What Makes Something Orthodox?

[@ienjoyapples]

I think most of us would do better to focus on the basics like prayer, fasting and repentance than to get caught up in the minutiae of these contentious topics. Many of us fall short on these essential aspects of spiritual life, and we miss the forest for the trees with these debates.

[@Nicolethesinner]

🙏

[@lyralong]

Bravo!!! Rinse! repeat!!

[@PSNSMANIACALMIND1st]

This has been very pertinent to my own experience. I hope everyone can come to approach the faith this way

[@Nicolethesinner]

My thoughts, views, opinions, and feelings have and continue to change the deeper I go into the faith. I am learning to be more open to being corrected. Learning to keep my heart soft and my ego trampled under my feet. Lord have mercy on us. Thank you Father for a very enlightening video! 🙏

[@Beerfornothing]

It's always a real joy to listen to you speak, father. Appreciate the video.

[@OrthodoxInquirer]

"The end is soon approaching and anyone who has not found love will be swept away by the deluge. The door to the Ark is not yet shut, there is still mercy left for us,... Kindness will open the gates of Heaven; humbleness will lead him into Heaven; a man, whose heart is filled with love, will see God." St Gabriel Urgebadze (Nov 2) Thank you, Father, for a great message. I saw the above quote today and thought your message, and it, went together so well. St. Gabriel rescued Catholic icons and other holy things from being destroyed by the communists, even though they were Catholic. We should love Christ more than anything, and not be full of judgement constantly. Being simple and loving is better than being "right."

[@davidkehrer7342]

This was very helpful, I’m still going to have a conversation with my spiritual father but this has changed the shape of the conversation

[@zzzaaayyynnn]

Thank you for the usual insightful & commonsense words of wisdom, Father Andrew. I pray for you each day.

[@aterrt8523]

There are a lot of neophytes in the Orthodox Church that still have a Protestant “phronema”, they’ve replaced quote mining scripture with quote mining Saints.

[@aburns1999]

Today's world is just one sound byte after another instead of slow, deep thought. Silence is gone for most of us and we're constantly bombarded. Your comments about the saints was timely for me. Patrastic Nectar had just released a book, a translation of St Symeon of Thesselonica. It's a well-done book and there's no complaints. However, I didn't end up enjoying it because it wasn't taking me deeper into Orthodoxy it was one scolding after another of the Latins and athiests. Your point became evident to me, even if I didn't know how to say it like you did. I wasn't the audience. But my son, who has many questions, is the audience and has agreed to read the book. Skepticism, a true skepticism, was taught when I went to university. It was how to think and research, find the answers on your own. Now I believe kids are just taught what to think. That said, we can't know Jesus through our brains alone. This is why I've quit trying to intellectualize my path and focus on trusting in the Lord to lead me where to drink. Thank you for pouring water in my glass.

[@RootsofOrthodoxy]

Father, I would love to have a conversation with you. How can I reach you?

[@frandrewstephendamick]

@@RootsofOrthodoxy I've got a contact email in my profile.

[@PSNSMANIACALMIND1st]

Looking forward to these videos!

[@aterrt8523]

@@frandrewstephendamick Fr Andrew Damick on Roots of Orthodoxy? 🍿🍿🍿

[@a_corne]

Thanks for posting!

[@gnak6525]

We could all use a little more critical thinking, discernment and humility. Thank you Fr. Andrew

[@annab3393]

This makes me think about the Bishop Strickland situation in the Catholic Church.

[@marcuscoetzee5686]

Thanks. This was very interesting and useful.

[@know_not_wickedness]

Years ago I was interested in a number of new age practices. I never really felt like anything "worked" on me. I think that was due to always feeling this stuff is silly or fake in the back of my mind. I wasn't a Christian at that time, but I was raised Protestant and maybe I had some internal guilt for exploring this kind of bad stuff. Thank you again Father for another wonderful video. ☦️

[@phillipbingham487]

Appreciate you❤

[@Steto19]

Thank You Father Andrew ! Go Pack !

[@aterrt8523]

I think a lot of the things that give Orthodox faithful pause, specifically Western customs, come from Christian Orthodoxy being preserved in the East… which has led to this lazy polemic of “East good, West bad”. I pray for the Western Rite and for its continued growth in the Orthodox Church, because I do believe it is the way that Western civilization (already having an Orthodox past and inheritance) can be brought back into the fold, FULLY. One of the struggles I had early on when I discovered Orthodoxy (for context, I was a cradle Roman Catholic and became Protestant in my 20s and am now Orthodox in my mid 30s), was that it seemed like an eastern sect, since it is overwhelmingly and has been, by and large, Eastern for the last 1,000 years. This conversation, in my humble and lowly opinion, needs to be front and center…. especially with so many Westerners being converted to Orthodoxy, many, seemingly, through rigorously anti-western polemics. I ultimately converted to Holy Orthodoxy because I do believe it is the one, holy, Catholic, and apostolic church that rightfully preserves and guards the Apostolic faith. These issues of rites and customs are certainly secondary and aren’t usually a problem, at least until they begin to clash with a culture that is rooted in a western expression of Orthodoxy, but has long been separated from it.

[@NathanaelPetucci]

I think the layers of Dogma, Doctrine, and Theology, that Fr. Georges Florovsky enumerated and you used years ago in a blog post regarding the Church's "sameness" can also apply here. It's just an intuition though. What do you think Father?

[@ValentinBrutusBura]

1. Intercession of the Theotokos. 2. Calendar. 3. Lifes of the Saints. 4. Liturgy (and Paraklesis etc.)

[@vsevolodtokarev]

4:43 "...if you drink a cup of coffee but there's one drop of poison in there...." Mark 16:18: "if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them"; while, at the same time, "you shall not tempt the Lord your God".

[@OrthoBroJoe]

Just my personal opinion, basics is what we should focus on (prayer, fasting, church, loving God and each other more than ourselves), and also we should read the saints. We need to remember that Orthodox Christians are set apart. We are supposed to shun the world. Now I know when you’re a parent it’s hard at least for Halloween because other kids of course are dressing up at schools and etc. You simply have to slowly fizzle them out in a way. I am a humble sinner and a convert and this is simply what I am doing: slowly leading my family away from worldly things and diving deep into spiritual things. As a father I care very deeply about my family’s salvation which is why we converted in the first place. If I have to be like the rich man in hell and my kids and wife get to be like Lazarus in Abraham’s Bosom then I will be happy. Lord, Jesus Christ, have mercy upon us and save us all.

[@sudabdjadjgasdajdk3120]

very wise council

[@margarettsikoonis9314]

Am orthodox Christian God gave us commandments will help you to be obedient to God not the high rakes of the orthodox Church. Take heed bible our lord jesus christ is our savour he died for us no one else 🙏

[@wojonet12]

Could we be Evangelizing Orthodoxy ?

[@knightrider585]

So who was the first saint to make a telephone call?

[@frandrewstephendamick]

@@knightrider585 I don't know, but I remembered this weekend that St. Raphael of Brooklyn sent telegrams! I have no idea if he was the first, though.

[@SaltShack]

I am Orthodox because Orthodoxy is the only Faith Tradition that maintains authority of the Holy Spirit to determine Truth. Scripture tells us how to discern the Truth through enduring consensus that Fr. Panayiotis Papageorgiou calls the resounding voices of the many and that Scripture defines as being pleasing to the Holy Spirit. Quote mining and proof texting the Saints is no less perilous than with the Bible. Fr. Bless and forgive me a sinner.

[@rosem8377]

Saint Paisios has the answers in his book "the great initiates of India".

[@TheRadChadDad]

☦️☦️☦️

[@fr.michael9213]

I'm not sure what Father was getting at when he referred to the Western Rite. Based on what he said in this presentation, one would think that he would be supportive of the Western Rite.

[@frandrewstephendamick]

@@fr.michael9213 I am supportive of it. But it is controversial in general and that is especially so of particular practices. My point was about how people justify or reject these things, not about the particulars.

[@fr.michael9213]

Thank you, Father, for your kind response. I agree that we have to ask ourselves some hard questions, and prayerfully examine our often superficial understanding of the Faith. But that is actually where my question about the Western Rite comes in. Perhaps we should consider WHY we in the East think that certain practices of the Western Rite are NOT Orthodox? Is it because many Eastern Orthodox have never seen these practices? Have we ever taken the time to investigate what these practices actually mean, especially in light of the Western experience of Orthodoxy? Are we aware of the anti-western bias that is present in many Orthodox circles these days? Being different is not a sin. I sometimes think that it is a miracle that the Eastern Rite has survived this long in the West, with all the hyper-ethnicity which characterizes much of Eastern Orthodoxy in the West. Just a few thoughts. I mean no disrespect.

[@frandrewstephendamick]

@fr.michael9213 I agree with you. That's why my video was about focusing on the actual content of things and not external formal criteria.

[@stephengolay1273]

Walk about my town (rural California) long hair and beards is the local costume. Is an Orthodox man being so costumed conforming to the world!!!!!!!!

[@tzaphkielmelekiyah1518]

You do realise that beards are Gods design… don’t project Americanism into Gods kingdom

[@mement0_m0ri]

Wait, are you equating engaging in witchcraft, and putting actual spells on people, with putting scary decorations outside your house? I feel like those two things are NOT on the same level. What must you think of gargoyles on churches!

[@frandrewstephendamick]

@@mement0_m0ri No. My point is that all these things are not the same.

[@mement0_m0ri]

@@frandrewstephendamick Okay, sorry I misunderstood. I thought you were contrasting two extremes, saying witchcraft and scary decorations are evil whereas litte kids getting candy in the parking lot is okay.

[@vsevolodtokarev]

9:31 "..the Orthodox Church doesn't teach indulgences.." If I recall correctly, the Encyclical of the Eastern Patriarchs (1848) says otherwise; in my understanding, proper indulgence is a form of penance, and not at all a form of simony.

[@frandrewstephendamick]

@@vsevolodtokarev True indulgences are part of the Purgatory model, which is why none of it is Orthodox.

[@KillingMyApathy777]

I don’t think you can fully discount modern yogic practice as “just stretching” I am a former mekubbal and occultist and movement ,especially in a liturgical context, has meaning. If we’re going to split hairs on whether will and intent matter we could argue divination is fine as long as we’re asking The Trinity and powers of Heaven for our answers. In the same way If we’re dismissing modern innovation based on ancient practice we might as well tell prots “sorry you’re not Christians you’re just making hollow movements” outright