“When the doors were shut for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst and
said, ‘Peace be with you!’” (John 20:19)
If we say, “Why do we meet again at an All American Council?” it means that we have forgotten the purpose of council. We can speak of agendas and problems, budgets and departments, reports and reviews; but the primary reason is to be together in Christ. We may occupy an entire continent and scatter over three nations our parishes, monasteries and institutions, but we are basically the same Church who gathered that traumatic day of the resurrection in the Upper Room. Like the apostles, we too yearn to experience the same Christ alive now among all who are baptized in His name.
The tragedy of forgetting that we belong to one another in Him deprives us of the sobornost, which we explain to western Christians as an earmark of our communion. It may be that as Wordsworth wrote, “The world is too much with us,” and we have lost the awareness of having partaken of the same sacred Host and chalice several years ago. It’s in our nature as humans to adapt and adjust to whatever conditions we find ourselves; nevertheless we ought to bear in mind the ideal condition—at least on this side of the Kingdom—and that is to become that same “little flock” that our Lord Jesus so loved and for which He sacrificed His life on earth.
We know all this theoretically, and we even practice its implications. All our hierarchs remember one another in their sacred prayers, those diptychs that are on their and our tables of oblation. Every priest stands at his preparation table an hour before the Divine Liturgy recalling by name the ordained and lay persons in his deanery and diocese, removing small particles from the bread of offering so that not only by word but by matter all are united on the sacred paten to be lifted up to the Lord of love. More, the priests call to mind the invisible yet actually present Church, those who have gone before us to their rest in the bosom of Abraham.
We come to Him, and we do so many times alone in our prayers and contemplation. In our “closets,” we close out the cacophony of society and descend from our minds into the depths of our hearts to be with Him one on One. Nourished and energized with spiritual food, we expand our awareness of all others who have given themselves totally and irrevocably to Christ Jesus.
We pray for those with the Elijah syndrome, tempted to believe that they are one of a pitiful few left with a remnant of faith in a world having left the Orthodox Church behind. We pray for the nun considering whether her choice of a lifetime commitment to Christ was the right decision. We pray for the layman struggling to establish a mission with so little cooperation and so many obstacles to conquer. We pray for the young priest in an old parish, and for the old priest who senses that he may be out of touch with his flock.
We are the Orthodox Church in America, but we are not all Americans. Many of us come with Old World attitudes, convictions and mindsets that can never be altered. Others are trying to look as little American as possible, hoping to pass themselves as immigrants. Children and grandchildren of early pioneers whose native tongues and ways have long been forgotten share the same Christ with those with a record of having passed through a variety of cults, sects and life styles. The One Who proclaimed that “Whoever loses his life for My sake will find it” (Matthew 16:25), stretches His arms out from the Cross and calls us all to gather with love for one another despite our disparities and find consolation, energy, confidence and renewal of our commitment in Him, with Him and for Him in the assembly we call the All-American.