“It’s very hard to criticise someone you fundamentally carry a great deal of admiration for,” I told a friend inquiring into Christianity several months ago.
This old friend, only recently made an orphan in his twenties, was not long thereafter drawn to Christ and conversion (one is led to wonder if Christ’s promise in Jn 14:18 doesn’t also have a literal meaning). The words I just described were my response to his question about Eastern Orthodoxy.
Though this friend is now nearing the completion of his journey to Catholicism, taking RCIA classes as he prepares for baptism and confirmation, he was for a time captivated by the splendour, rigour, mysticality, depth and antiquity of the Orthodox tradition. This mirrors my own experience. Before my own conversion, I was not immune to the aesthetic and spiritual charms of the Eastern Christian world.
