My neighbor

‘Jesus Christ will not condemn people for dedicating themselves to errors about Him if they did so unknowingly and if it resulted in love and mercy. Their love is not lost to incorrect doctrine, but is accepted and points to the extreme humility of Christ.’

— Aunt Melanie, ‘Hunting Down Truth’, Desert Dimension

“Yes, yes, that's right, but…” is what you will hear many say after reading the above words or anything like them. Maybe they won't say this out loud, but inwardly. People just won't let go of their doctrinal possessions. Although I am Orthodox, and believe the literal truth of such concepts as ‘the Trinity’ and that salvation in fact can only come to human beings through Christ, all these thoughts seem, in my mind, a world apart from ‘what am I going to do with the person standing in front of me right now?’

That person is, in act if not in fact, Christ. What I do with or to or for that person is what I do with, to or for Jesus. Do I believe in Christ? Do I believe in the person who stands before me? Is that person God? No. But he or she is the only real contact I will ever have with God while living in the body on this planet. I may ‘meet’ Christ in the holy mysteries or in the bible. But I can actually touch Him only in the form of my fellow man. Do I love and serve and believe in Jesus Christ? No more than I love and serve and believe in ‘the one that He has sent,’ that is, my neighbor.