Evangelical Orthodox?

[gtsecc]

Could the Orthodox Church be more evangelical without changing the theology?

[xenia]

I think more mission churches could be planted.

[gzt]

The evangelizing of Siberia and Alaska was a good move, even better was the evangelizing of the Slavs. And Georgia! Etc.

Fr. Daniel Byantoro is doing great work in Indonesia right now, I hear, but we could be doing more these days. Even though we had more martyrs in the past century than most of Christian history, it hasn't proven to be the seed of the Church in the way most people think of the phrase yet, but I'm not one to doubt ancient wisdom.

[Rilian]

Evangelism and being evangelical are not the same thing.

What do you mean by your question?

[gtsecc]

Evangelism and being evangelical are not the same thing.

What do you mean by your question?
I supose I mean evangelism.

[Rilian]

I guess I'm not sure what you mean gtsecc. Many of the greatest saints have been missionary saints. There are modern examples like Father Cosmas of Grigoriou (http://uncutmountain.com/index.php/uncut/pages/C6/). Evangelism is a basic component of the faith.

My parish is a mission that has been in existence for two years.

[Dust and Ashes]

We hope to have a mission Church in our area before too long but there aren't enough of us to support one just yet. I love telling people about Orthodoxy and there are a lot of people in the area who sincerely want the Truth so it will just be a matter of time.

[Matrona]

We should all be active in prayer for the mission parishes in the West, as well as the Orthodox missions in the third world.

[tizziale]

Sometimes I feel like this too. Coming from an evangelical background we would often see dramatic conversions, but I don't know if that happens often in Orthodoxy. Most Orthodox I know are converts from other Christian traditions - which is actually true of most of the 'converts' from lives of sin, etc that we would see in the churches growing up. Most were 'backslidders' coming back to God. However there were quiet a few 'new' conversions. Does this happen often in Orthodoxy?

[nicodemus]

www.ocmc.org

The Orthodox Christian Mission Center, which operates out of the USA does a good deal of evangelizing mission work and that's pretty impressive considering the number of Orthodox in the USA only total a few million (they send out full time & part time missionaries as well as send native clergy to seminaries in America.) Combine that with the IOCC (International Orthodox Christian Charities) which is also out of the US and you've got a good deal of mission coming out of the USA alone. One of my friends is going to spend the summer in Alaska with OCMC.

My wife is a convert to Orthodoxy from a non-Christian religion as is my godfather. My old parish had a former Mormon and few former new agers, etc.

Orthodox parishes are popping up across Asia and Africa quite rapidly. The church has grown massively in The Congo, Kenya, Uganda, Madagascar, etc. recently. There's even a parish in Mauritius now. I'm in pretty frequent contact with some Orthodox priests in Asia and one of them went to serve liturgies at two Orthodox parishes in Pakistan over the weekend. If we're getting missions into Pakistan, I don't worry about the missionary mind of the Church.

One of the differences between Orthodox missions and a lot of others is that short-term missionary stuff is in Orthodoxy (and is important), but the mission heads tend to do it for life. I believe Fr. Cosmas who worked in the Congo said "a true missionary leaves his bones in the soil of the mission field" (and he did just that.)

Since Orthodoxy doesn't do "altar calls" and things like that, Church growth is going to come slower, but I believe the people that convert aren't doing so out of emotionalism, but out of true conviction given the catechal period, etc.

The various local Orthodox churches of the world all have missions running, and I'm sure will do more once there are a few more decades between them and communism. Those churches had to buckle down for survival a lot during that period. Their people (and especially their priests) were restricted travel by their governments, so that was going to hinder mission some abroad as well as the fact that the churches aren't super wealthy like they are in the west and that Romanian money for instance doesn't go as far in the world as an American dollar does....

Not trying to make excuses for the european churches, but they're just emerging out of an incredibly trying period.

[gzt]

A bunch of the converts I know would be atheists or were atheists if not for the Orthodox Church. Sometimes they may have been baptized in their infancy as a Lutheran or whatever, but that was the end of that. In this forum, for example, we have Matrona and Marjorie, both of whom were not Christian at all. One of my priests was a convert from a non-practicing Jewish background [though he spent a few years as a Christian before becoming Orthodox]. Seraphim Rose was an atheist. There are plenty of "new" conversions.

But any conversion is miraculous. Flannery O'Connor said, "All voluntary baptisms are a miracle to me and stop my mouth as much as if I had just seen Lazarus walk out of the tomb. I suppose it's because I know that it had to be given to me before the age of reason, or I wouldn't have used any reason to find it."

[gord96]

I have trouble professing my faith sometimes....I never deny it, and defend it if I have to, but bringing it up is hard for me.....but with Orthodoxy I have been getting better, basicly because it makes sense.....when I was a protestant I wasn't even sure I beleived what I was thinking or saying......thank God for the Eastern Orthodox Church.....I have struggles lately but knowing that the Church is there brings me much hope