Hristos a ȋnviat din morţiCu moartea pe moarte călcȃnd
Şi celor din morminte
Viaţă dăruindu-le.
The words above are the Romanian words to a song sung by Orthodox Christians around the world on Easter. The English words are:
Christ is risen from the dead,
Trampling down death by death,
And upon those in the tombs,
Restoring life.
Today is Easter Sunday in the Eastern Orthodox Church. (The Eastern Church uses an older calendar when calculating the date of Easter than does the Western Church.)
Last night I went to Holy Trinity Orthodox Church in Overland Park, Kansas, for their midnight Easter service. I have attended an Orthodox Church for Orthodox Easter each year I've been in the Kansas City area, except for last year when Eastern and Western Easter fell on the same Sunday.
I was introduced to the Orthodox Church when I traveled to Jerusalem in 2000, and became more familiar with it while I was in Romania. Since I plan to return to Romania, it is vitally important that I understand the language and cultural traditions of the Romanian people. The Orthodox Church has had a profound impact in the Romanian culture. As Protestant missionaries, we cannot pretend to be the first bearers of the Gospel to this traditionally-Orthodox country. We need to understand the historical significance of the Orthodox Church. We need to build on the foundation they have already established.
Many Protestants believe that since our methods of worship are so dramatically different that there is little commonality between Orthodox and Protestants. Some people have even gone so far as to wonder if the Orthodox are Christians! While our doctrines and church polity do differ, there is much more that unites us than divides us. Until about 150 years ago, there was little communication between Protestants in the West and Orthodox in the East. For the majority of the second half of the twentieth century, much of the Orthodox countries were being oppressed by communist atheism. Eastern Orthodoxy has remained a mystery to many in the West, and Protestantism is equally mysterious to many in the Orthodox East.
By taking steps to understand the Orthodox Church, we can hope to open up communication between Protestant and Orthodox church leaders. An ambitious goal, perhaps, but think about this: Often the only thing Protestant missionaries know about the Orthodox church is what people who left the Orthodox church have told them, rather than investigating it for themselves. They take opinion to be fact and do not search for the truth. True, there are some Orthodox leaders who are quite antagonistic toward Protestant Christians, but there are also a lot of Protestants who are antagonistic toward the Orthodox. And yes, there are some abuses in the Orthodox Church, especially in those churches during communism, but can we say that our church is free of abuses?
When we actually take time to study the Orthodox church, it forces us to study our own tradition in order to see if we are as different as we initially think. As members of the Church of the Nazarene, we follow the teachings of John Wesley, who patterned much of his theology after Eastern Church models. In that manner, we as Wesleyans are closer to our Eastern Orthodox brothers and sisters than are some other Protestant groups.
We may use different calendars, speak different languages, have different histories, church polities, and worship styles, but I am able to proclaim with my Orthodox brothers and sisters in Christ, "Hristos a ȋnviat (Christ is risen). Adevarat c-a ȋnviat (Truly he is risen)."
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