Essay Sample on Orthodox Spirituality

The expression of orthodox spirituality is through prayer, the daily Christian living and worship. These are the activities that ultimately lead an individual to union with the divine, uncreated light. Everyone is entitled to spirituality because it is religious and not confined to a particular culture; hence one does not need to belong to a specific religion or ethnicity for them to be spiritual.

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The orthodox fathers believe that man was not created from the beginning but was created with the potential of achieving perfection through grace. To realize it, God sent the saviour Jesus Christ to be a man, and it is through the suffering and his resurrection from the dead that he got to restore man to the original state of grace and enabled man to attain perfection. It makes the ultimate purpose of man to be perfect in God through love. Human beings should work towards achieving perfection, selfless love of God as well as that for fellow human beings.

An orthodox Christian has the most significant goal as living in proper spirituality which is a life in Christ. Human beings must be purified from their passions to sin. Passions are sins that make their way in the life of a Christian through their sinful thoughts in mind coming from human senses and also through the mind and heart. With sins come guilt and spiritual decay; hence it is necessary to identify with one's sons and stop from being its slave.

Orthodox fathers believed that the first step to take towards spirituality is repentance, where the individual makes a confession through a father. In repentance, one struggles against their sin. However, they will have purified their passion by the end of the phase. Christians are urged to repent their sins and seek the forgiveness of the Father in heaven who will make it right for them in the way that reveals their spirituality.

A Christian is said to have a fear of God and the thought of judgement that proceeds repentance. The meaning of the fear of God is the fear of displeasing God and not being scared of him. It all shifts towards acting out of love for God. The second phase of illumination is also known as stillness, where a Christian should understand that Christ is the King of peace.

When Christ was ascending to heaven, he left by saying that he had given man peace to be with them, not the same way that the world gave it to them but they should not let their hearts be troubled or be afraid. A Christian should have a spiritual understanding of the scripture. They should know that Christ is the key to the scripture and that the temple represents Christ's body. Christ explained the scriptures to the disciples when they were on the road to Emmaus, and it is upon the Christians to understand them spiritually.

Orthodox Christianity upholds perfection in terms of the gifts of the Holy Spirit where they are urged to let the light shine before others so that they may see their good deeds and glorify the Father in heaven. Christians need to engage in pure prayer such that they pray without ceasing because prayer to God helps to lead to union and hence the ultimate goal of perfection. That determines how a person acts of love or fear. The general purpose of orthodox spirituality is to ensure that all the struggle of being a Christian is consummated in the Eucharist.