The Arena

Mentors and mentoring are all the rage in the contemporary landscape. One industry after another is seeking to develop the art and science of mentoring.  A mentor is one who is entrusted with education and counseling of another. Unfortunately, mentors are in short supply. There are many sociological reasons for our state of affairs that have led us to this scarcity. One primary cause is our method of conducting education in general.  Our society is much more focused on pumping out students that have memorized large amounts of data points, and demonstrated those points in standardized testing, than on having one on one relationships where information is transmitted, and then the use of the information put to work, pressed, and refined to an art form.  The later is what we call mentoring. Due to our lack of mentors, many of those who desire to learn, grow, and become proficient and even excellent at a task, are left to all kinds of alternative measures. 

This can be particularly tricky when it comes to our spiritual life.  Very few, if any, can simply study their way into a grown up kind of spiritual life. Historically, we Christians have relied on spiritual fathers and mothers. These are persons who have walked with Christ, and gone through the many trials and tribulations that life in this world has to offer, and yet have come out the other side of these experiences more whole and perfect than when they began.  The goal dear friends is to find these people and to draw close to them, that they might be our mentors.  For Orthodox Christians, this role falls to our priest and father confessor. It is with our priests that we find someone to educate and counsel us in the spiritual life. The life of a spiritual father is truly a daunting task, yet it is not the person alone who guides, but it is the person assisted by the Holy Spirit and the tradition of the Church, and its many writings. 

For Orthodox Christians, this spiritual life in which we are led by our spiritual guides centers around a rule of prayer, ascetic practices, and sacred reading.  This prayer rule is usually connected to a prayer book, and certain occasions for prayer contained therein. There is also a time for quiet prayer- the Jesus Prayer, normally assisted by the use of a prayer rope. Then there is sacred reading. This is mostly connected to the scriptures, patristic authors, lives the saints, and to guidance by the great ascetics.  All of this guidance however needs  temperance and refinement. Many of these writings are directly written to monastics, who live very different lives than those of us outside of a monastery. The church commends certain ascetic practices which are better suited for life outside of a monastery. The spiritual mentor is critical to our proper learning, use, and application of these resources.

I plan to write about these resources, but in this post I will focus on the genre of ascetic writings. Remember, if you choose to read and follow the guidance found in them, do so under the mentorship of your spiritual father. There  are two books in this category that I have found extremely helpful. One, “The Arena”, and the other, “Unseen Warfare”.  The Arena gets its name from historic coliseums. They were called Arenas because the floors upon which the gladiators did battle was covered with sand, for which the Latin term was “Arena”. The sand played two roles. One to conceal and soak up the blood of the injured, and two, as a disguise for the elevators containing wild beasts below the platform that would be raised up in the middle of a battle.  Moreover, those gladiators who fought in the arenas were taught and counseled by magistri/mentors. In this wonderful book written by Bishop Ignatius, he gently mentors new monastics novices, those who plan on living a life of spiritual warfare, on how to live a life according to our Lord's instructions on how to conduct spiritual battle in the arena of this world.

To be continued.

Learning Exists For The Sake Of Doing

I believe that I am not alone when I say that I have a great love of learning. Learning can be invigorating, it illumines that which was once a mystery or a conundrum. It enables the learner to gain new appreciation.  But is that all? No, learning is primarily for the purpose of doing. Learning allows the illumined person to bring the useful and beautiful into being. It is the learned who heal the sick, build useful objects, and so on.

Learning is no different when it comes to sacred knowledge. The primary purpose for learning sacred truth is to do something with that knowledge. In the case of Christianity, the learning is for the sake of our transformation into the likeness of the one, unique, God-Man, Jesus Christ. When it comes to Christian knowledge, any use of learning other than that which is applied to our doing, is for the most part a waste of time, mere entertainment for entertainment sake.

The last judgement, at least as Jesus Christ speaks of it in Matt 25:21-36, will be all about what we have done with our knowledge. Now let’s be clear, knowledge is needed, however, it is needed for one reason, and that is in order to do something with it.  

Whenever we spend our precious time reading, or listening, our focus should first and foremost be on what we are to do. If you’ve never tried learning with this goal in mind it can be quite daunting. The more one knows, the more there is to do. With great knowledge, comes great responsibility. It has been said by the great ascetics that we should read the bible just enough to figure out what God would have us do.

As an example of this, if you open you New Testament to the first book and start reading, it will be a while before you find the first general command.. That command is found in Matt 3:2 where John the Baptist says, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”  While there is a great deal of information given leading up to this point, the purpose for all of that information is so that we might “repent”.  The information in the first two chapters mean nothing if we do not “Repent”.

No amount of doctrinal knowledge, no amount of trust called faith, or mental ascent to truths, amount to any value whatsoever, if we do not do what we are commanded. Learning is for doing, and it is our doing that God will judge.

Why Blog?

It has been over 8 years since I last published a blog post.  I withdrew from the blogosphere because it became clear to me that I had so much to work on within my own soul, that blogging was not high on the priority list. I think that this was a good decision. However, there is a kind of cathartic effect to public writing that I have missed out on. For me, blogging has always been about forcing myself to take my thoughts and write them down cogently, to the end that whatever foggy thinking I may be having on a matter might be cleared up. I plan to try my hand and mind at blogging once again. Lord have mercy on us all!