When the Apostle Paul contemplated the relationship of Christ with the Church, His union with it, and its embodiment of Him, he cried out, “This mystery is great!” What if we were to empty the Church of its greatness and eliminate the mystery within it? How great the loss would be then!

This is what is meant when one speaks of the “secularization” of the Church. It is not the secularists, that is, the non-clericals, but rather that the Church bears the spirit of the world and not the spirit of God. That is, what the Lord warned against will happen: “that the salt will be corrupted” and not yet what it is seasoned with. When Christianity turns into a mere moral system, it can exist without Christ. I will never forget a conversation I had with a monk of Mount Athos, a tower in the face of the secularization of the Church, preserving its great secret. He said to me: Do not think that when the end comes, there will be no Church, organizations, bodies, church activities, priests, and servants… They will all exist, because Jesus did not say, “When the Son of Man comes on the last day, will he find these?” Rather, he said that “he will not find faith.” The end of corruption is not the disappearance of the temple, for it is an innate bond that does not disappear, but for Satan to take up residence in it, as the Book of Revelation says. When true, deep faith is absent, and the evil one takes up residence in the temples, then evil will reach its peak, and all the ecclesiastical manifestations that we have today, and perhaps others, will exist, but with the spirit of the world - secularization. God forbid! Let us pray and watch. Let us say that what is happening today is the entry of some manifestations of secularization into the life of the Church, which we must watch to correct before they grow.

So secularization is the alienation of the church’s children from its true life, and the dissemination of concepts that are not part of its essence or spirit. And the replacement of the mentality of the spirit with the mentality of the world - that is, its secularization. Then we see ourselves before a church that is more like an institution, company, school, or party, that begins and ends with man and with him, and its mentality revolves in a circular circle that does not exceed the limits of this world and its material needs, or also its psychological and human needs. But God is the one who dies in it, even if we embalm Him in the swaddling clothes of an idea or principle.

The Church has always been tormented by external persecutions and difficulties, but these later made the Church more brilliant. The greatest danger is the corruption and secularization of the Church from within! During times of persecutions, Christians lived the spirituality of their Church and bore witness to it, even to the point of martyrdom. The time of rest is not the easiest; on the contrary, it is the easiest time for deception. The time of peace is more suitable for the devil, who uses it better for deception. If the time of suffering keeps us awake, during times of prosperity we must voluntarily stay awake, otherwise this prosperity will become a cause of secularization, because vigilance is the spirit of Christian life!

Throughout history, monasticism has played the role of a watchful eye in the life of the Church. When church life was learning, vigilant monastic orders restored its spirit and spirituality. Monasticism is “an absolutely Christian life,” it does not want to share the truth of the Church with the world, nor does it accept concessions, bargains, and exchanges with the evil one in the face of the truth of faith and the sincerity of life. This is exactly what happened in the fourth century AD, when Christianity became the religion of the empire, secularism mixed with faith, and many Christian principles became secularized. Then the monks did not hesitate to create a special, pure world in the face of secularism. Monasticism has never formed a world outside the Church, but rather builds a Church far from secularism and the impurities of secularism, living Christian monasticism in its purity and beauty. When some asked Saint John Chrysostom: What is the necessity of monasteries? He answered them: “If cities were real cities, we would not need monasteries, but since they have become more corrupt than Sodom and Gomorrah, we are in dire need of monasteries”! When the minimum spiritual rights of the Christian in his church, his society, and his daily life are absent, the need for monasteries becomes very urgent. Perhaps our societies today, including the Christian ones, require this need!

Let us then observe the folds of our church life in all its aspects, and examine it in the light of “the spirit and the truth.” Then we can see with humility some of the aspects that the world has swallowed up for its own sake and has left Christianity in it in name only, in order to tempt and deceive Christians.

When we talk about secularization and purging the life of the Church of it, we do not mean at all separating the Church from the world, and fighting the world, while we are responsible for it and it is for our use.

There are two meanings for the word world in the Bible. There is the world and there are worldly things. The first is the entire creation and its crown is man, and the other is a moral color that means life for this world only. That is, the opposite of the direction of man’s movement to resemble God, who was created in His image and likeness, to the movement of resembling the creature, while he was supposed to be its master and not its equal. The distinction is moral, between two mentalities, the spiritual and the worldly, between life with God and life without Him; between life with Him and for Him or living without Him and for someone other than Him! When God created the world, He found that “all things are good”! And when He created man, it was “very good”! The created world is good, very good, and it is God’s gift and the fruit of His love. Therefore, in Christianity, its purity does not mean its selection and separation! The Church must be pure in its life and within the world. The Church’s departure from the world means its corruption, because it was created to be “the world of the world.”

The Evangelist John preserves for us in Jesus’ farewell prayer a wonderful dialogue, when Jesus entrusts his disciples to the care of the Father, and says, “I do not want you to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one” (John 17:15). This prayer of Jesus is absolutely a prayer for the non-secularization of the Church.

In this dialogue between Jesus and the Father, his designation of “the world” is made clear for three reasons. The world here means first of all the universe, as the Lord says: “And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory which I had with you before the world was” (17:5), that is, before the beginning of creation. “The world” also means human beings, our brothers and sisters, as in Jesus’ words to the Father: “As you sent me into the world, even so I sent them into the world” (17:18). “The world” can finally mean the evil one and the evildoers, or corruption, or the world of sin, that is, worldliness and the lowly things of the world, as in: “I have given them your word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world” (17:14).

The world, “the universe,” is good and is God’s gift. The world, “human beings,” is our mission and for them Christ died. As for the evil world, sin, evil people, and the desires of the world that are not spiritual, this is what secularizes the Church. And if the Church lives in the midst of the world, her mission is to watch over her so that she may be the “leaven” and the world the “dough,” and not the opposite, which means secularizing her. Jesus does not want us to leave the world but to be in it, but not of it (John 17:15-16). Thus, while the Church interacts with the world, it is expected, due to our human weakness and the weakness of our faith at times, that she will be affected as well as she is affected. While she is sent into the world, some of its colors sometimes stick to her. Thus, returning to the voice of the Spirit and the Word always makes us wipe away these strange images and labels from the Church. This is so that the face of the Church and her work in the world do not change. We should always review (self-critique - examination of conscience) our church life here and there to test the extent of its obedience to the Spirit, or to discover what is strange and secular and restore it to its purity and dignity.

Amen