Cultural Orthodoxy

Culture (Wikipedia) is a somewhat vaguely defined term that describes an integrated system of behavior between people that share a similar experience. For a sense of culture to be personal it cannot, as a rule, be someone else's culture. For example, parents often try to tell kids what their culture is, but it is impossible for people separated by a generation to truly share the same exact culture. Times change and, even if they share the same place of birth, genes, and social structure, two people will have a different cultural experience that is unique to the time they live in. A father who grew up in the 60's would be quite different from his (even if otherwise identical) son who grows up in the 90's. 

I think it is safe to say that while culture is shared by a group, the perception of that culture is both individualized and multifactorial. Each person is affected by many different cultural factors, some of which they share with some people but not others. To me the best description of culture is this Venn diagram of all the different cultural influences on a given individual:

In this very simplified example, this individual is influenced significantly by his race, somewhat by his family values, and to a certain extent by his religion. There is even some room left for entirely idiosyncratic individualism, whose perceived extent is in and of itself quite cultural; a Western minded person with a more independent spirit would be much more likely to make this space in the Venn diagram much larger than someone from an Eastern culture that is more collectivist by nature. It might be a beneficial exercise for all of us to sit down and think about what cultural influences we have and to what extent we are influenced by them. If we did so, each of our Venn diagrams may not be completely different, but they also will never be identical. Like a snowflake, our Venn diagram will be as unique as we are.

Now the next layer of complexity comes when these unique Venn diagrams start interacting with each other - except we don't exactly wear buttons that identify our biases and cultural influences. It would be nice if we did, but we don't; we leave each other to figure it out for ourselves, and quite frankly we may not even understand the true nature of our own inner selves. What you find is that these complex beings with varying degrees of self-awareness end up having to interact with each other and needing to find a way to sort out their differences. We may see two people with a nearly identical Venn diagram in that they grow up in the same geographic region, with a similar cultural environment, family structure, etc. that are unable to coexist peacefully simply because of a difference in religion (the Middle East presents us ample examples). In contrast, you may see two people who may otherwise seem completely different from each other that are able to manage to get along very well, simply because they go to the same undergraduate university and have learned to tolerate and maybe even celebrate cultural differences.

So why have I not yet mentioned Christ in a spiritual blog? Because this, unfortunately, is what may happen in a culturally oriented church. There is a clarity that the parishioners are Christian, but nobody in life wants to be "just another ..." anything really. Would you want to be just another "lawyer" or would you rather tell people you are a "corporate attorney, specializing in tax law, with a subspecialty in executive compensation?" It may not sound exciting, but it sure does sound more impressive. Christians acknowledge other Christian sects by their profession of the creed, but we have a tendency to say or at least think "yes, I am a Christian, but our sect is special because we have [fill in the blank]." Rather than do what CS Lewis does in Mere Christianity and focus on the core foundation that we all agree on, we have a tendency to rather focus on the window dressing that, forgive me, to a great extent doesn't matter.

When does this become a problem? Well, first, we know that in the medical field there is such a thing as an asymptomatic problem. High blood pressure and high cholesterol are two well known examples of medical conditions that people have without knowing. In time these problems may result in symptoms, but at that point the treatment is more difficult and potentially irrelevant in the face of larger problems created by these previously treatable issues. Similarly, the cultural undertones of an Orthodox Church are not necessarily bad - my father of confession calls them the "salt and pepper" that add flavor to the Church. However, when these cultural undertones begin to take a primacy in the identity of the Church, it becomes difficult to figure out what elements of the perceived dogma are Christian and which are cultural. Once again, these may not even be noticed and may remain asymptomatic as long as the group is homogenous and everyone involved accepts and even embraces these cultural elements of the Church. The problem comes when there is a culture shift that challenges the status quo - this can be a change in the cultural mileu that the Church resides in, such as the so called Arab Spring; this can be a change in the location of the parishioners who bring their religion to their respective land of immigration; and this can be challenge for an individual who does not personally identify himself as the same culture as the majority of the people with whom he shares Communion.

The question I am (finally) building up to asking is: what matters more? The Church or the church? Is it the Bride of Christ that is our vehicle to heaven, or is it the physical building where the people go to pray? You may say they are equally important but to me that is like saying that an engineering firm's building is as important as the engineers. What about the rules of the church, are they important? Again I need to question whether these rules are related to our relationship with God or our relationship to our cultural heritage. For example, the use of a certain language may have a cultural significance but is of no intrinsic theological or spiritual value. Does that mean we should get rid of everything that is cultural in favor of focusing only on the spiritual? No, I don't think so. There is no reason to say "I love chicken so much that every time someone cooks chicken it needs to be made the same way." Yes, there are certain tenets that most chefs follow when making chicken, like the temperature of doneness, but these general rules allow for a great deal of flexibility that allows for us to appreciate the genius of each individual chef. The Christian Church has many churches, each of which has a special flavor and nuance that adds to the complexity and character of the Church as a whole. Trying to sweep away and remove all the cultural elements is not progress but rather oversimplification; in the other extreme, when we dwell on the cultural and miss the spiritual we have then turned the church into a country club or special interest group.

For those of us that are in a cultural Church I pray that we understand the difference between our Church and our church. I pray that we try to focus on the Church and our relationship with Christ, and try not to fall into the trap of letting the cultural cart lead the spiritual horse.  For the people visiting or joining a cultural Orthodox church I ask for your forgiveness - we really do want to welcome you, we really do want to share in an Ecumenical Spirit of Christianity, and we really want to focus ourselves on Christ - but we are also humans with very complex Venn diagrams and multiple influences that we do not always understand about ourselves. May God help us all to increase our self awareness and even more importantly help us to lose ourselves in Him so that we may find each other.

Why did they go to the grave?

In the week after the Resurrection there are myriad contemplations that we have left unresolved in the wake of the events we experienced with Christ last week. One question I was recently asked is: why did the women go to the grave in the first place? They knew the stone was there. They knew they were not strong enough to move the stone. They brought spices with them - why? What were they going to do with these spices if the tomb was sealed?


My contemplation is that I don't think it was a rational decision that they made by weighing the pros and cons. They were devastated. They wanted to see Christ in any way possible. They had a desperation that trumped logic, so it's not possible to really ask "what were they thinking?" because they really weren't thinking. For our purposes now we can ask ourselves if we have the same sense of urgency. Do we seek Christ in this irrational, unreasonable way that these women did on Sunday morning? If we do we will find Him in the same miraculous, impossible to expect way that they did.

Finding Your Puzzle Piece

So you're looking for a mate. Someone to be your Eve. Someone to be your Adam. Someone whom God created for you and said "you are perfect for each other." Not like your friend says you and so and so are perfect for each other because you go to the same school and have the same color hair. No, like, really perfect, like, in a way that I can't really explain but, OMG, just so perfect. The question is how do I look for this person and how do I know when I have found him/her?

First we must know who we are. If I don't know who I am then how do I know whom I should be looking for? If I am making a puzzle and I am trying to find two matching pieces what makes more sense: 1) looking randomly through the box, or 2) holding a piece in your hand and carefully checking all the pieces to see if they fit? You don't necessarily need to force the pieces together to make sure they don't fit but even holding two pieces up next to each other should make it easy enough to determine incompatibility. So the first point is to know what your puzzle piece looks like and to keep it close at hand in the process. 

Next we must know what attributes we have that are important to our identity. At any one moment we can think of 100 different nouns and adjectives that we can use to describe ourselves, but my question is which of these things really defines who you are? You are holding the puzzle piece and looking at the other pieces, but what are the cues that you are using to find a match? Is it the shape, is it the color, is it the pattern? What is it about the adjacent piece that you think will be so important to help you find "the one?" Being quite deliberate, albeit flexible, about these inclusion and exclusion criteria will make it easier to spot the right person when he or she comes along. 

The next point is to know that it's not "one person out there" but rather many people that could potentially work if you are both committed to the process. Even the corner piece in any puzzle has two possible mates. Yes it's not just anyone that could work for you but it's statistically impossible for anyone to ever be in a happy marriage if it were only one possible person that God was expecting you to find. Then you say "yes but God can do the impossible" to which I respond "yes that is why I am still happily married even though I am such a pain."  Marriage is hard. It takes effort. Love is a commitment not an emotion. Many of the core values of a strong marriage have deep implications in how we look for a mate but surprisingly they often lead us to realize that we often place too much emphasis on what attributes the other person has that we find acceptable when in fact we should be more concerned about what attributes the other person has that will help us grow. The goal of marriage is not to find the perfect person but to be perfected together in God's love. 

Finally, and maybe most importantly, is the friendly reminder that you are not looking for your clone. We want someone who is compatible not someone who is identical. Sorry to keep beating this puzzle piece thing into the ground, but this is probably the most obvious part of the analogy - the two interlocking puzzle pieces cannot be exactly the same. If I buy two identical puzzles and find two identical pieces that may give me a "match" but not the kind of match I'm looking for. It takes a great deal of introspection and discernment to know how much similarity you are looking for in a mate, but your self-evaluation may lead you to realize that you are looking for someone completely different from yourself. In any case no matter how similar he may be he must be different enough to be complementary. In a good marriage we are constantly learning from our spouse - how is that possible if our spouse shares not just the same strengths but also the same weaknesses?

In the end, finding a spouse is such a complex process that no contemplation, advice, book, or even personal experience can make it easy. Know yourself. Know what matters to you. Know that there is no perfect person out there. Know that your differences may be as important as your similarities. Trust in God that if you are with God then you will find someone in God. And when you do find someone then cleave to them, and bind yourselves so tightly to each other, with God as the glue, that when people look they no longer see two puzzle pieces but one.