The New Normal

The title of this piece - it's an expression we've all heard.  We know what is intended by those who use the expression.  They mean to indicate that things as we have known them historically are gone.  We need to "learn to live differently" than we have in the past.  We need to adapt to the changes around us.  We need to embrace how things are today, and leave the past behind.

Those words are all couched in phrases pointing to us as individuals needing to become something we weren't before.  YOU need to change.  YOU need to adapt, or YOU'LL be left behind.  YOU need to stop thinking as you did in the past.  YOU need to stop being an impediment to the wave of change you see around you.

But one must ask the question:  "Or what?"

What if I choose NOT to change.  What if the things that society is attempting to relegate to the past are core values for me?

Take for instance same-sex "unions".  I won't ask forgiveness here.  I refuse to use the word "marriage" in the same phrase with "same-sex", because no matter what society tells me about how antiquated my thinking is, my response is that it's not about "thinking" - it is definitional.  Marriage, by definition - for over 6000 years - is the union of a male and a female.  There's nothing "same-sex" in that expression.  If the government I happen to be living under chooses to recognize civil unions between people of the same sex, they have that civil authority to 'define' such a "union."  But it is NOT a "marriage," nor can it be nor will it ever be.

But this article isn't about same-sex unions.  It's about how our society's rush toward relativism and a general perspective of "there is no 'truth'" is attempting to remove the underpinnings of faith - yes, faith - amongst the people who live under our government's God-blessed auspices.  Why do I say, "God-blessed," and how is that to be interpreted when in the same expression I'm advocating the argument that this same government is attempting to subvert faith in God?  

Saint Paul teaches, "Let every person be subject to the governing authorities; for there is no authority except from God, and those authorities that exist have been instituted by God." (Rom 13:1)

Our Lord Himself, when He stood before Pilate, said, "You would have no authority over Me unless it had been give you from above." (John 19:11)  Jesus was not absolving Pilate from any wrong that was to come from his decisions over Christ's sentencing.  Rather, He makes it clear that as a civil authority, Pilate will be subject to God's review of his stewardship for the position he holds - by the grace of God.  Jesus follows on with these words, "For this reason he who delivered Me to you has the greater sin."

So just as our Lord instructed us to pray for our enemies, He also instructs us to pray for civil authorities, even when we disagree with the directions and decisions being taken by them!

We're going to have more to say over the coming days and weeks about how we, as faithful Orthodox Christians, have been impacted by government restrictions on our gatherings and on our corporate worship.  We'll discuss how our worship has been impacted by our hierarchs, and how we, while being called to be obedient to our hierarchs, are also called to be shepherds to our own flocks, meaning that we (parish clergy) are also responsible to speak openly, boldly, and with all love and respect to our hierarchs in attempting to defend the ability of the faithful to return to active worship IN the Church.

In 1929 the Soviet government introduced "the new uninterrupted work week", which was meant to increase productivity by keeping machines working throughout the year.  The unstated side goal was to wean workers away from Sundays and religious holidays as days of rest.

For us living through the COVID era, our benign government simply said (in various local jurisdictions), "10 people maximum," or "20% of normal attendance," or some other 'formula' to keep people out of the physical church buildings.

And what has been the result?  Today, when restrictions have been diminished (not necessarily removed), and parishes are allowed to have greater numbers of people present for services, PEOPLE AREN'T COMING.  The faithful have been conditioned to either watch streamed services from a distance, OR they have just said Church is just not that important any more.

This Sunday is the LAST Sunday before we encounter the Triodion, the preparatory Sundays before the Great Fast.  We encounter little Zacchaeus this week.  In him we find DESIRE!!  Oh, what a blessed thing DESIRE is, and what a blessed return it would be to have it once again engendered in our own faithful - the desire to be physically present IN the Church, worshipping corporately again!!

We spent last year's Great Fast with less than a handful of people in the building at most weekday services (Presanctified Liturgy, Soul Saturday Liturgy, Canon of St. Andrew, and as we got to Holy Week, Bridegroom Matins, the Passion Gospels, Lamentations, .....), and Sundays were not significantly different.

Will we allow this year to pass in this same way?

Have we lost the DESIRE to be physically in the presence of the Lord?

Can we still find it in our hearts to crave the ability to share in His Body and Blood, to approach the Chalice IN FAITH and love?

The Great Fast has not YET started - but we're at the threshold.  

Would we, like Zacchaeus, make the effort and climb that sycamore tree?  Or would we simply take passing note of the noise of the crowd, move on, and never encounter the Lord - Face to face?

Jesus called Zacchaeus by name.  He calls to us as well.  Are we IN?