Over the time I have been a member of the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch and all the East I have come to find myself in two minds about it all, both of which (rather surprisingly) have been becoming progressively clearer.
The first of these 'minds' is concerned with the Orthodox faith itself, that is to say with the understanding of the Christian Gospel which is maintained and proclaimed by the churches in communion with the Most Holy Throne of Constantinople New Rome. I am most deeply grateful for it. For almost forty years I have been an enthusiast, as many good Anglicans have been - even including the occasional archbishop of Canterbury. And I find it to be a tremendous relief after such a long time to be able to take it all for granted - in the best possible sense, of course!
But as for the other 'mind' - well, that's rather different. Here the ship of faith has acquired some rather unattractive barnacles over the centuries, mostly I believe, because living under various yokes for generations (muslim and marxist for example) experience and education have been hard to come by, and the religious and intellectual climate which the great majority of the Orthodox have had to live in has made them vunerable to the preconceptions and even the superstitions prevailing around them. Futhermore, this Babylonian Captivity has induced in many Orthodox something of a fortress mentality, very understandable when you consider that for centuries they had to circle the waggons in order to keep their faith alive at all.
We are all tempted to sing 'Backward, Christian Soldiers' at times. But as Christ himself said, "For truth I came into the world." And I don't doubt that I will be in for a bit of a shock too when all is revealed!
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