In America, for perhaps the first time in history, the Orthodox Church is flourishing in a truly multicultural atmosphere. By God’s providence, the combination of multiple Orthodox immigrant diasporas as well as the influx of new converts has allowed multiple different ethnic jurisdictions to exist alongside each other in every major city. American Orthodox Christians may even see friction within parishes as they transition away from the liturgical language of the diaspora, incorporating more English to accommodate both the newer arrivals and the cradle Orthodox who have assimilated. In a sense, the Orthodox Churches in America mirror the greater American dynamic: immigrant communities from Europe struggling to retain or even understand their own identity in the wake of assimilation. Therefore, Orthodox Christians of the diaspora may ask themselves: to what extent should the Christian value and preserve his own ethnicity, cultural heritage, and identity? Does baptism supersede or even annihilate this natural instinct to preserve one’s heritage?
Unfortunately, modernist presuppositions frame the answers to such questions. Worse, they can make people uncomfortable with even asking them. For a Greek-American to say, for example, that he cares enough about his heritage that he wants to have Greek children seems anachronistic and outdated to many in the West.
Nevertheless, such a modernistic understanding of fealty to one’s own nation is simply incongruent with the historical Christian perspective on ethnicity. Modernist Christians may cite St. Paul to brow-beat nationalists and shame them for their national pride. The Evangelist writes, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Gal. 3:28). However, the modernists err in reading liberal notions of “equality” into the sacred words. For them, his words are ammunition to perpetuate the elimination of the distinctions between men, or rather to pretend such distinctions do not exist. Of course, the Orthodox Christian understands that in Christ, all nations, whether Jew or Greek, were equally bound under the law of sin, equally redeemed by the precious Blood of Christ, and now they are equally judged by the same Gospel. However, the modernist goes further by extrapolating from this truth that all the distinctions between nations are merely accidents of geography and therefore “socially constructed.” Accordingly, the Christian has no need to care for his own heritage. To do so, for them, would constitute pride or, even more absurd, the heresy of ethnophyletism. On the contrary, to claim that the words of St. Paul here constitute the elimination of national or ethnic distinctions would also mean they constitute the elimination of the differences between the sexes. Of course, the more honest of the Progressive Christian denominations have already taken the modernist interpretation to its logical conclusion and imported both critical race and gender theory into their churches.
How then, should the Christian understand his heritage? First of all, everything a Christian has is a gift given to him by Providence. His life, economic circumstances, family, social standing, and nation have not been earned but rather bestowed upon him by God. As the priest exclaims at the end of every liturgy, quoting the epistle of St. James, “For every good gift and perfect thing is from above, coming down from thee, the Father of lights, and to Thee do we ascribe glory.” Therefore, just as with every other gift from God, the Christian is not meant to squander it and let it perish, lest he be found as the servant that buried the talents instead of multiplying them. Rather, he is obliged to care for and even transfigure it in the Christian life.
The Christian loves his people, both his progeny and his heritage, in the sense that he thanks God for his circumstances and then in turn desires the best for his own people, which would ultimately be their salvation. One may note the parallels here between the Christian attitude toward one’s family and one’s ethnos.
Until this point, we have dealt with the theoretical Christian attitude toward one’s people, but we have yet to see how this has played out in the Orthodox Church. Is there any historical basis for an ethnic consciousness in the history and life of the Church? To the dismay of the modernists, the answer is a resounding yes. Even in the early Church, an ethnic consciousness was already presupposed and applied to the practical Christian life. Commenting on the words of the Sermon on the Mount, St. Cyprian of Carthage writes, “If it is a source of joy and glory to men to have children like to themselves — and it is more agreeable to have begotten an offspring then when the remaining progeny [corresponds] to the parent with like lineaments — how much greater is the gladness in God the Father, when any one is so spiritually born that in his acts and praises the divine eminence of race is announced!” (Treatise 10, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/050710.htm) Note here the parallel between exhibiting the characteristics of one’s lineage and nation and then exhibiting the divine characteristics of virtue. St. Cyprian takes the natural human instinct to preserve one’s ethnic heritage for granted, and then applies it to spiritual life. In other words, “If it is natural for the father to pass on the traits of his people, how much more does the Heavenly Father want to pass on the divine characteristics of holiness?” Furthermore, an ethnic consciousness is even present in the liturgical life of the Church. For example, the Russian Orthodox Church commemorates St. Vladimir and the baptism of the Rus on July 28th. Such a liturgical celebration transcends imperial and national boundaries, as it is celebrated not only in Russia itself, but also the surrounding Slavic nations and even in the diaspora (see here: https://orthochristian.com/161943.html). Thus, the liturgical celebration demonstrates consciousness of an ethnic lineage spanning over ten centuries back to the Kievan princes. Even further, one can see the ethnic variance in how the Greeks and Russians each celebrate in October the Pokrov, or the Protection of the Mother of God. Whereas the Greeks commemorate the feast on October 28th, Oxi Day, as the Mother of God’s protection of the Greek people, the Russians commemorate the 10th century invasion of Constantinople by the still-pagan Slavs. On that day of the invasion, the Theotokos appeared before the Blachernae Church and the Slavic fleet was miraculously defeated (read more here: https://orthochristian.com/86742.html) . Despite this event occurring prior to the Baptism of the Rus, it is celebrated as the Slavic people’s first direct encounter with their future God. If an ethnic consciousness were not present in the life of the Church, then such celebrations would be impossible. The Church, then, recognizes each nation and their dynamic relationship with God. One can even see national characteristics manifest from things as substantial as hymnographic traditions to those as minute as local customs of piety specific to the national churches. Like a beautiful mosaic, all these variances reflect each nation’s unique relationship with God in the Orthodox Church. In 1971, Metropolitan Vitaly Ustinav of ROCOR, commenting on the Civil Rights Movement in America, expounded profoundly on the relationship between nationality and religion. His thoughts perfectly summarize the Orthodox spirit of an ethnic consciousness. He writes,
“The culture of each nation is, first of all, its view of heaven, its relation to divinity in general, to the Holy Trinity if it be a Christian nation. This orientation toward heaven impresses its own deep mark on the activities of a given nation: on its life, its habits, its productions in any field, science, music and art. Every nation strives toward the Unembraceable, Boundless, Uncircumscribed God. The nation follows its own path, establishes its own heaven: Russian, German, French — but invariably its own. And God opens their heaven to them. Here we have the highest value of any nationality, the window, as it were, of every race into heaven, into the Kingdom of Heaven. There is no man without a nation or tribe, nor is there a religion without a nation, just as there is no nation without a religion. These two phenomena are mutually dependent and cannot be separated either in time or in composition.” (Source: https://www.rocorstudies.org/2012/08/30/belye-negry/)
The Orthodox faith does not erase ethnic identity but sanctifies it, transforming national heritage into a vessel for divine grace. National and ethnic consciousness, far from being a modernist construct, is woven into the Church’s history, liturgy, and theology. To love one’s people is not arrogance; rather, it is gratitude for God’s gifts. Thus, the Christian honors both his heavenly and earthly inheritance, preserving his nation and striving for its salvation as an offering to Christ, the Lord of all.