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What is theology?

How do Scripture and the Fathers of the Church understand the task of the theologian?

Looking at the Bible, we encounter at once a striking and remarkable fact: nowhere in the Old or New Testaments do we ever find the words ‘theology’, ‘theologian’ or theologise’. These are, quite simply, not Scriptural terms. By the same token we may also note that none of the twelve chosen by Christ was educated at a theological college.

It is only gradually that the term, ‘theology’ enters Christian discourse. The word was viewed with suspicion by the 2nd-century Apologists, because for them, it meant primarily the speculations of religious thinkers who were pagans. On one occasion, however, it is used in a Christian sense by Athenagoras of Athens, to mean faith in the Holy Trinity. It was the Alexandrian, Clement, and to a far greater extent, Origen, who established the Christian use of the word, ‘theology’. Significantly, it was also at Alexandria that there emerged the first well-established theological college, the celebrated Catechetical School headed by Pantaenus, then by Clement and Origen, and subsequently, by Bishop Dionysios of Alexandria. At a later date, in the Byzantine period, the main centre of theological education moved to the Patriarchal Academy of Constantinople.

While noting that ‘theology’ is not a biblical word and that only gradually did it become part of the Christian vocabulary, we may also note something else. When the term is used by the Greek fathers, it is employed in a markedly different sense from that in which it is normally understood today. Evagrius of Pontus, for example, the disciple of the Cappadocians, and of the Desert Fathers, observes in a famous epigram, ‘If you are a theologian, you will pray truly; and if you pray truly, you are a theologian.’ Theology, states St Diadochos of Photiki (5 th century), ‘bestows on the soul the greatest of gifts .. uniting it with God in unbreakable communion.’ For St Peter of Damascus, theology is the most exalted of the eight stages of spiritual contemplation, an eschatological reality of the age to come, which takes us out of ourselves in ‘ecstatic rapture’.

As these three instances indicate, theology meant far more to the Fathers than it customarily does today. In their view it certainly signified, as it

does to us, the organised exposition of Christian doctrine, using the reasoning power of the human brain; for this is a gift from God and is not to be neglected. But to them it signified also, much more profoundly, the vision of God the Holy Trinity, a vision involving not merely the reasoning brain but also the total human person, including the intuitive spiritual understanding (nous) and the heart (kardia), in the biblical and patristic – not the modern – sense of the word. Theologia, that is to say, is nothing else than theoria, contemplation. It presupposes living communion with the living God, and it is integrally bound up with prayer. There is no true theology that is not part of an act of worship; all authentic theology is liturgical, doxological, mystical.

This patristic understanding of theology is admirably summed up by a contemporary Greek theologian, Christos Yannaras, ‘In the Orthodox Church and tradition, theology has a very different meaning from the one we give today. It is a gift from God, a fruit of the interior purity of the Christian’s spiritual life. Theology is identified with the vision of God, with the immediate vision of the personal God, with the personal experience of the transfiguration of creation by uncreated grace.’ In this way, he continues, theology is not a ‘theory of the world, a metaphysical system’, but ‘an expression and a formulation of the Church’s experience … not an intellectual discipline but an experiential participation, a communion.’

If theology means all this, we may well ask: Is it a suitable subject to be studied in universities and scholastic academies? Can we legitimately set examinations in theology, awarding to our students theological degrees and diplomas, assigning passes and distinctions? One thing at any rate is clear: if theology is to be taught and studies in universities and academies, professors and students should always keep in view the golden rule of St Gregory the Theologian: that we are to theologize ‘in the manner of the fishermen, but not of Aristotle.’

Although the word ‘theology’ is not found in the Bible, there are many Scriptural texts in which the nature of theology is indicated. Let us look at a few of them:

1. ‘No-one has ever seen God: the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father – he it is who has revealed God to us’. (Jn 1:18)

2. ‘Now that you know God, or rather are known by him …’ (Gal. 4:9)3. ‘We see through a mirror in a riddling, enigmatic way’ (I Cor. 13:12)4. ‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God’ (Matt. 5:8)5. ‘Be still, and know that I am God’ (Ps 45:10)

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Theology is a gift from God, a free and undeserved gift, a gift of grace. With good reason the contemporary and friend of St Maximus the Confessor, St Thalassios of Libya, speaks of ‘the desire of all desires, the grace of theology’. Theology, in other words, signifies not simply our human enquiries into the life of God, but rather the response that we make to God’s self-revelation (Jn 1:18). Theology is not so much we searching out and examining God, as God searching us out and examining us. In secular scholarship the human person knows, but in theology the human person is known by God (Gal. 4:9).

Thus theology rests upon divine rather than upon human initiative: God is never the passive object of our knowledge, but always the active subject. To put the same point differently, theology is wisdom – not just scholarly enquiries and learning, but wisdom. The true wisdom, however, is always Christ himself, the living and hypostatic truth, ‘the power of God and the wisdom of God’ (I Cor. 1:24). Christ himself is theology: he is the theologian and we are only theologians by virtue of the charisma that we receive from him. The true theologian is always theodidaktos, ‘taught by God’.

St Basil the Great and St Gregory the Theologian regularly use the phrase, ‘the mystery of theology.’ It is important to recall at this point the true theological sense of the word ‘mystery’. A ‘mystery’ is not simply an unsolved problem but something that is indeed revealed to our understanding, yet never exhaustively revealed, because it reaches out into the infinity of God.

Theology, then, is a mystery because, as St Thalassios says, ‘it transcends our mind’, seeking to express in human language that which lies far beyond all human understanding. ‘Every theological statement,’ remarks St Basil, ‘falls short of the understanding of the speaker … Our understanding is weak and out tongue id even more defective.’ According to the Cappadocians, once theology forgets the inevitable limits of the human understanding, replacing the ineffable Word of God with human logic, it ceases to be theologia and sinks to the level of technologia.

That is why our theology has always to be expressed ‘in a riddling, enigmatic way’ (I Cor. 13:12). We are compelled to employ antimony and paradox because we are stretching human language beyond its proper limits. In order to embrace, however inadequately, the fullness of divine truth, we find ourselves obliged to make statements that seemingly

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contrary to each other. Not without reason did Cardinal Newman describe the theological enterprise as ‘saying and unsaying to a positive effect’.

Since theology is the vision of God, and since it is the pure in heart who see God (Matt. 5:8), authentic theology is impossible without katharsis, purification. Although theology remains always a gift of God’s grace, this free gift requires on the human side our full co-operation, our voluntary synergeia: ‘We are fellow-workers (synergoi) with God’ (I Cor. 3:9). All theology is, in this sense, ‘theanthropic’. Our human co-operation consists precisely in our conversion, in the opening of our hearts to God’s love, in the total transfiguration of our lives through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Theology is a vita, an all-embracing ‘way of life’. There can be no true theology without a personal commitment to holiness: the real theologians are the saints.

For this reason it is surely dangerously misleading to speak of theology as a ‘science’, as if it were on the same level as geology or zoology. Undoubtedly, even in geology or zoology there is a need for personal commitment; indeed, some would argue that the observer is always part of the experiment. But in geology and zoology it is generally enough to gather objective facts with the utmost accuracy, and then to analyze these facts with insight and impartial rigor. The personal, moral life of the geologist or zoologist is irrelevant.

Above all there can be no progress on the path of theological katharsis without prayer. Prayer and theology are inseparable connected. Recalling the words of the good thief on the cross (‘Lord, remember me, when thou comest into thy kingdom’) St Modestos of Jerusalem (7 th

century) terms these words theologia; and significantly, they are precisely a confession of faith that is also a prayer.

LanguageWhat has been said about theology and prayer brings us to the final Biblical quotation from the psalms. There can be no theology without hesychia, without inner stillness, silence of the heart. ‘Be still, and know that I am God’ (Ps 25:10): theology, as the knowledge of God – as not merely talking about God but also listening to him – presupposes stillness, hesychia. Perhaps we could add one last thing. Equally essential is joy. We are to devote ourselves to theology with the fear of God but also – as St Diadochos insists – with joyfulness of heart. In the story of the conversion of Kiev Us’, what Vladimir’s envoys found lacking in the worship of the different nations that they visited was

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specifically the element of joy; and what converted them to orthodox Christianity when they attended the Divine Liturgy at Constantinople in the Great Church of the Holy Wisdom was the sense of joyful wonder. Ads theologians let us today cultivate the same joyful wonder and then we shall find that our witness bears fruit in ways far beyond our imagining.

Trakatellis

Today there are several challenges that confront theology. They raise questions, create problems or are simply provocative. I have selected three that seem to be important and indicative of more general tendencies.

The first challenge is that of language. Here we encounter a very contemporary and very acute problem. We could define it with the phrase ‘language inflation’ or ‘word inflation’. We are overflooded daily with all kinds of printed words, from big books to pamphlets, from various magazines to amusing car-bumper stickers. Printed words accompany everything; they appear on every possible or impossible surface. No matter where we direct our gaze, stumble across printed words. Our optical nerves and, subsequently, our minds are attacked by written verbal messages constantly and ruthlessly.

At the same time, we are at the mercy of audible messages of language as sound: radio, stereo, television, continuous announcements in public places, and so on. This audible and visual presence of language, this condition of being besieged and bombarded by countless words, becomes overwhelming indeed. It creates, simultaneously, a feeling of unbearable pressure and a sense of word inflation, of language devaluation. People have become more and more convinced that words are extremely cheap, hopelessly inexpensive, and valueless. Language increasingly loses its function as a carrier of meanings, as a means of communication, and becomes a neutral or an irritating noise, something like a hum, like a deadly lullaby leading to spiritual numbness.

This situation constitutes more than a challenge for theology and the Church. What could we offer as a response? Out of a number of possible answers, allow me to mention just a few for further reflection:

The first is simply silence. Our effort vis-à-vis language inflation is to start cultivating an awareness of, and an urge for, silence, a need for creating zones and spaces of quietness in our life. Theology should lead to the ineffable beauty of the world of silence. This is a time to re-

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emphasize the many aspects and facets of Christ’s silence, to rediscover the richness and the function of a language abstinence as it is manifested in the lives of the saints and ascetics of our Church. Theology should, among other things, become a training for silence and quietness filled with the presence of God, an education for a meaningful silence through which we could enter into communication with the word and the world of God.

The second answer to the challenge of the contemporary language proliferation is the refocusing on the theological reality of the sacredness of language. For theology, language is sacred because it is directly related to true word of God – the word which brought into existence the gigantic universe, the word which is the vehicle par excellence of God’s revelation, of God’s truth to us. The sacredness of language and its uniqueness is also a focal point for theological elaboration because of the immediate and decisive connection to soteriology and eschatology. Our place in the Kingdom of God depends on our confession of faith, that is, on a verbal confession (Mt 10:32-33; Rom. 10: 9-10). We should not forget that the heart of the basic act of a martyr is linguistic, a word-event – namely, an oral declaration of faithfulness to Christ the lord. Here language reaches a supreme state. Perhaps, in dealing with language inflation, it is about time to study seriously and honestly the warning of Jesus in Matthew 12L:36-37: ‘I tell you, on the day of judgment, men will render account for every careless word they utter; for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.’

The second major challenge which invites our attention is one created by bio-medical technology. Actually, in this case we encounter not one but several weighty challenges, which come from biochemistry, biology, biomedicine, and biotechnology.

What, specifically, are the problems in this instance? Here we deal with very sophisticated techniques in genetic engineering. The purposes of the scientists involved are in the experiments and the various projects are multiple and variegated. Let me mention a few: (a) he modification of the hereditary mechanisms of micro-organisms or cells; (b) the fusion of cells of different living entities; (c) the synthesis and the manipulation of DNA, which is often characterized as the master molecule of life; and (d), which is the most significant, gene-splitting or recombinant DNA, a formidable achievement comparable only to the splitting of the atom and the ensuing release of atomic power. The ultimate result of all this scientific activity is the possibility of interfering drastically with the basic hereditary processes.

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The challenge for theology is conspicuous, although the items mentioned are just a few examples. How do we face this formidable enterprise? Can theology stay neutral and voiceless? Are we to participate as hypnotized or naive spectators, watching a process that might produce saving drugs but also deadly viruses and, why not, monsters?

In this case, which is extremely delicate and complicated, the task of theology should, perhaps, start with a new emphasis on the sanctity of life, with a deepening respect for every living creature. The phenomenon of life, a wondrous and awe-inspiring phenomenon, demands methodical, diligent and long-range theological work in the years ahead. Furthermore, this is a case and a field where the truth of creation of life by God and of creation by man by God should be strongly underlined. The fact that man is created and not autonomous or self-standing is of paramount importance for all experiments and efforts related to biomedical technology. We have to acknowledge out limits as human beings, our finite nature. We are not independent, no matter what we pretend to be. We are not the masters of life in the universe. There is a mutuality of interrelations between God, man and living organisms; there is a network of interconnections resulting from the initial event of creation. Theology could and should present these truths to the people, not as a negative doctrine but as a positive and enhancing teaching, a teaching which restores the idea of the sanctity of life and elucidates the role of man as explorer and researcher within the created cosmos of which he is an integral part, being himself a created being.

The third challenge originates in the amazingly complicated world of human relationships. What we experience today and what will become more intense in the years to come is a deep and radical changing or shaking of these relationships. Basic institutions like marriage are under constant discussion, scrutiny and revision. Intra-family connections and dynamics seem to be destabilized with an increasing rhythm. The breathtaking mobility and lifestyle in the large urban centers grow incessantly into factors which prevent deep and permanent relationships. The need for survival gives impetus to an overgrowth of strong individualistic and animalistic elements within human beings. Large areas of services, especially public services, come constantly under the dominion of computer technology, which leads to a further dramatic reduction of interhuman communications. Depersonalization and dehumanisation inexorably devour large parts of family life, and vital and large interpersonal areas, such as human sexuality, are incessantly influenced and modified by detrimental factors. The breaking down of

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relationships, the growing difficulty of real in-depth communication and the resulting loneliness and isolation in the contemporary world constitute a challenge of colossal proportions for our theology and for our Church.

Here Orthodox theology has the high and urgent duty to bring to the people the inexhaustible wealth of the anthropological and the soteriological truths ands experiences of the Church. These truths could and should be presented, reinterpreted and analyzed. They should be applied with love and care to the pertinent problems. The sacredness of the human person, a person redeemed by Christ, ought to become a central point again. At the same time, the awesome and sublime mystery of the Holy Trinity, as a revelation of supreme and absolute interpersonal relationships, offers a unique answer to a number of hard questions, Furthermore, the fact of the institutions of the Church as the place of revelation of the divine truth, the fact that this truth and the life which accompanies it has been entrusted not to individuals as such but to the ecclesia, to a body, to an organism determined uniquely by relationships, presents theology with immense possibilities. The sacredness of the human person and the sacredness and absolute priority of interpersonal relationships, with its ultimate reference to the Holy Trinity and its immediate and visible manifestation in the life of the Church throughout the centuries, disclose a fascinating perspective for us. We must in all humility accept the challenge as a gift from God and gratefully proceed with our work.

In conclusion, I have tried to suggest basic targets for our theological task, targets related to three contemporary challenges: the challenge of language, the challenge of biomedical technology and the challenge of human relationships.

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Metrop. Daniel

The Tasks of Orthodox Theology Today

The tasks of Orthodox theology today are different according to the different needs of the local churches which are situated in different cultural and socio-political concerns. However, it is possible to speak about some common tasks of Orthodox theology as a whole.

1. To Become Less Defensive and More self-critical

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The first task of Orthodox theology in every local church is to reflect more critically on its own concrete tasks: to see if and how much the theology elaborated and taught in the different schools of theology is linked with the life of the Church today, reflects on it, finds solutions for its problems and helps to build up the Church as the Body of the living Christ living in our world today.

In other words, the first task is to see if Orthodox theology today is really and sufficiently in the service of the Church, whether or not it is the conscience and the consciousness of the Church.

Concrete historical reasons obliged Orthodox theology in the past to become more and more apologetic and defensive. In order to face the heresies, Islamic domination, and western uniatism and proselytism, Orthodox theology understood itself primarily as a ‘guardian and protector of Tradition’. In fact, this understanding of theology is based on the inseparability between the Tradition as a living experience of the Gospel throughout the centuries and theology as an effort to make relevant and fruitful the Gospel in every context and period of history. However, the strong emphasis on theology as guardian and protector of the Tradition often shaped among Orthodox theologians an exaggerated apologetic mentality which still constitutes today a main obstacle for the promotion of self-critical and creative theology.

In fact, a self-criticism, of Orthodox theology or a motion today does not mean to abandon scientific or academic research in theology, but to see how much academic theology is at the same time an ecclesial theology. In other words, is the theology of the schools the thinking of the Church today? Is theology her conscious and consciousness, her reflection on herself and on her problems, rooted in her life as the Body of Christ and concerned with her vocation and mission in the world today?

2. To Become more Biblical and Mystagogical

a) One of the main characteristics of the theology of the Fathers was theliving connection between their thinking and the Bible. They not only quoted the Bible, they assimilated it. Or, better said, they adapted their mind to the Spirit of the Holy Scriptures. Their thinking became ‘consubstantial’ with the Scriptures, even when they used expressions taken from contemporary culture.

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Their whole theology was a living homiletic, dogmatic, pastoral, or liturgical interpretation of the Bible. The reading of the Gospel was in fact for them a mystical encounter with the person of the incarnate Logos, with Christ. The approach of the Fathers to the Gospel, which has been preserved till today in the orthodox liturgy, was the basic ecclesial approach of their theology. The unity of the different parts of the Bible is realized in the mystery of Christ, in his Person, to whom the different writings of the Bible witness and call. In order to become truly ‘neopatristic’ our theology today must recover that familiarity and intimacy which the Fathers had with the Bible. At the same time, Orthodoxy has to fulfill this task by taking into account the contribution of modern western exegesis, which helps us to understand how the Person, the acts and the words of Jesus Christ were understood by his contemporaries and His disciples in their socio-cultural context.

The task of Orthodox theology today is to understand that the thinking of the Orthodox Church of the Fathers was primarily biblical and that the Orthodox Church of today has to be the same. The task of Orthodox theology is to correct the mistaken notion that a deep knowledge of the Bible and of a preaching inspired by its reading are uniquely Protestant ‘specialities’. At the same time, through a critical and constructive dialogue with western historical-critical exegesis, Orthodox theology has the task not to oppose but to find ways and methods of keeping together both the mystagogical and critical approaches to the Scriptures, in order to discern what the heart of the Gospel message is for the life of the Church today.

b) An ecclesial Orthodox theology is essentially mystagogical because itis based on the experience of new life in Christ which the Church of the Apostles, martyrs and saints has known in history. The mystagogical dimension of theology is in fact the reflection of the Church in its eschatological nature, as experience of the divine human life of Christ revealed in history and communicated by the Spirit to those who believe in Him. But no theologian can truly become a ‘mystagog’ unless he makes his own experience of the Church as the living Body of Christ, in Communion with Him. It is in this sense that we need to understand the ancient definition of the theologian: ‘If you pray, you are a theologian, and if you are a theologian, you must pray.’

In order to correct an intellectualist theology which presents the faith of the Church as an abstract doctrine or as a sum of truths to be kept and confessed, a mystagogical Orthodox dogmatic theology also must present

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the spiritual content of the dogmas of the faith. It must explain how the dogmas of the faith are connected with the living Person of Christ and how they concern the concrete life of the Church and of her members.

In this respect, Fr Dumitru Staniloae says that one of the tasks of theology today ‘is to present the articles of faith, not as abstract definitions to be memorized, but as models of personal communion with God (…). We have to penetrate beyond these dogmatic definitions to the reality itself by our direct and living contact with their content, with Christ as a Person, with the Holy Trinity as a communion of Persons (…) We need to feel in ourselves the presence of Christ, who by His incarnation and His s8iffering on the Cross came to live among us forever. By His compassion toward us, by the communion in His sacred Body and Blood, He makes us sensitive as well to the suffering and difficulties of our fellow human beings.’

3. To pay more attention to Concrete Historical Context and to Modern Culture

Orthodox theology often gives the impression of being too much oriented to the past, nurturing a nostalgia of ‘holy Byzantium’ and of the patristic golden age. Very often reference to the Church Fathers fails to take into account the historical perspective. The historical development of dogmatics, of the liturgy, of canon law, is not sufficiently known and considered. Without this historical and critical perspective, theology cannot be both creative and faithful to its tradition. The difficulty of Orthodoxy to enter deeply into dialogue with modern western civilization remains a very serious one. Metropolitan Paulos Mar Gregorios puts it this way: ‘Both the Roman Catholic and Protestant Churches have the advantage of being at home with Western civilization, having originated and grown up within it. The Orthodox, however, have great difficulty in adjusting to the modern world and its value system based on rationality, individualism, authority and truth as proposition. They survive in the modern world with much tension. They have not fully accepted the modern world or come to terms with it.’

This great difficulty for Orthodox to encounter western civilization cannot be overcome without making a critical distinction between universal faith and particular culture in the Orthodox tradition itself.

On the other hand, the task of theology today is to help the Church face secularization, to interpret the significance of the Church in a secularized culture and to elaborate a theology of the world which helps the Churches

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to develop[p the diaconia and their mission. If Orthodox theology does not take seriously the cultural context in which the churches live today, and if it is not concerned with its evangelization, salvation and sanctification, it cannot be called neopatristic theology.

4. Theology has to become more Pastoral

… more concerned with the real spiritual and ethical problems which Christians face today in a world marked by rapid change of value systems and by rapid progress in science. Orthodox theology cannot ignore the real problems of bio-ethics – human experimentation, contraception, abortion, sterilization, transplantation of organs, euthanasia.

How can the Church face alcoholism, suicide, or problems of sexuality when dealing with young Christian people educated in secular or agnostic schools? Since all these questions are real problems for the pastoral life of the Church, theology which is a function of the Church and service to its life has to reflect more seriously on them and help the Church to provide solutions. If Orthodox theology is not pastoral it cannot be called neopatristic.

5. To rediscover the ecclesial dimension of the Social Involvement of Christians in the World

One of the tasks of Orthodox Theology today is to rediscover what it means for the Church to be the living Body of Christ in the world or the sacrament of the Kingdom of God. What is the theological and ecclesiological significance of social significance of social involvement of Christians in the world? Since for the Church fathers diaconia in the world had a sacramental-mystical dimension, being another way to encounter Christ who is secretly present in our fellow human beings, it is not Orthodox to say that the struggle for justice in society, for human dignity, for peace, for the integrity of creation are just political and civil obligations without ecclesiological significance and unrelated to the question of salvation.

6. Orthodox Theology needs to become More Ecumenical

The claim of Orthodox theology that the Orthodox Church is not a confession but the one, holy, catholic, and a[apostolic Church, makes participation in the Ecumenical Movement to be understood as a mission,

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as an essential need to witness and to serve as the pivot-Church in the reconstruction of Christian unity.

However, this strong conviction that Orthodoxy is the true Church appears often as an arrogance and self-righteous, or as a religious ideological statement, since the real existential unity of the different Orthodox Churches among themselves cannot be taken as the credible model for all.

Therefore, the task of Orthodox theology today is to demonstrate what in the Church conforms with its nature and vocation, and at the same time to be critical concerning the aspects which contradict the Orthodox understanding of the Church as Una Sancta, the pan-Orthodox conciliarity and pan-Orthodox diaconcial solidarity. What can Orthodox theology recognize as authentically Christian in other Churches and even as a challenge for us? As Fr Alexander Schmemann said: ‘We often confuse the Universal Truth of the Church with a naive “superiority complex”, with arrogance and self-righteousness, with a childish certitude that everyone ought to share our own enthusiasm for the “splendors of Byzantium, for our ancient and colorful rites’ and the forms of our Church architecture. (…) It is sad to realize that there is no greater obstacle top the understanding and acceptance of Orthodoxy than the provincialism, the human pride and the self-righteousness of the Orthodox themselves, their almost complete lack of humility and self-criticism: yet Truth always makes us humble, and pride in all its forms and expressions is always alien to Truth and is always a sin.’

Humility is the precondition for authentic Christian love and service in the Church and in the world.

Concerning Orthodox involvement in the Ecumenical Movement, we just remember that the restoration of the world of visible and credible Christian unity cannot mean an abstract dogmatic unity. Rather, it implies a restoration of broken Christian communion. A renewal of the spiritual life of all the Churches, in order that their unity express the agape in Christ. There is a deep link between truth and love in the experience and understanding of the mystery of Church unity. In this respect, Patriarch Ignatios IV of Antioch observes that: ‘At the origin f every division was a wounding of fellowship of love, followed or justified by an opposition in the formulation of the faith.’

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All the tasks of Orthodox theology presented above find their convergence in the one concern. How can theology enable the Church to renew herself and grow more in their agape of Christ today?

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The most crucial subject for modern Orthodox theology is the phenomenon of secularization. Geocentric anthropocentrism, by ignoring all transcendental values, draws down as into a whirlpool all thought and consciousness, all criteria for evaluating life, and all social, political, economic and cultural structures. This is a new type of ‘heresy’ which radically alters the whole meaning of the world and the whole meaning of man, and which requires most thorough analysis and evaluation.

Orthodox theological thought of recent years has pointed out and underlined some basic truths regarding the duty of Christians to bear witness ‘to all nations’, that is, (a) Mission is an essential part of the nature of the Church, and is the extension in time and space of the work of Christ. It is the offering of salvation to mankind, the continuous transfusion of a new quality of life into human society ‘that they may have life, and have it abundantly’ (Din 10:10). The Gospel is addressed to all peoples, and therefore the work of the Church remains incomplete as long as it is restricted to certain geographical areas or social classes. Its field of action is universal and is active in both the sectors that welcome the good tidings and those which at first may reject them.

In the words of St Basil: “The definition of Christianity is the imitation of Christ to the depths of his incarnation and in accordance with each man’s vocation.

Traumatic Situations Inhibiting Orthodox Witness Today

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Our modern theology is often characterized by a certain spiritual slackness. It is often embodied in sterile academic forms and over-technical language. It fails to go very deeply into the problems posed by science, by various currents of thought, by politics, or by the philosophies of Eastern cultures. At other times we are unconsciously held back by a

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fear of waking sleeping dogs, lest we incur the displeasure of the high and mighty, lest we jeopardize established privileges. These become stumbling blocks to fruitful dialogue in which subjective opinions are set on one side in the interests of a higher synthesis. We often express views on subjects not sufficiently studies, views that have not been allowed to mature through protracted meditation and under the influence of silent worship in the Holy Spirit. Too often we talk in technical language instead of in that of a living theology. We forget that the verbosity of rationalistic theology does not touch the people of God.

A matter of resurgent interest today is the participation of women in the life of society (and women represent more than half the members of the Church and more than three quarters of those who attend Church regularly). In certain aspects of Church life possibilities open to us in this field include the revival of the institution of deaconesses and a more extensive utilization of social workers, nuns, etc. The enormous contribution of women is particularly noticeable in areas under regimes hostile to the Church. The position of the Virgin Mary in the work of divine Economy, and the multifaceted role of women saints in the life of the Church may open up vital new horizons for both reflection and action.

Theology today, then, is faced with the old problem of how to express the eternal in terms of the temporal, but with the mew problem of how to do so in terms comprehensible to modern man. But in order to tune into the wavelength of modern thinking, it is essential to comprehend the depths of the changes brought about by science, and to gain an understanding of many newly-created dimensions. Of most immediate importance are the sciences that deal with man and his history, and which reveal significant aspects of his psychosomatic structure, ie. Sociology, anthropology, medicine with its various branches, and most important of all, psychology and psychotherapy. A serious evaluation and utilization of the findings of modern science (God’s gift to man as a seeker) is an obligation of missionary and pastoral workers and theology. But a sober evaluation and use of modern knowledge cannot be achieved by fragmentary or individual work. This will necessitate collective seeking and critical examination – and not only this, but also the spreading of the work involved (eg the creation of specialized research centres in theological schools). Our schools will need to furnish a major effort so that we may study the most basic outstanding issues in common with scientists and specialists in other fields. We will also need to organise inter-school co-operation, in order that our studies may acquire a worldwide perspective and may benefit from the experiences of mankind throughout the world.

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Above all, theology is called upon to complement Orthodox worship by highlighting the ultimate bond that exists between the liturgical experience of the Christian and his dynamic presence in the world. Any separation between the experience of worship and everyday life leads, in effect, to a falsification of Christianity and to schizophrenic tendencies in the faithful. Since conscious participation in the life of worship of the Church constitutes a participation in that specific act which liberates man through the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ from the powers of the Evil One, a prolongations of the efficacy of the Divine Liturgy into the everyday life of the Christian implies a continuing struggle against those negative powers that are always active within us as well as within society.

T. Hopko: Theological Education and Modernity

The task of Orthodox theological education is basically two-fold. It into affirm and explain the Orthodox Christian faith, and to assist believers in applying and practising this faith in their daily lives.

Orthodox theological education has two basic requirements. The first is ‘the knowledge of the truth’ (I Tim. 2:14), for which we Orthodox regularly pray in our liturgical services. The second is the ability to ‘test the spirits’ and to ‘discern the signs of the times’ (cf. I Jn 4:1; Matt 16:3)… We must be aware of the realities of the world in which we live and work, acquiring eyes to see what is happening around us, ears to hear, and minds wiling to understand. We must be engaged with our world without being enmeshed in it; and detached from our world without being contemptuous of its questions, indifferent to its desires, insensitive to its sufferings, and insensible to its need for salvation.

Our modern world is a time of radical change and relentless novelty in all areas of human life. It challenges Orthodox Christians with a plethora of new and unprecedented issues, questions, and demands, as human persons and institutions experience the most rapid transformations and dramatic mutations in thought and behaviour in human history.

Our modern world is also a time when virtually all Orthodox churches and communities are experiencing a breakdown of the Church’s living Tradition while also experiencing an explosion of information about Orthodox theology, history, liturgy and spiritual life. This ironic situation has produced a loss of balance and integrity in Orthodox thinking and

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activity. For example, some people now the scriptures well, but know little about liturgy and spiritual life.

Orthodox theologians and educators must make a careful and dispassionate study of the Bible and church history to learn how change occurs in the Church. We must come to see how Orthodox Christians remain faithful to Christ while receiving new knowledge, answering new questions, and formulating new expressions of doctrine and worship. We must learn how the Church throughout history has re-fashioned what needs re-fashioning, while ridding itself of unacceptable teachings and practices, which have crept into the body.

How do Orthodox theologians and educators discern what is to be preserved or changed in the Church, welcomed or resisted? How do we answer new questions, meet new demands, and respond to new needs while remaining faithful to the ancient and eternal truth? How do we protect ourselves against erroneous and evil innovations, while ridding ourselves of old deviations and distortions? And how, in a word, do we determine what is right or wrong in the Church and society, true or false, good or evil, acceptable or unacceptable, of God or the devil?

Especially acute in modern theological education today is the issue which many consider being most critical and crucial for the modern world: the communion of men and women.

This general theme includes countless questions about human beings and life, human sexuality, marriage and celibacy, family life, the bearing and raising of children, and social and political behaviour. It raises basic questions of biblical interpretation, church doctrine and practice, and personal, legal and medical ethics. It reaches to issues concerning the very nature and naming of God. It forces a radical examination of the relationship between Orthodox Christian Tradition and the claims of modern philosophy, science and human experience in a way which makes it a perfect ‘case study’ for virtually every issue which the modern world presents to Christian Orthodoxy.

In dealing with the issue of the communion of men and women and in our churches and theological schools, we are dealing with the issue of permanency and change in its sharpest existential form. We are compelled to examine our teachings and practices about human sexuality in order to determine what in the Orthodox view is of permanent significance and value in human life, and what is not. And we are called to explain our convictions in ways which will inspire and enable

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contemporary men and women who are willing to understand and believe in Christ’s gospel to do so.

We shall be successful in this task only when we learn to deal properly with issues of freedom and authority in the Church, and in Christina life generally; when we become capable of finding and fulfilling ourselves as persons within a hierarchical and conciliar communion in which the truth and love of the Holy Trinity are made accessible to our participation and imitation.

Subjective individualism and authoritarian domination must both be rejected. Those in authority must foster free and open investigation and conversation on all issues in an atmosphere of mutual trust and respect. Church leaders must resist premature conclusions on disputed questions. All of Christ’s baptised and sealed members, who participate in 6 th

Eucharist must be permitted to speak and to be heard on every question, striving make their case by reference to the authoritative witness to orthodox faith and life. And all must seek to be ‘the mind of Christ’, desiring only to defend ‘the faith once and for all delivered to the saints.’ (cf. I Cor. 2:16; Jude 3).

The Orthodox Church and the Third Millennium

Metropolitan John (Zizioulas) of Pergamon, Balamand Monastery -December 4, 1999

The close of the 20th century and the arrival of the new millennium are part of our conventional conception of time and in this sense, they are of no fundamental significance for us Christians. The fact that many festivities have and will take place all over the world on this occasion should not lead us to think that there is a particular significance in any change of the calendar years, since for us the significant changes in time are related only to the great events of salvation history which we celebrate liturgically in the feasts of our Church. And yet, even in such conventional changes of time, Christians should pause and reflect. Not only each one of us personally should do that, but also the Church as a whole must use this as an occasion for reflection and even self-examination and self-criticism. It is in such a spirit that I propose to submit to your consideration certain reflections on the way the Christian Church understands its ministry and its witness in the beginning of the new millennium.

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What kind of a world have we inherited from the 20th century and from the expiring millennium? And what problems and possibilities lay ahead of us? What can the Orthodox Church in particular witness to in the context of the world, as it appears to be at the beginning of the new millennium?

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If we look back at the two thousand years of Christian history, we shall be overwhelmed at the same time with both joy and disappointment. The reasons for joy and satisfaction are thefollowing:

1. The very fact of the Church's survival. This is by no means a simple matter to be taken for granted. The Church was born in a hostile world and suffered severe persecutions not only in the first century, but even in our own times. In spite of all this, she still exists. The words of St. Paul, "we die and, look, we are still alive," apply fully to the Church's history, at least until now. How is this to be explained? Perhaps by sheer chance and historical circumstance as a rationalist would say. For us believers, the answer lies in our Lord's words that "not even the gates of hell will overcome the Church." Be it as it may, we cannot but be thankful to God for having preserved the Church in existence over the centuries.

The fact that the basic traditions and structure of the Church have been preserved in spite of the Church's involvement in so many influences from the cultural contexts in which she finds herself. This too is a great miracle. The Church lives in the world, but she is not of the world. The frontiers between Church and world are always difficult to establish. This will always be the fundamental problem of the Church, that is the preservation of her identity without withdrawing from the world into a ghetto.

The fact that the Church has made an impact on culture wherever she found herself. This was not the case only in Byzantium or in the Middle Ages in the West where we can almost speak of a Christian culture. It was also true even in modern times when the Church in the West was officially and emphatically pushed aside as an irrelevant factor in the creation of humanistic culture. Many of the humanistic and moral values of modern society are nothing but Christian principles of moral behavior. The Church has not been as irrelevant to human life as some people have wanted her to be.

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Particularly for the Orthodox Church, there are many reasons to be thankful to God. We have never been politically powerful except perhaps in Byzantium or in some modern nations inhabited by an Orthodox majority. But even in those cases, we have willingly developed institutions such as monasticism in order to remind ourselves that the Church does not belong to the world. Overall the days of suffering and humiliation have by far outnumbered those of glory and secular power in the history of Orthodoxy. Our Church can boast more for her martyrs and ascetics than for her worldly power. We can only thank God for that. For as Paul put it, "God's power is perfected in weakness." Especially in the 20th century, the Orthodox Church has good reasons to be thankful to our Lord for the fact that Orthodox theology has recovered its Patristic roots, realized the importance of the "lex orandi" particularly of the Holy Eucharist, and rediscovered the spirit of the Desert Fathers in and through a monastic renaissance of impressive dimensions. All this has been witnessed to in the context of the Ecumenical Movement in which the witness of Orthodoxy has been very strong in spite of our rather weak participation in it.

As to the disappointments and failures, there is, I am afraid, a great deal to feel sorry and repent for.

There is a failure to truly and deeply Christianize the world. The Church's mission has been either insufficient, as is the case with us Orthodox, or essentially unchristian, as it has happened with much of the missionary zeal and activities of the western Christians. We have mixed up the Gospel with the national and cultural values of a particular time. And we have thus failed to achieve a true inculturation of the Church. In many cases, Christian missions have been confused with the imposition of Christianity on certain peoples without regard to cultural particularities. Christianity has not loved the human beings as much as its Lord did, and we must be sorry for that.

There is the tragic division of Christianity itself. Especially the second millennium has witnessed a polemic and hatred among Christians previously unheard of in history. There is little point in trying to prove who is to be blamed for that. Our Desert Fathers have always taught us that we should always blame ourselves for the sins of all the others. Today there is a tendency among the Orthodox to stress the responsibility of the western Christians for the evil of division and for the wrongs done to the Orthodox Church by our Western brothers. History is, of course, clear in witnessing to the fact of a great deal of aggressiveness against the

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Orthodox on the part of the West. Deep however in the tragic reality of Christian division lies also an inability of the Orthodox to overcome and rise above the psychology of polemic in a true spirit of forgiveness and love. Confessional zeal has often proved stronger than forgiveness and love. The second millennium has been in this respect almost an unfortunate period of the Church's history.

There has been a failure to interpret the Gospel in existential terms Fundamentalism, confessionalism, and conservatism have killed the Bible and the dogmas of the Church, turning them into formulae to be preserved rather than lived and experienced. Dogma and ethics have been separated. And the same has happened with the lex credendi and lex orandi. Piety and theology have become two different domains. In fact the more pious one is, the less of a theologian he or she is. Similar dichotomies have occurred between dogma and canon law, or ecclesiology and Church administration. Bishops have become administrators, and it is almost a disqualification for them if they happen to be theologians. All this has led to a marginalization of theology from ordinary life, even from Church life.

There is particularly for us Orthodox an infiltration of the Church by nationalism and sometimes ethnophyletism. The idea of autocephaly has become autocephalism, that is a means of serving national or phyletic interests by using the Church for that purpose. The situation with the Orthodox Diaspora in the 20th century is in direct and open violation of Orthodox ecclesiology. There can be little doubt that we cannot be proud and happy with such a situation, although unfortunately we seem to have blessed it in the most official way.

This is what we have inherited from the past, from the two millennia of Church history, some of it offering us reasons to be thankful, while another part giving us grounds for repentance. An awareness of both of these will be extremely helpful as we approach the new millennium. The problems that this new historical period brings with it will demand a lot of reconsideration of our past.

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What will be the most important issues in the new millennium?

We are all familiar by now with the famous theory of an American political theorist of our days, who sees in the new millennium the period of what he describes as "a clash of cultures". Whether he is right or not in

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his predictions, it remains true for the Church that one of the main problems she will have to face will be, and I think has always been, that of inculturation. What will the Church do in relation to this issue?

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Inculturation can and must employ all forms of a given culture, provided that the basic aspects of the biblical outlook are maintained. The Church in these cases must be aware of what is important and must be maintained at all costs, and what can be changed. This is no easy task, as the history of the Patristic period itself shows. This underlines the crucial importance of theology in all forms of inculturation. Theology must try to reach convergence with regard to what constitutes the essential aspects of the Gospel, which must be maintained, albeit expressed in different cultural forms. Inculturation without theological awareness and sensitivity can be a very dangerous matter.

So much about history. Theology on the other hand, at the level of doctrine relates to the issue of inculturation via a Christology conditioned pneumatalogically. Inculturation is a demand of the doctrine of the Incarnation. By entering and sharing fully the human condition, God in the person of Christ made it imperative that His Church constantly allows Him to enter fully into every culture. The fact that the Son of God entered a specific culture, that is the Hebrew or Jewish milieu of a certain time in history, may be easily taken to imply that He sanctified and affirmed only a particular, thus calling all other cultures to be converted to this particular one. Indeed, a Christology which is not pneumatologically conditioned may lead to such a conclusion. Pneumatology, however, points to a Christology that is eschatological and therefore inclusive. TheChrist of the Spirit is not an individual conceivable in Himself, but He has a body. He is the first born among many brethren. And this may be extended to the point of making him a "cosmic Christ", and an anacephaleosis of all. There is no race and no culture to which he can be irrelevant. Thanks to the Holy Spirit He can be inculturated in all places, and at all times.

This stress on Pneumatology with reference to inculturation is not the same as the one encountered so often nowadays, according to which all cultures somehow contained the presence of the Holy Spirit. A Pneumatology, which is separated from Christology, is just as bad as a Christology without Pneumatology. The Holy Spirit is present everywhere. He blows whenever He wills and fills all things, as the

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prayer to Him says. But He never acts away from Christ or independently of Him. He receives from Christ and points to Him. There is no "economy of the Holy Spirit". There is only the economy of the Son. Inculturation involves inevitably the Incarnation of Christ, be it in forms other than the historical one. Instead of making of the Holy Spirit a divine person that works outside Christ, it is better to regard Him as the person who makes Christ inclusive, that is eschatological. In the Spirit Christ ceases to be Jewish or Greek. "In Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek", while in some sense being all that at the same time. The Spirit allows Christ to enter again and again in every culture and assume it by purifying it, that is by placing it in the light, one may say under the judgement, of what is ultimately meaningful as it is revealed in Christ. All this allows for a variety of cultural expressions of the one Christ.

The question of whether there is such a thing as Christian culture, that is a culture to be applying universally in the name of Christ, should be answered in the negative. A great deal of damage has been done to the Gospel whenever the Church's mission has been understood as the promotion, and quite often the imposition, of a certain culture. This does not mean that the Gospel must be totally divorced from all cultural forms in order to be preached. It rather means that mission should respect the freedom of the people to express the faith in their own way, provided that the fundamental outlook or worldview remains the one brought by the Gospel.

Inculturation therefore requires discernment, a discernment that the Spirit offers through theological consciousness, through Orthodoxy in the original sense. The role of the Church in each inculturation is therefore of paramount importance and consists in overseeing and making sure that the new cultural forms embody and not destroy the basic existential outlook that the Gospel of Christ brings to the world. For culture is a very complex matter and cannot always be distinguished from the worldview it expresses. Theology must provide the Church with the fundamental guidelines that will enable her to judge in a given case which cultural forms embody the Gospel faithfully, and which express in fact "another gospel". In any case, the Church must apply theological and not simply ethical criteria, which can often be identical with cultural ones. Questions for example whether or not magic or polygamy, and its opposite monogamy, constitute ethical matters in the cultural context of Africa, or relate to the basic outlook of the Gospel, is possible to decide only if we know what this outlook consists in. This is something that the theological consciousness of the Church can provide us with.

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Raising therefore the fundamental or ultimate questions concerning the way of being that Christ represents in the Spirit will be extremely important in the new millennium when the inculturation of Christianity will be once again crucial for the Church's existence.

Inculturation in the new millennium will be challenged by certain factors, which the Church must take into account. These are:

The challenge of non-Christian faiths. We rapidly move into a religiously pluralistic world. How should the Church react to this? The first thing that Christianity must do is to abandon its aggressive missionary methods of past times. Evangelization should not involve coercion of any sort, even of the most delicate kind. Secondly, Christian theology must rethink its position with respect to what may be called religious pluralism. Historically different views have been expressed and practiced with regard to this matter. The view that prevailed in the past was a Christomonistic one: only those who believe in Christ can be saved. This view prevailed particularly among Protestants of what we may call the "Barthian approach". It is a view that inspired many missionary movements in the West in the last few centuries. This view has been challenged within Protestant theology itself in our time. There are Protestant theologians today who wish to promote the idea of what may be called a "cosmic Christ", that is of a Christology large enough to include even in the term "Christ" those of other religions who consciously or unconsciously are looking for what we Christians call "Christ". This enlargement of Christology seems to be favored particularly among Protestant Christians living in areas like India, Japan, etc., where Christianity is in the position of a minority. They believe that, in their situation, the traditional, narrowly Christocentric position makes no sense.

This leads to my third point concerning what, in my view, Christianity should do vis-à-vis the religious pluralism of our times. After excluding totally the idea of establishing a new religion of some sort, by turning the religious pluralism into religious syncretism, and given the attitude of non-rejection on the basis of what had just been said, the only sensible and right thing for Christianity to do would be to enter into dialogue with other faiths. Such a dialogue must be constructive and cannot be an inter- religious dialogue in the void of religious conviction. Christianity must strengthen and deepen its theology, not narrow and water it down to a kind of religious agnosticism or relativism. Dialogue does not mean indifference to truth or relativization. On the contrary, it means

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conviction, yet without stubbornness, fidelity combined with openness. Dialogue is a step further than tolerance. It involves the recognition that the other, the different, exists not simply in order to exist--that is what tolerance means,-- but exists as someone who has something to say to me which I have to listen to seriously, relate it to my own convictions and judge it under and in the light of these convictions.

But what is it that the other will say to me in a dialogue of this type? A dialogue does not only need partners; it requires also a subject. What would the partners involved in such a dialogue speak about? Will it be about politics and the role of religion in the various national and other conflicts in the world? This may be opportune and to some people, mainly politicians, a useful and welcomed thing. But it is doubtful that such a subject would be constructively approached. The result most certainly would be a negative one. For this reason, I suggest that the dialogue with religions we are talking about should have a different agenda. It should place us before the burning issues of humanity as we approach the third millennium. Religion is not about religion, less so about religions. Religion is for human beings and their relation with God, with one another, and with creation. Religions must face the challenges of our times.

These challenges include, as we enter the third millennium, among other things, the challenges of technology and globalization. The world is shrinking. We all know that by now. There are good things to be said about that, but there are also serious dangers. We cannot remain indifferent before this situation. The great problem in the coming century will be globalization, that is how to reconcile the "one" and the "many"? how to avoid achieving universal unity at the expense of local diversity: how to allow difference, not simply to exist and be tolerated, but to contribute to the benefit of humanity. We must take a stance on this matter. We must explain our faith and offer solutions to this problem of globalization. We must inform our faithful and contribute accordingly to the formation of a universal consciousness on this matter.

And there is also the ecological challenge. This is probably the most serious problem facing humanity today. It cuts across nations and continents. Christianity shares a great deal of the responsibility for the ecological crisis. This is recognized by all. Fortunately it is also in a position to contribute very much to the solution of the problem. This is beginning to be recognized also in our days. A dialogue on such a subject can bring together even those involved in national and political conflicts

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to the same table. This can be a constructive use of religious pluralism with beneficial consequences in many other respects.

And there is finally the challenge from sciences, particularly from biological sciences. There is hardly anyone these days who does not feel alarmed by the news concerning advances in biology and genetics. Only yesterday as I was travelling on my way here, I read in the press on the plane, that scientists have managed to map chromosomes, thus making it possible to manipulate life itself. Certainly we cannot watch what is going on with indifference. This is a subject that requires theological reflection. And it is so new that such a reflection is bound to be an extremely complex matter. But it is rather naive, allow me to say, that the problem of Bioethics can simply be a matter of state legislation. World opinion must be formed, and religion is a major factor in forming and informing the human conscience. No theological dialogue can have an effect, if it does not address issues of this kind.

In the face of these challenges, what should the Orthodox Church do? How should she react and what could she contribute? Here are some personal thoughts on this crucial question.

Orthodox theology must review its language. We have inherited a rich dogmatic tradition and we must keep it faithfully and not change anything in it. We probably need no new dogmas. But this does not mean that we must conserve dogmas as archeological treasures. We certainly need an interpretation of our dogmas in existential terms.

What for example does it mean for today's man that God is Trinity? Does it throw any light on problems such as those created by individualism, universalism etc., which mark our present culture. What does an ecclesiology of the catholicity of the local Church have to say to the issue of globalization, which is beginning to dominate the world's agenda as we have noted it, etc.

We can mention any dogma of our Church, since there is no dogma of our Church that does not have to say something about the actual problems of humanity.

Orthodoxy must begin to answer cultural questions not with ethics, but with dogmas, that is it must interpret its dogmatics existentially. The Orthodox Church must draw more and more from its liturgical life, particularly the Eucharist. The Eucharist is not one sacrament among many. It is the summing up or the anacephaleosis of the entire reality of

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the salvation of the world. We have to bring our liturgy more into the discussion of the new cultural problems. In order to do that we must first pay attention to the way we celebrate the Eucharist and worship. Liturgical rite is not mere ritual. It is theology and it has profound existential significance. We must celebrate the liturgy properly if we are to offer anything to the world of existential significance. Secondly we must interpret our liturgy in existential terms. We need in other words a liturgical Dogmatics or a Dogmatics understood and expressed liturgically. This will be our specific gift to the world in the 21st century.

Together with our liturgy we must cultivate our monastic tradition in the true spirit of the monasticism of the Desert Fathers. There is a remarkable revival of Orthodox Monasticism in our times. But the Spirit of the Desert Fathers, that is the spirit of self-blaming or taking upon oneself the sins of the world is often replaced in our monasticism by that of aggressive zealotism which defeats the very purpose of asceticism. The world will need more and more the spirit of genuine monasticism as it will be overcome by the greed of utilitarianism and self-justification, which mark today's culture.

My brothers and sisters in Christ:

The Orthodox Church enters the third millennium with no political or economic power. On the contrary, it enters it with secular weakness to the point of putting into question its very survival in the next millennium. All Orthodox Churches are in difficulties, and they will be more so in the future. The strength of Orthodoxy is not in any secular power. It is in its Tradition, both dogmatically and liturgically, yet only on the condition that this Tradition is interpreted in a way that would make it relevant to the existential needs of humanity. It is no longer enough to preserve our Tradition. Our forefathers did that very well. We must not make Orthodoxy an exotic religion, as so many western Christians approach it. We must engage in its interpretation in the light of today's and tomorrow's basic existential concerns. Theology is and will be more and more the sine qua non condition for the survival of the Orthodox Church in the new millennium. Theology is the strength of the Orthodox Church. Orthodox Theology should not fear dialogue with any one. Its duty is to engage in dialogue. It is the only way for it to assert its uniqueness, its importance, its indispensability. It is the only way to avoid turning the Orthodox Church into a ghetto in today's world.

We are celebrating today the patron saint of this Faculty, St. John of Damascus, a local saint who became a universal theologian. Like in his

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own time, today Orthodox theology is preached in a non-Christian cultural context. And this will continue to be the more so in the coming century. The vigor of this Faculty promises that its contribution to the witness of the Orthodox Church in the years to come will be important. We wish it the blessing of God, so that together with the rest of the Orthodox Theological forces it may bring the witness of truth which the Orthodox Church confesses to a world that will need it more and more in the coming millennium. It has been said by a renowned British Byzantinologist that the 21st century will be the century of the Orthodoxy. This should not make us boast. It should rather make us feel more strongly the immense responsibility placed on our weak shoulders to witness to the Truth. It is with such a feeling that I have presented to you my modest reflections this evening.

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