I posted the following under a discussion of the recent Orientale Lumen East Conference, and now realize that it was really not on point.
There are so many positive aspects of this year's O/L Conferences, and future plans, that deserve comment that this list must have seemed a distraction. I can see that O/L Conferences may not be the place where these questions can be fruitfully considered. So, I post them here again, in the hope that the list can be refined and, perhaps, a setting and sponsoring organization(s) identified so that topics of this kind can be discussed in an ecumenical setting. I remain convinced that all our Churches can benefit from sharing insights into these topics. A slightly edited text follows:
Could programs be developed that include some sessions on "applied" Eastern Christianity? Is there a reluctance to get into topics that might highlight problems in our own communities or areas of disagreement within or among various Churches? Would it be possible to structure, say, panel presentations around themes such as the following:
1. Who are the primary focus of your Church's efforts at evangelization?
2. Does your Church agree that its primary task is (as one Eastern Hierarch once put it to me) "to take care of your own"?
If that is a fair description of your outreach, who are "your own"? How are you "taking care" of them?
3. What does your Church do to welcome and form new communicants who do not share the ethnic traditions of the Mother Church and/or the local Parish?
4. How does your Church respond, at the parish and eparchial levels, to the impact of local culture (including the practices of Sister Churches, East and West) on the descendants of initial and subsequent waves of immigration
5. As the cultural mix of your parish, eparchy, and Mother Church changes, how does your Church respond?
6. What might be learned from the experiences of Eastern Churches that have established communities in countries in this hemisphere where English is not the dominant language (Mexico, the Caribbean, Central and South America including Brazil, Francophone Canada)?
7. At the Parish and eparchial levels, how does your Church interact ecumenically with other Christian communities? What forms of dialog have you engaged in? What forms of joint prayer or worship have you experienced? What types of community service do you take part in together?
8. What are the views in your Church on "inculturation"? Has anything been done in your Church, at parish or at eparchial level, that you would consider to be "inculturation"? From the standpoint of your Church, are there "No Go" areas where it is thought, within your Church, that "inculturation" (as you define it) would not be possible?
9. What is the thinking in your Church on major social and economic issues? What perspectives do clergy and laity in your Church bring to their involvement in the world of business, the field of education, popular culture, family relationships, international relations, relationships with non-Christians (and the list goes on).
10. Does your Church (here in the U.S., and perhaps Canada) have reliable data on matters such as the numbers of Faithful who have come to this country from abroad, the numbers who were born here and baptized into your Church, the numbers who are now only nominally members of your Church, the numbers who are active members, the numbers of parishes, convents, monasteries and other institutions formed over the years and the numbers of institutions still active?
11. Does your Church have reliable data on the number of clergy, monastics and other consecrated religious, as well as candidates for the priesthood, diaconate and religious life over the years, and at present?
I fully realize that any of these topics might well consume an entire conference agenda. Nonetheless, I do think that some beginning needs to be made on the task of connecting the rich spiritual and liturgical traditions of our Churches to the world in which we Eastern Christians are living. I think we have an obligation to reach out to the communities in which we live.
