Is Mission the Main Ministry of Lay People?
Participants of a roundtable discussion on “How to Learn/Teach Christian Testimony” aimed to identify the unified theoretical bases of Christian mission and the most fruitful techniques for mission. What should be recommended to those who wish to bear witness to Christ themselves and help others acquire this experience? Participants also sought to highlight primary difficulties and suggest possible solutions, drawing from a discussion of "Orthodox Missiology" — a course designed by Fr Georgij Kochetkov, PhD candidate in Theology and the founder of the St. Philaret's Institute — in which the author himself also participated.
The course is based on lectures Fr Georgij delivered at SFI during the 1996/97 academic year, which compare and correlate both traditional and contemporary Orthodox missionary practice.
“Often the typical Orthodox don’t feel themselves as sent into the world, and find in the church ‘a comfortable corner’ in which they can live well while watching the world from the sidelines. Or they might think that witnessing about Christ is an activity for specially trained professionals,” says Maria Dikareva, a senior lecturer at SFI, summarizing the main ideas of the “Orthodox Missiology” course. "In reality, all His disciples are called to testify about Christ."
To whom and about what are we bearing witness, and how do we learn to better see a person and not speak to him of that, about which he is not prepared to hear? And at the same time, how do we help the person who already trusts God and wants to learn to live by faith, make a choice in favour of Christ, acquire authentic spiritual freedom, and begin to enter into the fullness of church life?
One of the issues discussed in the course is the relationship between mission and catechesis (teaching). Often, these are not distinguished, and people start teaching those who have not asked to be taught. On the other hand, it's important to see how testimony and teaching are connected to help those who already want to learn from Christ, change their life, and start relying on God.
Maria Dikareva emphasized the importance of not replacing mission with counter-mission (intimidation) or false mission (alluring). We must not promise in exchange for faith and a life with God that which the Lord Jesus Christ Himself never promised to anyone — a prosperous life, successful social standing, health, or economic, psychological, and other benefits. Where a person is deprived of freedom through coercion or enticement, one cannot speak of true Christian mission.
A great deal of attention in the discussion was paid to the principle of complementarity. “In everyone’s life, faith and practice of life there is something that is from God. It is important to see this, admit it and lean on this authenticity and good in our relating to the other person. When there is trust, a person is ready to hear and absorb something new that they lack in their experience,” says Fr Georgij.
“Apologetics should be deeper”, he added. “Our apologetics can be boring. When there are attacks on our faith, our church — are we to just give up? Absolutely not! But one should never approach someone who disagrees with us on a spiritual matter aggressively. One must not discredit the church in such a way! People who respond aggressively to attacks instantly receive the most negative evaluation in the eyes of the public. We must not fight aggression against the Church with the same means as are being used against us. Come to people in love, take pity on him that he has not found a good pastor and good witness for the faith, and try to supply what is lacking in his experience, provide the supplement that he needs,” clarified Fr Georgij.
Fr Dmitrij Trifonov, head of the Mission Department of the Kostroma Diocese, shared his experience with contemporary mission in his presentation "The Problems of Training Missionaries and Methods for Solving Them (based on the Example of Mission Courses in the Kostroma Diocese)." He spoke about assembling a team for street mission, preaching in hospitals and online, how to form Bible study groups, what significance there is in establishing a mission church, and how to interact with people of different faiths and other Christian confessions.
“Before the pandemic we had two catechetical meetings with candidates before baptism, and this was a real challenge, because most of the churches in town don’t prepare candidates at all,” said Fr Dmitrij. “People would often ring me and say, ‘Hello, you’re the head of the mission department, after all, could you please tell me where I can be baptised without going through catechesis?”. And I always answer: “Interesting you should ask, but I make it my business to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
In summing up the main ideas in the lecture course on Orthodox Missiology, Maria Dikareva reminded participants of the aim of Christian mission and its fruits: gaining faith and readiness to choose Christ and the Church, embarking on the path of discipleship with Christ, and wanting to live according to the Gospel. Another related fruit mentioned by Father Georgij is the emergence of self-replicating church communities.
According to Fr Sergej Stacenko, Chairman of the Education Department of the Tashkent and Uzbekistan Diocese and Vice-Rector for Academic Affairs at Tashkent Theological Seminary, such clarity in the criteria of mission and its fruits appeal to him. He raised, however, the issue of identifying leaders within these communities, pointing out one of the problems of parish life: people's reluctance to take responsibility.
In this context, Father Georgij recalled a recent decree by the Holy Synod addressing the ministry of laity: “Finally, we are talking about the service of laity within the church! When people choose the path of God, the path of Christ, and it becomes the only path in their life, despite the variety of forms of implementation, then the royal priesthood of the faithful is truly realized,” said Father Georgij.
"At that point, even the word ‘lay person’ — miryanin, in Russian, which is based on the root ‘mir’ which means ‘world’ and thus points to the secular — becomes inappropriate. We do not call our brothers and sisters “miryanje” because ' miryanin' in Russian, from Church Slavonic, means 'worldly' or 'secular'. This is not much of a compliment to a Christian — if he is worldly. And the ancient church supports us here; it never called its members by that name; more than that — they called each other saints," he added.
“Catechesis in the ancient church was never conducted at the parish level — it was the level of the whole city," Father Georgij reminded us, responding to questions about the issues faced in modern attempts to conduct catechesis through parishes. "Catechesis, baptism, and chrismation were performed in the cathedral — where the bishop served. A person can express their faith in various places — they are not tied to a parish, especially in our time. Before the Revolution, a parish was a territorial unit; it could unite the residents of a district, a village with a church (“selo”) — but now, there is no such territory. Sometimes they invent it, but that's just independent activity.”
“No priest knows exactly who is in his parish. Anyone can come and say: ‘I am from your parish.’ And you've never seen the person in your life. What will you tell them? ‘No, you’re not’? And then they’ll ask: ‘Why not? This is where I’ve come!’ They come when they want to and leave when they want. Here's your parishioner. And for a priest at a parish, this is one of the main problems now: they never know who they are responsible for. Yes, there might be a close circle, but that's not a parish. It's very hard, therefore, to organize both mission and catechesis on a parish basis — neither fits into the parish framework,” stresses Fr Georgij.
"Therefore, the creation of communities and brotherhoods has always been significant, both in ancient times and now. There were no parishes in the Church in the first centuries! What did the Church call itself when there were no parishes? It called itself a brotherhood, a community. But this has been forgotten. We forget that even in the history of Rus', there have been brotherhoods since the 15th century! This is not them modern era, it’s not just the 19th century. A community differs in that it is built on personal communication. A parish is not; there might be people who communicate deeply and personally, but there also might not be. A brotherhood is built on the fact that we have one Heavenly Father — thus, we are brothers and sisters to each other," concluded Father Georgij.
As the discussion demonstrated, ecclesiological issues are crucial in matters of mission, as well as to our very understanding of “being church”, the image, and the experience of church life, on which a Christian bases his or her testimony about God and Christ.