Letter from the Editor:

Conflict and Ecclesial Life

NICK TABOR

The scriptures and our liturgical prayers are forever extolling the importance of unity and harmony. “For the union of all, let us pray to the Lord,” we hear in every litany. The psalmist writes of “how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity,” and St. Paul urged the church in Rome to “Live in harmony with one another.” Likewise, the Proverbs describe “a man who sows discord among brothers” as one of the seven things the Lord considers an “abomination.”

And yet, we all know from experience that conflict is a routine, not to say elemental, part of church life. Even in the best of circumstances, our fellow parishioners’ personalities sometimes grate on us. Parish councils inevitably clash over building projects and other questions of money. And if we’ve been around long enough, we’ve seen priests and bishops get caught up in scandals: perhaps embezzling funds, or carrying on extramarital affairs, or even committing abuse or helping to cover it up. 

Moreover, in this moment, it’s safe to say that we’re not living in the best of circumstances. The Orthodox world, both in the US and worldwide, seems more divided than it’s been at any other time in recent history. In many American parishes, the COVID pandemic created massive new rifts within congregations, as we disagreed about which safety precautions were appropriate—from suspending services to mandating face masks. Though we’ve all gone back to church now, more or less, and discarded our N95s, those clashes haven’t necessarily been forgotten. No doubt many parishioners think about one another differently now than they did in 2019.

More important, the Russian military’s invasion of Ukraine has been disastrous for ecclesial relations, as Patriarch Kirill and other leaders of the Russian Orthodox Church have rallied in support of Vladimir Putin’s administration. Setting geopolitical questions aside, it’s been heartbreaking to see images of churches like the Transfiguration Cathedral in Odessa largely in ruins—to say nothing of the tens of thousands of people who have killed and the millions more who have been driven from their homes. More than a few Orthodox voices have likened the invasion to the sin of Cain. Hundreds of priests in Ukraine, and laypeople around the world, have called for Kirill’s ouster.

In moments like these, our prayers for the “union of all” can sound like nothing more than wishful thinking. We find ourselves confronting an impossible gap between the lofty rhetoric of our church texts and our lived experiences. We’re forced to reflect on what the call to harmony actually demands of us, in a world of such discord.

—

To begin with, the analogy to music is helpful here. Musical harmony is a kind of unity that depends on differentiation. It’s a moment of togetherness and individuality at the same time, where the voices neither merge nor clash. Applying this to the church, we might say that disagreements are part of a harmonious community life—they’re not antithetical to it. 

In their essay in this issue, “In Praise of Dissonance,” the church musicians Benedict and Talia Sheehan go a step farther, arguing that even too much harmony can be destructive. “In any given piece of music, it is the interplay between consonance and dissonance, the dance between tension and resolution, that creates movement and gives music its sense of direction and meaning,” they write. Extending this to a social context, they argue that when there’s “too much similarity of perspective,” a community can “spiral out of control.”

This interplay is something we especially strive for in the Orthodox tradition. We have less centralized authority than the Roman Catholic Church but a far greater sense of unity than Protestants do. And we celebrate distinct ethnic cultures, as an integral part of our spiritual lives, but we try—at least in our better moments—to do this without losing sight of the universal elements of our faith, the ones that transcend ethnicity.

It’s a difficult balance to strike. Some of us have a tendency to oversimplify the Orthodox tradition, to imagine that it’s monophonic. In reality, it has spanned many cultures over a period of 2,000 years, and it has seldom convened its leaders to issue definitive theological decrees. The bounds of what has been accepted as Orthodox over the centuries—in theology, liturgical practices, and other areas—are broader than we might imagine.

But of course, there are limits. There’s a reason we recite the Nicene Creed at every Divine Liturgy: it’s an expression of our core beliefs as a group, of the teachings that bind us together.

However, even in cases where one party is definitively in the wrong, the conflicts we can experience often resolve into a greater harmony. In centuries past, the Church’s very dogma, including its core teachings on the nature of Christ and the process of salvation, were only arrived at after many rounds of intense, often bitter conflicts. The catalyst for each of the ecumenical councils—at least according to conventional wisdom—was that false doctrines started circulating, forcing Church leaders to clarify the official teachings. 

—

Nevertheless, we wouldn’t want to suggest that all conflicts are beneficial. Within our parishes—and within our families, and among our friends—they can also be destructive and tragic. As a general rule, our spiritual tradition always urges us to turn inward, to consider how we might personally be at fault before we level criticisms at others. And when we find ourselves at odds with the people around us, we shouldn’t only ask whether we’re in the right; we should also ask whether the fight is worth picking. St. Paul’s words to his disciple Timothy come to mind: “Have nothing to do with stupid, senseless controversies; you know that they breed quarrels.” He goes on to say that a Christian must be “kindly to everyone.”

In his essay for this issue, John Livick-Moses, a licensed clinical social worker, explains that when his patients are having troubles with their partners or family members, they often have better results when they set aside the instinct to criticize, or to defend themselves, and instead approach the other person with genuine curiosity. “I’ve seen many cases where someone’s true motives or concerns are hidden behind other issues in the midst of conflict,” Livick-Moses writes. “By asking questions and maintaining empathetic curiosity, we may realize that a more profound pain is present.”

Of course, only so much depends on us as individuals. What are we to do in the face of catastrophic conflicts like the one centering on Ukraine, where our prayers and personal humility can’t produce accord among our hierarchs—let alone cause the violence to cease?

Sergei Chapnin and Fr. Matthew Brown reflect on this question in another essay in these pages, “War As a Challenge for the Christian Vision”. In the case of the Ukraine war in particular, they argue, almost any hardline position would be misguided. The just-war theory originating from St. Augustine has no place in Orthodox tradition; “at best, war can be the least bad option in a fallen world.” At the same time, in their view, to suggest that God has condemned all violence would also be a departure from the mainstream of Orthodox teaching. Absolutist ethics like pacifism “overlook the personal dimensions of moral choices,” they argue, “and ignore the moral burdens placed upon each of us to discern what is good in each situation.”

More broadly, in the face of conflicts beyond our control, prayer is the most fundamental and obvious response—but it’s not enough. “Christians should think creatively about how they might help,” they write, citing the work of Dr. Paul Gavrilyuk and his team at Rebuild Ukraine, who deliver aid to suffering Ukrainians, as one possible model in the present conflict.

Finally, a little historical perspective might help. It can be easy to lapse into sentimentalism about Christian history, to imagine that our forebears worked out their differences more amicably. But since the days of the Church of Acts, bitter infighting has been as much a staple of ecclesial life as prayer and forgiveness. If we remember that the body of Christ has survived worst scandals in the past, it might help us stave off despair about the present and future.