I think a lot of people that struggle with the beauty aspect of the churches
are people that look at the story of Christ and look at his crucifixion.
They look at the poverty of the images in the Gospel. They're like,
why then do you have these golden temples and why do you have all this
powerful imagery? And the truth is that orthodox Christianity tends towards fullness, tends
to like a yes and right. We don't have a no butt It's like
yes and And one of the images that's important scripture is the eschatological image.
Although Christ, even in his life the way that he lived very simply and
walked, you know, with sandals on the ground, he also presented this
vision of the coming of the Son of Man as this glorious finality where all
things will come together. This is Jonathan Pejo. Welcome to the symbolic world.
So hello everyone. It is my great joy to be here with David
Patrick, Henry and Father Turbo. This is something that has been preparing itself
for quite a while. I've been looking forward to meeting Father Turbo. We've
had a lot of conversations, you know, in messaging and email and stuff.
So it's great to finally meet him in person. And so David Patrick
from the Channel of the Church of the Eternal Logos you can check that out,
is going to lead the conversation. I'm going to talk about beauty about
icons and so yeah, take it away, David. Yeah, I was
really excited. Thanks again, Jonathan for having us on. When we talked
a little bit about the beauty of logos theology, we mentioned that you had
been wanting to stream and have a conversation with Father Turbo and I have the
great fortune of him being both a spiritual father to me and also a friend,
and we wanted to talk a little bit about esthetics, orthodox beauty,
iconography and all these things. And I thought it was perfect for you guys
to come together because both of you have done iconography, and both of you,
you again Jonathan, with your work with the Symbolic World, has touched
on these topics at nauseum, I guess you could say. But to begin,
just for Father Turbo, I thought he could kind of set the foundation
of how is beauty and aesthetics understood and utilized in the Orthodox Church. When
Protestants engage, sometimes they would make claims that were over ornate that we worship
pieces of wood, that we you know, we worship idols and all this
different stuff. But they don't understand why esthetics and beauty is important to our
liturgical worship, to the church, to our theology and how we engage and
participate with God. And so I thought to open it up and we can
go anywhere. Is Father Turbo could lay out exactly how aesthetics work. And
in the Greek word symbolos, this sim bollow throwing together two realities. That
a symbol from an Orthodox worldview is so much more than just a sort of
an empty, meaningless thing, as you've talked about, Jonathan. But it's
the brain together of two realities. And so, Father, if you could
then lead us into how aesthetics are understood from an Orthodox front, well,
I think the first thing to understand is that it's about leading us into reality,
which is God, and the incarnational aspect of it is absolutely imperative.
But I think sometimes we stop short because we'll look at an icon of let's
say, you know this is very common. You give a tour and a
temple, and you know every priest has done this, every you know,
lay leader has done this. And you kind of break down the econa stass.
If you're blessed to have a dome with a Ponto grazer icon and the
dome you're blessed to be able to you know, have those. You know,
every church has those, unfortunately on a kind of like majestic scale.
But you say, like, oh, you know Christ, the incarnation and
this is all very good, you know, but I think it isn't just
about the incarnation, meaning the logos becoming flesh, but it's also about us
being brought into the life of God and that incarnational aspect, you know,
think of it going both ways. I think is key because worship is about
this bringing in of the finite, the created, the broken into you know,
infinity, eternity into the you know, never actually reaching, but being
able to be drawn and approach the uncreated, being broken and being brought to
healing. Those are all things that you know, aesthetics, the aesthetics of
the church facilitates. It brings us to a place of not just the abstract
of theology, but the real, which is what we need to be healed
to experience love and symbol does all of that in a shorthand you know,
I try to instruct people when they think about symbol in the life of the
church. You know, it's it is imbued with something higher than itself.
And so when we encounter across, we can look at it across and you
know, a whole unfolding of understanding happens, you know, in a millisecond.
So it's a shorthand that it brings us into increasingly deeper levels of meaning
and experience and that and it's really a bringing in. And I think that's
really key because when we view the icon or when we view architecture in the
church, when we also you know, it isn't just visually when we experience
chan't you know, there's something that happens to you when you're in a service
and then you hear the song. You know, the song is the kind
of like low droning note for those who don't know what that is, and
chant and then just all of these you know, this this wave of melody
that's melismatic, and it's just it's undulating, and it's just it's living and
and it brings you into this heavenly space. That's all a part of it,
and it's all a part of being brought and being drawn, you know,
invited into into God. And so that's that's its purpose. And it's
done in such a way to communicate the ineffable to us, that which is,
you know, beyond our normal way of being able to articulate understand.
And that's what I mean by layers of meaning and really love and experience.
This is what symbol does. It's this, you know, however you want
to call it bridge, you know, collorbook fans are called a boom to
it, and however you want to look at it. It just brings you
to this place. And that's that's what it's always been an especially for us
now in this modern times, it's even more so a rich experience because we
are inundated with the plethora of images, we're inundated with the plethora of sounds,
and there's something so clean, it's cleansing, it's cathartic, it's it's
it brings us to this place that I think, although we suffer in many
ways from lots of things that you know, the ancient people didn't have,
and the ancient people where this aesthetic was formed through, we haven't a unique
blessing in the sense that we can in some ways appreciate it on a different
level because we're coming from a place of absence. We're coming from a place
of being, you know, like I said, inundated, and it helps
us to see this one thing which is beauty is the revelation of Christ.
And I think that's you know, the kind of period I would put on
it. It's it is the revelation of Christ and everything from you know,
harmony, symmetry, you know, and even you know areas where there isn't
symmetry, even those reveal Christ. So that's how I it'd explain it,
you know. And I love that you talked about the symbol is it bringing
it into ourselves because it connected with a stream that we did on the devil's
iconography, which is a famous quote of Father Serah Formos talking about pornography.
But then through these black mirrors are our phones that we're seeing that, especially
those who aren't of careful discernment spiritually, that they're they're bringing in demonic iconography
within themselves, and it's it's impure. As you talked about a sort of
purifying effect of true beauty. I think we're also seeing an attack on aesthetics
within our society at multiple levels, and this is affecting the interior reality,
the spiritual reality of people themselves. I know this something that Jonathan has spoke
about a little bit, Father Trouva. I think he really brought it all
together maybe a thing in terms of helping especially Christians. I don't understand why
it looks the way it does or why it is the way it is in
our church. I think a lot of people that struggle with the beauty aspect
of the churches are people that look at, say, the story of Christ
and look at his crucifixion. They look at the poverty of the images in
the Gospel and how Christ lived a simple life, you know, with fishermen,
and so they're like, why then do you have these golden temples,
and why do you have all this powerful imagery? And the truth is that
orthodox Christianity is tends towards fullness, tends to like a yes and right.
We don't have a no butt It's like yes and And one of the images
that's important in scripture is the eschatological image. That is the way that although
Christ even in his life, the way that he lived very simply and walked,
you know, with sandals on the on the ground. He also presented
this vision of the coming of this on a man as this glorious finality where
all things will come together and the glory of the Throne will be shown,
and you know, and the the authority and the glory of God will fill
the world. Right, you see that already in the prophetic text, even
before the coming of Christ, right, that the glory of God will fill
the entire earth. And that is what we are, that is what we
are participating in our church service. We are participating in eschatological reality, which
is piercing in, piercing in from the future, piercing in from the final
Revelation, and giving us a glimpse of how we can participate in that glory.
And so many people they're like, why are you doing this Old Testament
stuff? Like you, why are you still doing like the Old Testament?
Now that Jesus come, that's changed. But the image of the church is
not based on the Old Testament as much as based on the Book of Revelation.
And that's true even from the early churches. If you go to Rome
and you see the very early churches that were built in the fourth century,
they have eschatological motif you know they they they're representing the twenty four Elders,
and you see Christ on the throne, and there's a sense in which that's
what the liturgy has always been calling us to participate in. And so in
some ways it's the proper ordering of reality. When you read the Heavenly Jerusalem,
you have this beautiful vision of how civilization, how all the activities of
humans, you know, architecture, music, the relationship of the natural and
the artificial, all of this is properly ordered in glory to God. And
that is what we that is what we're participating in when we when we go
to church. And I think that that's really important to understand because the thing
even in terms of the idea of beauty and of ornament and of proper ordering
and all this stuff, these are all things that exist also to understand.
It's like one of the things that happens is that, you know, if
you look at the early Bondy period, for example, and people started criticizing
the Christian Church and the excesses of the Christian Church, all of a sudden,
all that ornament and all that excess got put into state built things,
right, and so that exist that desire to celebrate and to kind of lift
up and to make beauty and to make even like even to to to a
certain excess is something that's part of our of our nature. And if we
don't dedicate it to God, we're gonna end up dedicating it to something else.
And you're gonna start, You're gonna start with this is how bad it
is. Like you're gonna start with making government buildings ornate and huge and beautiful,
and you're gonna end with some pop star looking like decked out like queen
with gold and jewels and everything. Right, that's how you end. And
so you start, you start with you want to remove that glory given to
God, and you end up with like an image of a kind of whore
that is completely you know, decked out and make up put excessively ornamented.
Right, And so we have to be able to direct our desire for that
kind of exuberant beauty in the right in the right place. Yeah, I
think you make a great point in regard to you. You don't get away
from the ornimation in society one way or another, but it's actually of a
selflessness when we give it back to the church, when we give it back
to God and we give the as as much as we can do in a
temporal setting. The beauty, the transcendent beauty. And I wrote down timeless
objectivity because as you pointed to, the sort of eschatological dimension, the piercing
of beauty inside of a parish or personal relationships wherever people encounter it in sinuates
the objectivity of beauty, the objectivity of morality, and the objectivity of the
truth, which is a who, not of what. It's Jesus Christ,
he is Truth incarnate. And so the ornimation isn't something that is paganistic or
idolatry. It's actually something that we want to give the best back to God
and we want to live in sort that transcendent beauty, that beautiful reality.
And you look at Protestant societies and as you said, they don't have saints.
So then Beyonce, Johnny Depp, the Hollywood celebrities, the stars elevate
themselves as now the role models, the leaders for those in those societies to
look towards, to orient themselves in society. And like you said, the
ornamentation now is due to you know, these these modernist asymmetrical art museums or
these new understandings of beauty. This is a displacement of the lack of true
aesthetics within I would say Protestant worship. Not that they are on great people,
of course there are, but you look at the the the mundaneness of
many of the inside of their churches. I think that that that that instinct,
in that pursuit for beauty then gets transposed to the world and not back
to God, which is the ultimate offering. And I think that's really key
because the instinct is in everyone, and that's part of the problem. It
has its points depending on you know what we're talking talking about, especially like
in a polemical sense in regards of something being Pagan or Christian. But I
think especially in this sense, it's important to realize that, you know,
why did why do pagans you know what, quote unquote pagans, right,
people, little citizens? You know, why would they have beauty? Because
it's it's innate in us, because God created us. And the awareness this
is one of the things in regards of having a disposition very much like what
jo I was saying about. You know, yes, you know and both
and in the sense that you know, recognizing God as creator and you know,
God is and being able to see God in the other person but also
in their expressions and even if they are devoid of you know, truth and
to a greater degree, you know, obviously the truth and the awareness of
who Christ is, you can still see the print of God in that.
And I think that's really important because this idea that well, you know,
it's funny. Jonathan said that because I had this, I got transported back
in time. I had a friend I remember during my time of conversion.
I think we were just made caticumens at the time. I had a good
good friend and I invited her to a service and there was already contention.
It's like what is this, you know, I heard you're becoming Orthodox,
Like what does all this mean? And I remember just her, you know,
kind of being in shocking and one and I remember especially you know,
the great entrance happens, and then she got up and left, you know,
she is she got up and left in those service. I was like,
wow, that's that's I don't know what happened, you know, so
I didn't, you know, what's wrong, you know. And after the
entrance, I you know, wanted to go talk with her, and she
said, you know, Christ wouldn't. Christ wouldn't do all this. And
I remember her saying that to me, and I remember feeling so sad,
not just because my friend got up and walked out of the service, but
because this reality that Christ is ruling and reigning. Now that that's what makes
me sad, because I knew she loved God, you know, and as
best as she could as what she understood, and that that is a very
powerful thing to be able to recognize the potential for people to experience the God
that already is, you know, kind of imbued them with the desire and
the ability to pursue truth and beauty. And I think this goes all the
way even back to what we're talking about with like, well, why are
doing all this whole Testment stuff? Even that had the eschaeological reach, even
that was the echo from heaven even there. And I think this is really
key because when people set up this kind of dialectic of like, well you
do it this way, do it that way, it's they lose this reality
that this is about revelation. Although yes, you know certain aesthetic from a
period of time, you know that we call quote unquote Byzantine, right,
But the reality is is that those are just the means by which God is
revealing himself to us. And one of the things that the Church does,
through her aesthetic iss her trains her people, you know, trains the people
of God to have an increasingly astute, accurate, pure, but expansive view
because we will never be able to contain, you know, we'll forever be
approaching the fullness of God. And so if we find our vision becoming,
you know, more and more limited and circumscribed, we have to be careful
that it isn't really about becoming more accurate, but maybe we are losing We're
going in the wrong way, if that makes sense, you know, because
one of the things that you learn when you enter into Orthodox worship you're not
orthodox, is it's incredibly familiar and incredibly foreign at the same time. How
is that possible? And that paradox, that tension, that's a very spiritual
thing being able to keep that tension. And I think that's one of the
things about are being quote unquote orthodox in this modern time is that we can
see It's like another example, I remember taking one of my kids to the
bank for whatever reason, greatest, greatest, you know, kind of anecdotal
story. But you know, my daughter, she's like, I think she
was like eleventh time. She's like, this looks like a church, right,
Like the way the way it was decorated, you know, it had
this, you know, it had a very our deco feel to it,
but our deco has this kind of very Buzantine esthetic baked into it, right,
And so she could just discern that naturally, you know. And I
said, well, yeah, I told her, well, I told her
this is a temple, but it's a temple to Memmon, you know.
And so he kind of had a little Bible story there while waiting for the
teller. But my point with these stories is that it's it's already in people.
And I think for a lot of people outside of the tradition, you
know, a lot of it's this this dialectical like, well, you guys
just kind of then invented this and you just kind of take this, took
this from the Pagans, and it's like, okay, even that, even
that, even if that is the case, what you I think are missing,
my friend, is that God created all things. This is this is
the revelation of how He's getting back. Towice saying earlier, drawing us closer,
you know. Yeah, but it's important to understand, like you said
about this woman who said Christ wouldn't do this, you know, and and
when you talk about the paradox in the Orthodox tradition, we do have that
paradox very strongly represented, which is, we both have the ascetic living in
a cave, you know, eating like carrots every day or whatever for for
his entire life. And we also have you know, Constantinople and Hagia Sophia
and the absolute glory of this eschatological vision. And the truth is that those
two not only can co exist, but in some ways they reinforce each other.
Right. It's like we if we only had the great celebration and the
kind of royal aspect of the tradition we would we could you could say that
we would have something missing, but that's not how it is. We have
and you see it sometimes, like you know, you see it. We
pay attention to this. If people were careful, you'll see some priests like
come to the parish, you know, and you can see like his ratty,
this ratty thing, and it's like and he's got his head, it's
all fraying and it's all one of them. It's like it is like,
you know, it's like you can see and he's got he's got his prayer
rope that it's like it's kind of slick from the oil of his fingers or
whatever. And it's like, you know, you see the priests come in
and then and then he puts on right the vestment, and then he enters
into the worship and participates in this glorious thing. But it's like that's the
that's the contrast, you know, And it's it's a very important contrast to
have. It's as strong as the contrast between the Cross and the Throne of
Christ, which are both true and both manifests the fullness of what Christ brought
to us. And so it's important to understand it even in terms of what
you said in terms of the city, for example, like this idea of
bringing in the pagan elements into the The image that we see in Revelation is
the image of the city being converted. Right. It's like the Holy City
now becoming a vehicle. And it says in scripture. In Revelation it talks
about the heavenly Jerusalem. It says the kings of all nations brought their glory
into the heavenly Jerusalem, right, And so the glory of all the nations
is brought into the heavenly Jerusalem. And so it means that it's not it
doesn't oppose that which is good in all the cultures in all the world.
It's rather that the best of Rome, the best of different cultures, can
be brought in as an offering to become a vehicle for a participation in the
heavenly liturgy. So you both have this image that the image of the liturgy
is a representation of the description in Revelation of the angels that are surrounding the
throne and are sensing and doing all these things that we do in church.
But then also of the heavenly Jerusalem, that which is happening on earth as
this image of Because a lot of the forms that we have in church,
it's true, they're Roman, right, they come from Rome. A lot
of the architecture, a lot of the even some of the vestments. There
are certain things that have brought in from Rome. But that is the image
in the Book of Revelation. Right. There's both, there's two Romes.
You could say. In Revelation there's the horror, which is the evil aspect
of the city, the evil aspect of civilization that beasts and that horror together.
But then there's also this other image of all of human activities bringing up
their glory in service of God. I just wanted to say, I think
it's important too to kind of like dive, you know, kind of drop
down a couple thousand feet. And even just looking at the fact that the
quote unquote again Byzantine right Roman, the aesthetic even that is a synthesis.
You know, when we when we experience it, it isn't just this kind
of pure static just that popped out of anywhere that doesn't have you know,
influences from different nations. I mean, but Jonathan just brought up about the
ascological aspect. I mean works I think when I'm when I'm failing and trying
to get across too, is that that you were experiencing that now to a
veiled degree or whatever you however you would put it, Because even in regards
of the aesthetic of the Church, there are these somatic influences, Asian inversion,
Persian influences, and you know, this is when this is one of
the things that when you see that already, You're already seeing it if you
see what I did, right, They're like you, you're already seeing it
happen. And I think this is really key because one of the big problems
when we veered too far one way with something is that we we we miss
some of the details that are very important. Like, for instance, one
of the things that I you know, I don't do them as much,
but I used to do lectures on iconography like a lot. And one of
the things that I would do that would just you know, kind of scandalize
people. I would talk to them about Fayum portraits, portraiture, and I
mean it without fail, especially at that time. This isn't like the like
mid like two thousand and five, two thousand and six, two thousand and
seven, and I would, you know, do these slide shows. And
I'd showed them and I thought, well, you know about the origins of
the quote unquote Byzantine style, you know, quote unquote, and you know,
some people would start getting kind of uncomfortable. You could see it in
their eyes because they have this idea that it just kind of like drops out
of nowhere. Yeah, you know what I mean, And it doesn't and
it is this which God always does. Right. God takes the synthesis of
human failed yes and fallen yes, but but human effort, human experience,
and he wields it together. He baptized that, he purifies it, he
loomins it, he imbus it with his love, with his presence. That's
what the love of God is. It's his presence. If God shines his
presence on you, it's because he loves you. How you respond to that,
that's a different thing, but it's it's always out of his love.
And we see that revelation is a very unitive. One of the effects of
the revelation of God is it's unitive. It brings, It brings synthesis,
It brings things together, because that is the repentance. That's the undoing of
the fall, that disunification on a lot of levels. It's taking seemingly disparate
parts and bringing them into harmony. And I think that's one of the things
that maybe should be emphasized a little bit more because as the world, you
know what I mean, like the world like passions in the flesh of the
fall world and all that, and and the fall and powers are are continually
seeking to imitate to our even greater and greater degree the life of the Church
and the glory of God. For the sake of deception and all these things,
it's important that we discerned that. You know, ultimately, you know,
the love of God is what could never be triumphed over, and that
love it conquers. You know, love covers multitude of sins. But in
this sense the problematic multiplicity which Jonathan has talked about at you know, at
death that a nauga, But that problematic multiplicity of culture and esthetic and all
those things, it really does get reconciled. In the church. I mean
San John the Baptist, the Holy Mother of God always on the Iconostafs,
I mean male, female, the ascetic, the heavenly Queen, like right
there, it's always there for us to see. So Andrew Gould, the
architect, has pointed out to what extent Hagias of Fear is Persian like that
that even in like the sixth century, they have a Roman building. It's
still a Roman building clearly, and but that a lot of the ornamentation was
brought in from Persia. And there seems to have been this this desire,
like you said, to bring in things and to join them in synthesis.
It's like it's the opposite of mixture. It's the opposite of confusion. Right.
Confusion is when disparate things don't play together towards a common goal. That's
when you have confusion. So you have a bunch of different things and they're
doing their own thing and they're not coming together towards towards towards purpose. Whereas
synthesis is when you do have several things, but they're all that's say,
kind of dancing together and you can feel that they're joining towards a common a
common purpose. And so Christians are not against or for diversity and against against
the idea of different things. It's rather how is it that they come together
in love, in participation in the life of Christ. That's all really that
matters, you know, And and the liturgy ultimately plays that that that great
role, like you said, like if you look at the aconostatis and even
the way in which we we are, like we are the people you know,
saying the amen. There's the choir, there's the there's the there're the
priest and the clergy, and there's all these elements and they're all they're all
in a great dance. You know, they're all coming together in the worship
of God. Well, and I wanted to pick up on a comment that
you said a few ago regards to the tension between beauty and asceticism. Jonathan,
and I think that we look at the contemporary culture and I totally agree
with you. That's what the church does. It holds the both and together.
And I when you're talking, what popped in my mind is that the
growth and hedonism and pleasure seeking actually erodes the beautiful tension and distinction between beauty
and asceticism. And as we become more hedonistic, one we can look at
the informalness of our society. I mean, it's stark contrast to look at
the beginning of the twentieth century on how the average person dressed versus in the
beginning of the twenty first century. And again the informalness of the way we
dress, the informalness of the way we talk to each other. But maintaining
boundaries. Something that I kind of reap on a lot and harp on a
lot on my channel is that this is the point of the logos, is
that it maintains the order, It maintains the boundaries between things, and that
I would argue moving forward, at least, what we're seeing in culture is
this continual dissolution of boundaries and distinctions between things, and so as formalism breaks
down, as boundaries break down, you're talking about how discipline is tied to
the coming of a forward purpose. Well, we're living in a culture where
discipline is the under attack. Essentially, meritocracy is under attack. That we
have new understandings of the way that we move through our societies, and that
beauty and asceticism are necessary, because if you just have beauty, you're going
to end up in hedonism, You're going to end up in an over indulgence,
in which we could look at the Roman Empire, we can look at
the American Empire, we can look at our own context and culture. And
so I think again, the church, what it does is it holds these
things in the proper context, and that beauty is true, and beauty is
morally right, and more is true and beautiful, and that all the the
good, true and the beautiful they play on each other. And I think
pleasure in the in the lack of the crucifying of our own will, is
actually leading to the eroding of all these things in our society to one degree
or another. And you'll see it's interesting because you know that image that I
proposed at some point when I talked about the priests that comes in, you
know, kind of you know, a little ratty and a little kind of
disheveled or whatever, and then and then moves into the glory. Uh.
There's a sense in which these contemporary culture is the very opposite of that.
Right. It's like, in some ways the church asks you to come to
church broken. Right, It's like, come broken, my friend, Like
you know, come in confession, Come and come contrite. Come not not
like this, you know, it's like, come broken. And if you
come broken, then you get this glory. You get to participate in this
beauty and this ping. And the contemporary world says, go out and like
joy, right, do it all jo and participate in excess. And the
result is that you are accidentally broken. Right, You're not broken in the
Christian sense of recognizing your loneliness and entering into that, but you're made low
and then you suffer for it. Right, You're broken, and your relationships
are broken, and everything gets broken. So it's like a weird inversion in
a caricature of each other, like if I can, if I could just
throw something out there, though, I mean, I think that so with
hedonism, there's something that happens in the sense that you know, hedonism and
it pulls it not only pulls someone out of the potential for that experience,
right, but it perverts intentionally in many ways. I would I would submit
because like, for instance, the inability to see the beauty in the ascetic,
the inability to see the beauty that is in and the poor, right,
the inability to see the beauty that is in those things that are not
pleasurable, right. And I think that's the thing is our society conflates beauty
with you know, something that is dazzling or pretty or it's not when when
the Church speaks of beauty, and I think this is one the things in
the church speaks of beauty, people can mistake it for simply just you know
that which is grand and you know that which elegant is is a good way,
in a better way, I think, in many ways, to begin
to explain to people what the how what beauty is, because elegance can oftentimes
be very subtle. The sublime is another way, because you know, the
sublime, and there is a at times, this catching of the breath at
the sublime. You know, this this landscape which is terrifying, you know,
in its beauty. This I think this is important because our culture seeks
to pull all of that away and just give people, you know, the
sugar, you know, the the hot pink, you know what I mean,
and the ice and and and you know, and the blank. But
that's not beauty anyways, Like there's nothing beautiful really about that. It lacks
transcendence. It lacks transcendence because because of it's but it's it's absence. And
what makes it transcendent is that transcendent isn't isn't a disdaining of the whole,
but it something that's truly transcendent not only encapsulates, but its ability to encapsulate
it. It moves above it. It's above it. Not it doesn't disdain
it per se, it's above it. It's it's beyond it. Right,
there's another way to I think, to see it. And so I think
this is really key because what could happen is that someone could begin to see
the beauty of the church. And if they don't allow the beauty of the
Church to do its work. They could very begin they can very easily begin
to lose the ability to see the beauty of the church. Trying to know
what I'm saying, because if you are coming in and if you see beauty
and you see only the aspects of the beauty of the church which are self
serving, right, order is self serving? Right, we see it,
right, All these things are self serving because we want to be safe,
We want to be secure, all those things. But you you'll begin to
miss it because then you're you are extracting because of your own desire for comfort,
to have those things which you're only tentillating and appeasing to you. But
the reality is is Christ calls us into especially it gives us eyes to see
where the beauty is found in the aesthetic, in the beggar. I mean,
if you think about Christ, the logos incarnate walking among men, walking
in the height of civilized Roman Empire, that's the height distublati civilization on the
planet, right, quote unquote. And he's pulling together and how does he
do it? Like he's talking to the Samaritan woman and he's talking, you
know, to these and he's doing all these things alluding to the coming of
the Gentiles and his apostles they bring in the Gentiles. I mean, all
of this is just it's mind boggling, but that's absolutely what Christ did in
his ministry was to show where there isn't anywhere where He didn't touch, right.
I think that's really important for us because if we lose that sense and
people can lose it, especially as people see the beauty of the church as
a beacon of and it is a beacon of safety. But if it's always
just that, then there are these places where Christ is calling you, and
you will not be able to see them because they're not things that He's forcing
upon you. There are things that He's inviting us in too, And I
think this is why the ascetic tradition in the Church isn't just about you know,
the prostration and the bottle experience. But the icon for us at a
modern time, imposes a fast on us in ways that I don't think people
understand. You know, that the icon imposes a fast on our senses and
calls us to really reject the sugar and the pop and the you know the
kind of you know, visual kinetic energy that's given to us like all those
things. It calls us to to actually discern that the pop and the twinkle
and the hot pink isn't really beautiful. And you need to have the better
herb, you need to have the salt, you need to have those things
to really help you to apprehend greater scope of beauty, right And I think
that's really key because if we don't have that, then what can happen is
people no longer are entering into the heavening realm, and they do just make
it, you know, a place which is like a museum with gold,
you know, orimentation, and they and they begin to lose what the icon
of Saint John the Baptist is communicating. They begin to lose the sense of
what the church is is ushering us into. And then it really does become
flat and two dimensional in the wrong ways, and we lose the ability to
enter into that eschological experience because now we're just you know, spectating on some
sort of very interesting and exotic kind of amalgam, you know, and that's
that's not what's happening, right. Yeah. I would argue that the lack
of beauty in our society coinciding with what you're saying, it's bringing us down
to more of a base level of reality and just the pursuit of our pleasures.
Because what what does in twenty twenty three walking through America, what gives
somebody the sense of all? I mean, is it the empire state building?
Like what exactly brings somebody to a transcendent awareness of asking deeper questions about
themselves, about the world, about each other. And that's again part of
the as Jonathan highlight the eschaonological purpose of beauty in itself, of esthetics,
and how God is working through the beautiful to reach us directly and think about
you're saying, Father Tobo. And and my question was because there is that
like in the the in the church there there is definitely what modern people now
would call the bleak, right, that is, if you look at the
mosaics, you know that are that we still see in Ravenna or you know
in the in the in Hawgesfia, it's like it's something I mean, it
is over the top, you know. And then even the vestments, right,
the vestments are over the top, hand embroidered, you know, with
gold thread and and all that. And so how do you see that like
how do you see because I I kind of saw you pulling back and saying,
we have to be careful not to be also deceived by by that that
those moving pictures or that kind of the kind of excess of luxury. And
I mean I see that in the tradition, right, I see it.
You know that you see it in Saint John Chris System who in some ways
it is kind of criticizing, you know, the overly overly ornamented altar,
and then ends and says, but if there is gold, you know,
you should you should use the gold. But it's like you should be careful.
And it reminds you also of the the patriarch of Contintinople. When Justinian
built hag Yesophia. There's a legend the store. I don't know if it's
true, but there's a legend that he wanted to make the templon or the
door. I think it was the door of the church out of gold or
the templon out of gold or something like that. Like there was something,
the massive thing in the church he wanted to make out of gold. And
the patriarch said, he said, okay, you can do it, but
if there's one bigger left in Contantinople. After that, it's like that's on
you, right, That's that's on you. And so he kind of had
to pull back, you know and make it out of silver or something to
kind of find that balance. And so how do you see that? Because
I mean, I'm not a pastor, so I don't have to deal with
that as much. But how do you see that, even in managing a
parish, for example, how to balance the charitable aspect with the beautification,
with the the you know, the the two kind of the tension that you
seem to be wanting to to bring out, to be careful not to be
also seduced by just this kind of external beauty. Yeah, I mean,
I think the first thing is it's I'll just give this this insight. I
hope this is helpful. You know, our parish is in Kansas City and
it's you know, in the middle of the hood, like the hood.
And when we were you know, it's an old Baptist church which we brought
down to the studs and then you know, renovated. And when we were
doing it, you know, I was being very particular about things, and
there was you know, murmurs and some people that were upset. They're no
longer in the community that blessed them. But they were upset because they said,
you know, why why would you be spending all this, you know,
why are you gonna put a baptismal font here? Why are you going
to have a marble inlay here? Why are you doing that? And then
I sat down and I told one of them the story of you know,
the baptism of russ you know, and the whole story of like sending out
the emissary, sat blam, are saying the emissaries out to you know,
all these places, and you know, we all know the story, right
the emissaries went here there, and they finally went to Auguio cit and they're
like, we didn't know if we weren't having an on earth. And that
revelation of beauty wasn't just about you know, the incredible mosaics in August at
the time. It was it was the chanting, it was the music,
it was it was the spirit that was imbibed in the people. And we
know that it's if you know that it's valid because when you look at the
life of Saint Vladimir, I mean, he ceases being a polygamist. He
ceases being cruel, all these things. They begin to affect him and begin
to affect the Russian people who were illiterate and pagan and barbarous and all that
stuff, right, and then they became people of God. Now I see
all that To say this, the reality is that you know beauty will save
the word, but you have to know what beauty is first, and that's
part of I think what the church does is the church always you know,
it's the it's the the yes, and you know it's the fullness, it's
we're maximalists, but we also understand that there is a place where you must
ascend from or excuse me, you know you must you must ascend from this
place. And the way that I think you really begin to do this for
someone that you begin to understand what's your intent. Because the intent, if
it's a the worship of God, and the worship of God necessitates the bringing
of the loft sheep, then what's happens is there's a real sense of invitation
that's in there. And I want to make this not so abstract. I
think that there are moments in people's lives when they can if you've been Orthodoxic
or not orthomotgicy. You've traveled around, like, why is it that you
can get a sense of something a warmth of a community and it may not
have all the quote unquote accoutrement that like a huge, perfect parish has,
But you feel like you're being ushered into the Orthodox Church. You feel like
you're being ushered into something that's just as valid. Why is that, Well,
it's because of the beauty. The the actual material of that's used to
express the beauty is precisely that it's just a material to express the beauty.
Dph has behind him an icon of Saint Maximus. It's right there. I
was just looking at it, right, and it's like, well, the
problem is that people have these passions and they become attached to things in a
disordered, improper, idolatrous way. Right. And it's like Saint Maximus is
famous as saying, it's like, you know, gold is an object,
woman is an object, right, But gold connected to a thought of luxury,
which is fundamentally about self, right, then becomes a passion. You
know, it becomes this thing that becomes idolatrous. And so I think the
way I would say this is number one, I recognize that it is possible
for someone to become unduly enamored and therefore, you know, begin to fall
to an idolatrous relation to the expression of beauty in the church. And we
see that when they begin to and this is what Saint John Krassostom's talking about,
when they begin to disdain the beauty of Christ in the beggar or whatever
whatever context that you want to do, you want to look at. But
ultimately that horizontal, you know, the vertical of the cross, right,
you do the cross, You have the vertical of me seeing God, me
sing, the transcendent, you know, me seeing all these things, right,
and ultimately it's still about me right, seeing that thing and being connected.
But then if we begin to lose the horizontal of that reality, which
is the humbling aspect of seeing the other and seeing the beauty and the other,
I think that's where people begin to lose it. And that's where you
see people feeling like it's not even so much that this person's you know,
disturbing you, but if they come in it's like, ooh, do they
look unkept? You know, like that that happens in parishes, and I
think that's I think that's important because a parish which, you know, someone
I'm not talking again about someone who's you know, maybe having some mental health
issues whatever. I'm talking about just if a if a human ping wanders in,
doesn't know what they're doing, but maybe I know this is crazy to
soon maybe God is leading them to that church to see something so that they
could have a place of conversion. And people could flip out and be like,
hey, you know, kind of get that guy out of here,
right. And Saint Peter talks about this about hey, be careful about having,
you know, the wealthy person brought to the front and the poor person
brought to the back. And I think that is really key because if we
don't ad knowledge, and if we don't have the humility to admit that,
we could become beguiled. It's not the fault. And that's where I think
a lot of the Protestants Evangelicals miss it is that they think a person they
realize that that can happen, but they think it's the fault of the icon
or the fault of the mosaic. It's not the fault of the mosaic or
the icon. It's the person who has not kept that tension of you know,
the transcendent beauty, yes, but also the beauty that's that's humble,
you know, the beauty of of the beggar Saint John chrossoft Stone, I
mean, and Father trouble. You can you can treat the Bible as an
idol too. Absolutely, it's not hard at all. Like I saying,
people do it all the time. When you talk to someone and they're saying
about the Word of God, the Word of God, the Word of God,
and you're like, what are you talking about, And it's like it's
like it's like, it's not Christ, the incarnate Logos, it's the Bible
that's the only word of God. And you're like, really, I don't
know, it's a little weird, man. It's the spell book they have,
and then they treat it like it's a spell book, you know,
right, and so so yeah, I mean it is to say, any
this is the this is the you know, I've been looking at Exodus a
lot, because we did this Exodus seminar, you know, a while ago,
and I mean thinking a lot about some of the images in the book.
And the character of Aaron is a really interesting figure because in some ways
Aaron is a tool that God gives to Moses to communicate to the people,
because Moses like, I can't communicate. I need something, So God gives
them an external He's like, here's this other layer that you can that will
I'll speak for you, and Will be like, you're representative in front of
the people. And so he's like he is in some ways that tool that
God uses to manifest himself. But then he's the one who makes the golden
calf. It's like, that's the duality of externalization that in some ways it's
necessary and inevitable. That is, all things that come down to us from
God, you know, are externals in the sense that they're you know,
the glories of God appearing in the myriads of things that we that we see,
and that's real and that's true. But they are all everything in the
world is in danger of becoming an idol if we are not looking through them
towards towards that which is transcendent. So it's just the reality of externals.
So the idea that in some ways our particular form of worship is more in
danger of becoming an idol, I think is nonsense. It's just the reality
of the externals. Yeah, I was wondering if maybe we can tie a
few of the different topics we've discussed with we're talking about symbols, bringing them
into ourselves, this timeless beauty, the eschaological importance of these things with us
being living icons, because that seems that in a sense, that's what Father
Turbert was getting at in regards to me and my relationship to the transcendent.
But then the horizontal is me enacting out the beauty as a living icon of
Christ, and that this is the goal of all of us, and this
is the beautiful transformation of all of us through theosis, through the engaging with
these uncreated energies of God. I was thinking, maybe Father, you could
speak a little bit to what for those who may not be familiar with windows
of veneration, how we understand icons, How does that relate than to the
individual person having that relationship with Christ and becoming a living icon. Well,
I think this is one of the things that's really important, is because man,
you know, I don't know if I can talk without throwing something out
there that might be kind of hard to swallow, but I just there is
no Christianity without an ascetic aspect. It's just it's just you can't have it.
It's a it's a caricature, it's a distortion. And the reason why
I'm saying that is because the aesthetical aspect of the life of the church,
it's there to do. It's there to it's it's there to help keep this
tension that we're talking about, right, And it's also there because that tension
is necessary in the sense of development, Like if we're going to look at
the powers of the soul and the need for the powers of the soul to
be you know, honed and strengthened and disciplined, and the powers of the
soul being primarily the means by which we actually experience, you know, the
unseen God, right, because God is the maker, you know, the
Father's maker of all things visible and invisible. And so that reality, which
is a reality, just because people are unaware of it, doesn't mean that
that reality isn't there. And what the Church does, especially for us,
awakens us up to this reality. And it does it through the asthetic tradition,
but it does it also first and foremost, I think through the iconography,
through the beauty of the church, the architecture of the church, through
the beauty of our hymnography and our chance. And the reason why I say
that is because what happens is when you even if you are not aware of
you know, the kind of the historical, you know, accidents of what
different cultural aspects brought together this thing, when you encounter it even if actually
let me flip that, actually forgive me, let me flip that, because
oftentimes the movie producer and the director is the guy who can't watch a movie
anymore because he's he's so aware of what went in there that he's no longer
able to kind of like suspend his knowledge to actually enter into watching a movie.
You know what I mean. It's like the artists who can no longer
appreciate something in the way that he used to back in the day, because
you know, he's he's become to some degree, like so jaded by his
knowledge. Right. I think what I'm trying to get at here is that
this reality when you experience something, and it's sometimes often just a flash,
and it pulls you to I don't have a better word except for potential.
You maybe might be able to say hope, but you get this flash or
something it's otherworldly, and I don't it's nothing that I that you give an
image to him. I'm talking about seeing flying you know, horses or anything
like that that I'm talking about a hope, it's forgiven. Let me digress
a little bit. If you've ever experienced something very tragic, like the death
of a loved one or you know, I see this whole time being a
perious mentioning someone where I'm with someone who's dying, or they know that their
parent is dying, or you know, something really difficult is happening. And
my job, my work is not so much to bring them to this place
where they can like kind of make it through. That's really up to God
in many ways and up to them. But my work is to be present
with them, just being present because my presence is only possible. My presence
is valuable in so far as I'm trying to just be present to bear witness
of what they're going through and God willing to bring to be some sort of
conduit for hope, right, and that flash of hope in the face of
the eminent. Trying to describe when this these flashes of eternity, these flashes
of something transcend it in the real way, that's what if you're being guided
well, and you're actually not just looking at the icon and the church and
all these things. It's trying to, you know, find a solid ground
in a temporal sense, meaning like yes, or society is crumbling, yes,
their political systems crumbling, yes, or morale is crumbling all that,
but like it's always crumbled because Antium crumbled, you know, quote unquote Holy
Russia crumbled. Like what has kept the people of God grounded? It's these
things. And it's actually in the face of these very terrible moments that like
we get to see that hope being purified into something. You're not purified,
but freed from these things that were at once. They're given to us as
aids, but we want to hold onto the crutches to some degree. And
I know this gets into dicey territory because people like whoaha, whoa father?
Then that isn't that the Is that the mindset of like you know, the
Puritans and all these people. And I'm like, yes to some degree,
but it was again not for the reasons that I'm talking about. Because we
can talk about all of the I can give the legend to how to read
icons, right, this means this and this means that, and someone can
become really adept at being able to break down like, oh, this symbol
means this, this equals this, but see what what they what? You
don't understand? This only comes from like really kind of experience and striving for
it is if the more adept you get at being able to kind of like
read the code, the easier it is for you to begin to miss it,
because what happens is is you're now leaning into your ability to wield understanding
and information for the sake of wielding it, right, And that's magic,
that's not That's not what this is about. This is about being brought to
this place that only God can bring us to. That's what the icon's there
for. The icon is there to sure on a real basic level, even
though this isn't the case, but there's truth to it, right that the
icon is there initially to you know, pedagogically instruct those who couldn't read.
But that's not really you hear this, but that's not really the case because
it's like we're we are retrofiting our understanding of how people learn in pedagogy and
experience on the ancients. Right, it isn't just about reading right, it's
the Gospels meant to be heard. See what people? That's not satisfying to
people when they hear the gospel, Gods will be mean to heard. No,
No, because if I can read, it's meant to be read,
because yes, it is meant to be read. But not not just exclusively
right because communal activity. It's a communal activity, and not just communal in
regards of like the horizontal right. But think about I think about the children
who hear the gospel, you know, weekend and week out, week in
and week out, and some of them are not going to most of them
are not going to go on to be priests. They're not going to go
on to be you know, quote unquote church workers. But they're gonna be
plumbers. They're gonna be moms and dads. And they may not even be
picking up the Bible daily, although I hope they do. But something there's
a seed that was planted deeply in them hearing those the hearing the gospel.
There there's something that's very powerful that's opened up to them. When it may
not even be a well executed icon quote unquote, but what is it?
They'll remember that icon that was in their church when they're growing up. Why
Because the icon facilitated something called communion, called connection. And and that's the
thing is, if if we don't kind of really keep that, I think
in the front of these conversations, it becomes very easy for someone from outside
of our tradition or anywhere else to like, oh, that's cool and learn
this. And that's where that's where you get people who are like, yeah,
yeah, I know about icons and it's cool and blah blah blah blah
blah, and I have one here, right and they they're they're treating it
like like it's a saison print that they got at big lots or something,
you know what I mean, It's a it's a commodity. And the reality
of it is is that, yes, there is a whole thing about you
know, inverse perspective, and we can talk about all these things, and
we should. I'm not saying we shouldn't, but I think what's I think
what's appealing and what's captiving for people is that, For instance, why do
people keep listening to Jonathan because Jonathan's a wealth of knowledge. But I think
the thing about Jonathan is you still get the sense that he's in awe and
wonder still you don't get the sense forgive me for talking like you're not there,
Jonathan, like he you know, he doesn't. It isn't just kind
of like he's just throwing like yeah, da da da da da da da
da da, and this is this and this is that. Right that you
can tell to some degree that he's still searching, that he's still being pulled
into that he's still he's in communion with someone. That's what That's what we
want to that's the end goal. We don't want to just know like the
why of something. But it's like what you're saying, dph about like the
who. And I think I really think that's important to bring forward because one
of the hardest things for someone who's coming out of let's say a reform tradition,
an evangelical tradition, is that they they see the icon, they see
the liturgy, they see all the mystery of the church, and they want
to pierce that mystery. But the thing is is they have to understand you
can't pierce that mystery in the same way. And forgive me for being lewde,
but you cannot approach it the same way. A guy kind of wants
to you know, go for the hunt, you know what I mean,
Like some guys like the chase and you want to you don't want to approach
it like you're you're going to conquer something. And I think that's what happens
when we view these things and just almost exclusively like kind of pedagogical like approach.
We have to remember like what, like what is being revealed here about
who? Yeah, I think I think Father Terbo, what you're saying,
what you're getting to is important in terms even in terms of the question that
you asked their uh David that you know, the one of the main purposes
of the icons is to bring into remind us of the communion of the saints
in which we're participating when we are in prayer and in liturgy. And so
that's why we have these standing saints that are just there kind of standing in
the church like as if they're standing with us and they're worshiping God and you
know we you know, you talked also, you asked a bit about how
how we treat each other in terms of the in terms of becoming icons,
and that is something that I this is a speculation on my part, but
I think part of the reason why we kiss icons has to do with the
Saint Paul's asking us to greet each other with the Holy kiss. I think
I think that there's at least part of it which comes from that, which
is in the same way that I bow to the priest and kiss his hand,
the same way that the priest comes out of the altar bows to us
and ask for forgiveness in that in that way in which we re see Christ
in each other in the church, and we and we signify that through different
ways, in the same way that we encounter the icons and the saints as
a continuation of the same process that we encounter each other with. And so
I think you're right that there is a connection, definite connection in the manner
in which we're meant to encounter each other as icons. It's more, I
think it's more best formulated, not that we're to become icons. That's that's
difficult. It's like, it's more that we should encounter others as icons,
like we should when we meet others, we should see in them Christ.
That should be our focus. And if we do that, then we will
be becoming like Christ. If we do that. But how to be in
that disposition where we see like this person in front of me, you know,
is a little Christ to me, and I should I should, I
should treat him that way. That's hard, that's a tough one, but
that's what we're asked to do. I verily on when even you know,
just coming to the church and people are like, okay, well, what's
this, what's that? Blah blah, And I would explain to them about
my time when I was in the Balkans or even in Iraq, and I'd
say, look, you know, like I was missing my wife and at
the time to kids, and I pick up the pitch, I'd kiss it.
I would do that. I'd be on the fob and I'd be know,
missing my missing my wife and my kids. Then I kissed the picture
and people would go like, yeah, they get it. They would get
it because they've had something some kind of experience somewhat like that, and they
be like, there you go. We can move past that if you want.
And you know, I can talk to you about photiosconto Gloux and all
that stuff, but like that's not going to get you anywhere right now.
Like what you want to know is like okay, like, well, how's
this helping out. How's this helping out the person actually in the church,
not just the priest, you know, not just the educator. But what
about that kid, what about that old grandma, what about working class gym
with his family. I mean, I'm really into this because I think one
of the things is that for the people, the laos, for the people,
it's all there to bring them into it because they're they're the people of
God. It isn't just about the educated. And the illumination that the church
brings comes from love. It comes from love, and and when we begin
to have like that's the thing. People have relationships with these saints, they
really do. Like if someone you know, it's like I'm in the serving
church of the tradition of the Slava, and you know, you have this
patron of a family and oftentimes, you know, generationally, like they turn
to Saint John when there's actual problems. Saint John isn't just like we have
Saint John up here because he is a figurehead of resistance to government power.
Like that is such an interpretation we would he would give, which it's valid.
I mean, I'll go there all day. I'll go there all day.
But I think what's really important is that not everyone should strive to be
a Jonathan Pago a David Patrick Kennedy, Like, I think people need to
strive to be good, faithful men who work their h back job, who
go to church and love their neighbor. And when they do that, they'll
be able to experience the glow and the profundity of God. Like that's that's
reality, and and I'm all for that, because that's what transfigures the world.
Like you said, at some point, you realize that the Saints are
there, and they're there, and you know, if you're if you're attentive
to it, you'll see them kind of you know, act in your in
your life and act in the life of others. And you know, that's
a that's a great joy because it reminds us that they're alive in Christ,
you know, and that they they're there. They are kids still in the
church, and they still pray for us, and they just like we're meant
to pray for each other. We can kind of experience it when we see
the Saints move among us and and move things, you know, among us.
So it's a it's a testimony to what the church is. I tell
people about it and I know it's I'm taking liberty with it. But when
I give my explanations, you know, I tell people that think of the
halo and the icon as the wedding ring and the unification of God and that
person. Right, there's your thiosis, right, the univocation of God and
that person and that wedding ring, which is a symbol, right, I
mean, and then you can even have someone touched their wedding ring. It's
like, you know, put your hand on that wedding ring, Jim,
you know, put your hand on that wedding ring, you know, Joni,
and recognize like what is that? Yeah that's metal, Yeah, that's
gold. Yeah, that's an or. But like the effort that you put
in, Jim to work those extra hours, you know, to get Jony
that really nice ring, right, that that's an actual manifestation of your love
for Jonie and your love of you know, Mark and Lucy, who are
your parents, right, Because you're holding to this tradition and you're you're loving
this tradition and you're giving of yourself in the real world. Right, let's
wet and tears to bring forth that love which is in the tear in the
sense of you know, it's invisible, but where you're manifesting it, and
that's a real thing. And that's what icons are. Icons are a window
to heaven. Okay, well what's heaven? Well look at an icon,
and what's in an icon? Every icon, generally speaking, there's going to
be a human person, right and the halo. There you go, God
and Man. That's what heaven. Heaven is the union of God and Man.
Right, anything else we begin to kind of like get into other stuff,
but we know that's what heaven is. Person's with God and God in
persons. That's what it is. That's what the Kingdom of Heaven is.
And so when we're able to bring it down to that level and show,
you know, Jony and Jim that the symbols that are even on their body,
on their ring finger can actually lead them into that understanding, then you
start to approximate the purpose and the function of the icon. It isn't just
there to give you, you know, a high level theological understanding of you
know, blah blah blah, but it's actually like to ground you, which
is incarnational. That's the thing is that being incarnational is about being grounded.
And I think this is really key because one of the big things that you
want to do that I wanted to do. I wanted to pass on the
tradition, yes, but the life of the church to my kids, right,
I want them to become citizens because this is the meta The church is
the meta culture, right, Everything gets you know, everything is subsumed into
that meta culture. And if there's something valuable and good, it gets baptized,
it gets illuminated, it gets you know, impregnated with God's wisdom and
glory, and then it becomes something blessed. Right, And that's that's why
we have to keep this reality in front of people. And that's what the
icon does. It keeps that reality of what God is calling and has already
ushered you into. You know, you remind me of the conversation I had
with Bishop max Maximus on participatory versus propositional understandings of God and how we relate,
and that this is what we're hinting at through the entire conversation, was
this participation in God, participation in the experience of beauty, the creation of
beauty, participation in the uncreated energies of God, which is related to all
this different stuff. So we're talking about saints we're talking about men that,
with their free will, chose to choose God, chose to love, chose
to participate. The icons then are windows of energetic realities of heaven in which
that you participate in. As you said, you don't just decipher it like
a code. It's a living reality, even though it's just a piece of
wood with paint on it. And so this participation is this mystery of orthodoxy
that I think is what's so beautiful. It's not this overly scholastic propositional understanding.
It's not just a sort of bland and lack of aesthetic due to the
fear of idolatry. It's it's again, it's bringing all these tensions together and
allowing you to participate in these realities. And that is then becoming a living
icon, is the fullness of day after day after day choosing to participate in
this and hopefully God willing in yourself. You then can be as as Abbot
Trefont says, and an angels unaware, you can be somebody in somebody's life,
say it's the man who's disheveled and smells and comes into the church.
That you are now in a position to actually be another window for somebody into
the kingdom, and that's the goal of all of us, and that I
think that's that's it's subtle, but it's a different emphasis than maybe you get
in other flavors of Christianity because it's not so participatory. I think. I
think your point is right, and Father Troubau, your point about the wedding
ring, I think is a great way to help people understand Sacramento reality when
they're not used to it, right, and you can you can reduce it
to very simple things like a good I try to. You find this the
most the simple examples, like a handshake. Right. A handshake is a
ritual, right, A handshake is a means. A handshake is all these
things. But you know, you still tell your child, like, here's
how you shake your hand, right, this is you have a firm handshake,
don't just flop, you know, hold the hand not too long,
like the child has to learn to shake the hand properly. And but the
purpose is not the handshake, obviously, just like the purpose is not the
wedding ring. And also the purpose is not this piece of wood with painted
The purpose is that which we see through and so and we're used to it,
because now once you internalize it and you shake someone's hand, you're not
thinking about the handshake at all, Right, You're seeing through the handshake to
the person that you're encountering and seeing it as a method to greet and to
enter into communion with them. It's the same with the kiss. It's the
same with all these gestures, and the icon is the same. It's like
you know, when you when we encounter the icons, we see them as
mean of encountering the saints, of remembering them, of bringing them to mind,
bringing them into prayer, and asking them to pray for us, And
that becomes as natural as a handshake once you have kind of entered into that
life. But like you said, Father Trubau, if you just kind of
sit at home online and you like interpret icons, like I'm I've interpreted icons
more than anybody, right, Like I spent a lot of time interpreting icons.
But obviously the point is ultimately for them to become vehicles for our participation
in the life of Christ. That's right, I mean, I think one
of the best ways to understand it, and especially I really hope that this
helps a lot of people kind of get over some of those hurdles of barriers
of entry, and that they don't worry about what people think or whatever,
and they just want to approach God. Right, And this is what I
mean by this. All this is necessary insofar as it becomes tacit, because
b that's the space in which you begin to really get it and you get
into it. For instance, your example about the driving, about the handshakes,
perfect. Let's do another one driving a car, right. You know,
I had first day of school today, my sixteen year old He's like,
can I drive Dad? Sure? Right? And you know he's taking
turns to why you know, all the stuff, all stuff, and it's
not tacit yet he's still thinking. It's like, okay, break distance,
right, and then there's gonna come a point when it becomes tacit. And
what's interesting is the more all of those parts are tacit, the better of
a driver, he'll be. Right. It's like more he forgets what he
has to do, the better of a driver he'll be. It's the same
thing as you come into the church. The more that you internalize these things,
the more that the remembrance's constant, you're present, it's there. You
don't have to take the energy to recall. Right, because here's the thing.
There's people who are living in the liturgy all the time. The animesis
is happening from all the time. It's not that they've transcended it, but
they internalized it so much there's no need for the recall. Right, they
are in it, and then when they're actually in those very explicit moments,
it just shoots them up another level, if I can use that language.
But it's tacit. And so that's the thing, is you get to this
place where the remembrance of the saints prayers. I mean, that's one of
the purposes of the quote unquote practice of the juice prayer is that it becomes
this tacit thing. That is, so you know, you've then bibed it
to such a degree. Right, this is the key thing to understand.
But you have to go through that process of understanding. So I'm not disdaining
or detegrating that process of learning at all. I'm just saying that because of
our culture, the emphasis is so much on it, because of our tendency
for control and for our want of power, our want of security, and
that's what keeps us wanting to stay in this very kind of scholastic mode because
it's like, if I'm approaching everything through this kind of zoological framework, I'm
the master, right zoological. It's like I gotta be able to name everything
everything's going on before I ever engage, you know, yeah, yeah,
And ultimately here's the thing. You hit these you know, if you come
to the church, it's maybe two years, maybe twelve years, whatever,
but you hit a hump, you hit this kind of flat point in this
plateau, and then you can often say to yourself, Okay, I'm just
kind of like going through the motions. So is it tacit now? Okay?
Sure? But like here's the thing that's where, getting back toward talking
about earlier, some of the dark parts of the Mosaic become important. The
dark parts of the Mosaic are death horror, you know, seeing the reality
of the fall world for what it is, and the light of Christ right
not needing to you know, put a false lens on seeing it for what
it is. If you imbib all these things, then what happens is it's
not so much that you become a window to the disheveled guy who's smelly,
but actually he becomes the window for you, right, And that's the thing.
He becomes the window for you because one of the problems for us is
that we get a sense of I got it, and things are tacit,
let's say, And then you do begin to plateau. But you're plateauing not
because God isn't giving you anything, but because you have hit this place of
your own glass ceiling of experience and understanding. It becomes self sufficient, supposedly.
And what happens is God then has to really kind of put He has
to turn everything upside down to wake you up. He has to use you
know, the car accident, the dishovels, beggar, whatever thing to like
bring you out of this place where you thought, Okay, I'm good,
I'm clean, I got all the boxes checked. Everyone looks to me as
whatever, and it's like, no, like that's nice. But here's another
level. And that level then becomes and that's where the cross now becomes a
whole other thing for you, right, because it takes on a different understanding
and you begin to now move in what you've already been doing in a different
way because I think this is the thing, my son, He'll become more
and more, you know it becomes tacit, he'll become a better driver,
blah blah blah, and he'll enjoy that for a long time. But there
will come a point, God willing, where the driving now takes on another
meaning for him, and that meaning is going to be about transporting his siblings,
right, transporting his own kids one day, and it's going to change
everything and things that he was maybe able to do. Maybe at some point
he's able to there's some donuts in the parking lot and got some good control.
That's great, But something's going to want him to move beyond that and
to not flex and to not show off. And I think this is key
because God again hasn't forgotten him, and God says, okay, son,
there's still more. There's there's there's still more to enter into, right,
And that's why you need to learn this stuff and allow it to become everyday
life. That's why prayer rules and the mundane are are are are valuable because
you don't become adept at something quote unquote by entering into it in this In
this, it only happens when it becomes a part of your life intentionally,
and and that takes work, you know what I mean? So yeah,
And to sum up the conversation, I think this esthetic dimension of Orthodox he's
one of the most important that speaks to the contemporary world because I would say
most people are feeling the world's getting less and less beautiful in many many regards.
In the Church allows us to see what beautiful behavior is. Well,
how in a new context for beauty. As Father was speaking, you know,
somebody may think that the beautiful picture is everybody dressed nice at liturgy,
sitting in standing in the right places. But it could be the homeless man,
it can be the unbautiful inconjunction the both, and that from an Orthodox
perspective, is more beautiful that the bringing together of all these things together in
the worship of God. That is more beautiful than everybody wearing the right palette
colors and standing in the That's almost too contrived, and that's not reality.
But keeping the tensions between things and beauty doesn't necessitate, you know, large
rational understandings of our theology. It doesn't demand complicated explanations for correct behavior,
utilitarianism, deontological ethics, virtue ethics. Anybody can engage with beauty, and
for me, coming out of the New Age, and the psychedelic and the
occult. It was the beauty that felt so comfortable, because it's one of
the things I liked about the visionary art and all the colors and all the
all the pictures and all the esthetics. Orthodoxy has that, but it's so
much deeper, and so it offers I think, a really great entry point
for people that you don't have to know the intricacies of the energy, essence,
distinction or iconography to see, oh, wow, this is really beautiful.
There's something here, and I want to engage more in that and in
our worldview so mystical and it's so participatory that, as Jonathan and you said,
it calls people in and I think I think this esthetic dimension is one
of the most important things that the Orthodox Church can offer to, especially the
contemporary Western world. Oh. I think it's a great place to end.
I think we we had. It was great to meet you, Father Trugau.
Finally, you know, after all this time, I really have conversation.
We're trying to actually plan for people watching. It's not set yet.
We're trying to plan some event in California where we'll be speaking together. I
hope we can get that at least. Maybe you don't even know about this,
but there's people scheming. People are scheming, and so so we'll try
to hopefully that will come about. And David, thanks for hosting us and
kind of prompting the conversation. It was great to talk to both of you
and hopefully we'll be able to do that again. Well, thank you Jonathan
for having us. We really appreciate it. And God bless you and all
the work you're doing. Thank you so much, Thank you so much.
This is great. I want to invite you all to the very first Symbolic
World Summit. Over three days, we will finally meet in real time,
in real space, and everyone from this little corner of the Internet will be
there to explore the theme of reclaiming the cosmic image. Of course I will
be speaking, but there will also be Martin Shaw, who is an amazing
mythographer, father Stephen Deyong of Lord of Spirit Fai. There will be Richard
Rowland from the Universal History series, Vesper Stamper, Nicholas Kotar, and Neil
de Gray that you've all seen on my channel here, and there for entertainment,
we have everyone's favorite apocalyptic band, the One and Only dirt, poor
Robbins. This event will be the chance of a lifetime to capture and embrace
our current moment. So join us from February twenty ninth to March second,
twenty twenty four in Tarbinspainings, Florida. Visit the Symbolic World dot com slash
summit for more information and I will see you there. So they watching