Orthodox Reflections

By Austin Martin

1 Peter 4:17 For it is time for the judgment to begin from the house of God. And if it is first with us, then what will be the end of those who do not obey the Gospel of God? 18 And if the righteous one is barely saved, then where will the ungodly and the sinner appear? [All Bible translations are my own.]

Often with ideas it is the implicit teaching that is the most dangerous, even if it contradicts the explicit teaching. No one would explicitly teach this, but there is an implication in Orthodox Christianity that there is a minimum-threshold of renunciation that you have to reach. Keep the fasting calendar, do not have sex outside of marriage, believe the right things, say the Jesus Prayer, and then you too can go to heaven like the saints. For monastics, you also have to give up meat, sex and TV altogether, and otherwise any further requirements are just legalism. Being a monastic just means having a slightly higher minimum-threshold than the rest of us.

Yes, I am over-simplifying, but my point is not to draw the exact boundaries of an attitude that is never stated outright. We want to know just exactly how much Christ expects us to renounce so that we can know what our rights and boundaries are. We will give God his due and pay Caesar his taxes, but the rest is ours for the keeping. St. John the Baptist said, “He must increase, and I must decrease.” But our attitude is that it is great if Christ increases as long as we can increase a little too.

How much are you supposed to renounce? The answer is absolutely everything. You have never given up enough. The narrow way is always narrower than you think. There is always something else that you are still holding onto, and you cannot have eternal life unless you let it go.

The command to the rich young ruler is a universal moral. It was not a rhetorical flourish to test one individual to see if he was dedicated. Instead Jesus was laying down a new law for all of humanity. No priest or monk ever told me this. But St. Basil says it like it is the most obvious thing in the world.

“But wealth is necessary for rearing children,” someone will say. This is a specious excuse for greed; although you speak as though children were your concern, you betray the inclinations of your own heart. Do not impute guilt to the guiltless! They have their own Master who cares for their needs. They received their being from God, and God will provide what they need to live. Was the command found in the Gospel, “If you wish to be perfect, sell your possessions and give the money to the poor,” not written for the married? After seeking the blessing of children from the Lord, and being found worthy to become parents, did you at once add the following, “Give me children, that I might disobey your commandments; give me children, that I might not attain the Kingdom of Heaven”? [Basil of Caesarea. (2009). On Social Justice. St Vladimir’s Seminary Press. Page 54]

Of course the command to the rich young ruler was for all of us. That is what the Apostles did. Why would we expected anything else? St. Barnabas’s entrance into the apostleship was by selling his land and giving all the money away. Jesus said the thing, and all his followers did it, but we think that it does not apply to us? If Jesus said that selling all your possessions to feed the poor was a requirement for salvation, then why would we think that this is just a special monastic thing?

Jesus also said, “Woe to you who are wealthy, for you have received your comfort.” [Luke 6:24] What else can that mean except that the wealthy have no comfort after death? How much more clear could Jesus make it? If he wanted to explain why the wealthy will not be saved, what other words would he use? There is no asterisk or footnote and no qualifying statement. Jesus simply states throughout the four Gospels that to have success in this world is to have utter failure in the next, and all the Apostles taught the same thing in their Epistles, and then it was reiterated for 2,000 years by every saint who ever wrote on the topic. And yet we think that it was just some kind of general metaphor that will not be applied to us because we are not monastics.

Throughout their writings and sermons, St. Basil and St. John Chrysostom categorically reject any kind of two-tiered morality for monastics and married people. There is one law for all Christians and for all time. What they tell us to do is just the basics of Christian salvation that Jesus and the Apostles taught, and it is how the ancient Fathers lived their own personal lives. These men were the furthest thing from hypocrisy.

St. John the Baptist is the proto-monastic ideal in the Bible, along with St. Elias and St. Anna in the temple in Luke 2:36-38. St. John was a hermit from his infancy who lived by foraging in the desert and never drank alcohol. Suddenly after 30 years he comes out of the mists and preaches to the masses – just the regular, common people of Judea. He was not telling everyone else to become a desert recluse. Only that they should “flee the coming wrath.” [Luke 3:7]

When St. John warned the masses that they would be cut down like a barren tree and thrown into the fire, the people – not monastics, just regular people – asked him what they must do to avoid the wrath of God. St. John did not tell them to just “live a good life in the world.” He did not tell them to forgive their enemies and donate 10% to the church. He did not even tell them to trust in faith alone apart from works of righteousness in the law. Instead he gave them the same answer that Jesus and every saint gave: “He who has two shirts is to give to the one who has none, and the one who has food is to do likewise.” [Luke 3:11]

Someone comes up to Jesus and says, “I will follow you wherever you go.” Jesus tells him that he is so poor and destitute that even the wild animals have more than he does. How would you respond to that? If you could stand before Jesus in the flesh and look into his face, and he told you that to follow him meant being homeless and eventually dying a brutal death, what would your answer be? What did else he mean by “take up your cross daily and follow me”? Did we think that we could deny ourselves and lose our lives for his sake and then still have a comfortable modern life like America promised us? [Luke 9:23-26, 57-58]

Of course we cannot all become homeless street preachers like Jesus. We need a savings account for emergencies. Housing is expensive. Some of us have children. But I do not think that that is what St. Basil is saying. Or maybe he was saying exactly that, but I think that what St. Basil is really trying to impart is a mindset where your possessions are just a tool.

You use your possessions as you need them, but you are not used by them. You may have things, but you are not attached to them, and you do not desire them for their own sake. You freely give away your things and your money when others have a need for them, and you do not mourn the loss. Money and possessions come and go like water in your hand because you have faith that God will always provide what you need when the time comes.

As St. Paul said, “those who buy as not possessing, and those who use the world as not abusing it.” [1 Corinthians 7:30-31] We should pray Proverbs 30:8, “Give me neither wealth nor poverty, but rather appoint the things to me which are needful and sufficient.” That is the correct Christian attitude towards money.

For St. Basil, this maximalism is the minimum-threshold of salvation. If you do not do this, then you will go to hell. What more could be the foolishness of this world? Effectively St. Basil is saying that the wealthy have no hope of salvation. Most of us are probably included in the category of the wealthy. You do not own your things – your things own you. But Christ came to set us free and give us the true wealth that does not perish and cannot be stolen.

Despite the extremity of the command, what Jesus was telling the rich young ruler was just the beginning. His material possessions were only his foremost idol. What the young man also carried was his pride. He carried his desire for enjoyable food. His desire to be liked and respected. His opinions about politics and theology. His educational background. His career dreams. His justifications for gray-area sins. His nostalgia for popular entertainment or holiday seasons. Even his emotions and personal boundaries. The young man had the kinds of immaterial possessions that we all have, and the narrow way involves renouncing every last bit of it. Everything must go. Christ must increase, and we must decrease.

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St. Jerome is one of the many Latin Fathers that offer us a rich body of literature and an exalted model of life but that we often ignore in Eastern Orthodoxy. He was a disciple of St. Gregory Nazianzen and most likely present at his five theological lectures and the second Ecumenical Council. He was ordained in Antioch, and his monastery was in Bethlehem. So St. Jerome is at least as much an Eastern Father as a Western Father.

His statement in Against Jovianus, “The Word became flesh so that flesh could become Word,” certainly sounds like Orthodox theosis. Against Jovianus is his defense of asceticism and general overview of Scripture. Against Helvidius and Against Vigilantius thoroughly knocked down protestant heresies for over a millennium. He wrote commentaries on all the Old Testament prophets and the New Testament Apocalypse, and his introduction to Isaiah famously stated, “Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ,” a lesson we often forget in Orthodoxy. Had he lived just a few years longer, he likely would have corrected St. Augustine’s predestination errors before they could fully develop, and Calvinism might have been avoided altogether.

St. Jerome further explains what renunciation means in his commentary on the passage about the rich young ruler.

It is in our power whether we want to be perfect. Yet whoever wants to be perfect ought to sell what he has and sell not merely a part of it, as Ananias and Sapphira did, but sell everything. And when he has sold it he must give everything to the poor. In this way he prepares for himself a treasure in the kingdom of heaven. Nor is this sufficient for perfection, unless, after wealth has been despised, one follows the Savior. That is to say, when the evils have been forsaken, one must do good things. For a wallet is more easily despised than the will. Many who abandon wealth do not follow the Lord. But he follows the Lord who is his imitator and walks in his footsteps. For “whoever claims to believe in Christ ought to walk just as he walked.” [Jerome. (2008). Commentary on Matthew. The Catholic University of America Press. Page 219-220.]

Giving up your material possessions is only the start. You have to dig into the bottomless pit of your will and root out it altogether. But as St. Jerome says, this is entirely within our own power. It is our own choice. It takes all of our will to give up our will. I have met many a poor person who was just as selfish, dishonest and hedonistic as anyone wealthy.

I sometimes wonder if the homeless are actually better off than we are. They do not have to think about these questions. They can receive without the burden to give. They can live on faith alone. I often think about whether I would be a better Christian if I went homeless and just ate at the various church charities. Certainly I would not have the anxiety about money that has dominated my adult life. I would not work some soulless corporate job or do back-breaking labor. I could just chill at the library.

St. James explains to us this paradox so that we can know everything we need to order our lives right. “Has God not chosen the poor of the world to be wealthy in faith and to be inheritors of the Kingdom which he has promised to those who love him?” [James 2:5] That is to say, the wealthy have not been chosen by God to have the three enduring virtues of faith, hope and love. The wealthy do not love God, they are impoverished in faith, and they have no hope of inheriting the Kingdom of Heaven, according to the Brother of the Lord.

Then further down, St. James writes, “Come now, you wealthy, and weep and howl for the troubles coming upon you.” [5:1] It does not get more explicit than that. Note, again, the lack of qualifying statements. If you are wealthy, then you have troubles coming upon you for which you should mourn. In the next verses he talks about holding back the wages of the poor and murdering the righteous, but he says this as though it is the inevitable, natural behavior that accompanies having wealth. You cannot possess wealth without robbery and murder. “You have indulged yourselves and lived luxuriously upon the earth. You have fattened your hearts as in the day of slaughter.” [5:2] Which of us have not lived in luxury and indulgence? It is interesting that he uses a metaphor of gluttony. What does the Brother of the Lord say will be the outcome for living like American pigs? Naturally the day of slaughter for Christmas dinner at the dread Second Advent of the Messiah.

“Adulterers and adulteresses, do you not know that the friendship of the world is the hostility of God? Who therefore would make himself to be a friend of the world is established as an enemy of God.” [4:4] There are no in-betweens or half-measures. You are either on Team Jesus or Team World, but to play for both teams is treason. Adultery, actually, St. James says. You may have only one spouse. If you marry Jesus but keep your affections for the World on the side, then of course the jealous husband will have you stoned in the marketplace.

Without martyrdom, the wealthy are almost without hope of salvation altogether. This is the clear and universal tradition of the Fathers and the New Testament, whether our clergy today teach it or not. If the monasteries were as monastic as they claim, then they would not be so eager to court wealthy donors and accept their filthy lucre. That the monasteries try to prove their holiness and fidelity through building such gaudy churches shows that they are just as worldly as Episcopalians and Hindus.

And yet what do we teach our children? We want them to plan for a smooth life without serious hardship. If they grow up like the rich man in Jesus’s parable, then they are a success, and we are proud of them. If they become like Lazarus – a smelly, friendless tramp on the streets – then they are an embarrassment to us, and we say that they are a loser who deserves all their misfortune. Truly the wisdom of Christ is the foolishness of the world.

Jesus does not care about your career dreams. Our whole childhood is spent planning for the future, as though such a thing were even possible. But Jesus’s plans for our lives might be completely opposite of what we want to do. What we want to do with our lives is more than irrelevant – it is hostile to the core notion of following Christ. Are you willing to let go of your dreams and goals?

There are a lot of four-letter words, and I use them more than a Christian probably should. But the most evil four-letter word is “want.” Our lives are spent on “want” and not “should.” “Should” is controlling and judgmental, but “want” is everything that America was ever promised to be. “Should” is about the foundational principles that order the world whether or not you want them to be that way. “Want,” however, is inherently self-seeking. The constant prayer of your heart should be like that of Psalm 115/113: “Not to us, o Lord, not to us, but to Thy name give the glory.” There is no room for “want” in such a prayer.

Young women, if Christ is calling you to be a dedicated wife and mother, are you willing to let college and careers go? You want that glamorous career as an alpha lawyer boss, but what does the Bible say that women should do with their lives?

1 Timothy 5:14 I desire therefore that the younger women are to marry, to bear children, to rule the home, and to give no free opportunity to the adversary for reviling.

Young men, if there are no marriageable women available, are you willing to remain in lifelong virginity? Such might be the cost of following Christ in these evil times. You need to be open to the possibility that you will never have sex, not because you have such a vocation, but because society has degraded so much. Are you willing to die poor and lonely for your salvation? Such is what Lazarus did.

And to both young men and young women, if I could only say one thing, it would be this: Your value is not derived from your ability to attract the opposite sex. Your value comes from your faithfulness to Christ and his commandments. It is on this alone that you are judged, not on your acceptance by others.

Christmas is coming up. You cannot mix the Santa-and-snow holiday with the Holy Nativity. These things are in complete opposition to one another. You can either have the things of the world, or you can have Christ, but there is no splitting the difference. You cannot serve two masters. Christ must increase, and we must decrease.

American Christmas is a vulgar, neo-pagan festival of greed and gluttony, and it has no place in a Christian home. I always make a point to go to a liturgy on December 25, just for the sake of rejecting the world, regardless of whether my current parish is on the Old or New Calendar. You cannot call yourself a “trad” Orthodox ROCOR anything if you cancel church on December 25th in order to celebrate fireplaces and evergreen trees like a pagan in the woods. ROCOR people often accuse the OCA and GOA of being modernist and secular, but which one is actually going to church on Christmas?

So if you are a member of a parish on the Old Calendar, and your priest is not holding a liturgy on the secular December 25th, then visit a nearby OCA or Antiochian church. It is what traditional Christians do, and it is deeply offensive to the world, the demons and the Jews  — the three forces that I have spent my life fighting against. I did that last year, and they had a huge meal, and then I stayed for several hours afterwards talking with young new converts about all the evil in the world. Then I got a second Christmas two weeks later.

St. John Chrysostom teaches similarly to St. Basil in his sermons on the rich man and Lazarus.

“See the man,” He says, “and his works: indeed this also is theft, not to share one’s possessions.” Perhaps this statement seems surprising to you, but do not be surprised. I shall bring you testimony from the divine Scriptures, saying that not only the theft of others’ goods but also the failure to share one’s own goods with others is theft and swindle and defraudation. What is this testimony? Accusing the Jews by the prophet, God says, “The earth has brought forth her increase, and you have not brought forth your tithes; but the theft of the poor is in your houses.” [An alternative reading or adaptation of Malachi 3:8-10. The MT and LXX do not mention the poor.] Since you have not given the accustomed offerings, He says, you have stolen the goods of the poor. He says this to show the rich that they hold the goods of the poor even if they have inherited them from their fathers or no matter how they have gathered their wealth.” [John Chrysostom. (1981). On Wealth and Poverty. St Vladimir’s Seminary Press. Page 49.]

We are not told how the rich man acquired his wealth. He might have earned every cent the American way through honest hard work. Like the rich young ruler, maybe he had never broken a law in his life. He may have been perfectly moral externally. He was a devoted family man and a role model in the community. Sent his children to the best schools and always gave them a magical Christmas. Funded the church, sponsored the symphony, and endowed the art museum. He was a passionate fighter for the right to life of the unborn or whatever social cause is currently popular with the religious right, and people admired the courage with which he advocated his convictions in the public sphere. Jesus’s reference to his five brothers seems to indicate that this was someone in the local community who had died recently and was well thought-of by observant Jews.

For Sts. Chrysostom and Basil, all of this is irrelevant. Any usage of your money beyond the necessities is theft and excludes you from salvation. Two major Church Fathers teach that – we are starting to get to a consensus. Read St. Jerome for a third.

At this point in our society, you cannot become wealthy without stepping on someone else. You might be able to become stable through honest work, but no one who is prosperous did so without doing something dirty. Maybe it was easily justifiable. Maybe it was something so tiny and so normal that it could hardly be said to be a sin at all. Maybe the person never considered that it might be wrong. But morality does not work by democracy. When you drive past a big house in the country, you can bet your bottom dollar that the owners did something bad to get there.

And as for the rich man’s popularity among the “good church people,” Jesus tells us elsewhere,

Woe when all men speak well of you, for their fathers did such things to the false prophets. [Luke 6:26]

St. John Chrysostom applies this kind of radical simplicity and not-self-focused-ness to daily practical life, especially food. Keep in mind that this is a sermon given to lay parishioners in Antioch. It is not monastic theology for the special few. He is speaking to all of us.

There is nothing more grievous than luxury. … I know that many will condemn what I say, thinking that I am introducing a strange new custom into our life; but I will condemn more strongly the wicked custom which now prevails over us. Christ has made it very clear that after taking nourishment at table we ought to receive not sleep in bed but prayer and reading of the divine Scriptures. When He had fed the great multitude in the wilderness, He did not send them to bed and to sleep, but summoned them to hear divine sayings. He had not filled their stomachs to bursting, nor abandoned them to drunkenness; but when He had satisfied their need, He led them to spiritual nourishment. Let us do the same; and let us accustom ourselves to eat only enough to live, not enough to be distracted and weighed down. For we were not born, we do not live, in order to eat and drink; but we eat in order to live. At the beginning life was not made for eating, but eating for life. But we, as if we had come into the world for this purpose, spend everything for eating. [On Wealth and Poverty, page 26-28]

St. Chrysostom does not teach the fasting calendar on the wall. Conquering gluttony cannot be reduced down to spinach and rice on Wednesdays and Fridays. Instead he teaches that food exists merely as nourishment itself. If you are still focused on enjoying food for its own sake, then you are a glutton. This is true whether you keep the strictness of the calendar or disregard it altogether.

In his letter on the priesthood, St. Jerome tells us that we should always be trying to increase our fasting. It is not about struggling to reach a certain universal threshold because the Orthodox law commands us and then plateauing off. Instead we should always be pushing ourselves further. Above all, regardless of what we do or do not do, we should eat with simplicity.

Lay upon yourself only as much fasting as you can bear, and let your fasts be pure, chaste, simple, moderate, and not superstitious. What good is it to use no oil if you seek after the most troublesome and out-of-the-way kinds of food, dried figs, pepper, nuts, dates, fine flour, honey, pistachios? All the resources of gardening are strained to save us from eating household bread; and to pursue dainties we turn our backs on the kingdom of heaven. There are some, I am told, who reverse the laws of nature and the race; for they neither eat bread nor drink water but imbibe thin decoctions of crushed herbs and beet-juice — not from a cup but from a shell. Shame on us that we have no blushes for such follies and that we feel no disgust at such superstition! To crown all, in the midst of our dainties we seek a reputation for abstinence. The strictest fast is bread and water. But because it brings with it no glory and because we all of us live on bread and water, it is reckoned no fast at all but an ordinary and common matter. [NPNF 2.6, Letter 52]

St. Jerome tells us that even if you keep the letter of the fast, if you are still carnal-minded about it, then you have rejected salvation. While he encourages you to only consume bread and water, he balances this by telling you to only fast as much as you are able. There is no legalism about what is allowed or forbidden – only the struggle for virtue.

In his 57^th homily on Matthew, St. John Chrysostom says something similar. First he gives his famous “two wings” imagery of prayer and fasting. He encourages you to fast as often as possible, not merely when the calendar tells you to.

For he that is praying as he ought, and fasting, hath not many wants, and he that hath not many wants, cannot be covetous; he that is not covetous, will be also more disposed for almsgiving. He that fasts is light, and winged, and prays with wakefulness, and quenches his wicked lusts, and propitiates God, and humbles his soul when lifted up. Therefore even the apostles were almost always fasting. He that prays with fasting hath his wings double, and lighter than the very winds. For neither doth he gape, nor stretch himself, nor grow torpid in prayer, as is the case with most men, but is more vehement than fire, and rises above the earth. Wherefore also such a one is most especially a hater and an enemy to the evil spirits. For nothing is mightier than a man who prays sincerely. For if a woman had power to prevail with a savage ruler, one neither fearing God, nor regarding man; much more will he prevail with God, who is continually waiting upon Him, and controlling the belly, and casting out luxury. [NPNF 1.10, Homily 57]

It appears that St. Chrysostom meant literal, total fasting and not the dietary restriction that we call “fasting” today. For the ancient Fathers, salvation meant going into the cave to starve and memorize the entire Bible. More recent Fathers like St. Paisios Velichkovsky discouraged total fasting for our age, and perhaps he was right for most people and for most of the time. And yet he says that ideally you should eat only once a day, only simple foods, and only just enough to sustain yourself. St. Paisios also says that you should do this as a regular discipline and not just during fasting seasons. So there is not a great degree of difference between the ancient and modern Fathers in this regard.

But even if you cannot fast, however that may be defined, there is something that you can do that is almost as effective. You can live in simplicity. St. Chrysostom continues,

But if thy body be too weak to fast continually, still it is not too weak for prayer, nor without vigor for contempt of the belly. For although thou canst not fast, yet canst thou avoid luxurious living; and even this is no little thing, nor far removed from fasting, but even this is enough to pluck down the devil’s madness. For indeed nothing is so welcome to that evil spirit, as luxury and drunkenness; since it is both fountain and parent of all our evils.

The Eastern fasting calendar was not designed with Anglo-Saxons in mind. Some ethnicities and blood-types need animal fat and protein more than others.

But all of us can reject living decadently. All of us can reject the world and spit on the Devil’s trinkets. Even if you are unable to keep the fasting calendar, rejecting American consumerism, entertainment and gluttony will be enough to pummel Satan like St. Marina with a hammer.

What excuse will you have for not living in simplicity? If you do not keep the fasting calendar, then you can say that you were too old to relearn how to eat. If you cannot pray without ceasing, or if you cannot quit music and video entertainment altogether, then you can say that you were raised from early childhood to be addicted to distraction and stimulation.

But what will you tell God about why you spent your money on frivolities that had no practical benefit? What will you say about the forgiveness that you held back, the apologies that you owed, and the relationships that you let die? When God asks you why you lied your way through a morally compromising career, will you tell him, “I needed money because I did not trust you to provide”?

Once you understand this principle about gluttony, even if you have not mastered it (and St. John Climacus questions whether that is even possible), then you see it applied to everything. Coffee, alcohol, soda and tea are a form of gluttony. There are no real health benefits to these things. You drink them just because you desire them. And so when you go to church, the church feeds your gluttony.

What would St. John Chrysostom say about the alcohol culture at so many Orthodox churches? What would he say about the social acceptance of the mind-altering, addictive drug called coffee? If the Orthodox Church were serious about rooting out the passions and bringing people to salvation, then there would be no coffee or alcohol in the trapeza or nave other than the Eucharist.

Two years ago I was drinking two giant gas station fountain sodas every day. Awful. So I decided that for Lent I would go down to almost only drinking water. Then after Lent I kept that up for several months, and I still mostly drink water. That is a very different approach than following the strictures and allowances of the wall calendar, but I made real progress against my carnal desires, which is always a win. By “carnal” I mean any kind of bodily desire. The Fathers even consider a full night’s sleep to be carnal.

St. John Chrysostom has a high threshold of salvation. Salvation is always within reach, but it costs you absolutely everything. You must constantly be reaching for salvation. While this is not in contrast, strictly, with what is taught today, instead we find this attitude where you keep Orthodox law, try to be a good person and hope that God’s mercy fills in the gaps. It is a very different approach.

St. Chrysostom wants you to climb the mountain and seize your salvation. You either stand on the mountaintop in victory or drown when the valley floods below. Win big or lose everything, but there are no participation trophies in the Kingdom of Heaven. Climb the mountain, groping carefully along the way, unsure of every step but determined to reach the top. There is no other road to eternal life.

My motto is “Simple Orthodoxy.” In the West, and likely in the home countries, we have created a very complicated Orthodoxy that becomes an idol in itself. But the Gospel is as simple as what Jesus told the rich young ruler. The call of Christ is to come and suffer. Renounce everything and find the eternal treasure.

There is no ideology that you need to articulate. There is no arcane, hidden, “true” Orthodoxy that you have to uncover. You do not need to read the academic theologians to find the correct formula to explain theosis, and you do not need some boomer convert hieromonk to teach you the secret to prayer. As long as you are willing, the Holy Spirit will teach you how to renounce your attachments. None of us have the ability within ourselves to see our hidden selfishness. We only have to want it more than anything, and the Spirit will reveal it all to us. The beautiful and bitter truth is that you get as much of God as you want. If you want God, then take God.

Furthermore, no one else can do it for you. Even if you found the mythical staretz behind a waterfall in a cave, only you can unpack the premises of modernity for yourself. Only you can confront your own hidden selfishness. There is no amount of liturgies and sacraments, no theology books, no prayers, no obedience to a monastic elder, nothing of the Church whatsoever that can replace your own determination to seize your salvation. All these things are good if used rightly, but they are a waste and even harmful without a singular determination to reach sainthood or die trying. Ultimately the path to salvation is a lonely and dark path through the jungle that you have to blaze alone.

This is the actual “trad” Orthodoxy. Not Old Calendar, corrective baptism or anti-ecumenism. Traditional Christianity is giving away all your extra money in faith that God will give you what you need. And not just material possessions but also the possessions of the flesh – eating and drinking as simply as possible and only having sexual relations for procreation. And not just material and carnal possessions, but your invisible possessions as well – abandoning everything that you think is true or important, everything that you want to do with your life, everything that makes you enjoy life, even the good things of the Church tradition that you consume for your own self-actualization – every bit of everything that you have must be sold in exchange for eternal life. This is the “trad” of the Fathers that we claim to be in continuity with. If we are unwilling to do such, then we have deluded ourselves that we are on the narrow way.

As the Creedence Clearwater Revival song says, “How much should we give? More! More! More!” The path of Christ is always narrower than we think. Each time we pass through one gate, the next requires us to drop another bag. At first this is impossible and irrational, and all of our intellect reasons against it. But as soon as the bag is dropped and we pass through the gate, we find that it was a burden all along, and we hate that we ever held it. And then we are at yet another gate with another demand to drop a bag that we think is indispensable.

And with that I’m bowing out of the internet theologian game forever, which I never wanted to play anyway because it’s vain and stupid. Really, I just wanted to expose the hypocrisy and worldliness of the “good church people,” especially those who make a career out of being a professional Orthodox Christian. Any of my writings on Orthodox Reflections may be reproduced and distributed freely without permission.

 Many years ago I was a minor but influential writer in the “Red Pill” “Manosphere,” which was a radical anti-feminist internet movement from the late Bush to early Trump years. Although I never identified with the Alt-Right, I followed it closely and attended AmRen in 2015. During this time I learned a lot about how internet right-wing movements work and why they always fail. One of the lessons was to never say or do anything that you would be embarrassed of if it became public, which is why I wrote everything on Orthodox Reflections under my real name. Another lesson was that inauthenticity is inevitable when presenting ideas in a public forum. The internet can only produce hypocrites.

I tell new converts to not read anything written after 1900 and not to listen to any clergy whom they do not know personally. Maybe they will miss out on some good stuff, but they will also avoid a lot of garbage. Or they will avoid things that are good but that they do not have the context and frame for. Especially when you are new, you do not know how to discern. Most people never learn, which is why they so easily follow impressive but false elders.

All internet priests (and internet theologians) are inherently dishonest because of the medium itself. Orthodoxy means tradition, and tradition means relationships, but that can never happen with the medium of the internet. And so the medium itself can only produce a false, consumable Orthodoxy instead of a relational Orthodoxy rooted in community.

The internet priest presents ideas as a catch-all for every viewer or reader, and nothing is catered to the individual’s need. Soon he has to build an internet following and put out popular content, and he will tailor it to what people want. He has to be market-minded in order to stay relevant. If no one is watching your content, then you have wasted all your time and effort. So the internet priest will either put things out for the lowest common denominator or always try to do something new and interesting that no one had heard of before. Internet content is meant to be consumed as entertainment, and boring videos teaching basic catechism in a dry lecture setting do not get views.

But that is assuming that what the internet priest says is properly Orthodox and presented in good faith. Almost without exception, the internet priest becomes conceited. The medium of the internet curates an audience who give only positive feedback. With blogs this is especially easy to cultivate, and there are priests who delete any comments that disagree with them. Soon the internet priest posts his own opinions as the objective tradition of the Church, and he says them with the full weight of authority. He takes a self-important, clericalist attitude that a younger version of himself would not recognize.

Often the internet priest decries the hostile side of internet discourse, but he is unwilling to acknowledge his own role in creating it. The internet priest wants the benefits of the internet without the drawbacks, but you cannot get the rainbow without the rain. If all technology is ultimately given to us from Satan, then we can easily understand how the internet has ruined the souls of our priests.

So I said my piece and did my part to bring clarity to American Orthodoxy. If people didn’t listen, then that’s their choice. I’m going to bounce. If you want more content from me, then read St. Nil of Sora until it makes sense.