Because Christ himself is the Truth, as when he says, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life,” but because Christ himself is the Truth, we cannot have any such thing as “partial” Truth. Something or someone can be close to the Truth or moving towards the Truth, but in a proper Christian sense only Christ is the Truth, and Christ is one.

And thus it is within Orthodoxy [that] it becomes problematic to speak of anything in isolation from everything else, for the Church is not the summary of its parts, but is the very Body of Christ: the Church is one. I have been told any number of times that Fr. Serge Verhovskoy of blessed memory, is quoted as having said, “Orthodoxy is the absence of one-sidedness.” I have always taken this to be a comment on the character of Orthodoxy, that it is “whole” and not “partial.” This aspect of the faith requires an effort on our part, particularly since we live in an atomizing culture, that is, a culture which almost always focuses on the parts rather than the whole.

Fr. Sophrony, in his writings and teachings, frequently makes a distinction between what he calls what is merely “psychological” and what is “spiritual” or what he will term “hypostatic” or “ontological.” Don’t get lost in the terms, but a distinction between what is merely psychological versus that which has true spiritual substance is a distinction he makes particularly when he addresses the subject of spiritual fatherhood. Some who come to a spiritual father will only understand things on a psychological level and are not ready to hear a “word” from God. They, indeed, might be crushed by such a word, or simply let it pass unnoticed.

There is an entire level (or indeed more than one) at which our faith can be lived where things are understood psychologically, or understood morally, or even politically, never rising to the level of true communion with God nor the transformation of the inner life in which we not only forgive our enemies, but enter into a communion with them in such that we pray with bitter tears and anguish for their salvation and the salvation of the whole world. But this is the fullness of the Tradition.

By the same token, the Sacraments, the Mysteries, can be seen in a lesser way and not entering into the depth which they contain. I dare say all of us (certainly myself) live on a level that is less than what God intends.

The danger comes when these levels begin to be substituted for the true gift of God in Christ Jesus as though they were the true end for which we live, that is, the whole truth. I can think of several areas where this can be a problem.

On the personal level, it is possible to remain enmeshed in a psychological understanding of the Church and the sacraments. We see that an inner change is to take place in us, but that change is seen largely in psychological terms rather than the depths of ontological change, that is, a very change in our being, that is taught by the fathers of the Church. We see our sins as “problems” but not in fact as the evidence of death and corruption at work in us. So we’ll say in confession, “I’m trying to do better.” Well, this is good, but that is not the point! It’s not psychological therapy; it is a very healing of our being that we need to hunger for. We are sorry for things we have done wrong, but we do not see that these things are in fact dragging us deeper into the realm of death. Thus our repentance remains shallow, and grace for a greater and deeper work is refused.

By the same token, it is possible to understand sin or the teachings of the Church in a purely “moral” way, that is, as simply a set of rules by which we should live. I have said elsewhere that God did not become man in order to make bad men good but in order to make dead men live. Our problem is not a “moral” one, in the weaker sense of the word, but truly existential and ontological, that is, having to do with the very core of our existence, the core of our being. There is something mortally ill and wrong with us—something that is not described by mere moral description. The Church’s life, when presented or lived merely on the moral level, is robbed of supernatural life and rendered into little more than a human institution, to help people be a little better.

The same can be said of the Church as a “political” entity. The Church has a proper role to play in speaking to the ills of our society, and to the social inadequacies of our institutions. But were the world to turn from its present mis-doings, and tomorrow have a perfect environment, proper living arrangements, etc., it would still be placing fallen man in a make-believe paradise. Even desert monasteries have occasionally fallen into carnal life and become little more than outposts of Hades.

None of this is to say that there is no place or use in addressing the social and justice issues of our culture, or that the Church is meant to live without monasteries and the like. But the sickness which infects us can be healed, finally, in any setting in which the Church dwells. The thief on the cross found paradise, we are told “in a single moment,” as we sing during Holy Week. It is not a normal setting, in a certain sense, and yet the thief on the cross is quite normative for us in another way. The thief perceived, by the grace of God’s, the depth of his own sin and accepted the shame of his condemnation. He also perceived the goodness of Christ and begged for his mercy—and found it—in a single moment.

The world has been filled with various movements, particularly in the modern period. Different problems have seemed of cosmic significance and worthy of all possible attention. I think of the issue of slavery in our culture—it was right for it to be addressed by Christians—though there is a deeper slavery that has yet to be ended. The prohibition of alcohol was another problem addressed in a social evil in our culture—but that whole Prohibition ended in a very deep failure. I remember living through the 1960s and even spent a couple of years in a very serious Christian commune, but not one possessing the wisdom to do what a commune, or a monastery, should.

The slow maturation of true Orthodox life, in its fullness, without “one-sidedness,” is precisely that—slow maturation of true Orthodox life. St. Vladimir, Prince of the Rus, received baptism in the year 988 AD, but the story of Orthodox life in Russia generally marks the life and ministry of St. Sergius of Radonezh in the 14th century, that is, some 3-400 years later, as the point at which there came a flowering of Orthodoxy in its fullness in that land.

There are, perhaps, many Vladimirs among us today, but few, if any, of Sergius’ vision or stature. It is for his like that we pray, struggling to live faithfully what we have been given, and to live it on levels deeper than is obvious in our culture.

The Truth will always be—and always must be—measured by the fullness of the stature of Christ, as we are taught in Ephesians 4. It will be a stature which will be marked by the depth of our communion with God, our communion with all mankind, our communion with the universe itself, and our willingness to follow Christ towards the cross and the empty fullness, if I can coin a phrase—the empty fullness of true personal being. This is the gift of God in Christ. We should never ask for less. Glory to God.