder us from trying to convey the Gospel to people living in the world, and even to those not yet Orthodox Christians. We cannot allow ourselves to become Manichean about the question. One cannot convince people that God created the universe while at the same time lying to them about the processes and the timeframe. The creation, with all its beauty and mystery is, according to God, at least, "very good." Did he create the beauty of the universe in vain?
allsaintsmonastery 2 years ago
@allsaintsmonastery The materialist accounts of nature are themselves lies, which obscure the true beauty and goodness of the creation. Someone who looks at the beauty of nature in a purely carnal or passionate way is in fact not looking at the beauty at all.
Cherubicon 2 years ago
You are sounding more Gnostic all the time. The hatred of the material world is, of course, Manechean, not Christian of any form. If you hate the beauty of the handiwork of our God, then I can only pity you for your blasphemy and your Gnosticism. Evidently you do not believe that God created the beauty of the universe, that there is only some invisible universe that can be loved, and God's beautiful creation must be dispised. That is what you are saying, at least.
allsaintsmonastery 2 years ago
No, that's how you choose to interpret my words.
Cherubicon 2 years ago
@avantibarbari You can make an ideology of the matter if you wish, but the Scripture says nothing of the processes of Creation. We have an ultra-brief summary needed for us to understand our place in it. Again, nowhere in Scripture are quarks, leptons, hadrons, neutrinos, gluons or star formation mentioned. The billion year process of the shaping of planet earth is not mentioned, nor the 4 billion years of ocean and continent formation, or the epoch of dinosaurs, etc, before man was created.
allsaintsmonastery 2 years ago
@allsaintsmonastery All of which is besides the point. There are deeper forces in the process of Creation than can be measured or speculated about by modern science.
avantibarbari 2 years ago
This actually has its birth in William of Ockham and the Scholastics, with an emphasis on nominalism and rationalism. The modern conservative Evangelical doesn't know the real origins of his thinking, that he is in fact thinking much like a medieval Catholic monk! This kind of worldview was actually alien to the authors of the Scriptures. They thought about things more intuitively- and we actually still think like this in our day to day lives (eg., everybody knows what a "sun-rise" is).
Magnulus76 2 years ago
In fact, Archbishop Lazar's approach is just as much a product of scholasticism as that of Protestant fundamentalists. When he says that the book of Genesis says nothing about the creation, it is because he views the spiritual and material realms as completely separate. He adopts a rationalistic approach to the visible and accepts revelation to explain the invisible only.
avantibarbari 2 years ago
Perhaps so. We live in a "Scholastic" world, though, those ideas have won for describing empirical reality. The point is, religion is what you do more than "a scientific description of how it really is". The flipped-out side, I've argued with half-educated Fundies who think that God has sperm becaues the Virgin Mary became pregnant (I guess they forgot about the Holy Spirit). This overly literal mode of thinking is an issue. I'm Anglo-Catholic Anglican, BTW... not Orthodox.
Magnulus76 2 years ago
Sometimes people take their sense experience too literally, at the detriment of other forms of experience. As soon as we approach "empirical reality" as a sphere divided from the spiritual, we are working in an illusion. The whole literal vs. metaphorical debate arises from the assumption (by both sides) that everything 'real' must be explicable in terms of sense experience- the fundies have not escaped this either, hence the "God has sperm" absurdity.
avantibarbari 2 years ago
Evidently you did not pay much attention to what I said. The book of Genesis tells us all about the purpose of Creation; it does not give us a detailed or scientific explanation of it.
allsaintsmonastery 2 years ago
@allsaintsmonastery Your exact words: "[The scripture] is not revealing to us anything about the creation of the universe or the earth."
avantibarbari 2 years ago
No where does the Scripture tell us the details of the Creation. Hydrogen, Deuterium, the formation of stars, the origens of microwave anistrophy: none of this is talked about. All we are told is that God called all things into being according to his will, and we are given a symbolic summary of the events. We have no science expositions in Scripture, we are told what is necessary to know: God created it. The rest, science reveals to us. Don't get to hysterical.
allsaintsmonastery 2 years ago
@allsaintsmonastery No hysterics needed. You said, "[The scripture] is not revealing to us anything about the creation of the universe or the earth." I'm glad to see though that you've changed your position.
avantibarbari 2 years ago
I have not changed my position at all. The Scripture tells us nothing about the creation. We are only informed that God created all that exists, but we are told nothing at all about the process of creation. That is not what the Scripture is about. We are informed about the condition of man, how we came to be in that position, and what needs to be done about. There was no need for a scientific essay about the creation, and none is given. To bad for fundamentalists.
buchanansask 2 years ago
NB The above note is from Archbishop Lazar, but from a different computer.
allsaintsmonastery 2 years ago
The urge to distort modern science to conform to scripture= creationist fundamentalism. The urge to reinterpret revelation to conform to modern science= scientific fundamentalism. And I'm afraid His Eminence is engaging in the latter. What the "creationists" share with the Dawkinites is an assumption that modern science is neutral. In fact, as it rests on a basis that is either dualist or fully materialist, it is neither neutral nor objective.
avantibarbari 3 years ago
(cont'd) It is not surprising then that scientists, acting perfectly scrupulously, but beginning with the principle that we can know about matter and the natural world only what is measurable or empirically observable, would reach "discoveries" that point away from the active presence of the divine in nature. The spiritual is considered completely separate from the natural- this is dualism. And His Eminence reflects this dualism by claiming that the scripture says ~nothing~ about the creation.
avantibarbari 3 years ago
(cont'd) The otherworldly Gospel regards the present world as phantasmic- in this case, the poetry of the "rising sun" is more true than the earth's rotation. Claiming that the Genesis account is wholly metaphorical (an approach the Fathers rejected) and assuming that God's revelation can be proven through modern empiricist techniques (as"Creationists" do) are two sides of the same coin. Both naively accept the precepts of modern science, and it is this attitude that is "de-evangelizing" youth.
avantibarbari 3 years ago
Science has to remain neutral. If science operated on metaphysical presuppositions then it would be ideology, not science. One must also avoid interpreting Scripture on the basis science. I agree that Creationism is "de-evangelising" modern youth. I deal with these questions at universities several times a year. Of course, I am also perfectly comfortable with Evolution and I can see no conflict between it and the Orthodox Christian faith.
allsaintsmonastery 3 years ago
Modern science does, in fact, operate on metaphysical presuppositions. It assumes that observable phenomena are not permeated with spiritual forces, or, if they are, these forces are not relevant in understanding observable phenomena. Modern science therefore begins with a strict dualism. As for de-evangelizing youth, many would reasonably ask "what's the point?" when confronted with a faith that is nothing but metaphor and psychology.
avantibarbari 3 years ago
I am still not sure that I see your point. I do not see a conflict, where you evidently do see one. I do not see "nothing but metaphor and psychology" in Orthodoxy. I do see an inhumanity that can develop in people whether believers or not, and it arises mostly from fear and ignorance, and a desire to force an ideology on others: be that ideology Americanism, democracyism, religiosity, atheism, scientism, egoism, Nicholaitanism, hyper-moralism, or whatever.
allsaintsmonastery 2 years ago
In fact, I had asked Dawkins one time why he was so vehement in his anti-Christianism. He indicated that it was the outrageous attacks and statements of Christian Fundamentalism that made him respond "in kind." He really does consider Fundamentalism to be dangerous to medical science, and in fact, so do I. Our job is to make it clear that one does not have to choose between cranky fundamentalism and Dawkins. Faith is not harmed by truth.
allsaintsmonastery 3 years ago
well it seems true that creationist fundamentalists are fueling the rise of an atheist movement led by the likes of Richard Dawkins. If you thought you only had a choice between these two options, who wouldn't go with Dawkins!
8palmsofpower 3 years ago
thank you so much for sharing your sermons, they are so helpful in my spritual development
bradbavarde 3 years ago