Flagrant Secularism in Church
Not always, but right now, I'm awfully happy that I’m not registered as a believer, and I have my reasons for it. I know well what the Church means in the history of Georgia and in the current life of its populous parish, and I have a lot of respect for their feelings. What bothers me, though, is that the Church today looks like a regular industry, ridden with outrageous scandals. We hear that somebody wanted to take our Patriarch’s life, and to this end, that ‘somebody’ had clandestinely purchased poisonous material, strong enough to assassinate the holy man. The investigation into the alleged crime has been ongoing for months now, with zero results. Moreover, the more time passes, the more the plot thickens…and the characters involved are multiplying like mushrooms.
In this sickening process, we, the watchers of the filthy story, are gradually coming to believe that the Church is not much different from the rest of our life’s regular components: the lay want to have fun and frolic around, so do the clergy; the lay want to drive expensive modern cars and use overly sophisticated cell phones, so do the clergy; the lay want to drink and go garrulous, so do the clergy; the lay want to make a fortune overnight, so do the clergy; the lay go out and do business, so do the clergy; the lay go on TV and radio with big mouths to somehow justify the alleged wrongdoings, so do the clergy. Both use the same style of parlance, same vocabulary, same stresses and accents, same ups and downs, same slang, same everything. So, what’s the difference between the two? The only difference is the social status – the clergy preach and the lay listen. The result – zilch!
I understand well that what I’m saying can be construed as atheist’s talk, but no- I’m just a regular pursuant of the truth. And where the truth might be is either egregiously obfuscated or deliberately concealed so tightly and masterfully that centuries will pass and the people will never know it.
Christian Orthodox Church goers are convinced forever and irrefutably that the Orthodox belief is the strongest among the extant Christian denominations in the entire world, but based on what’s going on in the Georgian Church today, nobody could say it’s the most sacred venue of saints. The issue in question and its development have finally staggered the remnants of my belief that the Church can teach me morals and ethics. What I see is the unmitigated secularism with all its vices and humane erroneousness happening in our church. I am earnestly surprised that people still want to go to church, but that’s probably an individual belief in God – not in the organized faith called religion.
Judge me as you wish, but I feel myself a better person for not being involved in church life than anybody else who is. I hate the entire skullduggery I hear and see in the realm of our longstanding traditional faith. I don’t even understand what those grandly and expensively frocked and equipped men are talking about. What do lawyers have to do with the Church? The Church should have its own things to do – kind, elevated, tolerant and wise. Do they have time in there to wax so secular? Unbelievable!
As a consequence of the scandalous incident of the supposed poisoning of His Holiness, one of those clergymen is arrested, ready to do time for God knows how long. Others are still at large, but are suspected for criminal acts. But that’s all OK – almost! The most deplorable side of the situation is aggravated even more by what is happening with the Patriarch’s image and stance, especially at his age of unbidden caducity. Somebody has managed – very wrongly and viciously – to hurt the man’s great name and fame. One of the evaluations of the demoralizing happenings that I have recently heard is that Church needs as much management and leadership with a strong hand as any other segment of human activity.
The Church is even more difficult to lead and manage and let it function on the level of its genuine vocation. We need our Church, but not as it stands right now. We need it intact, pristine and lofty as it has always been with its heroic past and individuals, and with its indispensable role of a spiritual leader of the nation.
Nugzar B. Ruhadze