...continued from part three.
3. Metropolitan of Pergamon John Zizioulas on the Cross of Golgotha and the Divine Eucharist
The purpose of Creation is the Church. That is, the Father, by creating the world, wanted to transform it into the Church. However, in order for this incorporation of Creation in the Son and the Church to be realized, the free consent of man would have to be ensured. For man is the one who, by nature, as the only free being in Creation, the material Creation, would be used so that Creation could be referred to God. But man, summing up creation, instead of ultimately referring to God, chose to refer to himself; in other words, he deified himself. For this reason, God's entire plan for transforming the world into a Church came up against man's denial and, as Saint Maximus says, God now had to think of another way to save the world and unite it with Himself. This way is the incarnation of the Son within the fallen creation, which means that the Son, and man in general, and all of creation, had to go through the experience of death in order to attain union, that is, the Cross had to intervene. This is why the Church could no longer be realized without going through the Cross of Golgotha.
The Church, then, takes on a new form in relation to that which God had originally foreseen and desired. But here now there is a subtle, but very important observation. Despite the fact that the Church, like the Economy, took a path that passes through the Cross, the end of this path remains the same as that which was in the beginning, namely the union of the created with the uncreated God. Therefore, the Church is a reality that passes through the Cross and takes upon Herself, passing through, all the characteristics of the Cross, but with a purpose and destiny not to stop there. These characteristics of the Cross must be transformed into characteristics of the eschatological state.
Here ecclesiologists begin to encounter difficulties. Because the Church's passage through the Cross leaves the marks of the Cross, which are wounds inflicted by evil and History on the Body of Christ. Consequently, there are many who stop there and say: "this is the identity of the Church" - A body, the embodied creation in the Son, which is, however, wounded by evil, as is the Cross. Western theologians, mainly, tend to take this line, because they tend to start from History and stop, one might say, with an ontological disposition, at evil, to give evil a final ontological stamp. That is why all Western music, literature, and theology involve a preoccupation with the problems that evil creates in the world and do not proceed beyond to the Kingdom of God. Thus, an Ecclesiology can be created here, as it is actually being created, which has the Cross, Golgotha, as its center. The characteristics, therefore, of this Ecclesiology are the concept of the Church as the body of that which in History sacrifices itself, suffers and serves the world. It is a very attractive Ecclesiology that appeals greatly to human emotion, but an Ecclesiology that excessively traps the Church within the world...
Therefore, for Western Ecclesiology the mysteries and especially the view of the Eucharist are in essence nothing more than a continuation and repetition of Golgotha, a constant presence of it.
The Cross is placed in the center of the Eucharist, as it is in many Orthodox churches today, something that did not exist in the past. But this is happening in the West. In the East, one cannot easily stop at the Cross, because the Eucharist is so structured that it leads us to the transcendence of the Cross. The Eucharist brings before us not Golgotha, but the Kingdom of God. It brings before us the communion of the Saints, the radiance, the light, the splendor of the eschaton, with the iconography, the vestments, the words, the psalmody, with all that the Orthodox Tradition has surrounded the divine Eucharist. All this points towards a transcendence of Golgotha. And for this reason, our own Ecclesiology returns to this original will of the Father to unite the created with the uncreated as the final goal of Creation and Economy...
The hermitage, of course, is part of the Church. The monk who bears the visible traces of participation in the Cross of Christ is within the Church. But, when this monk or someone else (to illustrate it in this dramatic way), puts on the gold-colored vestments of Protaton - I don't know if you went to see what vestments they have, more elaborate and brighter than ours, they have for the time of the Eucharist - when the monk puts them on, then the Eucharist, the Kingdom of God, is realized. It is the transcendence of the Cross with the light of the Resurrection that constitutes the Being of the Church. Consequently, it is not possible to reach the Resurrection without the Cross. We all say this and repeat it, but too many of us forget it and tend to speak of the Church without the resurrectional experience of the transcendence of the Cross, without the experience of the new creation, which shines full of light.
One could say that the new Creation and the experience of the Church can only be found in the person of a monk who shines with holiness. Of course, it is there, but that is not the Church. The Church is the one that must reflect the transformation of the entire world; the transformation of the material world and human society and community. Therefore, only when we have community do we have Church. And for this reason, the monk whose face shines with holiness also needs to be a participant in this community of the eschaton, which is the Eucharistic community, in order to be ecclesiasticized.
We therefore conclude that the Father's will is that the whole world, even the material world, become a Church in the Son, as the body of the Son, not just humans, nor certain humans, and that because of the fall of man, this incorporation of the world in the Son passes through the Cross, but does not stop at the Cross. She goes through the hermitage, through this profound and shocking experience of evil experienced by the ascetic who fights with the devil (the ascetic being referred to here and not the contemplative monks) like Saint Anthony, and who participates in the Cross and in the passage of the Father's good favor - the passage through the narrow gate and the path of the experience of evil. But Her destiny is to exit through this narrow gate to enter the Kingdom of the eschaton. And the Church advances until there, She does not stop at the Cross and the narrow gate. In the Kingdom She is fulfilled and realized. Therefore, Westerners in their Ecclesiology have this great weakness to focus on History, on Golgotha, and to also focus on the Church there also. And this in Orthodox Tradition and Ecclesiology translates as a tendency to consider the struggle with evil, Satan, which is mainly experienced by Monasticism, as the ultimate element, which par excellence expresses the Church.
It is therefore a form of Western influence in Orthodox Ecclesiology, where this tendency exists. Some will not forgive me for pointing this out. On the contrary, as I said, healthy Orthodox Ecclesiology is that which leads the monk and the layman who struggles with evil, to the taste, to the foretaste of the Kingdom of God in the divine Eucharist, to the experience of light, to that experience where a community of people imagines the world of the future, the world of the future society and the world of the future material creation that has overcome corruption. This has consequences for our understanding of spiritual life, the organization of the Church, the Mysteries and any specific aspect of Ecclesiology.
- From Dogmatic and Theological Notes of University Traditions, Academic Year 1991-1992.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
3. Metropolitan of Pergamon John Zizioulas on the Cross of Golgotha and the Divine Eucharist
The purpose of Creation is the Church. That is, the Father, by creating the world, wanted to transform it into the Church. However, in order for this incorporation of Creation in the Son and the Church to be realized, the free consent of man would have to be ensured. For man is the one who, by nature, as the only free being in Creation, the material Creation, would be used so that Creation could be referred to God. But man, summing up creation, instead of ultimately referring to God, chose to refer to himself; in other words, he deified himself. For this reason, God's entire plan for transforming the world into a Church came up against man's denial and, as Saint Maximus says, God now had to think of another way to save the world and unite it with Himself. This way is the incarnation of the Son within the fallen creation, which means that the Son, and man in general, and all of creation, had to go through the experience of death in order to attain union, that is, the Cross had to intervene. This is why the Church could no longer be realized without going through the Cross of Golgotha.
The Church, then, takes on a new form in relation to that which God had originally foreseen and desired. But here now there is a subtle, but very important observation. Despite the fact that the Church, like the Economy, took a path that passes through the Cross, the end of this path remains the same as that which was in the beginning, namely the union of the created with the uncreated God. Therefore, the Church is a reality that passes through the Cross and takes upon Herself, passing through, all the characteristics of the Cross, but with a purpose and destiny not to stop there. These characteristics of the Cross must be transformed into characteristics of the eschatological state.
Here ecclesiologists begin to encounter difficulties. Because the Church's passage through the Cross leaves the marks of the Cross, which are wounds inflicted by evil and History on the Body of Christ. Consequently, there are many who stop there and say: "this is the identity of the Church" - A body, the embodied creation in the Son, which is, however, wounded by evil, as is the Cross. Western theologians, mainly, tend to take this line, because they tend to start from History and stop, one might say, with an ontological disposition, at evil, to give evil a final ontological stamp. That is why all Western music, literature, and theology involve a preoccupation with the problems that evil creates in the world and do not proceed beyond to the Kingdom of God. Thus, an Ecclesiology can be created here, as it is actually being created, which has the Cross, Golgotha, as its center. The characteristics, therefore, of this Ecclesiology are the concept of the Church as the body of that which in History sacrifices itself, suffers and serves the world. It is a very attractive Ecclesiology that appeals greatly to human emotion, but an Ecclesiology that excessively traps the Church within the world...
Therefore, for Western Ecclesiology the mysteries and especially the view of the Eucharist are in essence nothing more than a continuation and repetition of Golgotha, a constant presence of it.
The Cross is placed in the center of the Eucharist, as it is in many Orthodox churches today, something that did not exist in the past. But this is happening in the West. In the East, one cannot easily stop at the Cross, because the Eucharist is so structured that it leads us to the transcendence of the Cross. The Eucharist brings before us not Golgotha, but the Kingdom of God. It brings before us the communion of the Saints, the radiance, the light, the splendor of the eschaton, with the iconography, the vestments, the words, the psalmody, with all that the Orthodox Tradition has surrounded the divine Eucharist. All this points towards a transcendence of Golgotha. And for this reason, our own Ecclesiology returns to this original will of the Father to unite the created with the uncreated as the final goal of Creation and Economy...
The hermitage, of course, is part of the Church. The monk who bears the visible traces of participation in the Cross of Christ is within the Church. But, when this monk or someone else (to illustrate it in this dramatic way), puts on the gold-colored vestments of Protaton - I don't know if you went to see what vestments they have, more elaborate and brighter than ours, they have for the time of the Eucharist - when the monk puts them on, then the Eucharist, the Kingdom of God, is realized. It is the transcendence of the Cross with the light of the Resurrection that constitutes the Being of the Church. Consequently, it is not possible to reach the Resurrection without the Cross. We all say this and repeat it, but too many of us forget it and tend to speak of the Church without the resurrectional experience of the transcendence of the Cross, without the experience of the new creation, which shines full of light.
One could say that the new Creation and the experience of the Church can only be found in the person of a monk who shines with holiness. Of course, it is there, but that is not the Church. The Church is the one that must reflect the transformation of the entire world; the transformation of the material world and human society and community. Therefore, only when we have community do we have Church. And for this reason, the monk whose face shines with holiness also needs to be a participant in this community of the eschaton, which is the Eucharistic community, in order to be ecclesiasticized.
We therefore conclude that the Father's will is that the whole world, even the material world, become a Church in the Son, as the body of the Son, not just humans, nor certain humans, and that because of the fall of man, this incorporation of the world in the Son passes through the Cross, but does not stop at the Cross. She goes through the hermitage, through this profound and shocking experience of evil experienced by the ascetic who fights with the devil (the ascetic being referred to here and not the contemplative monks) like Saint Anthony, and who participates in the Cross and in the passage of the Father's good favor - the passage through the narrow gate and the path of the experience of evil. But Her destiny is to exit through this narrow gate to enter the Kingdom of the eschaton. And the Church advances until there, She does not stop at the Cross and the narrow gate. In the Kingdom She is fulfilled and realized. Therefore, Westerners in their Ecclesiology have this great weakness to focus on History, on Golgotha, and to also focus on the Church there also. And this in Orthodox Tradition and Ecclesiology translates as a tendency to consider the struggle with evil, Satan, which is mainly experienced by Monasticism, as the ultimate element, which par excellence expresses the Church.
It is therefore a form of Western influence in Orthodox Ecclesiology, where this tendency exists. Some will not forgive me for pointing this out. On the contrary, as I said, healthy Orthodox Ecclesiology is that which leads the monk and the layman who struggles with evil, to the taste, to the foretaste of the Kingdom of God in the divine Eucharist, to the experience of light, to that experience where a community of people imagines the world of the future, the world of the future society and the world of the future material creation that has overcome corruption. This has consequences for our understanding of spiritual life, the organization of the Church, the Mysteries and any specific aspect of Ecclesiology.
- From Dogmatic and Theological Notes of University Traditions, Academic Year 1991-1992.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
