This is an Excerpt from a letter Written by Seraphim Rose (An eastern Orthodox Clergyman) to the Trappist monk Thomas Merton concerning Merton's call to "Christian Social Action/Social Justice". In the light of movements in the church at present, and after reading some of Merton's writings, I thought it was very illuminating and I agree with it wholeheartedly.
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Modern idealism, which is devoted to the realization of the idolatrous "Kingdom of Man," has long been making its influence felt in Christian circles; but only in quite recent years has this influence begun to bear real fruit within the womb of the Church itself. I think there can be no question but that we are witnessing the birth pangs of something that, to the true Christian, is indeed pregnant with frightful possibilities: a "new Christianity," a Christianity that claims to be "inward," but is entirely too concerned with outward result; a Christianity, even, that cannot really believe in "peace" and "brotherhood" unless it sees them generalized and universally applied, not in some seemingly remote "other world," but "here and now." This kind of Christianity says that "private virtue" is not enough—obviously relying on a Protestantized understanding of virtue, since everything the true Christian does is felt by all in the Mystical Body; nothing done in Christ is done for oneself alone—but not enough for what? The answer to that, I think, is clear: for the transformation of the world, the definitive "realization" of Christianity in the social and political order. And this is idolatry. The Kingdom is not of this world; to think or hope that Christianity can be outwardly "successful" in the world is a denial of all that Christ and His prophets have said of the future of the Church. Christianity can be "successful" on one condition: that of renouncing (or conveniently forgetting) the true Kingdom and seeking to build up a Kingdom in the world. The "Earthly Kingdom" is precisely the goal of the modern mentality; the building of it is the meaning of the modern age. It is not Christian; as Christians, we know whose Kingdom it is. And what so greatly troubles me is that today Christians—Catholic and Orthodox alike—are themselves joining, often quite unaware of the fact, often with the best possible intentions, in the building of this new Babel....
2 comments:
so what you are saying is that we are making a Christianity that is fit for this world?
That is one of the really wonderful side affects of not being able to fit in anywhere in the world or in the church, you get to see things from the outside and aren't swept up by mass mentality.
Although I believe its impossible to disconnect from the collective mind in that our souls affect one another without us even knowing each other.
But I often think about man and that scripture where they were all going to make Jesus king by mass drive, and the scripture says "He did not put entrust himself to man for he knew what was in man".
I wonder...and maybe you can answer, what is in man, that Jesus did not entrust himself to them. I mean I understand that trusting yourself in God is, well for me, my all falls away, reality, but what is in man?
I believe that what scripture means and what the Lord Jesus knew was in man was the same thing that made Peter capable of denying Him three times after all his resolutions, and the same thing that had the crowds alternately praising and then trying to kill Him. I'm not sure if we have a name for it, but it's part fickleness and part evil. It's the "Old Man" that God replaces in us when he sends His Spirit to give us a new one in His own image.
That's what I believe it means.
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