Everything in Orthodox Christianity points toward one end: union with God through Christ in the power of the Spirit. This is the most important thing. Other Christians might express it in different words, but this is our way of stating the core of the Christian mystery.

Two questions immediately arise:

What does this mean?

How does it happen?

There is a problem with the word "God." Often, the definition of God is something like this: "cosmic entity, without definite content, usually filled in by prejudice, or concepts favorable to the person who holds them; often simply a synonym for nationalism confused with patriotism, right- or left-wing political beliefs." Not to be confused with biblical definitions, which are restricted and focused: For Jews, God is "the One who saved Israel out of Egypt," for Christians "the One who raised Christ from the dead, trampling down death by death."

We say, in our prayer, God is "incomprehensible," which means we cannot grasp God. We acknowledge that God is "inconceivable," which means that we cannot, and should not, form a mental image of God. But we can know God because God disclosed himself to us in Christ. God has "condescended" (to use the theological term) to come among us in human form. What we have been given is adequate for our knowledge.

The answers to these two questions above, then, are intertwined. We know the answer to the first question by following a pattern that allows it to happen. How do we, today, know Christ and, through him, God? By following the pattern. That is why we worship as we do, why we undergo ascetic disciplines, why we spend time in prayer corporate and personal.


In a series of remarkable interviews, Metropolitan Anthony Bloom (of blessed memory) said, "this is the whole aim of asceticism: to become open." Prayer renders a person vulnerable, he proclaimed. Openness and vulnerability are two ways to shed the carapace of self-defense and self-enclosure we normally carry on us. Openness and vulnerability are two ways to enable God to break through to us.

Perhaps this is why Orthodoxy has produced Fools for Christ, like Xenia of Petersburg who dressed in her late husband's army clothes, gave up her riches, and wandered the streets simply telling people about Christ. Or St Andrew of Constantinople, who had a vision of the Theotokos spreading her mantle over the city in a gesture of protection. Such people used their openness to open others to the mystery of Christ. Many of them achieved insight into the lives of others because they had given up worldly goods and turned, with openness and vulnerability, to God. This sharpens the senses and fine-tunes the perception. But that's not the point; the point is relationship to God. From this all else proceeds.

Or here is Serge Verhovskoy, a lay theologian who taught for 30 years at St. Vladimir Seminary.

"The essence of Christianity lies in the real union of God and man in Christ, which is equivalent to a life in love and truth. Everything else is only a path to the treasure of the Kingdom of God or its manifestation," he said.

Every word in those two sentences was carefully weighed and chosen. Union with God equates to life in love and truth. Love as relationship with God, truth as participation in the life of the Blessed Holy Trinity. This is life in its fullness (in Greek, zoë) not mere biological existence (bios). This is the essence.

Fr. Gabriel Rochelle is pastor of St. Anthony of the Desert Orthodox Mission in Las Cruces. Visit the church website at stanthonylc.org. His regular podcasts are available on AncientFaith.com.