The Orthodox Preference for Democracy: An American Response to “The Church in the Public Square” (Section II), in For the Life of the World: Toward a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church

In For the Life of the World: Toward a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church, there is a clear preference for the “democratic genius of the modern age.” This preference for democracy is due, in part, to the long experience of the Orthodox Church with other governmental forms, especially autocratic and authoritarian states.

For the Life of the World: Some Reflections

As its title would suggest, For the Life of the World: Towards a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church offers a comprehensive statement of the ideals and principles that should guide Orthodox Christians, and the church itself, in the effort to live a Christlike life in today's pluralistic society. The expression “social ethos” might suggest that this document limits itself to social questions as these are commonly understood, offering a kind of Orthodox equivalent of Roman Catholic social encyclicals. On examination, it is clear that this document goes beyond the standard topics pursued under the rubric of social ethics. It includes an extended discussion of marriage and family life, addressing questions of marital relations and family dynamics as well as the social dimension of marriage; a comparably extended discussion of medical ethics; extended comments on ecumenical and interfaith relations; and reflections on the liturgy as the ultimate context for the moral life. We even find brief but perceptive remarks on our treatment of animals. This document is not so much a presentation of social ethics as a treatise on moral theology comprehensively considered. The nearest Roman Catholic parallel would be Veritatis Splendor, rather than one of the social encyclicals.

For the Life of the World: Toward an Appraisal of Its Use of Scripture

Adopting David Kelsey's study of modern theologians’ uses of Scripture (1975), this article investigates the theoretical basis and practical outcomes for the procedure exemplified in For the Life of the World: Toward a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church (2020). A consonance of its interpretive postulates and manner of scriptural appeals is demonstrable, coupled with diminished attention to biblical breadth and cogent scriptural warrants.

Life in This World and For the Life of the World: Natural Science and the Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church

For the Life of the World: Toward a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church (FLOW) is an admirable and important document, not least because it affirms natural scientific insights as valuable resources for Christian theology and social teaching. Given the current Ecumenical Patriarch's extensive engagement with environmental concerns, this affirmation is especially apposite. However, I do not believe FLOW fully recognizes the implications of such insights for its conception of God's creation or its social ethos. In particular, FLOW maintains that scarcity, competition, violence, and death are distortions of God's creation due to human sin and that human beings are commissioned and capacitated by God to strive to overcome them. By contrast, I contend that contemporary scientific understandings of planetary forces and ecological processes—and indeed Christian scripture—give Christians cause to consider scarcity, competition, violence, and death aspects of God's creation. I further claim that striving to overcome scarcity, competition, violence, and death would be environmentally disastrous and spiritually deleterious since it would domesticate the rapidly disappearing wilderness that biblical wisdom literature depicts as delighting and glorifying God. Happily, allowing natural scientific insights to inform Orthodox conceptions of God's creation in this way would render FLOW's injunction that human beings redress the environmental implications of their sin an imperative to reduce and remedy pollution and to minimize and restore anthropogenic habitat degradation and destruction, thereby fostering the ecological sustainability Orthodoxy champions and the respect for wilderness Christians have multiple reasons to commend. Although this abandons FLOW's aspiration that human beings wholly civilize God's creation, such respect for wilderness does not imply acquiescence to human deprivation and distress, for just as it is inappropriate to impose cultural values on all of nature, it is wrong to regard all natural dynamics culturally normative. Similarly, attributing scarcity, competition, violence, and death to God's creation rather than its sin need not undermine Christian hopes for freedom from these and all other maladies, for Christians await not only God's salvation from sin and its effects but God's new creation too. Thus, in addition to honing Orthodoxy's social ethos, heeding FLOW's embrace of natural scientific insights as constructive theological resources foregrounds a commonly neglected dimension of Christians' traditional depiction of the divine economy.

Welfare State Romance

Forster’s works responded to the heated reformist debates surrounding the passing of the 1911 Insurance Act, and they engaged with the question whether a new social ethos of responsibility and care would need to precede, or whether it would flow from, institutional reform. What Howards End calls ‘preparedness’—i.e. the attempt to protect the most vulnerable members of society against the risk of unemployment—is central to the generic instabilities of Forster’s novel. These instabilities are further heightened in Forster’s novel fragment Arctic Summer, which fails in championing the excitements of ‘romance’ over the perceived boredom of a life guarded against risk. We need to read with rather than against the grain of these texts by taking seriously both their progressive aspirations and their reparative attention to subject positions that are excluded from the period’s projects of reform.

To Live is Christ: Exploring the Promise and Limits of For the Life of the World

For the Life of the World represents a landmark discussion of social ethics within the Orthodox academy in the West. This article begins by looking at the document's self-understanding as an exploratory rather than a definitive text that seeks to provoke rather than curtail discussion. The overarching matter of how even the possibility of a viable social ethos is debated in modern Orthodoxy is briefly dealt with through the lens of ethical apophaticism and cataphaticism. The document itself, a cataphatic contribution in this regard, is then examined in terms of its ethical priorities, its tone in addressing these priorities, as well as its overall theological coherence. Potential ambiguities and dissonance in the document are highlighted. A concluding appeal is made for more work on clarifying the Orthodox theological presuppositions that go into crafting Orthodox social ethics, and a positive proposal is offered, centred on an Orthodox ethos of repentance.

Violence, War, and Capital Punishment in For the Life of the World: Toward a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church

In response to the challenges presented by violence, war, and capital punishment, For the Life of the World: Toward a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church argues that foundational liturgical, canonical, and spiritual resources invite the Church to manifest a foretaste of the fullness of God’s peace amidst the brokenness of a world that remains tragically inclined toward taking the lives of those who bear the divine image and likeness. It also summons the Church to engage people and power structures toward the end of enacting practical reforms that ameliorate the underlying causes of violence, a task especially urgent in light of the powerful weapons and technologies employed by governments today. While reflecting distinctive Orthodox sensibilities on the topics it addresses, the document also presents points of commonality with other Christian traditions of theological and moral reflection, especially concerning the obligation to take realistic initiatives in peacemaking.

Neuere sozialethische Entwicklungen in der Orthodoxie

Zusammenfassung Dieser Artikel möchte das neue, im März 2020 veröffentlichte Papier „For the Life of the World. Toward a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church“ (FLW) vorstellen und durch den Vergleich mit früheren orthodoxen Äußerungen zum Thema in seiner Bedeutung für den inner-orthodoxen Dialog wie auch für das ökumenische Gespräch erfassen. Dabei kommt die Autorin zu dem Ergebnis, dass FLW im Vergleich zu den früheren Texten einen grundlegend positiveren Zugang zu modernen Fragestellungen wie Menschenrechte, menschliche Lebensformen, Wissenschaft und Technik hat und eine größere Offenheit aufweist. Aus diesem Grund hat das neu veröffentlichte Dokument ein wegweisendes Potential nicht nur für die Orthodoxie selbst, sondern auch für die ökumenischen Dialoge der Orthodoxen Kirchen mit anderen Kirchen.

Doing Orthodox Political Theology Today Insights from the Document For the Life of the World: Toward a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church (2020)

The document titled For the Life of the World: Toward a Social Ethos of the Ortho dox Church, authored by a special commission of Orthodox scholars appointed by the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew is a document that can be definitely understood as a political manifesto of Eastern Orthodoxy for the 21st century, namely for this period of history and not for a by-gone historical setting or a Christian utopia (either the Byzantine Empire or Holy Russia), a period of time with urgent problems and challenges that call for our attention. Therefore, bringing to the fore the personalist anthropological view inherent in the document itself, an attempt has been made in the text to critically reflect and highlight certain relevant aspects of the document (a positive reception of liberal democracy, human rights language, solidarity to the poor, etc.). The goal is to show how theologically important this document is for the Church witness to our pluralistic world.