Clarion

“The One True Church” – Bradley Jersak

Aug 12, 2023 |

My ecclesial journey has included 20 years with the Baptists (via my parents), 10 years with the Mennonites (via marriage), another 10 years with renewal movement folks, including a church plant focused on the margins (mainly people with disabilities, addicts in recovery, etc.), followed by a slow journey into Orthodoxy (via my monk mentor, Lazar Puhalo). Over the years, I have learned to retrieve and appreciate the gifts I received from each of these communions. I am committed to both interchurch fellowship and interfaith charity.
 
So when I run into some Eastern Orthodox believers who insist they are the "one true church," I confess that I sometimes struggle to be kind. My pushback at that lingo includes the following points, which I stand by as I write this:
 
1. People claiming to be the "one true church" are obviously sectarian. Indeed, a pair of them knocked on my door this week. Is that what we're doing now? Are we a cult?
 
2. My great-uncle Karl was a faithful Baptist minister in Czechoslovakia. He was arrested and tortured for his faith. Meanwhile, Orthodox priests were in active collaboration with (or actual members of) the KGB and other Communist secret police forces across Eastern Europe. Please don't presume to tell me Uncle Karl wasn't a "true Christian" or brother in Christ.
 
3. The current Patriarch of Moscow (the world's largest Eastern Orthodox community) is currently in bed with Putin's imperial agenda. During his homilies, he has promised absolution and eternal life to recruit soldiers for the invasion of Ukraine. This is the very definition of anti-Christ.
 
4. I also follow the Orthodox maxim, "We know where grace is. We do not know where it is not." I.e., We believe that we encounter Christ and experience his grace in our communion. We do NOT believe Christ limits his grace to our communion. He is the Light of the world.
 
5. I say all of the above as an Orthodox believer. Relatively speaking, we have too many priests and not enough prophets. I love our liturgy, our theology, our spiritual fathers and mothers, our Psalms and hymns, and our icons and incense. BUT we follow Jesus, not ANY hierarch, canon, or trend that exults ourselves and creates an us-them division with other followers of Jesus Christ.
 
Why? Because to exclude and belittle other believers is an act of direct defiance to the express will of Christ revealed in his High Priestly prayer (John 17). That prayer reveals his deepest desire: that we would be one as he and his Father are one. To defy his will is rebellion. 
 
I know the counterarguments around so-called "false unity." I've heard them all for 20 years now. Every one of them is nothing other than an excuse to narrow Christ's new commandment ("Love one another as I have loved you) to the point of willful disobedience. In the earliest days of my catechism, I was taught that to turn away from love is heresy. It is not to be Orthodox. And if faithfulness to Orthodoxy requires a turn from love, then Orthodoxy is no longer Christian. So please, let us all choose our path most carefully. 
 
What I've said here feels like more than just pushback. Perhaps it is even a shove against the anti-ecumenical rhetoric that once alarmed me but now bores me. So I suppose I'd better get my heart right. And in the meantime, I'm happy for any friends who promote and nourish the unity in the Body of Christ.
 
Here is what I have learned in the Orthodox Church and a good reason for me not to wash my hands of it. I'm quoting word for word:
 
"The one true Church is found wherever we see moments of communion–even between a Hindu and an Atheist. It is visible in this world, not as an institution, but in these exchanges of grace with the Other. And it is incarnational because we meet Christ in them as the Holy Other.
 
"The problem, then, is not so much people leaving 'the church' as it is trying to avoid the discipline of gathering in the mess of a liturgical family, where we encounter those in whom we see our own limitations and stupidity–where we share the same Cup with other sinners, 'of whom I am the chief.'" 
 
That challenge will keep me busy for a lifetime.  

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