The tragedy of being a priest without Divine Grace
by
Nikita Kafkiou
SAINT
PORPHYRIOS A PRIEST’S PRIEST
Mr. Kafkiou tells us: “The personal
relationship of man with God is not a given, nor is it guaranteed to be stable,
progressive or constant. A priest may
start off in life with spiritual enthusiasm for his priestly calling. But after a few years, it is possible for him
to feel completely removed from the Grace of God. Human weaknesses, the difficulties of married
life, the uncertainties of daily life are able to knuckle under the most
dedicated faithful priest. The only possible
way for a priest to live a spiritual life is for him to accept his unworthiness
and to submit his feelings to the love of Jesus Christ. If a priest cannot bring himself to bring
before Jesus his pain and defeat, he will end up being completely lost. For a priest to find spiritual maturity he must
realize that this journey is a one way street.
If a priest does not progress spiritually he will be ripped to
shreds. If the priest falls away from
God because of his spiritual failures, he will become worldly. Instead of a liturgist he will end up being simply
an actor.
A priest who is burdened by the
darkness of his spiritual downfall no longer has the disposition or the burning
desire to deal with liturgical details of Church life. In many of our Orthodox Churches on Sunday
mornings and feast days the gathering of the faithful feels like they are attending
a theatrical performance. During the
celebration of Church services the faithful do not feel a sense of peace. Instead of charging up their spiritual
batteries they experience psychosomatic turmoil. His emotional life is tortured and his
spiritual being is scandalized.
In the following paragraphs, I will
attempt to comment directly on certain acts and behavior of a spiritually burdened
priest which upset sensitive and well-intentioned Church goers. I am listing
fifteen contemporary ways with which our Church turns people off.
LITURGICAL
MISCUES CAUSED BY AN INDIFFERENT PRIEST
1.
Acoustics:
(Please remember, once again, that the author of these
statements is making them with tongue in cheek). Turn up the
volume on the PA system so that nobody feels comfortable and cannot feel a
sense of compunction. Also place
speakers outside the Church building in order to upset the neighbors. This will
also allow Church goers listening to the service outside the Church not to find
a sense of peace. Do not allow
professional people install the PA system.
The priest should be concerned that the final acoustical system should
remind one of a gypsy who navigates our neighborhoods with his cart selling
carpets and potatoes.
2.
Lighting. The priest should make sure that the
chandeliers are turned on for the services.
And if for some reason the chandeliers are not lit make sure that you
have a powerful floodlight that reminds people of a police searchlight during a
police investigation. You should allow
the cantors to have a bright light shining on their heads so that they can read
their service books.
3.
Sermon.
Make sure you give the
sermon before Holy Communion (before the invitation: “With the fear of God,
with faith and with love draw near.”
Make sure your sermon is long. It
should avoid talking about real life issues and zero in on social, moral and
political issues. You should also
emphasize the moral downfall of contemporary society. You should offer moral advice to the
congregation in an alarming way. Make
sure that you express your exasperation with the prevalence of sin in our
contemporary world. Emphasize the
egocentric tendency of middle class people wanting to live the good life. While doing this you should also compare this
way of life with the ascetics of the Church who live in the wilderness. Try to
convince people in your sermon that the reason they are not progressing
spiritually is because they are not trying hard enough. Make sure to speak with a loud voice—menacing
voice so that the people will believe what you are saying.
4.
Typikon—Rubrics.
(The
liturgical order of services). The
priest should be indifferent to the liturgical order of services. The
liturgical rubrics are not something foundational. Cut and paste the
service the way you desire it
to be. Do not read the Psalms and the readings
from the Old Testament because the faithful do not understand this
ancient
language. Give directives to the cantors
not to chant the whole of “Κύριε έκέκραξα» during the vesper service and also omit most of the odes in the
matins service. Do things in a hurried
and most convenient way for you.
5.
Behavior.
The priest should make
sure that during the course of the services that he should navigate around the
altar nervously. The priest should do
everything with a sense of indifference and without feeling deeply what he is
doing. When you face the congregation in
the Royal Entrance or when you are about to incense the people make sure you check
out who is in Church. You can also look upon the congregation with a sense of
indifference.
6.
Vestments. During the Divine Liturgy the priest should wear
vestments with bright colors and a lot of phony jewels. Make sure that you look
spectacular. Understand how important
you are and that you are truly the pride of the Church by the way you are
vested.
AN ANGELIC PRESENCE AT THE
DIVINE LITURGY ON MT. ATHOS
7.
Commentary.
During the highlights of the Divine Liturgy such as the Cherubic Hymn, the
Consecration of the Holy Gifts or before dispensing Holy Communion, make sure to
admonish the people about their proper conduct in Church. If a child cries, make sure you make it known
to the mother in a stern way to either remove the child or keep it quiet.
8.
The
Cleanliness of the Icons. Do not bother with the cleanliness of the
icons during Sunday services and for the feast days. Allow the accumulation of saliva and lipstick
to remain on the protective glass of the icons so that the faithful will feel a
sense of disgust while reverencing them.
9.
Candles
and Incense. Make sure
that you offer only the cheapest candles you can purchase for the candle stand
in the narthex. These candles look like soap.
Also price them according to their size.
The priest should stock only the cheapest incense money can buy. Place the kernels of incense on the charcoal
shortly before you start to incense the altar and the icons. Do this so that by
the time you come to incense the people the censer will be giving off only smoke
without the fragrance of incense. Do not
add any more kernels of incense while you are incensing.
10. Intoning the Petitions. When intoning the petitions shout them out
in an inarticulate voice so that no one can understand what you are
saying. Chant in such a way that you
sound like someone singing in a night club.
Forget that you are offering your
prayers to God and make sure that you sound good to your audience and to
yourself. When you read the prayers make
sure you annunciate only the vowels and skip the consonants. It is important to say what you are chanting
or reading not the way you are expressing them. Remember that no one cares and
or understands what is being said.
Project the intensity of your voice in a boisterous way believing that
this will elicit spiritual compunction from the faithful.
11. During the Divine Liturgy make sure that you use wine that is of
average quality. And fill the chalice
with a lot of hot water so that the taste of the wine will be lost. While dispensing Holy Communion make sure the
communion spoon contains very little consecrated wine (the Blood) and no
consecrated bread (the Body). And while dispensing Holy Communion do not say
the name of the communicant. Be very
indifferent to the fact that you are holding in your hands God Himself. While serving the Divine Liturgy make quick
and nervous movements. Dispense the Body
and Blood of the Lord in a casual and indifferent way as if you are serving
desert. Make sure that the Divine
Liturgy continues to be chanted while you are dispensing Holy Communion so the
faithful can hear “we have seen the true Light” even before they receive the
Body and Blood of Jesus. At the end of
the Divine Liturgy dispense the antidoron (the pieces of altar bread) with both
hands. While doing this the cantors should
stop chanting so you can hear the chatter of the people in the Church. Make sure you avoid reading the prayer of
thanksgiving while consuming the consecrated elements in the chalice before you
leave the altar.
12. Beggars.
Make sure that
on Sundays and Feast Days that you allow the beggars to stand at the very
entrance to the Church. This allows the
faithful to get a taste of poverty, misery, horror, lies and indignation. In this way, those who attend Church
infrequently acquire a clear connection with God so that they can identify their
attendance at Church with negative feelings.
13. Money. Make sure that
you use every opportunity you get to ask the congregation for money. Place large containers in the narthex that
clearly display how the money will be be used.
Pass trays during the Divine Liturgy.
Make sure that these trays are passed during the holiest moments of the
Liturgy so that the faithful will give more money. Make sure that there are fees for weddings
and baptisms. When the priest visits
homes to perform the services of holy unction or blessing of water the priest
should accept an honorarium without hesitation.
You should believe that you are worthy of being compensated for these
services that you offer. You should not
forget that the majority of the faithful believe that priests are not money
hungry.
14. Problematic Co-workers. The priest should make sure that he appoints
self-centered and ill-tempered council members.
Make them understand that they are the leaders. Impress upon them that they have special
powers. Remind them to police the
faithful in the Church. Now and then
you, the priest, should have disagreements with the council members in front of
the faithful.
15. Automobile.
The priest
should buy a very expensive automobile so that the faithful will be
scandalized. You should make your choice
of an automobile based on the argument that even Jesus did not walk around but
used a beautiful donkey for transportation.
With an automobile like this the faithful will be reminded of Palm Sunday
and Jesus Christ.
16. Iconography. If there are any bare walls in Church, the
priest should get bids from iconographers and fill these spaces with
inexpensive icons. Make sure that these
icons do not display a sense of creativity but they are simply copies of icons.
17. The Altar Bread. Place baskets of altar bread in the narthex of the
Church. The pieces of bread should be large pieces and make sure that this
bread is purchased by the faithful at a local bakery. If the priest does this he will not be burdened
with handing out the bread himself. This
will also allow him to avoid coming into personal contact with the faithful of
the parish.
-Dear
People,
I found this article on the Greek internet and it
fascinated me about Church life in Greece and why people do not attend Church
frequently in that country. It is
fascinating to me because, as an Orthodox priest in America, I am always
concerned about issues that keep our faithful from attending our Churches. It is very important to realize as you read
about these issues that turn people off about attending Church that some of
these issues do not apply here in America.
As you read the article, those of you that live in the USA will know which
are unique to Greece. As I translated the seventeen reasons that discourage our
faithful from attending Church services, it is very evident that the person who
wrote this article writes about these issues with tongue in cheek. Every one of the reasons that he writes about
are written mockingly. In other words he
wished that priests would not do the things that he writes about. As I read about the negative things that
priests do in our Churches that make them uninviting to our faithful, I came to
the conclusion that only by being totally committed to Jesus Christ as Lord and
Savior can a priest avoid the pitfalls that destroy his calling. Mr.
Kafkiou says that when a young priest loses his enthusiasm and idealism about
the priesthood he most always ends up being nothing more than an actor. I pray that I will be able to get across to
you the spirit of what this man is trying to say about the parish priest.
Translated
from the Greek by:
+Fr.
Constantine (Charles) J. Simones, Waterford, CT, June 24, 2014,
No comments:
Post a Comment