True Love
by V. Rev. Fr. Vladimir Berzonsky

“Many people have said much about love, but only in seeking it among Christ’s disciples will you find it for only they have the true love, the teacher of love.” (The Four Hundred Chapters on Love, No. 100, St. Maximos the Confessor)

Oh, what beautiful words!  And what a glorious affirmation – if indeed it is true.  Our priests when celebrating together kiss one another three times just before the Creed is sung, saying: “Christ is here in our midst.”  And of course we mean it.  The Teacher of love is among us.  We feel His presence in one another.

The celebrant turns at the Divine Liturgy to the believers with the invitation: Let us love one another.  Do we all hear and obey that directive?  Who of all Orthodox Christians would challenge the statement that we know who the true teacher of love is, and that He is present in our churches, our lives and in our hearts?  Certainly we believe it.  That’s why we gather in His name.  But the rest – the love part – will a visitor to our church go home to his family and say, “Look at the Orthodox, and how they love one another.”  Even as I write this, I imagine some might think that I am naïve, hypocritical in presenting a condition that I know to be false, or else I’m just a hopeless dreamer.

But what is our faith about if it is not possible to make a reality of the gospel message of Jesus Christ?  Are we making the gospel and, God forbid, our Lord Jesus Himself a dreamer?  And on the other hand, if we agree that love among us, real and not nominal, pretentious tokenism is possible, then why is it not realized?  And if it is real, then why is it not manifestly evident to one another and to any stranger who comes to share our fellowship?

What do we want from the visitor if we try to encourage her or him to become one of us?  Another donor?  Somebody to tally up for vanity’s sake to show that our parishes are growing?  Or can it be that we want to lift the newcomer into the love relationship that we share in Jesus Christ with one another?  Dare we say, “Welcome to Christ’s family of love”?

If that is the case, what would true love look like if our churches were to make the definition of St. Maximos real?  Let’s begin with ourselves.  Little kindnesses to one another, smiles of greeting, signs of affection and pleasantries ought to be at least marks of our care for each other, but that’s far from adequate.  One doesn’t need Orthodoxy for that.  There are an abundance of congregations who are more practiced in social graces.

We do indeed pray for each other, including friends of the spiritual family and even for their departed loved ones.  That concern should reach out to embrace the ill, the bereaved, those out of work or caught up in a period of life’s challenging transitions.  In a word, the parish ought to be as concerned for each other as any healthy extended family.  Whether it’s a myth or a fact, I’m told that Jewish people help one another beyond prayers and good wishes.  If we are the new Israel, we ought to patronize our own businesses, establishments, professionals and merchants.  We should help our own young people to get a start in whatever career they pursue if we have the opportunity to do so.  We partake of the same chalices and worship in the same temples as one spiritual family.  It follows that because we are communing in the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, He in us makes us blood brothers and sisters with Him, and therefore with one another.  The implication of His words is self-evident.  This is the love that the evangelist John is speaking of when he wrote: “He who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.  And this commandment we have from Him, that he who loves God should love his brother also.” (I John 4:20)

* from Holy Trinity Orthodox Church, Parma OH - Bulletin 12, Volume XLIV, January 21, 2007