There is much talk today about how the observant Christian should live in a world that is hostile to Christian values. A great deal of the current conversation centers around Rod Dreher’s The Benedict Option. Rod is a long-time acquaintance of mine – although we’ve only met in person once – but that said, and with all due respect, The Benedict Option conversation is not one that I’m interested in entering – there are a zillion potential conversations about countless issues to be had at any given moment, so we all have to pick and choose what we have time for. Being able to do that is the key to sanity these days, I think.
But ...today’s reading from the Office of Readings pertains to that conversation, so I’m just going to toss it out here for you.
It pertains not only to the Benedict Option conversation, but obviously, to the bigger, enduring conversation about a believer’s life in the world – enduring because the document cited dates (we think) to the second century.
It’s well worth reading in its entirety, not just today, but every day.
The passage is from the Letter to Diognetus. Patristics Popularizer Extraordinaire Mike Aquilina provides a helpful introduction here.
But amid the babble and bigotry came a group of early Church Fathers known as “the apologists.” Following St. Peter’s counsel, they sought always to “be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks for a reason for your hope” (1 Pt 3:15). Some, like Justin Martyr (c. 100-c.165), spoke the highly technical language of the Platonist philosophers, who were somewhat confused about the Christianity they sought to refute. Others spoke to Jews, and still others to the devotees of the mystery cults.
But one apologist offered a different method. He produced a documentary of sorts — a vivid, impressionistic account of how the earliest Christians REALLY behaved. In the face of hatred, he showed a community that lived in true love.
We don’t know his name, the author who wrote the stunning “Letter to Diognetus.” But he was addressing a high Roman official, and deferentially, assuming that the great Diognetus was intelligent and open-minded (and, certainly, that God’s grace was all-powerful).
The text, and some of what’s in the Church’s prayer today:
Christians are indistinguishable from other men either by nationality, language or customs. They do not inhabit separate cities of their own, or speak a strange dialect, or follow some outlandish way of life. Their teaching is not based upon reveries inspired by the curiosity of men. Unlike some other people, they champion no purely human doctrine. With regard to dress, food and manner of life in general, they follow the customs of whatever city they happen to be living in, whether it is Greek or foreign.And yet there is something extraordinary about their lives. They live in their own countries as though they were only passing through. They play their full role as citizens, but labour under all the disabilities of aliens. Any country can be their homeland, but for them their homeland, wherever it may be, is a foreign country. Like others, they marry and have children, but they do not expose them. They share their meals, but not their wives. They live in the flesh, but they are not governed by the desires of the flesh. They pass their days upon earth, but they are citizens of heaven. Obedient to the laws, they yet live on a level that transcends the law.Christians love all men, but all men persecute them. Condemned because they are not understood, they are put to death, but raised to life again. They live in poverty, but enrich many; they are totally destitute, but possess an abundance of everything. They suffer dishonour, but that is their glory. They are defamed, but vindicated. A blessing is their answer to abuse, deference their response to insult. For the good they do they receive the punishment of malefactors, but even then they rejoice, as though receiving the gift of life. They are attacked by the Jews as aliens, they are persecuted by the Greeks, yet no one can explain the reason for this hatred.To speak in general terms, we may say that the Christian is to the world what the soul is to the body. As the soul is present in every part of the body, while remaining distinct from it, so Christians are found in all the cities of the world, but cannot be identified with the world. As the visible body contains the invisible soul, so Christians are seen living in the world, but their religious life remains unseen. The body hates the soul and wars against it, not because of any injury the soul has done it, but because of the restriction the soul places on its pleasures. Similarly, the world hates the Christians, not because they have done it any wrong, but because they are opposed to its enjoyments.Christians love those who hate them just as the soul loves the body and all its members despite the body’s hatred. It is by the soul, enclosed within the body, that the body is held together, and similarly, it is by the Christians, detained in the world as in a prison, that the world is held together. The soul, though immortal, has a mortal dwelling place; and Christians also live for a time amidst perishable things, while awaiting the freedom from change and decay that will be theirs in heaven. As the soul benefits from the deprivation of food and drink, so Christians flourish under persecution. Such is the Christian’s lofty and divinely appointed function, from which he is not permitted to excuse himself.
And what happens when we say yes?
And when you have attained this knowledge, with what joy do you think you will be filled? Or, how will you love Him who has first so loved you? And if you love Him, you will be an imitator of His kindness. And do not wonder that a man may become an imitator of God. He can, if he is willing. For it is not by ruling over his neighbours, or by seeking to hold the supremacy over those that are weaker, or by being rich, and showing violence towards those that are inferior, that happiness is found; nor can any one by these things become an imitator of God. But these things do not at all constitute His majesty. On the contrary he who takes upon himself the burden of his neighbour; he who, in whatsoever respect he may be superior, is ready to benefit another who is deficient; he who, whatsoever things he has received from God, by distributing these to the needy, becomes a god to those who receive [his benefits]: he is an imitator of God.