The likeness of God meaning what? Morality, ethical holiness? This is what I'm trying to get at. What do the EO think/say constitutes the likeness of God?
Reformed persons going Eastern Orthodox
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RamistThomist
Puritanboard Assessor
It's been probably 12 years since I have read them on it, but it is much stronger than simply ethical holi, ness. I guess they would say we become like angels. The angelic life is a big theme among them. To be sure, most won't get there until the very end of life, if then. On a more attainable level, it can be as much as being free from the passions.
JP Wallace
Puritan Board Sophomore
I don't know anyone who has converted to EO, there aint too many EO churches in Northern Ireland - but I think in the last 10 years a lot of people are changing positions on many things frequently because there is a modern unsettled mindset - some people just seem to always have to be changing, always looking for something cooler, edgier, less conservative - wasn't that what the YRR crowd (many/most) were doing and then some started deconstructing, and some started going RC, and some start going EO.
So I tend to think that a lot of this is not theologically grounded at all - but people just wanting something new - something that makes them "feel" more authentic - its the air the modern world breathes - the irrelgious go transgender - the religious go EO....so to speak (a metaphor by the way not really, mostly!).
The spirit of Athens is alive and well in the evangelical world -
Acts 17:21 ESV “Now all the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there would spend their time in nothing except telling or hearing something new.”
Or those Paul describes in 2 Timothy
2 Timothy 3:7 ESV “always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth.”
None of that is to ignore all the theological rationales already presented in this discussion, but just to say that I'm not convinced theological knowledge is as much to do with it as we might think/like there to be.
So I tend to think that a lot of this is not theologically grounded at all - but people just wanting something new - something that makes them "feel" more authentic - its the air the modern world breathes - the irrelgious go transgender - the religious go EO....so to speak (a metaphor by the way not really, mostly!).
The spirit of Athens is alive and well in the evangelical world -
Acts 17:21 ESV “Now all the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there would spend their time in nothing except telling or hearing something new.”
Or those Paul describes in 2 Timothy
2 Timothy 3:7 ESV “always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth.”
None of that is to ignore all the theological rationales already presented in this discussion, but just to say that I'm not convinced theological knowledge is as much to do with it as we might think/like there to be.
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RamistThomist
Puritanboard Assessor
Very good point. We can say, and probably truthfully, that many become EO because it is edgy. They (often the very same people) did the same thing with Calvinism.
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Speaking more broadly, I've wondered if EO and Romanism appeals as a backlash against the come-as-you-are emphasis in evangelical churches including many in the PCA. Made in the image of God, people instinctively know that God is greater than themselves and that approaching him is not on man's terms. The modern church goes out of its way to say there is nothing special about worship, that the style must appeal to the lowest talents, and what's important is whatever makes people the most comfortable.
Susan777
Puritan Board Sophomore
I know of a highly respected OPC pastor who recently went EO. It was a surprise to his congregation but I suspected he was being drawn to it based on his choice of teaching materials and book recommendations. All by formerly Reformed pastors who converted. At the time I wondered why his session seemed not to notice this. So when I heard that he resigned and left the ministry I was not at all surprised, only sad. It did create a period of crisis in terms of faith for me personally because I can’t imagine anyone being willing to exchange the joy of reconciliation and forgiveness offered by the Savior for mere asceticism and outward beauty. At the end of the day, the truth of resting on Christ alone is worth more than life itself.
RamistThomist
Puritanboard Assessor
I'm totally ignorant of this situation, but I can almost bet one of the books was Alexander Schmemann's For the Life of the World. It brought several Reformed people to EO. I never could figure out why since there isn't anything particularly EO about it. It hinges on the argument creation-good, gnosticism-bad. Quite true, no doubt, but not really a confession-defining issue.
Theoretical
Puritan Board Professor
Yep, I've definitely seen this in terms of when the New Calvinists were cool. These days it's the Anglicans and "liturgy/tradition for liturgy's" sake or the Trad Catholics.
Northern Crofter
Puritan Board Junior
Just curious: does anyone who has observed this happening think one of the signs is a move to weekly communion? I'm not suggesting that everyone moving to weekly communion is headed to EO or episcopalianianism, but in the cases where folk do "transition," looking back, has that been a common predecessor?
Ploutos
Puritan Board Graduate
I haven't observed that. There's good precedent for a desire to have weekly communion in Reformed theology and what I've observed - personally/anecdotally - is just that: a desire for weekly communion.
D
Deleted member 6112
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It may be that he had no experiential knowledge of those things to begin with. Judas preached the gospel, and even worked miracles (Matt 10). Pray for his soul; he may well lose it.
DanSSwing
Puritan Board Sophomore
in my opinion it's the same reason some secularists are starting to look to womanizers like Andrew Tate. They recognize the new mega-gender culture is madness, so they're reacting to it by seeking out the opposite extreme. The problem is that they're doing so without discretion. I'm no Thomist, but I think Aristotle was on to something when he talked about virtues often being the median between two vices. Even if not strictly accurate, it's a good warning against swinging the pendulum too far or in a new wrong direction entirely.
RamistThomist
Puritanboard Assessor
No. They almost always center around apostolic succession and “twenty thousand denominations.”
D
Deleted member 9611
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Glen Clary is one OP minister I know of who went EO; not sure if that is who is being mentioned. He was a frequent contributor to the Reformed Forum. I found it rather shocking.
HauerVos
Puritan Board Freshman
It depends. One of the big issues is, like you noticed, potential converts don't consult their pastors or elders on their interest with the east. Or worse, they do, and they get bad, uninformed answers. Orthodoxy hits different when you're young and passionate about theology. Knowing anything about the East gives you a gnosis that most Western Christians don't possess. I was ready to convert to EO after some elementary reading when I was 19, until I went to a liturgy and found it extremely uncomfortable.
RamistThomist
Puritanboard Assessor
That is word for word my story. Although I was never YRR, I studied EO at the same time YRR was the biggest thing in the world. Older Reformed guys would give right answers to the wrong questions. YRR types were...well, YRR.
The first time I went to a liturgy I experienced shopper's (although not buyer's) remorse.
RobertPGH1981
Puritan Board Sophomore
Some high-level generic thoughts on this trend.
I think there is an appeal since it is a foreign concept to many folks in the WEST. It is also appealing when you start to modify the ordo salutis. Changing the order distances a believer from protestant reformed theology. The negative sentiments of Rome are still present, but many see a greener pasture with Eastern Orthodoxy because it's foreign.
I also think many who make the move don't know much about their views with icons, and they still have very close views of Rome.
I think there is an appeal since it is a foreign concept to many folks in the WEST. It is also appealing when you start to modify the ordo salutis. Changing the order distances a believer from protestant reformed theology. The negative sentiments of Rome are still present, but many see a greener pasture with Eastern Orthodoxy because it's foreign.
I also think many who make the move don't know much about their views with icons, and they still have very close views of Rome.
alexanderjames
Puritan Board Junior
Do you remember if there was anything in particular that made you feel uncomfortable? Same question to you @RamistThomist ?
I think there is a bit of neo-Gnosticism in the hipster Missional movement. Look at Revoice as an example where it denies basic human sexuality and a mental state is confused with one's very identity. It could be the same thing attracting men to the manosphere in other arenas because so many prominent TGC/culturalist voices are upending basic humanity. I think your thoughts about the fact that EO seems to be pushing back on cultural trends make it seem like the last remaining sane Church. Even a Church as "physical" as the Roman Catholic Church has a Pope collapsing on gay marriage.
D
Deleted member 6112
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Wow. This is the first I've heard of this. When did he apostatize to EO? I can't find anything about it online.
RamistThomist
Puritanboard Assessor
One upshot to my looking into EO during the late 2000s: I missed the whole TGC/T4G craze. Once I realigned mentally with Reformed in 2012, I had no idea what the deal was with Keller or Driscoll.
That segues into my next point: if we had conferences on metaphysics instead of how radical seashells are, we might actually provide people with a sturdier foundation.
That segues into my next point: if we had conferences on metaphysics instead of how radical seashells are, we might actually provide people with a sturdier foundation.
Susan777
Puritan Board Sophomore
Yes. He is the one I was referring to but was reluctant to name. Glen had many intellectual gifts that attracted men to his ministry and some of these men went elsewhere but I’m happy to report that the assistant pastor stepped up to fill his shoes after his abrupt departure and the church seems to have recovered quite well.
Susan777
Puritan Board Sophomore
You won’t. He was immediately scrubbed from Reformed Forum. The thing was accomplished very quickly. I still have the Orthodox books he recommended. I wish him well.
Susan777
Puritan Board Sophomore
I wondered this myself. Why use Orthodox writers when there are many solid Reformed men? This was the point at which I could no longer participate in his online weekly Bible study. He was planning to use a book from yet another Orthodox convert so I bowed out. That’s why I wasn’t at all surprised when I heard he went the full Monty. As for that party, the church gave him the party unaware of his new direction. He gave as the reason for his resignation his family obligations, so they were still in the dark until the time he was demitted before his presbytery. It was a stealth departure.
D
Deleted member 9611
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I saw the writing on the wall before he ever resigned; I was recommended him as a friend on FB and he had weird eastern icons on his account. I actually thought someone hacked him at first given that he did his PhD on reformed worship.
D
Deleted member 6112
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He was merely demitted of his office, and not disciplined for heresy???
Balticus
Puritan Board Freshman
I have to admit that for me Reformed Christians going EO seems extremely strange. I live in a country where RCC and EO are the two largest denominations with overwhelming majority of the population belonging to the former and, I suppose, I could to some extent understand the move from RCC to EO.
EO church buildings are even more ostentatious and gold dripping in their sumptuousness than RCC ones, their priests wear even more gaudy robes, and their religious ceremonies are even more pompous. So, I can see how that can be attractive to a Roman Catholic (especially the traditionalists, disgusted with Vaticanum Secundum and what they call "protestantisation" of RCC) Also, EO clergy in general - if you look at particular churches - are even more... well... I don't want to say 'venal', but let's just say that the "alliance of the throne and the altar" is even stronger there than in the case of Roman catholicism. So, a move from RCC to EO is at least partly explicable.
But the move from Biblical faith, doctrines of Grace and the inerrant Word of God - in other words from the purity of Reformed Christianity - to EO is completely and utterly incomprehensible to me. Mind boggles.
EO church buildings are even more ostentatious and gold dripping in their sumptuousness than RCC ones, their priests wear even more gaudy robes, and their religious ceremonies are even more pompous. So, I can see how that can be attractive to a Roman Catholic (especially the traditionalists, disgusted with Vaticanum Secundum and what they call "protestantisation" of RCC) Also, EO clergy in general - if you look at particular churches - are even more... well... I don't want to say 'venal', but let's just say that the "alliance of the throne and the altar" is even stronger there than in the case of Roman catholicism. So, a move from RCC to EO is at least partly explicable.
But the move from Biblical faith, doctrines of Grace and the inerrant Word of God - in other words from the purity of Reformed Christianity - to EO is completely and utterly incomprehensible to me. Mind boggles.
Folks’ apostas(ies) are not always a careful embrace of the whole of a “church“’s confession. Sometimes, there is a particular itch someone wants scratched, and perhaps their current stop doesn’t scratch that itch, so they’ll do some shopping, until they can find it. Then, maybe they find the next shiny thing that scratches that itch, not taking into account all the other spots that will now be exposed to new itches. Those‘ll come, and -except the Lord intervene- they’ll be ever learning but never able to come to a knowledge of the truth. Therefore but by the grace of go I. Lord keep me!
A particular thing I’ve noticed/observed from those who leave, in my brief history, is an initial, and sometimes rabid, but SHALLOW fascination with TRUE and GODLY particular doctrines (e.g. Psalmody, Establishmentarianism, etc.). Yet, because they obsess on one or two legs of doctrine, and that mostly superficially, they’re easy pickin’s -as it were- for the next big thing, and are sometimes drawn to these because of their controversial nature. This only underscores the need to come under pastoral care, instead of taking up internet apologetics, often enflamed by internet attaboys, strengthening that little Pharisee who seeks to thrive battle-free in our hearts.
A particular thing I’ve noticed/observed from those who leave, in my brief history, is an initial, and sometimes rabid, but SHALLOW fascination with TRUE and GODLY particular doctrines (e.g. Psalmody, Establishmentarianism, etc.). Yet, because they obsess on one or two legs of doctrine, and that mostly superficially, they’re easy pickin’s -as it were- for the next big thing, and are sometimes drawn to these because of their controversial nature. This only underscores the need to come under pastoral care, instead of taking up internet apologetics, often enflamed by internet attaboys, strengthening that little Pharisee who seeks to thrive battle-free in our hearts.
Ploutos
Puritan Board Graduate
That's precisely it. We don't live in an EO country. It's novel. It's different. It's edgy. What more do you need to make a dramatic life-altering change from shallow mindless adherence to one religion to shallow mindless adherence to another?
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