This article originally appeared in the April 2000 issue of Crisis Magazine. The “dialogue of love” between Rome and the Orthodox Churches that offered so much promise after nine centuries of ecclesial estrangement seems to be running out of breath as we enter the third Christian millennium. A dramatic breakthrough is needed to restore the … Read more
The “dialogue of love” between Rome and the Orthodox Churches that offered so much promise after nine centuries of ecclesial estrangement seems to be running out of breath as we enter the third Christian millennium. A dramatic breakthrough is needed to restore the flagging spirits, in particular, of the rambunctious Orthodox participants. Taking a cue … Read more
America is quickly becoming Buddhist! It is, to be sure, a quiet, unwitting conversion process conducted by the high priests of nirvana like Dr. Jack Kevorkian, while Christians, Eastern and Western alike, remain distracted by our less momentous internal squabbles. When Orthodox Christians celebrate Pasca (“Easter”) next month (once again, alas, a week later than … Read more
The royal welcome that Patriarch Bartholomeos of Constantinople received during his recent visit to the United States was carefully prepared by the savvy publicists of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. However, the effusive praise from many of the political leaders of our society surpassed all expectations. Hillary Rodham Clinton called the Ecumenical Patriarch “a … Read more
The surprising announcement in Moscow a few months ago that the Russian Orthodox Church will not canonize the last Russian tsar and his immediate family is yet another sign of the spiritual confusion that reigns, if you will pardon the pun, in Moscow. At a November 12 conference at the Danilovsky Monastery in Moscow, representatives … Read more
It was an auspicious beginning of a new era. In a luncheon address in New York on September 21, following his enthronement as primate of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, Archbishop Spyridon promised to combat “the problems of crime, alcohol, tobacco, violence, and abortion.” Pro-life Orthodox Christian Americans were gratified to hear abortion included … Read more
After a whirlwind summer tour of college campuses, Kristen, my oldest daughter, a High School senior, seems to have settled on my own alma mater as her first choice. I have dutifully cautioned her, however, that, as a prospective Penn alumna, she may face a lifetime of neurotic anxiety over the popular confusion of the … Read more
Although a national policy of nuclear deterrence that apparently has not “failed” would seem worthy of continuation by a nuclear power, ways of improving that deterrent may be considered. One may argue, in fact, that given the high stakes in the current nuclear balance of power if deterrence should fail, a non-aggressive nuclear power is … Read more
The problems of whether and how ethics and public policy can be related — especially in terms of U.S. national defense — have preoccupied Christian ethicists more perhaps than any other group of American scholars. And yet few Eastern Orthodox theologians have shown any interest in these matters — a regrettable situation mitigated only somewhat … Read more