At the Divinity School Chapel in Leningrad (originally Czar Peter the Great’s “Window to Europe”), at the Millennial Easter, it was presumed, that people would simply accept the ritual in itself — though few were inside of it, or it inside if them. In San Francisco, at the Far West’s Chrysopylae, the beliefs of Orthodoxy, as to the heavenly being of Man, and the spiritual background of human existence, were held in clear distinction, relation, and challenge, to the modern mind. If the “beliefs” of Orthodoxy do not have truthful realities, towards which they are held; then we are in fact, unreasonable fools, who here speak of Vasili Romanov’s “life after life”. Such was the unvoiced meaning.
There was not, in this ceremony at Chrysopylae — though its procedures and contents were as arcane and “foreign” (even in English) as were those of Leningrad’s Millennial Easter Service — the unconscious presumption that “belief” alone, was present, or adequate, in those attending. Belief — however uncertain its contents might seem to reason — was distinguished from reason, in order that it could be asserted. The implication here was that belief was contrary to the prevailing opinions of reason.
Russian souls, in general, no longer do, nor easily can, dream inside of their religious past; this these two services make clear. The Russian people in Leningrad, were too “modern-minded” to readily and immediately enter into the old rituals and services of the Millennial Easter. Their hearts, minds and souls were filled with too much modern, secular (“horizontal”) content, thought, worry, and feeling, than that they could become easily reoccupied with the appropriate (“vertical”) feelings, emotions and reverence. The Orthodox service for the “passing-on” of a nephew of the last Russia Czar of Old Holy Russia — in 1989, at the Far West’s Golden Gate — faced — with its necessary faith of old — clearly and directly, the skeptical, mundane reason of the West. Reason has its own view and truth in life; but belief asserted its own — however unreal or fantastic they may seem to reason.
Do we here find revealed, limits to which the mind of Man can strain? Is this meeting of science and the modern, secular mind, with an old religious faith, some ‘final dialogue’, in some final act of a script in the intellectual and spiritual history of Mankind? Do old faith and modern mind, here, face each other, for their “final words” to each other. Do we hear final statements, by the skeptical human mind and innocent heart?)
This religious faith of old will not do, by itself, for the modern mind and soul. It must, certainly, not be simply rejected. No, it must be learned from. But it is not adequate, appropriate or sufficient in itself. Not in the “Window to Europe”, nor at the far Western Edge of the West, is such old faith — with its ancient traditions, rituals and ways — in and by itself, immediate or adequate to the modern conditions of heart, mind or soul; culture, civilization, or society. The modern mind, by its very character, seeks to understand what it experiences and accepts. These ceremonies come from a time of Man and soul, too ancient to be immediately accepted. They must, at least, be mediated by the mind’s reasoning and understanding, before the awake modern soul can truly embrace them. The best of modern men and women of Man can not, and should not, allow, that the deepest questions, wonders and worries of life, are “answered”, or assuaged, by forms, rituals and doctrines more akin to an earlier dream’s passivity. Such passive acceptance and belief is untimely, for the awake modern mind.
Answers to the questions of life must be clearly and consciously approached, recognized and embraced; such is this time, of self-conscious Man. Somehow, in a new way, science, modern earthly reason, and belief, must find a relation appropriate to the modern condition. This is the truthful, honest, dignified way, for modern man to live, and be, and know. What shall occur if men and women of Man, when they should be awake; attempt to return, spiritually, to sleep and dream…? Was Old, Holy Russia so enamored of its old holiness, that it could be awakened from this old dream, only by the secular violence of a successful Bolshevik Revolution? Has Russia, and the men and women of God in Russia, learned sufficiently, from the vehement earthliness of the first seven decades? Might Vasili A. Romanov have died peacefully in Russia, had not Old, Holy Russia slept so late, and dreamt so deep, in its ‘old dream’ of mind and soul? Is Russia’s future not related to a new spiritual [72] awakening?
The wisdom and the comprehension of life, bespoken by the Orthodox Church, can, and certainly must, be earnestly considered and understood, by the modern mind. But the presumption that the modern mind and soul can merely accept, without question, any such host of rituals and services, is unacceptable and inappropriate to the consciousness of the our time. It is simply outdated; too old, for contemporary men and women of Man, to simply or naively accept rituals, forms and patterns, as if they were immediately comprehensible or experienceable. This they most certainly are not.
If it is the mind of science (scire- [73])which has helped to bring us into the awake, deliberate, and conscious experience of life and world, which is the common fact of our daily inner lives; then, this consciousness must needs also be applied to religion, and related to the great “cursed questions” of life. We cannot retreat into some earlier dream-state of innocent faith. Old Holy Russia should no longer be imagined as adequate to creative minds, hearts and souls of this time. As Medieval European Christendom has passed away; so has Old Holy Russia. Forever. And if, to Russia, the modern mind came later, historically; it is, nevertheless, just as impossible to return to that earlier mind and soul, as it would be to somehow truly revive, or reenter, into the time and mind of Medieval European world of Christendom.
It is contrary to the direction of life, as well as inappropriate and untimely, for Russia to try to return to these earlier conditions of mind, soul and culture (though the idea of the Easter Resurrection, and life after life, should forever receive serious meditation by the individual and society). It would certainly not lead well forward; were Russia to try to progress, without learning deeply from its own past experience. But it must also go forward, into a new spiritual life. The ancient truths of life and Man, as well as the rituals and doctrines of the Orthodox church, must be consciously recognized and understood — by the modern mind. But such a meeting must also be a surpassing…
[72] Even in what was, in many ways, the spiritual core of Old Holy Russia, in the monasteries and hermitages, where the Orthodox emphasis on the heart over the mind, pure tradition, unconditional obedience, the denigration of the worldly ‘ego’, et al, are strongly held; there must be a new kind of spiritual awakening. As this chapter makes clear, I would suggest that this would be in the direction of an awakening of an active, conscious, independent mind in pursuit of truth, to supplement the heart’s quest of God.