Orthodox Reflections

Editor’s Note: This was originally written as a response to the author’s own parish priest who was requiring masks and an encouragement to other priests to stand strong for the faith. As it makes very good points, we have published it here with the author’s kind permission and assistance.

I have read through your email concerning the wearing of masks in church. As I’m sure you would guess, I am disappointed, but I know you have been under great pressure from some in our parish who are panicked by the virus. I know you stated that this is not about fear, but it is clear that that is precisely what it is about. Rather than requiring masks for everyone, which only feeds and validates the fear, it seems a more pastoral course would be to follow the counsel of Elder Euthymius of Kapsala who wrote, “[t]o the many unbearable problems which men have, the threat of the virus has now been added too, which has ended up a nightmare. People suffer more from their fear, panic, and involuntary reclusion than they do from the virus. In older times and in similar cases of deadly epidemics, [the Church] would perform sanctifications of the waters (αγιασμός) and go out in procession with the sacred icons and holy relics. Why should these not be done today as well? ‘Is the Lord’s hand unable’ to help us in these days too.’”

Wouldn’t the loving pastoral practice be the one that helps those who are fearful put away fear, rather than nurturing and encouraging their fear by forcing a change in how we worship merely to make the fearful feel safe? Is the Lord’s hand unable to help us in these days too? Are we a Church who worships the Risen Christ, or, like the world, is fear all we really have to offer people in times of crisis? Perhaps, then, we’re not that different after all-we are in the world and of the world.

It may seem a small matter to some, after all, what’s the big deal about being required to wear a mask in church? We Orthodox, when doing evangelism, often tell people to “Come and see,” knowing that our services are not only beautiful, they are mystical, bringing us into the presence of God. But I cannot say, “Come and see” any longer, because they will not see beauty and experience the mystical, rather, they will see only fear (hypocrisy?) hiding behind a sea of masked faces. This is not only bad theology; it is soul crushing and faith destroying. I do hope you will reconsider your decision.

As I have observed the different responses in the Holy Orthodox Church to our current circumstance, I am reminded that St. Cyprian writing in On Mortality, he urged Christians to see the plague as an opportunity to live out the teachings of the Church—he asked Christians “to stand erect amidst the ruins of the human race . . . and to rejoice rather and embrace the gift of the occasion.” I do not think that fear was the “gift of the occasion” that St. Cyprian was speaking about. Based upon his life and his words, I am confident that St. Cyprian would not agree that introducing a theology of fear into our liturgical life is “standing erect amidst the ruins of the human race.” Indeed, I can think of no Holy Father whose writings suggest he would agree with requiring masks as the sine qua non to participating in the liturgical life of the Church.

Certainly, there is no precedent for such innovation in the history of the Church.

So, I do not rely upon my private judgment to determine how the Church must respond (truly, I would rather die than elevate my private judgment above the authority of the Church.), rather, we have two millennia of Holy Tradition to consult in determining how the Church must respond to this pandemic. The Church, in times of peace, in times of plague, and in times of persecution, has never allowed the world to dictate how She worships, yet many today believe that because the State has mandated the wearing of masks in church, we must obey. I emphatically do not agree, and if, as some interpret Met. Joseph’s words, he is requiring masks, I must dissent and cast my lot with the consensual voice of the Church throughout the ages.

I am a lay person and chief among sinners, so I tread upon this ground with fear and trembling. But there have been times in the history of the Church where those in authority have been led astray and those under them have labored to save the Church by opposing their heretical teaching. My patron saint, Maximos, suffered greatly because he taught against the Monothelite heresy; a monk, he stood, not only against emperors, but against three Eastern Patriarchs who were Monothelites. The Sixth Ecumenical Council vindicated Maximos.

I am reticent to place mandatory masking in the same category as the Monothelite heresy, but both, it seems to me, deny the fullness of Christ. The Monothelites denied His two wills, the “mandatory maskers” deny His life-giving and salvific presence in the liturgical life of the Church. If Christ truly gives us life and salvation, liturgical masks are a grotesque denial and affront to that truth.

Brian Fahling – member Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America