The irony of believing

Fr Stephen's blog is always a rich source of reliable and honest truth about Christian faith, and the Orthodox in particular, and so for any who might not have visited his blog Glory to God for All Things, I want to introduce it again, and give you a sample of what he writes about, from his most recent post entitled The Irony of Believing...

There is a deep need for the appreciation of irony to sustain a Christian life. Our world is filled with contradiction. Hypocrisy is ever present even within our own heart. The failures of Church and those who are most closely associated with it can easily crush the hearts of the young and break the hearts of those who are older.

I can think of at least two times in my life that the failures of Church, or its hierarchy, drove me from the ranks of the Church, or what passed for Church at the time. As years have gone by I haven’t seen less that would disappoint or break the heart – indeed the things that troubled me as a young man barely compare with revelations we all have seen in recent years.

No hands are clean. Evangelical, Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, the failures and coverups are in no way the special province of any. The question of truth remains – but in a contest of the pure, everyone loses. The irony remains. Our failures would not be so poignant if the Kingdom were not so pure. Judas’ betrayal is darkened all the more by the fact that his victim is God Himself.

All of which brings us back to the irony that remains. The greatest irony of all is the God who forgives and remains ever faithful to us despite the contradictions.

These are questions that any follower of Christ, or anyone for that matter, has a right to ask. Some very famous non-Christians have asserted that they respect and admire Jesus Christ, but it's His followers that they can't stand. They're talking about the Church... well, actually, they're not talking about the Church (capital C) but about what they (and even we sometimes) call church. That's another discussion. But Fr Stephen examines this well, and his entire post is worth reading. It's all right HERE.