I took a look at a tract that was left behind in a public place yesterday.
It said, rightly, that people shouldn't be in denial about the Christian message, and I certainly agree.
But at the same time, Christians shouldn't be in denial about critical realities. Like the reality of climate change: one in three Americans have been hit by weather disasters this summer. Like the COVID-19 pandemic, which has topped over 40 million cases (and about 650 thousand deaths). Like the need for vaccination and public health measures.
Denying these realities harms the Gospel proclamation. It compromises the Christian testimony. Embracing alternative and conspiracy theories is as toxic to the Christian witness as hypocrisy.
What is needed in these emergencies is the true witness of ministry, not the sub-Christian superstition of denial.
To be sure, the atheist use of science to "disprove God" is ludicrous. Science can say nothing about God, because God is not subject to scientific observation. God is not subject to anything or anyone.
At the same time, Christians cannot deny scientific observation. To do so risks confusing faith with superstition. It would have been tragic if Christians had hung their Christianity on the notion that the Earth was flat, or was located at the central lowest point of the cosmos. The expansion of scientific knowledge should add to, not detract from, the wonder at and love of the God of Christian testimony.
Moreover, Christians -- especially Orthodox Christians -- cannot endorse extremist ideologies like anti-vaxxing and anti-masing doctrine -- because "doctrine" is exactly what they are. There are clergy and even monastics who are preaching opinions that are at least heterodox, if not outright heretical. These opinions are couched in florid spiritual rhetoric that camouflages the utter irrational nihilism that is advertised as faith.
This is a "witness" indeed. But it is not the Evangel. Every sinner looking for salvation will notice the absence of the Cross in language like this, and will not hear the voice of the Good Shepherd Who seeks only to save.
It is a bad witness. It depicts Orthodoxy as a haven for cranks, malcontents, purveyors of hermetic superstition, and partisans of extremist politics. American Orthodoxy should be no place for racism, authoritarianism, or anti-science ideology. American Orthodoxy should only be for the Orthodox Evangel of the kenotic Holy Trinity of Sacramental Love, redemption, and reconciliation ... good theology, instead of sub-Christian superstition and partisanship.
Tracts about the Gospel are an interesting witness of one's faith. But many more and powerful tracts are left behind in daily life that are unprinted. These "tracts" are our witness to the world in our speech and behavior, in our politics, our social interaction and concern for the unfortunate, our response to science and technology.
Our care for the real world is the best tract of all. That is precisely the evangelism of the early church, just how it “turned the world upside down.”
Are we known as extremists? As partisans? As deniers?
What kind of God do we witness to? The old demons of domination, violence, oppression, and dark magic?
Or are we witnesses of God's Word of Infinite Love, Who came to redeem and reconcile?
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