Whither TAW?

[rusmeister]

I'm not thinking of quitting the Church - where could I go? It's that maligned and misunderstood Chesterton (OK, and Lewis) that made clear to me what I would have to go back to. They keep me from walking even though I feel total spiritual burnout. Or as Peter said, "Where can we go, Lord? You have the words of eternal life."

Leaving TAW would be easy, though. Right now I feel a real sense of futility here. People come in teaching seriously un-Orthodox doctrine, and most members don't recognize or care, AFAICT. The days when we were united enough to establish our sub-forum rules and declare some subjects as dogmatically certain and unchallengeable (non-controversial topics) appear to be over. Any challenge of or attack on ideas can be construed as an attack on the person (as a person), meaning we can't challenge heresy in TAW, I guess. I've never had such a feeling of schism in TAW before, and the underpinnings of it came out in the evolution thread. Some people really don't get that if we deny the authority of the Church - or make it so that that authority has zero effect on our practical beliefs and attitudes in daily life, so that we pick and choose what we will accept and what we won't - we do what Adam did: unwittingly cut ourselves off from communion in a most practical sense, one in which we cease to be of one heart and mind with the saints, where we stop trying to put on the mind of the Church, and instead assert the supremacy of our own minds, and come to think and believe things at which they all would cry anathema. And there is no one in more danger of that than the intellectual, the mentally rich.

I suppose I should have seen it coming. The ultimate authority that rules CF is not the Church; the rules are designed on a foundation of pluralism to reflect the divided nature of the Christian world at large, so naturally that can be used to undermine any attempt to maintain a truly Orthodox atmosphere. So at some point TAW will be de facto un-Orthodox, just another harbor for pluralism, which a few members have openly advocated and not been admonished by everybody else. So schism is an inevitable result. If we don't agree on the authority of Holy Tradition, or even what that is, we can hardly avoid it.

 

[rusmeister]

On the uncertainty that seems to paralyze some of us:

"But what we suffer from to-day is humility in the wrong place. Modesty has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not to assert--himself. The part he doubts is exactly the part he ought not to doubt--the Divine Reason. Huxley preached a humility content to learn from Nature. But the new sceptic is so humble that he doubts if he can even learn. Thus we should be wrong if we had said hastily that there is no humility typical of our time. The truth is that there is a real humility typical of our time; but it so happens that it is practically a more poisonous humility than the wildest prostrations of the ascetic. The old humility was a spur that prevented a man from stopping; not a nail in his boot that prevented him from going on. For the old humility made a man doubtful about his efforts, which might make him work harder. But the new humility makes a man doubtful about his aims, which will make him stop working altogether.

At any street corner we may meet a man who utters the frantic and blasphemous statement that he may be wrong. Every day one comes across somebody who says that of course his view may not be the right one. Of course his view must be the right one, or it is not his view. We are on the road to producing a race of men too mentally modest to believe in the multiplication table. We are in danger of seeing philosophers who doubt the law of gravity as being a mere fancy of their own. Scoffers of old time were too proud to be convinced; but these are too humble to be convinced. The meek do inherit the earth; but the modern sceptics are too meek even to claim their inheritance. It is exactly this intellectual helplessness which is our second problem.

The last chapter has been concerned only with a fact of observation: that what peril of morbidity there is for man comes rather from his reason than his imagination.* It was not meant to attack the authority of reason; rather it is the ultimate purpose to defend it. For it needs defence. The whole modern world is at war with reason; and the tower already reels.

The sages, it is often said, can see no answer to the riddle of religion. But the trouble with our sages is not that they cannot see the answer; it is that they cannot even see the riddle. They are like children so stupid as to notice nothing paradoxical in the playful assertion that a door is not a door. The modern latitudinarians speak, for instance, about authority in religion not only as if there were no reason in it, but as if there had never been any reason for it. Apart from seeing its philosophical basis, they cannot even see its historical cause. Religious authority has often, doubtless, been oppressive or unreasonable; just as every legal system (and especially our present one) has been callous and full of a cruel apathy. It is rational to attack the police; nay, it is glorious. But the modern critics of religious authority are like men who should attack the police without ever having heard of burglars. For there is a great and possible peril to the human mind: a peril as practical as burglary. Against it religious authority was reared, rightly or wrongly, as a barrier. And against it something certainly must be reared as a barrier, if our race is to avoid ruin."
GK Chesterton, "Orthodoxy", ch 3, "The Suicide of Thought"
* (Why intellectuals are in greater danger than simple people.)

 

[gurneyhalleck1]

I don't know what to say, Rus. TAW can be a tough place. I think sometimes all of us posters take ourselves too seriously and can even get snobby and condescending. I think pretty much every one of us, myself included, hasn't shown their best light in the past couple weeks. We get frustrated. Sometimes I'd like to lighten TAW up a little. Matt and I did that with the Seinfeld thread, but we got shot down by some on here for that at the time. I mentioned TV shows a few times to lighten things, like how much I liked Walking Dead, and I got ripped to smithereens as some kind of quasi-pagan lunatic for watching it (even though a bunch of people at my parish LOVE IT!). Bring up something silly like Star Trek and you get mad, make super endless youtube videos with 2,000 links from another poster, and I get mad!

We can't talk about Father Seraphim Rose because the man is a lightning rod. Some on here see him as the ultimate spiritual leader who has truly opened doors in their walk with Christ, others see him as a raving madman taking things out of context to support a fundamentalist nutjob agenda. Hated by many, loved to a super high degree by others.

Can't talk about Father Seraphim Rose.

Can't talk about evolution. That turns into a virtual war.

Can't talk about homosexuality because the liberal group gets their undies in a wad and is buying into the pansexual agenda of modernity.

We can't agree on a common sense of much of anything now and even authority is questioned.

Some think you need to cool it on Chesterton, some think your words are a great insight in sharing him.

Some hate me and probably would like to jump me in a dark alley with metal pipes, others give me rep points and wonderful feedback.

People come in TAW and badmouth the Russians endlessly.

When I call into question Serbian atrocities, I'm jumped a bit.

We don't get much "accomplished" and sometimes I feel frustrated as well. TAW is a trip. You and I used to war like mad, now I think we agree so often that it's hard to remember the past. Some of the people I came in here loving like crazy who were so sweet to me bit my face off or ripped me a new one! Others were buddies with me, broke off friendship with me, came back, and are friends again! It's a Twilight Zone place, Rus!

Some people are turning super duper liberal and I'm shocked, others are just now lurkers because they're fed up, some just keep plugging along.

I just don't know what to say as a solution

 

[rusmeister]

No argument.

I'm all for "lighten up" moments, but like *somebody* once said, the opposite of "funny" isn't "serious". The opposite of "funny" is "not funny". And I think being divided over Church authority is not funny. Note what happened to my thread on that topic.

And division over THAT enables division over everything else. As we have seen, without that people can teach anything at all and call it "Orthodox". Unless there is a clear and identifiable thing that has the power to correct us when we err, then we will have... what we now have, what you (Gurney) have described. It's really different from 5 or so years ago, when we were united against the impositions of CF admin. Until less than a year ago, TAW had a rep, bolstered by all visiting posters, for being the friendlest and most welcoming forum on CF. But I think our being united on doctrine had a lot to do with being able to create that atmosphere. Now I think we aren't, and I think the poison of pluralism that we are exposed to in the outside world has a lot to do with THAT, and some here are singing the praises of pluralism, of "dynamic" (that is, changing) theology, and so on. And they are ready to appeal to a non-Orthodox administration to impose it when Orthodox that understand what it is reject it.

 

[RKO]

As faith based forums go, my experience is that TAW is among the most welcoming and polite forums on the net. The nature of a forum is to foster discussion, and there will always be legitimate differences of opinion, and a few lunkheads.

In the end, TAW is a good one. The people here don't antagonize each other NEARLY as much as other forums 'cough"OBOB "cough."

I hope your frustration eases. I for one learn tons from your wisdom.

 

[Trying_to_be_Orthodox]

@Rus

Definitely, you need re-charge. Big family, a lot of work. When do you go on vacation?

@TAW will be de facto un-Orthodox - do you know 100% Orthodox place with Orthodox ppl? I can say that met somebody ,who could be defined like Orthodox from my opinion, only one time in my life. So its standart case for current reality as for online as for offline. And of course, I dont know TAW of a few years ago.

Ps respect for you posting on TAW

 

[Kristos]

I don't know - I've been posting here for over 8 years, which when I think about it is a it bizarre...I wouldn't say thing have changed significantly. There have always been ebbs and flows when it comes to controversy - be it tollhouses or temples or evolution.

 

[rusmeister]

@Rus

Definitely, you need re-charge. Big family, a lot of work. When do you go on vacation?

@TAW will be de facto un-Orthodox - do you know 100% Orthodox place with Orthodox ppl? I can say that met somebody ,who could be defined like Orthodox from my opinion, only one time in my life. So its standart case for current reality as for online as for offline. And of course, I dont know TAW of a few years ago.

Ps respect for you posting on TAW

I am technically on vacation as of today. We came back from a summer camp I worked at just before midnight on Saturday, on Sunday had to run around all day in connection with the celebration of my wife's birthday, and saw the last guests off a couple of hours ago.

But this is not about me, and I don't want it to be. It really IS different from even a couple of years ago.

But you're right, we all come to the Church messed up. I don't think ANYONE is "100% Orthodox". When I say "un-Orthodox", I mean not really recognizable as Orthodox in terms of what people believe. That's why Church authority is so important. Unless we submit our views to correction by the Church, by what (pretty much) all have believed at all times, we can't be said to even have begun to experience the Faith. That means I may be wrong, and hold myself open to correction even if I don't like it or disagree on my pitifully limited intellectual grounds. Each of us has to do this, and it is easy for people who are humble and lowly in terms of intellect, but for intellectuals, who I like to count myself among, it can be tougher, and require a deeper acknowledgement of the limitations of our own reason and knowledge, and not only ours personally, but even the accumulated knowledge of a secular tradition, be it philosophical, scientific, historical or whatever (ie, an academic tradition with common agreement in the secular world may really be wrong).

 

[rusmeister]

I don't know - I've been posting here for over 8 years, which when I think about it is a it bizarre...I wouldn't say thing have changed significantly. There have always been ebbs and flows when it comes to controversy - be it tollhouses or temples or evolution.

It's changed, Kristos. They wouldn't have put up with it. Here and now we, collectively, do. I've never seen Church authority challenged before and everyone be OK with it. That's radically different. Ten years ago, everybody, from Handmaiden to Xenia to Oblio would have told off a poster who said that they didn't need to accept Tradition in order to be Orthodox, or one who clearly implied that the understandings we find in Tradition could have all been wrong and that now we need to "reinterpret" everything. Now people are all silent and there was even one who accused me of "hubris" for telling the poster off (She must have thought I was imagining exaggerated self-importance on my part). It's not just controversy. It's direct attacks on our Tradition and Faith, on all of it. Not just in regards to evolution but in regards to everything. That's why I stopped talking about evolution. Because it is so much bigger. It is not your run-of-the-mill disagreement like Tollhouses. If these ideas be accepted, all of our doctrines may be rejected one-by-one, and in each case, the people holding these views may sincerely protest when someone else takes their very principle of the supremacy of the individual over Tradition and uses it to reject something they do think important.

They (these pluralists that deny a continuous dogma where we agree with those of the past and actually do not misunderstand them and do not need to "reinterpret" them) like to say that it's not black and white - that there are "shades of grey". But a really good Christian thinker remarked that shades of grey is the limitation of evil, that good actually has all the colors of the rainbow, for white is that color that contains all colors. It really IS black and white.

 

[ArmyMatt]

it happens, tis the world of internet Orthodoxy. folks slam me prolly a tad less than I slam others on here. I can read my snarkiness when I look back, etc. I think we gotta remember that knowing someone face to face is a whole lot different than knowing an avatar and a forum name. I imagine prolly 99% of the issues here between the Orthodox could be handled fine if it was over a cup of coffee at a local bookstore.

 

[Columba7]

If it makes you feel better, I am done here, or at least done posting anything substantial. I can see that for some TAW is a welcome environment, and for that I am glad. For me, it never really felt like home. I wish you all well.

 

[Anhelyna]

As the outsider who has always been welcomed here

Yes TAW has changed over the years - people come and go and traffic also varies. I've learned a lot here - and I freely admit it.

I've also had companionship and support in times when I've needed it.

I've also found people understanding that I post more often here than I do in OBOB - and I think the reason for that should be obvious to most.

I think folk here understand that I'll never post anything against Orthodox beliefs and praxis [ for me , of course that's easy ] but there are times when I find I cannot understand why non-Orthodox folk come here and try their best to argue - it's just not polite and goes against hospitality.

Internet Orthodoxy is strange - it can go from one extreme to the other , and so of course can Catholicism - and there are extremists in both camps

 

[rusmeister]

If it makes you feel better, I am done here, or at least done posting anything substantial. I can see that for some TAW is a welcome environment, and for that I am glad. For me, it never really felt like home. I wish you all well.

It doesn't "make me feel better", Columba. If you have ever thought that you don't need to accept Holy Tradition to be Orthodox, or that you can dispense with teachings from it that make modern people uncomfortable, then you need to repent, and accept the authority of the Church to correct us. If not, then it's a case of "If the shoe fits...". I'm not singling anyone out right now, but Orthodox posters HAVE said such things here.

The key thing, along with accepting Church authority, is actually going to church. Internet Orthodoxy can be helpful - or hurtful. But we really could live without it.

 

[rusmeister]

it happens, tis the world of internet Orthodoxy. folks slam me prolly a tad less than I slam others on here. I can read my snarkiness when I look back, etc. I think we gotta remember that knowing someone face to face is a whole lot different than knowing an avatar and a forum name. I imagine prolly 99% of the issues here between the Orthodox could be handled fine if it was over a cup of coffee at a local bookstore.

Sure, except for this one issue of Church authority. It's the one percent, Matt. Do you admit that we have 3-bar Orthodox-cross posters that effectively deny it or tell us that Tradition changes so we can dispense with what seems good to us to do so? Forget evolution, forget tollhouses, forget even women's ordination. This issue of authority and Tradition determines our doctrines on the 99%.
is this not so?

 

[gurneyhalleck1]

Well, if we were to all be 100% honest, let's face it, online forums are populated with odd ducks. I think we're all a bit goofy. We, for various reasons, come online to a virtual café "hanging out" and leaving comments back and forth to each other. We've never met in real life (most of us), don't really know each other very well in depth, etc. We're all pretty opinionated to begin with. That's why we come on here. We want to talk about things that most people in "real life" could care less about---theology, ecclesiology, saints, sacraments, etc. We all have issues on here if you ask me. Myself included. A lot of internet posters in forums are either anti-social, alone a lot, or, like the William Shatner SNL skit from the 1980's, they live with their mothers and don't know how to get 'out there' and live! I'm by myself a lot and just with my kids. During the summers, I'm really alone. CF, TAW in particular, is kind of a hang-out. I think some posters, myself not included, like to come on and assert themselves, get tough, and let people 'have it' because they're not so tough and assertive in real life. some people come in these places to lurk and just listen, some want to rile people up, some want genuine discourse, some just want to debate and argue all sorts of angles to a discussion for the purposes of feeding their intellect, pride, and debating acumen.

I think we need to realize that there are WEIRDOS in every church who don't accept Church authority. Take my parish. There is a couple that 'converted' to Orthodoxy about seven or eight years ago. They got chrismated, but NEVER truly converted in spirit. They have told Kate and I that they believe in sola scriptura 100%, they believe in faith alone and grace alone, that the ancient Church Fathers are often wrong, and they REFUSE to go to Confession. Matter of fact, they have on a couple of occasions tried to tell me to stop going to confession. They try to talk me out of it. They have NEVER gone to Confession since their chrismation many, many years ago. They also refuse to do any fasting, even the Sunday fast!

Now this couple, who are REALLY PROTESTANTS, sit behind me at DL on Sundays, try to be friends with my wife and I, and Father puts up with them despite their nonsense. They really shouldn't be Orthodox. They should be honest and admit to themselves who they really are---Protestants!

Does this drive me nuts? You bet! Can I do anything about it? Not really.

I've talked to Orthodox Christians in person at my parish who I think are wing nuts. They are everywhere. I guarantee you that "internet Orthodoxy" isn't the only place where strange brews can be found in Orthodoxy. Think about it---these "internet Orthodox" are not phantoms. They're real human beings who belong to parishes and go to DL on Sundays and do what the rest of us do.

For us all to think that 'internet Orthodox' don't attend our parishes and live out in the real world is a fantasy. These folks live among us online and in real time out there in the world.

Orthodoxy, like any other church, gets watered down. You get people who enter Orthodoxy just so they can use birth control and they think it's cool you can get divorced just in case. There are Orthodox who get poorly-catechized, for lack of a better term. There are Orthodox who are secularized and accept the transgender garbage and who sympathize with the idea of women 'priests' and even are loosey-goosey on the holocaust of abortion. There are all kinds out there.

I will say that I think the Orthodox Church has less loons than most, thankfully. We have less liberal dingalings than Catholicism and infinitely less than the Episcopal Church, etc.

But in the end, people are people. People in TAW can get petty, politically correct, wishy-washy, liberal , and secularized.

I think if we are to come to TAW, we must be realistic that our expectations aren't always going to be met. We'd like to think that the pro-LGBT Nazis would never come in here..Wrong. We'd like to think that we'd get straight answers when talking to pro-evolution folks....wrong. We'd like to think that seminaries in Orthodoxy are kicking out lunatics who embrace secular ideas...wrong. We'd like to think we can all agree on the importance of authority since Orthodoxy is based on it and must have it!...wrong.

So, there are really two options: we get the heck out of here and give up, or we have to adjust our expectations and don't think this is a safe harbor for 'orthodox' Orthodoxy. We have to also accept that people in here don't like some of us. I've learned to live with it. But, like I said, online forums are a microcosm of our regular lives 'out there' in the world. And we all know it isn't always roses!

 

[ArmyMatt]

Sure, except for this one issue of Church authority. It's the one percent, Matt. Do you admit that we have 3-bar Orthodox-cross posters that effectively deny it or tell us that Tradition changes so we can dispense with what seems good to us to do so? Forget evolution, forget tollhouses, forget even women's ordination. This issue of authority and Tradition determines our doctrines on the 99%.
is this not so?

you know that of course I do. I just think issues would not get as heated if we had a sit down. I think sometimes one of the things that folks (myself included) forget at times is that this is a forum thread, and stuff get's wrongly interpreted often. even for those that I have disagreed with on here over certain issues, still will tell you that they submit (or struggle to) to the authority of the Church. I can only think of one that has said that one can decide for oneself.

 

[Dorothea]

I don't know - I've been posting here for over 8 years, which when I think about it is a it bizarre...I wouldn't say thing have changed significantly. There have always been ebbs and flows when it comes to controversy - be it tollhouses or temples or evolution.

I feel the same way.

 

[Dorothea]

I know any time certain subjects come up, there's always pages and pages of debate. That happens. I think that's why some subjects are avoided because they've already been discussed so many times. But I know new people join and so the questions, to them, are new ones. On evolution and life after death, there is much unknown and the Church did not make it all dogma because nobody knows the details because they weren't revealed by God as it's not recorded in the Bible. So, there are some varying opinions on things. Is that not allowed?

 

[gzt]

I know any time certain subjects come up, there's always pages and pages of debate. That happens. I think that's why some subjects are avoided because they've already been discussed so many times. But I know new people join and so the questions, to them, are new ones. On evolution and life after death, there is much unknown and the Church did not make it all dogma because nobody knows the details because they weren't revealed by God as it's not recorded in the Bible. So, there are some varying opinions on things. Is that not allowed?

Apparently not, as some posting in this thread think certain positions which are well within the bounds of the Church are in fact outside those bounds and argue quite vigorously, or at least echo quite thoroughly amongst themselves, when brought up. I strenuously object to being bullied about things which, as you put it, are not dogma because nobody knows the details because they weren't revealed by God. Which is what's happening elsewhere and what rusmeister is referring to doing here in this thread.

 

[jckstraw72]

I know any time certain subjects come up, there's always pages and pages of debate. That happens. I think that's why some subjects are avoided because they've already been discussed so many times. But I know new people join and so the questions, to them, are new ones. On evolution and life after death, there is much unknown and the Church did not make it all dogma because nobody knows the details because they weren't revealed by God as it's not recorded in the Bible. So, there are some varying opinions on things. Is that not allowed?

Dot - the issue is that, when we start to read the Fathers writing on these topics, we start to find out that these things ARE revealed. For instance, many Saints have seen the creation of the world in a vision revealed by God. That, or they are delusional and only THINK God sent them a vision ...