The Forerunner (Winter 2005)

On the Friday evening, after some opening words from Bishop Kallistos, Fr David Gill put the Fellowship's Summer 2005 Conference into context with the notions of 'True and False Self' used by Donald Winnicott and by Fr Vasileios Thermos in his book In Search of the Person, and showed how similar idea are to be found in the theology of St Gregory Palamas.

After prayers next morning, Fr Andrew Louth, using as his title Shakespeare's What a piece of work is a man!, presented the conference participants with a Patristic understanding of what it is to be human. For the Fathers of the Church, the human being is a microcosm. To be created in God's image means that we humans are creators as He is. But we are also fragile and have passions. These human passions have both a desiring and an incensive aspect. For the Fathers, prayer is the interpretation of human desires, and also the transformation of them, while prayer is also an expression of love.

Dr Frank Johnson, as a paediatrician with a strong interest in conception and childbirth issues, shared with the conference the insights he had gained from listening to women's experiences. He did this in a challenging way - and in front of a challenging audience largely made up of women. Notions such as sinful desire, lust, cleansing, controlled sexual life, etc. were debated. To bear witness to some experiences and to raise questions is important, even though the answers to those questions may not come for a generation.

Mother Sarah, of the Convent of St John of Kronstadt, Bath, spoke about the New Martyr Elisabeth of Russia. She was and still is a model for diaconal work by women. Elisabeth really fulfilled the meaning of a diaconal mission in Jesus’ sense of serving others and dying for them. Elisabeth served the poor in a creative way, and her example should be followed today. The discussion following Mother Sarah's talk brought out the fact that helping others is often a two-way process: both the helped and the helper benefit.

On Sunday, after the Liturgy, Fr Nikolai (Sakharov) spoke about Russian religious thinking on the concept of ‘person’. After the sixteenth century, Russia discovered that the most important ideal for her mixture of nations was for her people to learn what it really meant to be human. In the nineteenth century the 'person' was either seen as being 'above history' or else it had a holistic understanding, while in the twentieth century emphasis was placed on the 'person' in relationship, reflecting the love which exists within the Holy Trinity.

After lunch Wendy Robinson summarised the talks. The general conclusion was that there are no easy answers to the question 'What is a human being?', and neither medicine, nor anthropology, nor social sciences provide a satisfactory definition. Nevertheless, all these disciplines are in agreement that relationship is an essential constituent of human personality.

The plenary session on Sunday afternoon discussed further issues of concern to those present, for example homosexuality and sexuality in general.

The Conference's thanks are due to Ushaw College for their hospitality, to Bishop Kallistos and Bede Gerrard for organising the Conference, to Fr Kyril Jenner for his chaplaincy to the Conference, and to Nicholas Chapman for providing the Conference Bookshop. A collection was made towards the building work planned at the shrine of St Edward at Brookwood Monastery, Surrey.

We have all acquired set views, ways of perceiving and ways of reacting in given circumstances. We have acquired these views, these patterns of behaviour from somewhere, but from where? Sometimes they are not even our own and yet they are part of our makeup. We may well be puzzled! For they may be good - life enhancing, or they may be bad - life diminishing, life denying.

I recently saw a highly intelligent professional woman in mid-life crisis, who said that life was not worth living. She was asking: 'When can I get my life into pristine condition again?' I suggested that this sounded like a quest for perfection and asked where it came from. She immediately responded: 'From my parents! I still have to live by their standards, even though they have been dead for years.'

The essence of life is to be alive, whole, achieving our full and unique potential. We have to be real, true to our self and free from all that is false; not simply existing, living out someone else's life or the life determined by them for us, but travelling a path that is life-enhancing for us. Through our upbringing and development we may have become real or we may be quite false. The latter state may carry us through life, even with great success and sound achievement, but our true self may have been lost on the way.

'Feeling real is more than existing', said Donald Winnicott. If you like: being fully alive is more than survival, however successful that survival.

I want to kook at the foundation of personality - at that which shapes and defines each one of us. For, personality is predictable. We say, 'I know exactly how he will react in these circumstances'. 'She will take this news so hard'. 'That's just him!' 'She’s always been like that!'

I begin by mentioning Freud because of his great pioneering work. He was enabled, by scientific thought, to establish a science of the irrational. He advanced a way of understanding the inexplicable in human behaviour; the disability of nervous illness, the bizarre, the demonic, the explanation of coincidence and accident. He attempted to bring an understanding of human personality and its expression by giving the mind an architecture to describe health and mental aberration. From him we learned about personality and its disorders but relatively little about its early foundations.

He did develop the concept of libido or life energy and the importance of instincts, but he believed these to have the sole purpose of satisfying a need and thus discharging tension. In this sense pleasure seeking: e.g. the child crying out for food when hungry, is satisfied when pleasing nourishment is given. He explained the origin of various conditions as arrested development, as the libido became fixed in the wrong places.

But in all this his understanding was partial or misleading. Donald Winnicott, looking at Freud’s study of Christopher Haitsman, the painter, observed how near Freud was, and how he failed to grasp the significance of instincts which are not directionless but object seeking and object relating. The foundation of human life is to be in relationship. In the image of whomsoever we are made, relationship is at the heart of it.

Thus we have to turn to object relations theory to understand more completely. But first something more about Freud’s work.

Freud thought that the mind of the newly-born child was a ‘blank slate’ - a ‘tabula rasa’.

Thus the unconscious part of the mind is developed during early life by becoming the repository of all that is unacceptable to the child, all base wishes, all that is forbidden. In his reaction to the environment in which he was placed, and as he lived up to the expectations of those around him, parents, siblings, carers, and later teachers and peers, it became necessary to hide away the unacceptable. The unconscious continues through life as the repository of all that threatens the Ego. Freud introduced the idea of repression, while Anna Freud, his daughter, developed a whole theory of Ego Defence Mechanisms. These mechanisms are immediate, automatic and unconscious, as they thrust into the unconscious anything which threatens the Ego by causing excessive anxiety, depression or feelings of worthlessness. In a sense, out of sight, out of mind - but actually still very active in the unconscious part of the mind. Thus we have rationalisation whereby, for example, a student fails his exams but blames it on his involvement with the rugby team; projection where a person cries out for the reinstatement of the death penalty, whilst failing to accept his own inner murderous impulses; or again, Lady Macbeth crying out with remorse in her soliloquy after King Duncan’s death whilst Banquo righty discerns the mechanism of reaction formation when he declares: 'Methinks the lady doth protest too much!'

Carl Jung accepted the understanding of the unconscious with its repressed contents but learned that it was much more. It did not begin as a blank slate but was already formed at birth with a personal and a collective unconscious already enriched by the whole experience of mankind. It is from this collective unconscious that our own personal unconscious emerges and to which our personal life experiences are added. There is the dark side, the shadow, which contains all life's unwanted reactions and is the opposite of what we should like to be (or others would like us to be); but in it is also to be found 'pure gold', for there within it is the archetype of the real self, the icon of humanity at its best, the icon of Christ. There also is stored all the learned experience passed to the individual through his inheritance from his parents and the total tribal and universal wisdom of the ages. It contains the inbuilt possibility to key into the wisdom of ages past. Indeed, there is to be found within the collective unconscious the encounter with the life of God.

The great contribution of the Object Relations School - Fairburn, Melanie Klein, Winnicott - is the realisation that the primary drives of the baby/infant are object - seeking/object - relating. It is no surprise that the primary movement of life is the desire for relationship, made as we are in the image of God who expresses Himself in tri-une relationship.

The child is desperate for such a relationship because if he is not held, loved, made to feel secure, able to relate to others, made to feel real, his life is unbearable, and with urgency he may have to develop a false self to enable him to cope.

We thus come to the concept of the True and the False, the True Self and the False Self.

The True Self is that innate potential soul within us from the moment of conception. Life circumstances present us with a struggle to maintain this, and all of us in life develop a false self in varying degrees from slight to huge. Indeed there is known to us only One who has never done so (and later I shall indicate how important was the influence of His mother in enabling this to be so). A pertinent question is this: How do we become false? Why is it that some never recognise it in themselves or in others? Some never suffer from it. Some suffer a great deal. How is it that the false self sets itself up as real and is accepted as real?

The first awareness of the true self is in the aliveness of the body tissues and the working of the body functions. The baby/ infant is aware of its needs - hunger, thirst, hot, cold, etc., and desires to be held and cared for. In this it is seeking out for relationship and love.

The instincts, every gesture, every need is object - relating - teleological - reaching out to establish a relationship with whoever is closest. Without this security, the child is likely to experience the so-called 'primitive agonies' which are a terrifying fear of returning to the unintegrated state (disintegration):

Falling for ever (self holding) (often experienced in childhood dreams)

Loss of psychosomatic integrity (depersonalisation)

Loss of sense of the real (narcissism)

Loss of capacity to relate to others (autism)

It is thus important for the adult care-giver to be the caretaker of the true self of the child, not the child as perceived and presented, not the child the parents want it to be.

In the beginning, the good environment is a physical one - the baby needs to be held and tended. I emphasise this. We are physical beings and our psychological foundation is physical.

Always the infant’s needs and not the needs of the adult must be in first place, otherwise maternal deprivation can occur.

Maternal Deprivation is of three kinds:

Failure to provide for and to nourish.

Failure to allow time for reverie (abstract musing). It is essential for the baby to be left alone without any demands being made. It needs unstructured time to be itself. (Indeed I believe that we need this as adults in our spiritual regeneration. In the space of worship, when we are relating to God, there is nothing more disruptive and intrusive as to be told to stand up, sit down, sing this. A 'maternal deprivation' which many of our separated brethren have to endure.)

The third deprivation is failure of weaning. The parent must let go to allow the child to take on life’s challenges whatever the perceived risk. (The story of the Loving Father, in the story of the Prodigal Son, illustrates this).

In all this a Good Enough Mother is required, not perfect, but good enough. Fallen human beings can only do their best, but it is worth reflecting on the role of the Most Holy Mother of God, Mary, full of grace, and her importance in the care of Our Lord. His humanity, if, as we believe, it was authentic humanity, was shaped by her care.

Against this the Not Good Enough Mother substitutes her own problems and gestures to which the infant must learn to respond by compliance. Here the mother has an inability to sense the infant’s needs and to react and encourage appropriately. Rather, she pursues what is best for her, best for the adult and not for the child. Here is the danger. If spontaneity is suppressed the false self develops. Its development is the best the child can do in the circumstances.

Please refer again to my first illustration, the woman of full maturity crying out: 'I still have to live to their (my parents) standards! Please tell me I can be myself!'

When the child has to conform in order to cope with the unreasonable demands being made by inadequate parenting, then the conformity that results leads to intellectualisation.

In early life it is the body, emotions and desires which lead to conflict. The inadequate mother has not come to terms with these in herself and she can feel quite threatened when she sees them in her offspring. On the other hand, the intellect is internal and free from outside observation. It exists in a private space not threatening to others. Through it a false self can be developed unchallenged and even gaining approval and praise.

There is a fourth area of Maternal / Paternal Deprivation.

This is described, although not referred to as such, by Dr Vasileos Thermos in his important book In Search of the Person. Parents who are in a rush to reform their children before they have completed their formation may cause such natural formation to be disrupted and undermined. My first illustration again: 'They (my parents) had no need to push us; we would have achieved anyway.' Instead of natural development, she and her sister experienced 'pushed' development.

Parents have to be one step ahead to provide guidance, but they must also be able to assess where their own ability is defective, and seek wholeness as much as they can as a prelude to parenting. They must have a deep willingness to confront, handle and permit the body, desires and emotions of the developing child, but must always give primacy to the developing True Self.

This is difficult for any who experienced deficiencies in their own upbringing. The mother who is unable to respond to the normality of the feelings and gestures of the infant, suffers from similar inadequacies in accepting her own naturalness. Her parents failed to recognise her right to be spontaneous or she was herself unable to accept herself, with the possible explosion of her own aggressiveness. She fears this, she is not at ease with herself and she passes this onto her child. At an early age the child gets the message that it is not all right to be himself. His developing True Self is not acceptable.

At the same time there is the father who is incapable of offering genuine warm emotional support. He disapproves of the expression of anger, sorrow, anxiety and so on, and thus promotes the development of the False Self. It becomes easier for him to rule by the letter of the law rather than engage in the more demanding and sensitive essence of good parenting. The result is to suppress spontaneity and so encourage the conforming false self.

(I note that Rowan Williams in a recent lecture spoke of how Theology can be associated with a crippling by the intellect, whereas apophatic experience is associated with ecstasy. This describes well the tension between the true and false self.)

Let me give some examples of the False Self.

1. CM had what she described as an unremarkable childhood in a happy working-class family. She was a good achiever at school and successful in work. Indeed, she described herself as better than others, pursuing a punishing work commitment in which she was needed up and down the country. She was responsible for the sale and installation of specialised surgical equipment. She thus had to train surgeons and be available in an emergency if required. She had always wanted to be a doctor and now found herself as a substitute for a surgeon. She described herself as having a very important high profile in her sphere.

Suddenly, in her late 50s she had a panic when in the middle of traffic. She had the sudden thought: 'I can't do this any more!' In the following days she collapsed, grew depressed, and became unable to continue. Indeed, she developed a mental and physical breakdown. She has not worked since and now says: 'I can’t believe I ever did this, I feel a complete fake!' Her developed, achieving, highly acclaimed False Self has finally yielded to something more genuine and true. She is content to be at home, looking after her frail husband and pursuing hobbies she enjoys.

(Donald and Clare Winnicott describe this type of reaction in their work on 'Fear of Breakdown'. It arises in a high-achieving, apparently well-adjusted person, where there is an emergence of the Primitive Agonies which I have described above. There is a fear of return to an unintegrated state, of not being held, of falling for ever, of loss of psychosomatic integrity, a loss of the sense of the real, a fear of being abandoned.... The False Self is a defence against these fears and the defence is held rigidly as if life depends on it. It does depend on it in ontological terms. Typically cracks open in the early 30s when important life relationships are not happening or are failing. The person takes the risk of opening up to enter into such a relationship, and then if it doesn’t work the fears of childhood rejection emerge and the defences which held them in check break open. Physical complaints usually develop first. No one wants to see a psychiatrist! But, despite the distress, a real opportunity for realignment and healing is now possible.)

In CM her false self broke down at the peak of her career because it was too self-punishing, and the Primitive Agonies began to emerge, causing total incapacity.

2. AM described himself as a good little boy. He had a high IQ, and parents who were intelligent and conscientious. He said that he never asserted himself at home or at school, and that he was always very attentive to the opinions of others. 'I would live out their requirements of me. I would bury my own feelings.' (How often one hears this cry: 'I live out what others expect of me - I live out their lives rather than be myself.') At University he became depressed and could not apply himself to his studies. He said that he was only happy when listening to music, playing his guitar and out drinking with friends. In other words he was now open to emotional expression and activities which were previously neglected, and he was discovering a side to himself which was less conforming and more relaxed.

This is the problem with the False Self. It may be a necessary adjustment response, but it is never wholesome and healthy when there is the associated suppression of body, emotions and desires.

Dr Vasilios Thermos points out how the debate between the philosopher Barlaam and Gregory Palamas is enlightening. Balaam was horrified to learn that hesychast monks claimed to be perceiving divine experiences through the senses. St Gregory writes in response:

'How is it possible for what God has given us as gifts and has ordained to be part of human nature, to become an obstacle for His salvation?' (Triads).

How does a man with a body, emotion and desires approach deifying grace? According to Barlaam, he must mortify them: 'He concludes that we must completely mortify the passive part of the soul so that none of its energies can function, as well as the common energy of the soul and body' (Triads).

'What then is there left for us to offer God? A pure mind. In other words a phantom, a non-human!' 'We were given the command to crucify our flesh together with its passion (emotions) and desires, not to commit suicide...' (Triads). Vasilios Thermos in his commentary on this adds: 'In my opinion, this constitutes one of the peak moments in Patristic Theology where the wholeness of human nature is affirmed.' He emphasises that we are to be men and women of body, emotions and spiritual desires. A man without this fullness of bodily functions and the wholeness of his emotions and desires is crippled and mortified.

Hence, in spiritual counselling, we have to address this denial (of our bodily feelings and emotions) rather than tease out and emphasise the sinful contents. The passionate part of our being cannot be divided. Our wholeness consists in a physical, mental, spiritual integrity, the bad as well as the good parts.

The problem is that the False Self is popular and desired. Without such popularity (albeit deceptive and seductive), it would be impossible for it to be accepted with its disruption and distortion.

'The false self goes unrecognised because it is socially desirable and is seen as a sign of successful functioning, especially when it is accustomed of taking care of others as learned in infancy' (Edward Hanna).

Let me conclude by saying something about the True Self. The True Self is the realisation of one’s unique potential. It is characterised by the flexibility necessary to face life’s various challenges while maintaining individual freedom, despite the compromises that must be made. Adapting represents a compromise, but this is not allowable in health if it is life-damaging. The True Self must always be able to overrule the compliant self. An example of this is the recurring problem of adolescent crises. This is a clumsy way of seeking acceptance and giving expression to the True Self. It is therefore very laudable. Finally, the True Self must be earthed in the natural body, a temple of the Holy Spirit, not a prison for the soul.

It is important to emphasise that being spiritual is not to be taken as stripping off of the body. The soul must never be separated from the body, nor must spirituality be of the intellect only. It is not! The language of the Fathers makes it clear:

'That which crosses from the spiritually gladdened heart to the body, even when it acts in the body, is still spiritual' (Gregory Palamas, Triads).

'The union of soul and body is so complete and perfect that the body is very much involved in our self-awareness' (Dumitru Stăniloae).

'My soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you; in a dry and weary land where there is no water' (Psalm 63).

One does not have a body, one is a body! Where the body, emotions and desires are in harmony, there is the True Self. When a person refuses to accept the humbleness of his nature, preferring the narcissistic temptation of absolute control, the False Self predominates. A person cannot become his true self without the freedom and encouragement to do so.

I have described the foundation of personality and given some pointers towards the quest for the discovery of the True Self.

We are born with genetic potential but made in the image of God who is Spirit.

Our mind is not a 'tabula rasa', a blank slate, at birth but there is already a personal unconscious, bearing the image of God, and a collective unconscious containing 'pure gold'; and from this unconscious the person emerges. From within, not from without. The True Self is there in full potential.

In the collective unconscious lies the experience of generations of humanity, indeed all of humanity, with archetypes, the pre-existent embodiments of our collective experiences, which are there to guide and make possible. One such archetype is a pre-birth experience of the Logos of God, to be realised at the centre of our spiritual growth.

The instinctual drives within the newborn are not directionless but object-seeking and object-relating. The primitive agonies, so fearful, so distressing, so life-threatening have to be overcome. We relate in the image of the One who relates.

Hence the need for good enough (not perfect but good enough) mothering to hold, to love, to comfort, to reassure, to keep real, from the perspective of the child and his needs. To encourage the true self to develop. Mothering is the care-taking of the true self. The role of the Mother of God in this respect is amazing and exemplary.

If the True Self is compromised as it is made to adjust to reality, if it has to conform to meet others, needs rather than its own, if the primitive agonies are not checked by good enough mothering, then a False Self is developed. There are many degrees of severity. Most of us cope with what is required of us without becoming crippled by excessive disruption and distortion. If, however, the false self is developed fully, by necessary compliance and associated intellectualisation, then it is at the high price and heavy cost of existing rather than being real. The resulting personality gains acceptance and praise, but there is always the fear and threat of breakdown in later life, leading to psychosomatic illness or physical and mental distress.

In childhood it has been necessary for all of us to learn compliance and adaptation. We are dependent on the care and guidance of our parents, and they are the en-culturing agents of society and the teachers of right and wrong. Only where parenting has been greatly oppressive does a serious problem arise. Nonetheless, all of us in some way have fallen short of developing our true potential, and this has to be put right in our quest for spiritual growth. It is a lifelong quest and much can be said about it. We have to become like children again, to be born again, so that a spiritual re-mothering / regeneration can occur. 'Except ye become like little children...' (Luke 18:17), said Our Lord. Constantin Brancusi, the Romanian philoso-pher put it this way: 'When we stop being children we are long dead.'

I have emphasised that good care in childhood must enable the integration of body, emotions and desires. The body and soul must remain a unity.

The energy of the passions is needed to energise the progress of the soul. There is no division. The body as well as the soul longs for God and as the measure of our self-awareness becomes the Temple of the Holy Spirit. In our quest for wholeness, nothing must remain hidden, all must be named, revealed and accepted for wholeness to obtain. We must not be crippled by theology (of the intellect) like Balaam, but must hope for ecstasy as we tread the apophatic path (Rowan Williams).

For 'the glory of God is man fully alive', to quote St Irenaeus. Fully alive through the integration of his whole being, body, mind, emotions, desires - with freedom of the soul - the true self in its complete wholeness in Christ crying out, with St Augustine and the whole creation, 'We have been made!'

'What a piece of work is a man! How noble in reason, how infinite in faculty, in form, in moving, how express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god - the beauty of the world, the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust?' (Hamlet, Act II, Scene 2).

There are several reasons for beginning a consideration of patristic ideas about what it is to be human with this quotation from Shakespeare's Hamlet: first, it is memorable; secondly, it expresses very well much of what the Fathers thought about humankind; and thirdly, implicitly it raises a question that will be with us throughout this weekend: namely, the changes that have come about in our understanding of what it is to be human between Shakespeare's time and ours, changes that, on the one hand, represent an enormous leap in understanding, but, on the other, represent a loss, a loss due to the fragmentation of knowledge that has been part of the process of advance.

For Shakespeare lived with a world-view that was still much like that of the Fathers, a world view presented with fascinating detail in that great work by Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy, in which he draws on everything - ancient literature, the Scriptures, philosophy classical, medieval and from the Renaissance (which was for him contemporary), medicine, scientific and pre-scientific ideas, cosmology, astronomy, astrology, religion Christian and more ancient - in order to present a picture of the human condition, the fallen human condition, which he puts under the umbrella term of 'melancholy'. So much has changed since then, and was already changing in Burton's time: the beginnings of experimental science summed up in Bacon's Novum Organum, to be followed by the Enlightenment, and all the developments of science and technology that characterize our modern world. We now live in a different world, and if we ask about the view of human nature found in the Fathers, we are asking about views that are only partially accessible to us. To give an example: the Fathers, for the most part, explain a good deal about the world we live in, as well as the world that we find within ourselves, in terms of demons. But, in doing that, they were simply adopting ways of understanding common to most of their contemporaries, whether Christian or non-Christian. If we are so impressed by what the Fathers say as to believe in demons (a position endorsed by Philip Sherrard, and pressed against me in a review he once wrote of one of my books), we shall not be believing in demons in the same way as the Fathers, for no one in our society believes in demons, except for religious reasons. For us, then, belief in demons has become a special religious belief, while for the Fathers it was part of a world view they shared with most of their contemporaries, so even if we believe in demons (and I am not suggesting that we shouldn’t), we can’t believe in demons in the same way as the Fathers did.

This point is underlined in the first point that I want to make about the Fathers’ ideas of human nature: the sources of their ideas are twofold - the Scriptures, certainly, but also what was for them contemporary science. They looked to the Scriptures as an authoritative source of the truth, but they read the Scriptures with minds formed by the accepted ideas of their day. I think they would be surprised if we did anything different; but the accepted ideas of our day are not the same as the accepted ideas of theirs.

We can sum up the two sides of their approach to the question of 'What is human nature?' by saying that the Fathers believed that humankind was (a) created in the image of God; and (b) a reflection of the universe, the cosmos, a 'little world', a microcosm, to use the world coined by the philosophers of the Renaissance to express this traditional idea. This first idea (or really two ideas) of creation in the image of God, the Fathers derived from the Scriptures, and especially from the account of the creation of humankind in Genesis 1-2. The second idea, humankind as a microcosm, is not a biblical idea at all, but derived ultimately from Plato's account of the fashioning of the world in his late dialogue, the Timaeus. Both these ideas, however, capture something of the spirit of Hamlet's reflection on man: the holding together of a sense of the wonder of the human, a wonder rivalling the heavens, even the gods themselves, but also a sense of the frailty of the human, the ‘quintessence of dust’.

Creation in the image of God really contains two notions: first, the idea of creation out of nothing and, secondly, creation in the image of God.

First, creation out of nothing. This was really an idea that came to characterize the Christian understanding of creation. It was not present in classical philosophy: Plato's Timaeus myth was understood to be about the fashioning of the universe out of some pre-existent matter, independent of God, with which he was obliged to work. Nor is it explicit in the Scriptures, only finding explicit expression in some words of Solomonia, the mother of the seven Maccabaean martyrs (2 Macc. 7:28). It expresses the idea that there nothing created that is not owed to God, that indeed creation is nothing in comparison with God. It is a double-sided doctrine, expressing a sense of the fragility of creation, poised, as it were, over nothingness, but also a sense that, since everything is created by God, there is nothing in us that we don’t owe to God, there is nothing created that is not touched by God. The idea, incidentally, that everything in creation is touched by God, and therefore bears the sign of his presence and is in some sense holy: this is, it seems to me, at the heart of what Fr Sergii Bulgakov was seeking to affirm in his speculations about Sophia, the Wisdom of God. This double-sided sense of creation finds expression in the beautiful imagery of Metropolitan Philaret of Moscow, who said: 'All creatures are balanced upon the creative word of God, as if upon a bridge of diamond; above them is the abyss of divine infinitude, below them that of their own nothingness'.

But secondly, humankind is created in God's image: not simply poised between God and nothingness, but reflecting the glory of God Himself. This means, on the one hand, that humankind in some way represents God within the created order - symbolized by Adam's naming the animals (Gen. 2:20); but also being 'in the image of God' (or, closer to the Greek of the Septuagint: 'according to the image of God', kat’ eikona tou Theou) says something about human nature itself. The Greek Fathers often express this by saying that the human mind reflects the divine by being rational; but, to grasp what they mean, we must realize that the Greek word they used (logikos) has a much deeper resonance than 'rational' has in English. 'Rational' in English means primarily the ability to reason and argue and calculate (though thinkers like Coleridge deliberately stretched the meaning of Reason - with a capital R - to mean something much more like what the Greek Fathers meant). The Greek word logikos is the adjective from the word Logos, which, on the one hand, has more to do with contemplative understanding, the discerning of meaning, rather than a mere reasoning and calculating faculty (for which Greek has other words), but also, to the Greek Christian ear, recalls the Logos of God, meaning not just God's reason, but also (much more) the expression of his meaning and purpose, the One through whom the universe was created, the Word or Logos who became flesh and assumed human nature in Jesus of Nazareth, the Incarnate Word of God. The Greek word logikos opens on to a much richer landscape of meaning, as it were, than the English word 'rational' (or the Latin rationalis). On the one hand, I would suggest, it indicates a capacity for self-transcendence, the freedom to rise above one's condition, to shape one's destiny, to be creative. But, on the other, it suggests something about our relationship to God through Christ, the Incarnate Word of God; it points to our destiny of becoming like God, assimilation to God - deification, being transfigured by God. Humankind, therefore, exists suspended on this ‘bridge of diamond’, poised between our nothingness and the divine infinitude - and called to find its destiny in that infinitude (or lose its way in the labyrinths of nothingness). It is a vision of humankind very close to that of Pascal, who meditated on ‘le grandeur et la misère de l'homme' - human greatness and wretchedness.

In what way was the immortal mixed in with the mortal? How do I drift down, yet am borne up? What causes the soul's instability? Why does the soul give life, yet have its share of pain? What makes the mind both confined and boundless, both at home in us and touring the universe in rapid flowing course?

So speaks St Gregory the Theologian in one of his sermons, in which he goes on to raise a string of questions about what it is to be human - how we speak, perceive things, nourish ourselves, form close family links, how we are put together in detail, how we speak, how we see, and he concludes: 'There are many facts about rest in sleep, about our imagination at work in dreams, about memory and recollection, about calculation, anger and desire - to be brief, about all that runs the affairs of this little world called Man (ho mikros houtos kosmos… ho anthropos)'.

It is very easy to see how these two ideas - humankind as the image of God, and as a microcosm - complement each other; humankind as microcosm filled out, as it were, what was meant by the human role in relation to the cosmos. One idea that came in here, and is central to the thought of St Maximos, is the idea of humankind as the bond of the cosmos, syndesmos tou kosmou. The net effect of the blending of these two notions of humankind is to turn the story of redemption into a cosmic tale of redemption, in which the cosmos itself is intimately involved, rather than allowing the created order to form little more than a kind of backdrop to an essentially human story. This sense of a cosmic dimension to the tale of redemption finds succinct expression in St Maximos’ 41^st ‘Difficulty’ (Ambiguum 41).

This blending of the Scriptural notion of humankind as the image of God and the idea, indebted to Classical Philosophy, of humankind as a microcosm made it possible to draw on classical wisdom - not least medical and scientific wisdom - very extensively, and I want now to take one example of this.

Plato saw human nature as a union of soul and body (and not, as is often asserted, as a separation of body and soul), and as he explored the nature of that union he developed an understanding of the soul that was taken over by the Fathers, not least in the Byzantine ascetic tradition.

For Plato, the soul was twofold: an upper part, the rational part, in which the soul functioned as intellect or nous, and a lower part, the irrational, through which the soul was present in the body. This latter, irrational part was further subdivided into the desiring part (to epithumetikon), which expressed itself in desire and longing for food, possessions, sexual union, etc., and another part, often called the 'spirited’ part, but perhaps better called the 'incensive' part, in the felicitous translation of the English version of the Philokalia (to thumikon): the part that gets 'incensed', expressing itself in anger and rage, or in grief, or when it fails to function at all in a kind of listlessness that the Greeks called akedia (and the mediaeval English mystics called 'accidie') - what one might call the source of psychic energy. This lower part is called irrational, not because it doesn't make sense, but because the reason, mind or intelligence has little control over it: hunger, thirst, sexual arousal, anger, resentment - reason can neither turn them on, nor, without much experience, turn them off.

The soul and prayer

The goal of the ascetic struggle on which the soul has embarked in seeking God in prayer is called by Evagrios apatheia, literally passionlessness. This ideal of apatheia has been much criticized, from Evagrios' own time onwards: it has been accused of being a Stoic incursion into Christianity. But most criticisms of Evagrios (which were not heeded by the Byzantine ascetic tradition, which continued to use the term apatheia) fail to understand what Evagrios means. For him, apatheia is the serenity that comes when one can so control the irrational part of the soul that its disturbances no longer upset the intellect's ability to focus on God, to achieve attention to God. In that serenity we find ourselves able to love, for 'love is the daughter of apatheia'. The word for 'love' here is agape, which suggests that Evagrios does not just mean that apatheia enable us purely to love God, but also that apatheia enables us truly to love our fellow men and women. Evagrios' analysis here, it seems to me, is seamless. Just as obsessive thoughts draw us away from God, so they corrupt our relationships with other people, by drawing them into our own obsessive self-concerns and robbing us of the freedom to love, the freedom to let the other be and grow.

There is a wholeness about the patristic understanding of what it is to be human; a wholeness that holds everything together and draws it into our relationship with God. This is because at the centre is the idea that to be human is to be created in the image of God, and that being in the image of God is not so much a matter of definition, as a matter of relationship (logikos means not simply possession of a certain nature, but having the potentiality of a relationship to God, having the capacity to pray). In contrast to the patristic sense of wholeness, we live in a world that feels increasingly fragmented. The reasons for this sense of fragmentation are manifold, and cannot be discussed here. Nor is this sense of fragmentation necessarily a bad thing. The principal reason for it is that knowledge has vastly expanded in the last few centuries, largely as a result of the seemingly exponential growth of modern science. The sense that no one can know everything is not necessarily a bad thing; it might induce a certain humility before the vast and manifold wonder of God's creation - a wonder the vastness and detail of which was scarcely guessed by the Fathers. Conversely, the sense of wholeness, of everything fitting together—as you find in Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy - gave a sense of security, that was comforting, but was, maybe, a false security. But there is no going back. The range and depth of human knowledge is so great that no one can hope any longer to encompass it (and those who make the attempt - George Steiner comes to mind - reveal the pitfalls more than anything else). Nevertheless, the sense of fragmentation is there and evokes in many a nostalgia for wholeness that seeks many outlets in modern society; this seems to me the motivation between much in the so-called 'New Age' movements and interest in alternative therapies.

'All our dignity consists then in thought' Another way of putting this would be to say that to be human is to be able to find links, to be able to interpret. The grand, total interpretation will be always beyond us, but to interpret at all is at the heart of what it is to be in the image - again, think of Adam naming the animals. Thomas Aquinas has a marvellous observation on prayer, when he says that 'prayer is, in a way, the interpretation of desire'. The capacity to interpret, to make links, to understand is intimately bound up with what it is to be in the image of God, intimately bound up with an understanding of the end of man, the purpose of the human, as knowing God in prayer and contemplation. And it is here that he find the anchor, as it were, for values that our society is in danger of losing, not just the capacity to value, but even the possibility of understanding.

Healing in the Church has many manifestations. One of them is a kind of compulsion in the heart of the believer to go out and offer practical healing ministry to others. Taking healing to others has always characterised the life of the Church and it is this practical ministry that I would like to talk about tonight. I will be using the word 'healing' in its broadest possible sense, including not just medicinal healing but all the senses of consolation and restoration which practical service to others implies. If this talk had a biblical title it would be a slight paraphrase of St Paul's words: 'Comfort one another with the comfort you yourselves have received from God' (2 Cor. 1:4). The work of New Martyr Elisabeth in Moscow, just before the Revolution, is a perfect example of this kind of healing.

Elisabeth was born in 1864, daughter of Grand Duke Louis IV of Hesse-Darmstadt and Princess Alice, daughter of Queen Victoria. Although domestic life was simple, almost to the point of austerity, the children did travel and visited their relatives in Germany and England. Queen Victoria herself chose their governess, a certain Miss Jackson, so Elisabeth was at home in both German and English. Awareness of suffering and a sense of responsibility about it came to Elisabeth from her mother, who took her older daughters with her when she went to visit the wounded of the Austro-Prussian war.

Biographers place a great deal of emphasis on the fact that by her late teens Elisabeth had become a woman of exceptional beauty. It is said that she was adored by the future Kaiser Wilhelm of Prussia, but in June 1884 Elisabeth married Grand Duke Serge of Russia, brother of Alexander III and uncle of the last Tsar, Nicholas. Her younger sister, Alexandra later married Nicholas, so Elisabeth was sister-in-law to both the last two Tsars of Russia

For those of us who are converts to Orthodoxy it is a delight to know a saint who was herself also a convert, and to know that she shared the joys, and sometimes sorrows, that are part of that process. Elisabeth's entrance into the Orthodox faith in 1891 met with hostility from her father and brother. Her letters to them defending her decision give little indication of her reasons, except for the paramount reason of feeling that to remain a Protestant to prevent family conflict while feeling Orthodox in herself would be 'lying before God and man'. As far as I know there were absolutely no political pressures on Elisabeth to become Orthodox (although it was a condition when her sister married Nicholas). I believe that her later life and written spiritual testimonies show that her conversion came from a profound experience and love of Orthodox Church life that she encountered in Russia.

During the same year as her conversion to Orthodoxy, her husband was made Governor General of Moscow and the couple moved to that city. Elisabeth was now 'first lady' of Moscow, and dinners, balls and state functions became, as she said, 'not just pleasant but very necessary'. According to one biographer, the Grand Duke Serge lacked the gifts necessary for governing Moscow; in fact she calls the appointment 'disastrous'. Politically reactionary and lacking in imagination about how Russia could change politically, he made many enemies and little constructive headway in a worsening, unstable political situation.

Before talking about how she specifically did this, let me 'fast-forward' to the end of Elisabeth's life.

Here Elisabeth's story has a remarkable and wonderful development. A monk who was present when the bodies were removed from the mine set himself the task of taking the bodies to safety. He had coffins made and began an unimaginable two-year journey across Siberia to China. When the bodies arrived in Peking the coffins were opened and Elisabeth's body was found to be incorrupt. From there, the bodies of Elisabeth and Barbara were taken to the Holy Land and buried in the Church of St Mary Magdalene on the Mount of Olives. This is a really extraordinary example of God's providence. Not only has Elisabeth found her final resting place in a place she knew and loved, and in which she once expressed a desire to be buried (!), but also the faithful have been given her relics. What a joy it was to hear of the taking of her relics to Russia earlier this year, with bishops from the Moscow Patriarchate and the Church Outside Russia leading the veneration together.

So - what did she do specifically? Her original intention was to reintroduce the order of deaconess, since she rightly understood the work of her sisters to be essentially diaconal rather than monastic. She travelled to Germany to study the work of deaconesses in the Lutheran Church. She also came to England and visited Anglican monastic communities who worked in the East End of London. The Holy Synod turned down her original plan fearing that it was too innovative and contained a 'protestant leaven'. A revised plan again met with reservation, and finally her brother-in-law established the community by his own personal decree. Although the Holy Synod could not agree to her plans, she did receive consistent support from individual bishops. She was, for example, constantly supported by Metropolitan Vladimir of Moscow (later the first of the New Martyrs of the Russian Church).

Elisabeth gathered together a group of women who would begin to bring relief to those suffering in poverty in Moscow. The community was dedicated to Martha and Mary (in that order). In February 1909 Elisabeth bought an estate on the Great Ordinka in which she established a hospital, including an operating room, a pharmacy and outpatients room and an orphanage. Elisabeth and her sisters received training in nursing and cared for the sick themselves. There are numerous testimonies of her dedication to the sick; often she treated the most distressing conditions herself and sat whole nights with these patients to comfort them.

Later Elisabeth started to visit the notorious Kitrov market area, bringing help in acute poverty and wherever possible rescuing very young girls from prostitution. Almedingen gives a hair-raising description of the conditions there and notes that these come from personal memories. She worked in Moscow during the winter of 1921-22, and her English chief's comment on Khitrovka and its 'amenities' was that the worst slum in Liverpool or Hull seemed paradise by comparison. This area was a 'no-go area' for the police, and Elisabeth's visits there caused paroxysms of anxiety for those responsible for her safety.

The six sisters who began the community in 1910 had, within a year, increased to thirty, and it continued to grow. Elisabeth had the highest regard for the monastic life, but was quite clear that her sisters were not nuns. The blessing they received on entering the community was a form of dedication, and not a tonsure. Because of their hard physical work she insisted on plenty of sleep and food for the sisters. Her own regime was ascetic. She hardly ate anything other than vegetables, and, after a full day of hard work, often spent a large part of the night in prayer.

Elisabeth wrote a short text about the work of her sisters. I believe that it touchingly represents Elisabeth herself, her personality as well as her faith and aspirations. Each chapter begins with an icon reproduction, a verse from a liturgical text, a verse from Scripture and then the appeal: 'Brethren, pray for us!' It is fundamentally an appeal for prayers for the Martha-Mary obitel, an appeal made, as she says, in the spirit of the first Christian communities who supported each other in mutual prayer. The main themes are resurrection, consolation in suffering, and the cross. Elisabeth's spiritual roots in the Scriptures are striking.

The booklet begins with a meditation on the sisters Martha and Mary, and their exchanges with Christ just before the raising of Lazarus, placing the faith of the sisters firmly in the context of the resurrection. The Mother of God is set at the centre of the community's life - as the first Christians sought consolation at her side after Christ's resurrection. 'These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus and his brethren' (Acts 1:14). The third chapter is headed 'Yet not I, but Christ lives in me' and contains the text: 'Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows' (2 Cor. 1:3-5). I believe this is a key text in understanding Elisabeth's inspiration. Another key text is: 'Bear one another's burdens and so fulfil the law of Christ' (Gal. 6:2). It introduces a passage in which she says: 'It is true that there is a certain amount of struggle in the true spiritual life, but often, even on earth, it is crowned with inner peace and joy. In the beginning, when the cross lies heavily on our shoulders, we remember the words the Lord said to His disciples: 'If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me' (Matt.16:24). With meekness we have to take it upon us, and then, O wonder - 'My yoke is easy, and my burden is light' (Matt. 11:30), the cross, under whose weight we thought we would collapse, little by little falls from our shoulders, and it now appears standing in splendour before us. We grasp it with both hands, as it slowly raises us up to Heaven. Those who know this experience love their cross, and in carrying are made joyful.' She refers to the Fathers of Optina, particularly Fr Amvrosy, and stresses the importance of their guidance. I believe the text clearly shows the formation of these Fathers with its emphasis on stability, steadfastness, patience and deep humility.

Since the fall of Communism and Elisabeth's canonisation by the Moscow Patriarchate, communities have sprung up in Russia and elsewhere, dedicated to her and inspired by her example. I was fortunate enough to visit one of these last summer: the Convent of the New Martyr Elisabeth in Minsk, Belarus. Sisters from there have been coming to parishes in Britain in the last couple of years with an enormous van full of icons, vestments and many other items that they sell to support their work.

So how did all this come about? A group of young women came together as spiritual daughters of one Fr Andrew, who serves at the cathedral of Sts Peter and Paul in Minsk. In 1996 at Pascha, one of them who worked as a nurse in the psychiatric hospital suggested that he should visit the patients to greet them with the Resurrection. The women started to visit the hospital regularly and formed themselves into a sisterhood; the convent was born from the sisterhood.

Fr Andrew's spiritual father, Starets Nikolai from the island of Zalit, near Pskov, gave his blessing and a gift of three roubles, saying: 'God will give the rest'. The sisters collected money on street corners in the city - and people gave! The Convent is situated in the grounds of the psychiatric hospital on formerly derelict land donated by the hospital. Surely a testimony to the value of their work! Patients in the hospital are free to attend services.

The hospital is a large one with a children's section, frequently referred to in the convent as the orphanage, as so many of these children are abandoned. This section of the hospital receives particular attention from the community and is placed under the spiritual protection of St Nektarios of Aegina. It is important to stress that the hospital is well run and properly staffed. We are not dealing here with some hellhole of uncared-for children. The sisters' contribution is not to do with washing, dressing and other professional skills that are provided by the medical staff. The sisters' contribution is purely pastoral. I was in a children's ward during the Feast of the Transfiguration, and watched a play enactment, which the sisters had helped to prepare, of the events described in the Gospel. After the play, the children all clustered round one of the community priests and received prayer and anointing. Later the same day with Fr Andrew and some of the nuns, I visited another hospital in the city where patients are treated for cancer. White sisters had set up a table with icons in all of the main corridors. In each of these corridors in turn we sang a molieben and patients received a dowsing with holy water and anointing.

The ease with which the community seems to have access to the wards of the hospital is striking. The sisters readily agreed, when I asked them, that their freedom of access is entirely dependent on the good will of the hospital authorities. The fact that they have gained this is extremely impressive. I believe, however, that it can be precarious and that, when changes in personnel bring less freedom in the hospitals, it then has to be renegotiated.

The hospital also has many patients suffering from addictions, particularly alcohol. The priests of the community go there regularly to hear Confessions and are now able to combine their ministry with practical help, by offering a place where people can go from the hospital. The podvorie, established on land given by the government, provides a place where people (so far only men) can follow a spiritual path out of addiction. Fundamentally this consists of prayer and work. Although the government deemed the land to be infertile, various agricultural projects and animal husbandry are under way. The work of the podvorie is extremely challenging, and I imagine involves numerous disappointments. However, I was profoundly moved to see men there who really have regained not just personal dignity but real joy in life, and former drug addicts whose faces clearly showed the peace of prayer and a deep experience of God.

When Starets Nikolai blessed the beginning of the community he said: 'By the prayers of the sick you will be saved.' The sisters take this very seriously and I believe it is the foundation of their relationship with the people they care for. Fr Nikolai's injunction changes the dynamic of helper and helped: the sick become the ones who save. This 'levelling' affects the whole community and is evident in the partnership between monastic and lay people, working together as one family. Fr Andrew insists on salvation being found in everyday activities. A quotation about the life of the community goes: 'Spiritual life is inalienable from our daily routine, and every person can strive for salvation whatever the circumstances and surroundings, without neglecting their everyday life, responsibilities, the people around them, and without falling into extreme attitudes. A priest serves God in the altar, so does a housewife at the gas stove. Spiritual life is not a set of directions and is not complicated. What is required is a child's trust in God and an effort to look for Eternity in our thoughts and deeds.'

Before concluding this section I should mention that as a visitor from England I was asked at every encounter about Fr Sophrony and Metropolitan Anthony. Their books are read avidly and their influence is enormous. While I would not describe Fr Sophrony or Bishop Anthony in any way as 'western' in their spirituality, their authority in Minsk does seem to be a striking example of cross-fertilisation from West to East in a geographical sense at least, as Esther and Becky Hookway described at the Fellowship conference last year.

So what about us in the West today? Some years ago I was dismayed to hear a girl at an Orthodox youth meeting say: 'I don't want to be a nun, I can't paint icons, I might not marry a priest - I don't see a role in the Orthodox Church for me!' Part of the answer to this challenge is the path that I'm sure many people here are following: to work in hospitals, hospices and other agencies, serving in a way that is informed and strengthened by a relationship with Christ. This is an absolutely essential aspect of the life of the Church and part of what it means to be the 'salt' of the earth. However, I would like to suggest that there was in the girl's statement a desire to serve others specifically in the name of the Church. I feel that this is a healthy desire and that we must be self-critical about why such a desire might be frustrated, and creative about how such a desire can be fulfilled.

One way that is open to us now is hospital chaplaincy. A member of our parish works in one of the chaplaincies that exist in our NHS hospitals and I would like to share some impressions from shadowing her and our hospital chaplain in Bath. My first day started with the funeral of a premature baby. As the doors opened and the parents walked in holding a tiny coffin between them, I think everyone present started to cry. Afterwards I spent some time talking to the baby's grandmother, and was surprised about a year later when she rang me up, beside herself with excitement, to say that the couple had had another baby, which was doing fine! The fact that she remembered our brief conversation and wanted to share happy developments, indicated just how important it was to have someone there at that moment of anguish.

In hospitals in major cities it is increasingly likely that one will encounter Orthodox who have lost touch with the Church and who are delighted to meet a fellow Orthodox, through them perhaps being put in touch with a priest. I know of one Orthodox chaplain in the States who was asked by hospital staff to visit an Orthodox Jew. The man was unable to talk, was agitated and distressed and about to undergo surgery. When she spoke to him he started to make the sign of the Cross, and she realised that the hospital had confused 'Orthodox Jew' with 'Orthodox Christian'. She prayed with him, placed a paper icon of the Resurrection on his bed. Minutes later he was wheeled out for surgery, peaceful from having received such a sure sign of God's presence and care for him in the middle of his pain and fear.

So how does one start? The simplest way is to contact the chaplain at the local general hospital and ask for training as a volunteer. Volunteers are usually trained by working alongside chaplains and attending relevant seminars and courses. Acceptance into the Chaplaincy team is not automatic. The vulnerability of people in hospital means that screening of volunteers is essential. It is impossible to respond adequately to the challenges presented unless the foundation of this work is prayer. Starets Nikolai's words 'By the prayers of the sick you will be saved' resonate well with the insistence of one senior chaplain in a hospital here: 'Don't think you are going to "take God" to the patient: God is already there'. Wherever there is suffering, awareness is also essential of Christ's presence through the cross. Hospital chaplaincy is an opportunity to work creatively with the experience and excellent practice of Christians outside the Orthodox Church - this is an aspect of the work that I particularly value.

All that I have said applies to someone working as a volunteer or as salaried chaplain holding a post within a hospital trust. I believe that in the future the Orthodox Church in Britain should have, as already exists in the OCA, a process of training and qualifying people to hold such posts. If we are able to do that, we will have made definite headway in answering the challenge posed by the young woman with a calling to work, as an Orthodox Christian in a visible way, with those in need.

So to return to the New Martyr Elisabeth: How is she a model for healing ministry today? I suggest in three ways: she was profoundly prayerful, she responded to the real needs that she saw around her, and she was creative in that response. One could also add that she was also hugely energetic.

The theme of this Conference is 'healing and wholeness'. Christ himself is the ultimate model and source of all healing. In her original plan that her sisters should be deaconesses, Elisabeth must have had in mind Christ's perfect example of diakonia, service: 'I am among you as one who serves' (Luke 22:27). In preparing this talk, I found myself wondering if we can correctly speak of 'a diaconate of all believers'. I wonder if, as the Church, every member of it has a vocation to sanctify the world by their personal and distinct priesthood, so that all believers have a calling to heal the world through their personal and distinct work of loving service.

Whether this idea will meet with approval from the theologians here I don't know, but I am sure that a ministry of healing has something of a boomerang effect. It is itself healing, and brings wholeness and healing in the lives of those who practise it, and also to the life of the whole Church.

I am old, live alone, fifty-four miles from my Orthodox church and no longer able to drive my car. As far as I can see, I am the only practising Orthodox in this small market town. So it is not surprising that sometimes I do feel lonely as the sparrow on the housetop. It is not an ideal situation, for the lone Orthodox can become idiosyncratic, missing out on absorbing Orthodox truth and traditions through community life, and creating his own individual version of Orthodoxy. Nevertheless, it is the situation of many of our English-speaking Orthodox and, indeed, of many Orthodox in the West. We have some good conferences on the subject of 'Orthodoxy in the West', bur let me bring it down to a fine point, to the experience of one particular lone Orthodox, in one particular place in England, on one particular day.

The day I choose is a Tuesday, for Tuesday is market day and the day I like to walk up into the town. Occasionally I start at the Catholic Church: at least I did before they pulled it down to build a new one. Meanwhile, the Catholics worship in the adjacent Methodist chapel. So you have the unusual sight of an Anglican priest now living as an Orthodox layman at a Catholic service in a Methodist place of worship! Rightly or wrongly, I think I go for the company of good, faithful, worshipping people, and whatever other Orthodox may think of it, it does highlight the fact that, in the West, Orthodox have to live with other kinds of Christians, and it poses the question of how we are to relate to them. The easy way out, to pretend that they are not there, and to dismiss them as heretics, schismatics or worse, seems to me to be a waste of time. I do believe that the Orthodox faith is 'God's gift for all mankind', but I cannot ignore these others who seem to be better Christians than I am. So I turn to Metropolitan Anthony speaking about the 'Orthodox presence in Britain':

Whether I go to church or not, I do like to walk through the market place, and as I do so I see the image of God, Christ: the image of God, in the people I meet. Christ in them meets me, greets me, serves me. And seeing Christ in them, in my heart I say 'Glory to Thee, our God, glory to Thee', and sometimes, seeing the sadness in a face I am moved to say: 'Lord, have mercy, Lord, have mercy'. This is such a humbling and joyful experience that as I walk in the crowds I say: 'My Lord and my God'. It is no accident that eucharistic phrases spring to my mind, for are not Orthodox Christians meant to be eucharistic men and women, walking in the world, gathering it up in Christ, offering it back to the Father in the Spirit, 'redeeming the time'? Is not this 'the Liturgy after the Liturgy', the work of the people of God? I am not unaware of the fallenness of the world and of men and women. For twenty-three years I was priest in the poorest and most despised parish in this town, and I have myself been going to Confession for over sixty years! I find it deeply saddening that most people I see are not conscious of the image of God in them, and the wonderful potential of that image; that they live 'without God in the world'. But, however the image of God in these people is obscured, it is not destroyed, so that even in a fallen world men and women are still capable of generosity, kindness, self-sacrifice, love. And all of that I see shining out from them in the market place.

As I continue my walk, I reflect on the fact that the men and women I meet are all working-class and lower-middle-class, and I wonder: 'What has Orthodoxy to offer them?' These are people who 'maintain the fabric of the world'; who bake our bread, pick our potatoes, collect our refuse, keep the gas and electricity and sewerage system working; this is the part of society from which I come, and the area in which I worked for forty-four years as a priest, trying to help the people understand and receive orthodox faith, worship and life. I found no magical formula for gathering these people into the Church, but I was given - despite rather than because of my efforts - a good number of faithful, everyday Christians, some wonderful, quiet, humble, integrated saints, and a few robust, gritty, eccentric but faithful individuals. That men and women of this class of society can become members of the Church, I have no doubt; nor that they can become Orthodox: I have great affection for one Orthodox community where this has happened, where English men and women, just like my uncles and aunts in that area, have taken so naturally to Orthodoxy.

An Orthodox writer has called for a 'lay spirituality'. Orthodox tradition seems to be that monastic spirituality is for all of us according to our circumstances. But could we not start from the bottom rather than the top, that is with our common Baptism, with its potential for us all to grow into the likeness of Christ by the transfiguring work of the Holy Spirit? For monastics this work of deification takes a concentrated form, but lay people need a good deal of guidance and sympathetic support as to how to work this out in the Western world today, where discipline is laid upon us whether we like it or not. There is the basic discipline of having to go out to work for a living, to be at work on time: the disciplines of married life, of caring for children or relatives, of social and civic responsibilities, etc. And for all, whether monastics, priests or lay people, our spirituality, our life with God and our growing up into Christ, is 'for the life of the world'; all are called to offer themselves 'for all and on behalf of all'.

I walk through the town, climb the steps to the Civic Centre café and sit with my coffee by the window looking over the busy market place, trying to set the experience of the lone Orthodox in the situation of the Orthodox Church in the West today. There come to my mind the words of an Orthodox bishop: 'Orthodoxy, if it is about anything at all, is about the real world.' And the real world in the West is one from which Christian faith is fast disappearing: for example, students in higher education no longer know the names of the Gospel writers or what Pentecost is. It is a world of pluralism, relativism and indifference: it is a world of atheism, materialism, amoralism. How are Orthodox people to react to this world, to live fully in it? It is a world fallen away from God and as such we must resist the social pull away from Him. But it is still God's world, His creation, and He is still to be found in it. St Augustine, who knew well enough the fallenness of the world, could still write 'The world is a smiling place.'

Metropolitan Anthony calls atheism 'the loss of God that kills', and points out that Christ on the cross is left without God, and having no God He dies…. There is not one atheist in the world, either ideological or gastric (whose god is their belly), who has ever gone into the loss of God, into atheism, has experienced it and died of it in the way Christ has gone into it, has experienced it, has died of it…. If we look at the surrounding world, the alien world, the pagan world, but particularly at the atheist world, we must realise that even this world is not outside the sacrificial, tragic, crucified experience of Christ. And we must realise that our vocation is to understand, from within the Church, something which the godless world cannot understand about itself… we need to go beyond condemnation of it in order to achieve its salvation.

We do need our conferences, our Orthodox philosophers, our modern Fathers, who will face the reality of western culture and thinking, and help us to find a positive way of living the Orthodox life in this age. And there is always the Holy Spirit at work: '...unless we recognise the Spirit at work outside our own Orthodox Community - in the culture in which we live, in the families in which we live, in the work situations in which we spend so much of our time, and in other Christian communities - we will not be in touch with reality… in that real world, Christ is present, working to bring people to a fullness of life which we cannot give. Only God can give this life. But if in all humility we accept the gifts which we - not for any virtue of our own - have been given, if we accept them, we may be able to enter into this process in some small way, always remembering that in all this the true Actor, the true Initiator, is in fact, God Himself.'

So, a lone Orthodox, I make my way home along the riverside walk, able to rejoice not only in the image of God in people I have met, but also in the signs of His good creation.

Now, today is Sunday. With wonderful generosity, a member of my Orthodox church goes fifty miles out of his way to collect me and take me to the Liturgy. We arrive; I open the door of the church and - 'the sparrow hath found her an house', and I am no longer alone. The icons of the Mother of God and all the Saints, the presence of the priest and all the people, the sharing of the holy Gifts, remind me that we belong to the Body of Christ in Heaven and on Earth. The icon of Christ Himself tells me that we are all one in Him, and that He has given us the promise 'I am with you always, to the end of time'. I return to my life as a solitary Orthodox reminded of His presence, its privilege and its responsibility.

In Genesis we meet Adam and then Eve who are given a range of specific priestly tasks. From these all priesthood emanates. They are in the image and likeness of God. This is the first task: to be an icon of God. This is a task of being what one is created to be. Adam and Eve are sacramental beings.

The breath of God is in them: they also must be inspiration. This is the prophetic task. Today, in ordinary human life, we call this politics: the whole Body of Christ must be involved in this work of politics. By bringing the Gospel to others, so that they may also share in Pentecost, we also prophesy. This is our specific message. The Church (and clergy too) must be part of the community and also lead it.

Adam and Eve are made of dust and the breath of God: they are the meeting point between all material things and all spiritual things. In this they present the material to the immaterial and the immaterial to the material. Christ God is the perfect example of this. In our prayers and daily life we complete this task. Being made of dust they are humble beings; they are also made of breath of God, they are of infinite value.

Adam and Eve are to care for the Garden: this is their nurturing task. Caring and loving each other in the Church and also everyone else; feeding ourselves with the word of God and the Sacraments and feeding the world also with the word of God and with earthly food: this is the ministry of leadership in the Church: service. This is the building up of all people and of all creation.

Adam and Eve must be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth. Fecundity and increase is the next task. When this is done properly everything increases. The human task is not simply to leave things alone, but to bring them continually into a higher state of meaning. Human culture is part of this and so is the culture of the Church: missionary work, moral and ethical teaching.

Adam names all the animals: he participates in creation, recognising and furthering the order that God brings out of chaos. Adam recognises life, and in doing so he gives new meaning to the things he names. This is continued in all the ways whereby we take the created world and find new meaning in it: from taking rock, wood, wool and crude oil, and making a chair, to taking bread and wine and making Holy Communion. We are to recognise all things as sacraments.

Adam and Eve are companions for each other and helpmeets. Their work is one of equality and of service; by virtue of sharing the characteristics of Adam and Eve, all humans are priestly. They exercise their ministry on each other and on all creation.

Adam and Eve find oneness and completion in each other (missing in Adam alone) through the work of God. The natural person is one in community with other people and with God. Together they mirror the Trinity. Adam and Eve regularly go for a beautiful walk with God in the Garden in the cool of the day. They are called to be in the presence of God. In the quiet of the day when the work is done, we spend time with God enjoying each other's company. This we call prayer. Here we can learn to represent God to the Garden and the Garden to God. This is celebratory.

The new creation (the new Adams and Eves in the Church) has other priestly roles: healing, forgiving, self-sacrificing love (agape). Priesthood is in the end self-sacrificing. The Church's vocation is to profound, constant self-sacrifice.

In a sense, the universe is a priest: here we see the material creation of God. There is a boundary between material and immaterial beings. The earth is a priest: here we see the boundary between living and non-living. There is no work that is below a priest's dignity.

The Church, the baptised, is a Royal Priesthood within which there are thousands of different ministries of oversight, eldership, service, prophecy, etc. to others. The baptised are the yeast and the light and the salt - only a tiny amount but causing a profound difference.

The bishop, presbyters (priests) and deacons of the Church: these are particular ministries within the Royal Priesthood, they are icons of Christ, stewards and protectors of the Sacraments and the doctrines of the Church, and they are its servants. There is no work that is below a priest's dignity.

The activity of a priest is liturgical - the work of the people - whether we are speaking of the Royal Priesthood or of the ordained bishop / presbyter / deacon.

Proclaim the Resurrection. Be a channel of Grace.

The job of the Church is to care for God's children by spreading the Gospel. Preach Christ Crucified. Teach people about God's Grace. Provide for needs: spiritual growth, leading people into a deeper relationship with Christ, fostering the redemptive contact between God's person and the human soul.

Scripture and prayer. Fellowship. Growing organic selfless love that directs all human activity - aligns it with divine direction. The love should be visible in interpersonal interaction. Friendships should be everywhere, love should imbue all activity, every interaction, and everything should point towards Christ's love.

People of all ages. Countering attacks. Being light on a hill. Sanctifying the world. A meeting place of heaven and earth. Preaching the Gospel. Offering advice, prayer, fasting, almsgiving, sacramental life. Families providing for each other. Care and education of the young. Care for the soldiers, widows, poor, homeless. Stewardship of resources.

Helping those less blessed. Welcoming newcomers. Fostering and caring for the planet. Relieving suffering. Helping people towards sainthood. Actively being peacemakers.

Holding services. Making a loving atmosphere. People serving each other. Respecting nature and care for it. Showing forgiveness.

Care for the sick, fellowship, teaching, supporting families, encouraging sustainability, unity of the whole church, more than just Sunday services, living community outside the church, close relationship between the priest and the laity, provide places to build faith, friendship and spiritual growth, developing mutual love, going to the sick, hospitals, prisons, young help old and take church to all cultures.

Learn sacrifice and humility, camps and conferences, learning obedience – listening to all.

Serving different groups of people without dividing the Church into groups of people. Administering the sacraments. Setting an example, freeing people from bondage. Keeping the Orthodox Tradition alive, being light.

Studying Scripture together. Supporting those who are being persecuted, and working towards justice. Encouraging the fallen brother / sister. Promoting fair trade (through purchasing Fairtrade goods). Buying eco-friendly and organic products.

Consecration of the Church to God, living and teaching the Gospel. Simplicity, joyfulness, resourceful, directing all towards unity, comforting and strengthening, ready to answer for the secret for its hope.

When I was asked to give this talk I was asked to say something about starting a mission and something about your role as young people in mission.

The purpose of starting a mission is to provide a community where any Orthodox Christian may find a home where they can worship. A few years ago these would have mostly been Greeks but there are an increasing number of Russians and Romanians coming over the horizon that makes for a very interesting parish. There will also be a number of British people who take an interest and eventually want to become Orthodox. My community has a rule that such people are made welcome but no one ever asks them if they want to become Orthodox: that must come from them. It should be possible for all to worship in the same community together.

Suppose we start with a community of about six; we should expect to see the numbers regularly attending the Liturgy double every five years, though as the community gets bigger so the rate of growth slows down. Starting a mission is quite complex but there are a few principles that I have learned by experience that may be of interest.

The first is that a mission, although it starts off with great hopes, can all too easily degenerate into what I will call for the purposes of this talk a 'stagnant mission'. The scenario goes something like this: Fr George, an enthusiastic Orthodox priest, alights upon a pleasant English town where there are a small number of Orthodox Christians. He may even bring them with him. Here he starts to serve the Liturgy on a regular basis and others are attracted to the mission. However, Fr George is not paid by the community. It is anyway far too small to cope with that burden, so he gets a reasonably well-paid job in the locality.

So far so good, and many missions have started life like this: one almost thinks of this as the normal pattern.

However, as the years go by certain features become apparent. The first is that because Fr George serves the Liturgy in his own time, it is essentially his hobby. Because it is his hobby, he does not have any very burning incentive for it to grow very fast, and anyway he does not have time to deal with the extra work anyway. Also he has ideas about how things should be done, perhaps he likes a 'monastic feel' of 'super piety'. Or perhaps he is impatient of small children, and so families that loom over the horizon with children in tow are advised to go elsewhere. Or perhaps he has views about music and would really like to run the choir, and so he constantly interferes and maybe even sings the choir parts as well! He may not be musical at all, and so when there is pressure from lay people to vary the setting, he will say sharply 'No! Not in my lifetime.' As indeed one priest did say some years ago.

The result of this is that the mission never seems to really get going, there is very little impetus for improvement in facilities and parish life. Those that do go are very settled in the system and resist change. Do not get me wrong. There is life but with a very slow rate of growth, just about enough new blood to off set the haemorrhage of the old who tend after the normal way of things to die.

This kind of scenario is, I am sorry, to say all too common, so I would suggest the following few things as ways to avoid stagnation setting in.

1. Above all, it is absolutely essential that all missions should start with the blessing of the diocesan bishop. If you do not do this the enterprise will simply not be blessed by God and will go nowhere. (And this is not put in so that if this talk happens to be read by my Archbishop he will approve. It is an Orthodox fundamental that I firmly believe.)

2. Proper records must be kept of all the activities of the mission. They should include all the main services, their times and how many people attended. Only by doing this do you have any accurate record of the life of the parish. It is essential to assess trends - what happens when Pascha coincides with Western Easter, what happens when it does not, when do most people go on holiday, when are there more likely to be visitors and so on. It also gives advanced warning when people are starting to come less often - you are doing something wrong; and when they are coming more often - you are doing something right.

3. The priests must not have anything to do with the finances. These should be organised by a lay person and must be transparent to all.

4. The priest should have as little as possible to do with the choir. It may be initially that it is run by his wife, but as soon as it is run by someone else the better. There is no issue that is more divisive than the music. If the priest is out of it that at least is one hassle he does not have to be burdened with.

5. The priest must be paid and the expenses of the community must be met by the mission. Right from the very start, a mission must, as a fundamental principle, be prepared to pay for the expenses of the priest. He may not be well paid but he must be paid. Had this principle been followed, many of the financial problems faced by some communities and parishes would not now exist.

6. Have realistic, achievable aims. So the aim is to start an ordinary Orthodox Parish where all are welcome. This is as opposed to the aim of starting an Orthodox Parish where the Byzantine choir is of international standard; where the church can accommodate 600 people; where the library has not less than 6,000 books; where the hall can accommodate a conference for 200 people; where there are never less than three clergy at the Liturgy, two deacons, and a priest. Etc. etc. These are of course hyperboles, but all too often missions start with extravagant agendas that are their undoing.

7. And then above all: Be pragmatic. Do what works, do what you can manage. Where is the greater merit? In celebrating Great Week with at least two services every day, three on Great Thursday, four on Great Friday, a complete Liturgy on Great Saturday with all the readings, followed by a baptism and the reading of the Acts of the Apostles in full, with the result that on Pascha night - when a few people actually turn up - the choir is hoarse, the priest is shattered and suffering from a streaming cold, and all the visitors go away wondering what the service was all about. Or is it better to have a much lighter programme where choir and priest arrive at Pascha in good heart and the congregation go away with thankful hearts, ready to turn up on the next Sunday to sing 'Christ is Risen' again?

The first thing - and do not underestimate this at all - is to actually turn up regularly to the Liturgy in your community. Not only will you gain blessing thereby but you will also be in a position to help, to greet a visitor, to teach a child and all sorts of other things. Every person who becomes Orthodox makes it possible for someone else to do so. Every Orthodox who comes to the Liturgy with Christ in his heart makes it possible for another to receive the same. You presence will encourage the priest. It will encourage the lay people. It will encourage visitors.

Now what about out in the world? Perhaps a couple of things for you to think about. In this country we live in a post-Christian world. Many people have absolutely no belief and no idea of what Christianity really is, yet so many Christians are apologetic about their faith. This is because Christianity has been the object of rationalist attack from the enlightenment, but particularly since World War I. But is the country any better for it? No.

Perhaps we should start by pointing out what has been lost. Point to the violence - only this week it was announced that two-thirds of teenage girls are physically abused by their boy friends. But what of the wars, the exploitation of the Third World, the impurity, the abortions, the broken marriages, and so on, and so on. Should we not be prepared to point out gently that the world could be and indeed was a better place? I do not speak of material things; for us in the developed West, incomes and services are better than they have ever been. This does not of course apply in the Third World. I speak, however, of spiritual things, and point to the rudderless pointlessness of so many people's lives. Remember also the text from St John, 'None shall come to me unless the Father calls him'. Soon He may be calling. Will we be ready?