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For the Life of the World: Sacraments and Orthodoxy
In For the Life of the World Alexander Schmemann suggests an approach to the world and life within it, which stems from the liturgical experience of the Orthodox Church. He understands issues such as secularism and Christian culture from the perspective of the unbroken experience of the Church, as revealed and communicated in her worship, in her liturgy - the sacrament of the world, the sacrament of the Kingdom.
151 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1973
About the author
Alexander Schmemann
68 books216 followersProtopresbyter Alexander Schmemann was a prominent Eastern Orthodox theologian and priest of the Orthodox Church in America.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 382 reviews
November 30, 2008
The final sentence says it all..."A Christian is the one who, wherever s/he looks, finds Christ and rejoices in Him. And this joy tranforms all his/her human plans and programs, desicisons and actions, making all his/her mission the sacrament of the world's return to Him who is the life of the world."
January 17, 2011
Simply put, this is one of the greatest books of any genre I have ever read.
I am not sure how even to begin describing this incredible book. Ultimately it is about living all of life liturgically and understanding the world as sacrament. We come to know the world through the lived liturgy of the Church.
In this book, Schmemann rejects the false dichotomies between secular and religious, nature and grace, supernatural and natural. He orients the reader to living life liturgically.
I feel as if I am just jumping around trying to find a good way to describe this book and I realize that I cannot do it justice. Perhaps a few quotations will help to explain the profound nature of this book:
"If the Church is truly the 'newness of life' -- the world and nature as restored in Christ -- it is not, or rather ought not be, a purely religious institution in which to be 'pious,' to be a member in 'good standing,' means leaving one's own personality at the entrance -- in the 'check room' -- and replacing it with a worn-out, impersonal, neutral 'good Christian' type personality. Piety in fact may be a very dangerous thing, a real opposition to the Holy Spirit who is the Giver of Life -- of joy, movement and creativity -- and not of the 'good conscience' which looks at everything with suspicion, fear and moral indignation."
"[T]he tragedy of a certain theology (and piety) was that in its search for precise definitions, it artificially isolated the sacraments from the liturgy in which they were performed."
"The Church is the entrance into the risen life of Christ; it is communion in life eternal, 'joy and peace in the Holy Spirit.'"
"A marriage which does not constantly crucify its own selfishness and self-sufficiency, which does not 'die to itself' that it may point beyond itself, is not a Christian marriage. The real sin of marriage today is not adultery or lack of 'adjustment' or 'mental cruelty.' It is the idolization of the family itself, the refusal to understand marriage as directed toward the Kingdom of God."
"Feast means joy. Yet, if there is something that we -- the serious, adult and frustrated Christians of the twentieth century -- look at with suspicion, it is certainly joy."
"[T]he term 'sacramental means that for the world to be means of worship and means of grace is not accidental, but the revelation of its meaning, the restoration of its essence, the fulfillment of its destiny. It is the 'natural sacramentality' of the world that find its expression in worship . . . Being the epiphany of God, worship is thus the epiphany of the world; being communion with God, it is the only true communion with the world; being knowledge of God, it is the ultimate fulfillment of all human knowledge."
"Thus the very notion of worship is based on an intuition and experience of the world as an 'epiphany' of God, thus the world -- in worship -- is revealed in its true nature and vocation as 'sacrament.'"
I hope those quotations give a flavor of this book. It really is incredible. I don't know if there was one page on which I did not underline or star a passage. Do yourself a favor, buy and savor this book.
I am not sure how even to begin describing this incredible book. Ultimately it is about living all of life liturgically and understanding the world as sacrament. We come to know the world through the lived liturgy of the Church.
In this book, Schmemann rejects the false dichotomies between secular and religious, nature and grace, supernatural and natural. He orients the reader to living life liturgically.
I feel as if I am just jumping around trying to find a good way to describe this book and I realize that I cannot do it justice. Perhaps a few quotations will help to explain the profound nature of this book:
"If the Church is truly the 'newness of life' -- the world and nature as restored in Christ -- it is not, or rather ought not be, a purely religious institution in which to be 'pious,' to be a member in 'good standing,' means leaving one's own personality at the entrance -- in the 'check room' -- and replacing it with a worn-out, impersonal, neutral 'good Christian' type personality. Piety in fact may be a very dangerous thing, a real opposition to the Holy Spirit who is the Giver of Life -- of joy, movement and creativity -- and not of the 'good conscience' which looks at everything with suspicion, fear and moral indignation."
"[T]he tragedy of a certain theology (and piety) was that in its search for precise definitions, it artificially isolated the sacraments from the liturgy in which they were performed."
"The Church is the entrance into the risen life of Christ; it is communion in life eternal, 'joy and peace in the Holy Spirit.'"
"A marriage which does not constantly crucify its own selfishness and self-sufficiency, which does not 'die to itself' that it may point beyond itself, is not a Christian marriage. The real sin of marriage today is not adultery or lack of 'adjustment' or 'mental cruelty.' It is the idolization of the family itself, the refusal to understand marriage as directed toward the Kingdom of God."
"Feast means joy. Yet, if there is something that we -- the serious, adult and frustrated Christians of the twentieth century -- look at with suspicion, it is certainly joy."
"[T]he term 'sacramental means that for the world to be means of worship and means of grace is not accidental, but the revelation of its meaning, the restoration of its essence, the fulfillment of its destiny. It is the 'natural sacramentality' of the world that find its expression in worship . . . Being the epiphany of God, worship is thus the epiphany of the world; being communion with God, it is the only true communion with the world; being knowledge of God, it is the ultimate fulfillment of all human knowledge."
"Thus the very notion of worship is based on an intuition and experience of the world as an 'epiphany' of God, thus the world -- in worship -- is revealed in its true nature and vocation as 'sacrament.'"
I hope those quotations give a flavor of this book. It really is incredible. I don't know if there was one page on which I did not underline or star a passage. Do yourself a favor, buy and savor this book.
August 20, 2024
2026 reread: Schmemann provocatively suggests that the Thomist distinction between causa prima and causae secundae "is the real cause of secularism, which is ultimately nothing else but the affirmation of the world’s autonomy, of its self-sufficiency in terms of reason, knowledge, and action. The downfall of Christian symbolism led to the dichotomy of the ‘natural’ and the ‘supernatural’ as the only framework of Christian thought and experience. And whether the ‘natural’ and the ‘supernatural’ are somehow related to each other by analogia entis, as in Latin theology, or whether this analogy is totally rejected, as in Barthianism, ultimately makes no difference."
I like Schmemann's emphasis on the dialectic of old/new and expectation/fulfillment as more authentically scriptural and Christian than the nature/supernature dichotomy. He betrays an ambivalence, though, about whether secularism was birthed by an inauthentic development (or, rather, breakdown) within Western sacramental theology, or whether it represents an authentic Christian development gone mad—namely humanity's liberation from "cult" and "religion" in all of its traditionally therapeutic, transactional, we might say carnal forms, so that in the maturity of our restored innocence we might transform the life of this world into "'life in God,' filled with meaning and spirit."
Also, I love his treatment of marriage as a sacrament of divine love that transcends the human family in its truly cosmic significance. In the joy of nuptial union—between man and woman, and between Christ and his Bride—we become true men and women by transcending mere 'male' and 'female.'
__
As it turns out, this is a perfect follow-up to "Supper of the Lamb." Capon's meditation on cooking and dining as acts through which we offer the world to God in priestly love can be read as an application of Schmemann's sacramental theology. Man is a hungry being—hungry for God—and the created world was given to him as the means of communion with God. Man alone among the creatures has the priestly capacity to "bless" God, to offer the world to God in thanksgiving and receive it back from him as a gift of eucharistic life. It is only when man loved the world for its own sake, when he desired to taste its fruit without communing with God, that the world became dead matter, the scene of man's alienation and exile. The familiar divisions of sacred/secular and natural/supernatural are only thinkable as a result of this original alienation, and in the liturgy and sacraments of the Church they are overcome.
Schmemann's central argument is that when we isolate the sacraments from their liturgical celebration in the Church, we necessarily misunderstand them. The Church herself is a sacrament that transforms the life of the world by ushering it into the dimension of the eschatological Kingdom, and she does this through the totality of her liturgy (leiturgia). For me, one of the most provocative ideas in the book is that the natural life and joy of the world—and with it pagan "natural religion" that saw the world's sacramentality revealed in the cycles of harvests and moons—came to a dead end when Christ, the very life of the world, was crucified. Man's self-inflicted alienation from God renders time and human existence meaningless in themselves; now, life only has meaning insofar as it is transformed by the new life of Christ's resurrection. Yet this transformation is a *restoration* of the world to its original character as an epiphany of God. Thus, there is both continuity and discontinuity between natural life and resurrection life (though for Schmemann the emphasis is on continuity).
The last twenty pages are much denser and more like academic theology than the rest of the book, but they're immensely helpful for understanding what is Orthodox about Schmemann's view. According to Schmemann, sacramental theology declined after the end of the patristic age when a division was introduced between symbol (signum) and reality (res), a division which the endless Western debates over the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist wrongfully assumed. The Zwinglians and their medieval ancestors saw the sacrament as an empty symbol that functioned merely to recall to mind Christ's death, whereas the Roman Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation (the "suicide" of sacramental theology for Schmemann) annihilated the sign (signum) by absorbing it into the reality (res). These views are two sides of the same coin, and both were foreign to the early Fathers, who spoke of the sacraments in symbolic terms, but who saw the symbol not as a mere illustration but as the true manifestation and communication of the reality. I would humbly surmise that the "symbolic instrumentalism" (Brian Gerrish's term) of Calvin's Reformed sacramental theology is an attempt to repair the Western/Latin divorce of symbol and reality that Schmemann indicts. For Calvin as for Schmemann, in God's economy of salvation, the symbol truly effects that which it signifies.
I like Schmemann's emphasis on the dialectic of old/new and expectation/fulfillment as more authentically scriptural and Christian than the nature/supernature dichotomy. He betrays an ambivalence, though, about whether secularism was birthed by an inauthentic development (or, rather, breakdown) within Western sacramental theology, or whether it represents an authentic Christian development gone mad—namely humanity's liberation from "cult" and "religion" in all of its traditionally therapeutic, transactional, we might say carnal forms, so that in the maturity of our restored innocence we might transform the life of this world into "'life in God,' filled with meaning and spirit."
Also, I love his treatment of marriage as a sacrament of divine love that transcends the human family in its truly cosmic significance. In the joy of nuptial union—between man and woman, and between Christ and his Bride—we become true men and women by transcending mere 'male' and 'female.'
__
As it turns out, this is a perfect follow-up to "Supper of the Lamb." Capon's meditation on cooking and dining as acts through which we offer the world to God in priestly love can be read as an application of Schmemann's sacramental theology. Man is a hungry being—hungry for God—and the created world was given to him as the means of communion with God. Man alone among the creatures has the priestly capacity to "bless" God, to offer the world to God in thanksgiving and receive it back from him as a gift of eucharistic life. It is only when man loved the world for its own sake, when he desired to taste its fruit without communing with God, that the world became dead matter, the scene of man's alienation and exile. The familiar divisions of sacred/secular and natural/supernatural are only thinkable as a result of this original alienation, and in the liturgy and sacraments of the Church they are overcome.
Schmemann's central argument is that when we isolate the sacraments from their liturgical celebration in the Church, we necessarily misunderstand them. The Church herself is a sacrament that transforms the life of the world by ushering it into the dimension of the eschatological Kingdom, and she does this through the totality of her liturgy (leiturgia). For me, one of the most provocative ideas in the book is that the natural life and joy of the world—and with it pagan "natural religion" that saw the world's sacramentality revealed in the cycles of harvests and moons—came to a dead end when Christ, the very life of the world, was crucified. Man's self-inflicted alienation from God renders time and human existence meaningless in themselves; now, life only has meaning insofar as it is transformed by the new life of Christ's resurrection. Yet this transformation is a *restoration* of the world to its original character as an epiphany of God. Thus, there is both continuity and discontinuity between natural life and resurrection life (though for Schmemann the emphasis is on continuity).
The last twenty pages are much denser and more like academic theology than the rest of the book, but they're immensely helpful for understanding what is Orthodox about Schmemann's view. According to Schmemann, sacramental theology declined after the end of the patristic age when a division was introduced between symbol (signum) and reality (res), a division which the endless Western debates over the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist wrongfully assumed. The Zwinglians and their medieval ancestors saw the sacrament as an empty symbol that functioned merely to recall to mind Christ's death, whereas the Roman Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation (the "suicide" of sacramental theology for Schmemann) annihilated the sign (signum) by absorbing it into the reality (res). These views are two sides of the same coin, and both were foreign to the early Fathers, who spoke of the sacraments in symbolic terms, but who saw the symbol not as a mere illustration but as the true manifestation and communication of the reality. I would humbly surmise that the "symbolic instrumentalism" (Brian Gerrish's term) of Calvin's Reformed sacramental theology is an attempt to repair the Western/Latin divorce of symbol and reality that Schmemann indicts. For Calvin as for Schmemann, in God's economy of salvation, the symbol truly effects that which it signifies.
January 26, 2020
“'But what do I care about heaven,’ says St. John Chrysostom, ‘when I myself have become heaven…?’”
This reviewer always found it strange that the most rarefied height of Christian liturgical worship—the profoundest moment of mystical conjunction between the everlasting Christ and His Church—involves an act so seemingly mundane as the eating of bread and drinking of wine.
The digestion of food, when considered at all, is typically classified among the basest and most distasteful elements of our hopeless physicality. I recall reading in Diarmaid MacCulloch’s history of the Protestant Reformation that in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it was typical in Catholic parishes for the priest to receive communion alone on behalf of the congregation, rather than for every prepared parishioner to partake of the eucharist as they do in most churches today. MacCulloch attributed this phenomenon to the surfeit of male facial hair among the laity during the Reformation period: whiskerless priests were simply uncomfortable with the thought of the consecrated body and blood of Christ becoming lodged in some unwitting communicant’s mustache. This amusing anecdote makes salient the juxtaposition of what “religious” and “secular” observers alike would consider to be the antipodal sacred and profane dimensions of human experience in the consummation of the eucharist. The autotelic foundation of all that is, the very generative principle of the cosmos, the life of life itself, is made manifest in a loaf of bread.
In our age, daily life is accepted to be fundamentally mundane by believers and atheists alike; their sole point of contention is merely whether some kind of religious “superstructure”—some arbitrarily-conceived deity or extra-physical realm—may be believably superimposed on an already dead and desacralized world. But in fact it is the very concept of secularity, the very distinction modernity draws between the spiritual and material spheres of life, the very notion that our tactile world of matter is irredeemably false and that the object of our pneumatic life is to escape to another, truer world—to go to heaven—that the sacramental life of the Church is intended to erase; or, rather, to reveal as a grave and tragic error.
Secularity is the nature of original sin: it connotes a falling away from the sacramental life that is our true purpose and calling as human beings. The Fall of Man was not constituted by a mere act of disobedience, or by a preference of the world to God. It was constituted by the false perception that such a choice between God and the world is necessary, or even coherent, in the first place. To sin is to regard the material world as an end in itself: to act as if the world is self-sufficient in its physicality rather than recognizing that all of creation—every ounce of matter—is manna from heaven: a life-sustaining, utterly unreciprocable food for man to consume, to recognize in its giftedness, and to offer back to God in thanksgiving (eucharist). The nature of sin is secularism, and the consequence of sin is religion.
Secular anthropology identifies humanity as homo sapiens, but a Christian anthropology should recognize us more properly as homo adorans. The core of our nature is not gnostic, but liturgical and sacramental; which is to say, worshipful. Man, by nature, is the priest of a cosmic sacrament. He stands at the center of the cosmos, unifying the world by recognizing its creative nature and offering it in thanksgiving back to God. Adam failed to be the priest of the world because he consumed the fruit of the tree of knowledge as if it were an end in itself, and by so doing he estranged himself from the eucharistic light of Eden, cutting off himself and his descendants from the source of life. Our hunger for God as the life of the world was replaced by hopelessly superficial appetites—for food, sex, money, status, etc.—that can never fulfill our human nature because they are separated from their true source and object. Created to be the priest of the world, humanity became its slave. A self-defeating effort to become “free” from the source of being enthralled us to the futility of sin and death.
Christ did not inaugurate a new religion, but rather restored the eucharistic life which is man’s natural and appropriate condition. As the incarnate logos, the coeternal Word of God made flesh, the Wisdom that drew the cosmos from the chaos of nonbeing, Christ Himself is the living Eucharist, the life of the world embodied. As the Incarnation of divine love, possessing human and divine natures and reconciling them in Himself, Christ is both the perfect gift of God to man and the perfect offering of man to God. The mundane world, in its myopic self-sufficiency, rejected and condemned its very source and life as a blasphemer. But when the Church comes together in liturgy and “becomes what it is”—the mystical body of Christ—the resurrection life of Christ, and through Him the promised resurrection of those who are joined with His body, is revealed. Christ is the eternal mediator: in and through Him, by way of His eucharistic gift, God and man are reconciled and the Church is made manifest as the Kingdom of God.
This reviewer always found it strange that the most rarefied height of Christian liturgical worship—the profoundest moment of mystical conjunction between the everlasting Christ and His Church—involves an act so seemingly mundane as the eating of bread and drinking of wine.
The digestion of food, when considered at all, is typically classified among the basest and most distasteful elements of our hopeless physicality. I recall reading in Diarmaid MacCulloch’s history of the Protestant Reformation that in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it was typical in Catholic parishes for the priest to receive communion alone on behalf of the congregation, rather than for every prepared parishioner to partake of the eucharist as they do in most churches today. MacCulloch attributed this phenomenon to the surfeit of male facial hair among the laity during the Reformation period: whiskerless priests were simply uncomfortable with the thought of the consecrated body and blood of Christ becoming lodged in some unwitting communicant’s mustache. This amusing anecdote makes salient the juxtaposition of what “religious” and “secular” observers alike would consider to be the antipodal sacred and profane dimensions of human experience in the consummation of the eucharist. The autotelic foundation of all that is, the very generative principle of the cosmos, the life of life itself, is made manifest in a loaf of bread.
In our age, daily life is accepted to be fundamentally mundane by believers and atheists alike; their sole point of contention is merely whether some kind of religious “superstructure”—some arbitrarily-conceived deity or extra-physical realm—may be believably superimposed on an already dead and desacralized world. But in fact it is the very concept of secularity, the very distinction modernity draws between the spiritual and material spheres of life, the very notion that our tactile world of matter is irredeemably false and that the object of our pneumatic life is to escape to another, truer world—to go to heaven—that the sacramental life of the Church is intended to erase; or, rather, to reveal as a grave and tragic error.
Secularity is the nature of original sin: it connotes a falling away from the sacramental life that is our true purpose and calling as human beings. The Fall of Man was not constituted by a mere act of disobedience, or by a preference of the world to God. It was constituted by the false perception that such a choice between God and the world is necessary, or even coherent, in the first place. To sin is to regard the material world as an end in itself: to act as if the world is self-sufficient in its physicality rather than recognizing that all of creation—every ounce of matter—is manna from heaven: a life-sustaining, utterly unreciprocable food for man to consume, to recognize in its giftedness, and to offer back to God in thanksgiving (eucharist). The nature of sin is secularism, and the consequence of sin is religion.
Secular anthropology identifies humanity as homo sapiens, but a Christian anthropology should recognize us more properly as homo adorans. The core of our nature is not gnostic, but liturgical and sacramental; which is to say, worshipful. Man, by nature, is the priest of a cosmic sacrament. He stands at the center of the cosmos, unifying the world by recognizing its creative nature and offering it in thanksgiving back to God. Adam failed to be the priest of the world because he consumed the fruit of the tree of knowledge as if it were an end in itself, and by so doing he estranged himself from the eucharistic light of Eden, cutting off himself and his descendants from the source of life. Our hunger for God as the life of the world was replaced by hopelessly superficial appetites—for food, sex, money, status, etc.—that can never fulfill our human nature because they are separated from their true source and object. Created to be the priest of the world, humanity became its slave. A self-defeating effort to become “free” from the source of being enthralled us to the futility of sin and death.
Christ did not inaugurate a new religion, but rather restored the eucharistic life which is man’s natural and appropriate condition. As the incarnate logos, the coeternal Word of God made flesh, the Wisdom that drew the cosmos from the chaos of nonbeing, Christ Himself is the living Eucharist, the life of the world embodied. As the Incarnation of divine love, possessing human and divine natures and reconciling them in Himself, Christ is both the perfect gift of God to man and the perfect offering of man to God. The mundane world, in its myopic self-sufficiency, rejected and condemned its very source and life as a blasphemer. But when the Church comes together in liturgy and “becomes what it is”—the mystical body of Christ—the resurrection life of Christ, and through Him the promised resurrection of those who are joined with His body, is revealed. Christ is the eternal mediator: in and through Him, by way of His eucharistic gift, God and man are reconciled and the Church is made manifest as the Kingdom of God.
January 9, 2020
A Christian is the one who, wherever he looks, finds Christ and rejoices in him. And this joy transforms all his human plans and programs, decisions and actions, making all his mission the sacrament of the world's return to him who is the life of the world.This book was literally pressed into my hands by my spiritual director and I read it slowly it over several months. The author was an Eastern Orthodox priest but any Christian can get a great deal of insight and inspiration from this wonderful book. He looks at the connection between daily life and the sacraments and liturgy of the church. As a result, we are repeatedly drawn into fresh realizations about how present God is in everyday life ... and how connected that is with the liturgy.
I realize that doesn't make it sound very exciting. But it is. Chalk it up to my inability to properly describe this book which gave me some revelatory moments.
Man is a hungry being. But he is hungry for God. Behind all the hunger of our life is God. All desire is finally a desire for Him. To be sure, man is not the only hungry being. All that exists lives by "eating." The whole creation depends on food. But the unique position of man in the universe is that he alone is to bless God for the food and the life he receives from him. He alone is to respond to God's blessing with his blessing.This is one of the most inspirational books I've ever read. I may just begin again at the beginning.
March 4, 2023
Bullet point review time!
- Simply put, this is a mind-blowing, soul-opening book. It is capable of forcing you to rethink everything you thought you knew about both Christian "doctrine" and "practice"—and categories like those may very well leave your vocabulary after reading it.
- Yes, this is maybe the best book to read to understand Eastern Orthodoxy, but it is far more than that. Reading this as a high church evangelical catholic, or confessional Lutheran, there are certainly many areas that I disagree with (i.e. Mariology, baptism being reserved until confirmation, the general Eastern approach that minimizes Law and Gospel), but members of all churches would do well to consider the demolition of "Western categories" which Schmemann gives. This is one of the most universally applicable works of theology I've read, and maybe the best defense of the Liturgy around. Give this to the sincere believers in your life who think that rock concerts and sermon series based on movies are acceptable in the life of the Church. I have to admit that his case for the faithfulness of the Eastern Church is awfully convincing—far more convincing than any Roman arguments I've heard. I only wish he had further addressed two major areas of concern that divide me from its practices: the veneration of icons, and righteousness by works.
- The first chapter gives a stupendous analysis of the Fall of Man that will make you wonder why you haven't heard it before. The first sinful act was the rejection of the sacred nature of the world; the "secularization" of time, reality, and desire. Christ came not to provide reprieve from the world, but to restore it. That's a truth I'd known for a while, but Schmemann explains it near perfectly.
- I probably would have kept my rating at 4 stars if not for the two appendices, which are more philosophical but so, so worthwhile. The breakdown of the true meaning of "sacramentality", in particular the Eucharist, is not totally in accord with my theology, but there's lots to take away from it.
- Everyone has their own scapegoat for the rise of modernity. For Jesuits, it's Luther. For Radical Orthodoxy, it's the nominalists, and later Descartes. For evangelical apologists, it's Rousseau. But I thought Francis Schaeffer was the only one to blame Aquinas until I read this book. But Schmemann's reasoning behind this is actually quite sound. By "over-rationalizing" the faith, Aquinas ended up wedging apart sacred and profane. This is a hard charge to deny, and it somewhat confirms my inklings as a qualified critic of scholasticism.
- For Schmemann and the tradition he represents, the Resurrection contains the truest key to the meaning and telos of Christianity. Amen!
- I think I will be revisiting this every year or so just to keep simmering in what it has to offer and taking small steps toward correcting my understanding of Church, world, and Kingdom (I just love those Trinitarian categories of ecclesiology that Schmemann introduces!)
- Simply put, this is a mind-blowing, soul-opening book. It is capable of forcing you to rethink everything you thought you knew about both Christian "doctrine" and "practice"—and categories like those may very well leave your vocabulary after reading it.
- Yes, this is maybe the best book to read to understand Eastern Orthodoxy, but it is far more than that. Reading this as a high church evangelical catholic, or confessional Lutheran, there are certainly many areas that I disagree with (i.e. Mariology, baptism being reserved until confirmation, the general Eastern approach that minimizes Law and Gospel), but members of all churches would do well to consider the demolition of "Western categories" which Schmemann gives. This is one of the most universally applicable works of theology I've read, and maybe the best defense of the Liturgy around. Give this to the sincere believers in your life who think that rock concerts and sermon series based on movies are acceptable in the life of the Church. I have to admit that his case for the faithfulness of the Eastern Church is awfully convincing—far more convincing than any Roman arguments I've heard. I only wish he had further addressed two major areas of concern that divide me from its practices: the veneration of icons, and righteousness by works.
- The first chapter gives a stupendous analysis of the Fall of Man that will make you wonder why you haven't heard it before. The first sinful act was the rejection of the sacred nature of the world; the "secularization" of time, reality, and desire. Christ came not to provide reprieve from the world, but to restore it. That's a truth I'd known for a while, but Schmemann explains it near perfectly.
- I probably would have kept my rating at 4 stars if not for the two appendices, which are more philosophical but so, so worthwhile. The breakdown of the true meaning of "sacramentality", in particular the Eucharist, is not totally in accord with my theology, but there's lots to take away from it.
- Everyone has their own scapegoat for the rise of modernity. For Jesuits, it's Luther. For Radical Orthodoxy, it's the nominalists, and later Descartes. For evangelical apologists, it's Rousseau. But I thought Francis Schaeffer was the only one to blame Aquinas until I read this book. But Schmemann's reasoning behind this is actually quite sound. By "over-rationalizing" the faith, Aquinas ended up wedging apart sacred and profane. This is a hard charge to deny, and it somewhat confirms my inklings as a qualified critic of scholasticism.
- For Schmemann and the tradition he represents, the Resurrection contains the truest key to the meaning and telos of Christianity. Amen!
- I think I will be revisiting this every year or so just to keep simmering in what it has to offer and taking small steps toward correcting my understanding of Church, world, and Kingdom (I just love those Trinitarian categories of ecclesiology that Schmemann introduces!)
August 5, 2023
One of the most joy-inspiring, paradigm shifting works of theology I’ve ever read.
April 13, 2019
The "main point" of Schmemann's sacramental theology outlined in this book is that the sacraments should not be understood as the objective reality of Christ's continued and physical presence here on earth but rather as a liturgical "ascension" out of this world and into the Kingdom where alone we can confess the body of Christ to exist.
"But throughout our study the main point has been that the whole liturgy is sacramental, that is, one transforming act and one ascending movement. And the very goal of this movement of ascension is to take us out of 'this world' and to make us partakers of the world to come. In this world- the one that condemned Christ and by doing so has condemned itself- no bread, no wine can become the body and blood of Christ. Nothing which is a part of it can be 'sacralized.' But the liturgy of the Church is always an anaphora, a lifting up, an ascension. . . . Only in the Kingdom can we confess with St. Basil that 'this bread is in very truth the precious body of our Lord, this wine the precious blood of Christ.'" (Schmemann, 42-43)
This contrasts strikingly with traditional Orthodox sacramental theology. Which of the Orthodox Church Fathers or synods affirmed that "In this world... no bread, no wine can become the body and blood of Christ"?
Perhaps it was Justin Martyr when he wrote, "...the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished, is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh.” (Justin Martyr, First Apology, 66, retrieved from http://www.stmarkboston.org/sacrament...).
Or perhaps Schmemann derives his sacramental theology from St. Cyril of Jerusalem: "Then having sanctified ourselves by these spiritual Hymns, we beseech the merciful God to send forth His Holy Spirit upon the gifts lying before Him; that He may make the Bread the Body of Christ, and the Wine the Blood of Christ; for whatsoever the Holy Ghost has touched, is surely sanctified and changed." (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, XXIII:7, retrieved from https://www.scripturecatholic.com/the...).
Or from St. Athanasius: "When the great prayers and holy supplications are sent up, the Word descends on the bread and the cup, and it becomes His body." (Athanasius, Sermon to the Baptized, quoted in Early Christian Doctrine by J.N.D. Kelley, retrieved from https://arizonaorthodox.com/sacrament...)
It is interesting that Schmemann strategically fails to quote that portion of the Orthodox Liturgy wherein the priest explicitly prays for the Holy Spirit to "send down" the Holy Spirit, "And make this bread the precious Body of thy Christ; Amen." (http://www.orthodoxyork.org/liturgy.html). Schmemann quotes large blocks of text from the Liturgy on the pages immediately preceding, yet he suddenly fails to reprint that portion of the Liturgy wherein the priest prays for the Holy Spirit to come down and transform the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ.
Perhaps this is because it would be difficult for Schmemann to explain why the priest would pray for the Holy Spirit to "come down", if he was already "in the Kingdom". Schmemann's theology seems distinctly American, having as it does more in common with John Calvin than with John Chrysostom:
"But if we are lifted up to heaven with our eyes and minds, to seek Christ there in the glory of his Kingdom, as the symbols invite us to him in his wholeness, so under the symbol of bread we shall be fed by his body, under the symbol of wine we shall separately drink his blood, to enjoy him at last in his wholeness" (John Calvin, Institutes 4.17.18, 1960:1381, retrieved from https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/orthod...).
"The priest standing there in the place of Christ says these words but their power and grace are from God. 'This is My Body,' he says, and these words transform what lies before him." (John Chrysostom, "Homilies on the Treachery of Judas" 1,6, retrieved from http://www.therealpresence.org/euchar...)
Mercifully, Fr. Schmemann does not speak with the same authority as Metropolitan Nektarios of Hong Kong and South East Asia, the latter of whom writes: "The Holy Eucharist is a sacrament, or mystery, and sacrifice. It is a sacrament according to which, through the prayer of the priest, the grace of the Holy Spirit descends and changes the natural elements of bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ." ("on the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist", June 26, 2016, retrieved from https://orthochristian.com/94688.html)
"But throughout our study the main point has been that the whole liturgy is sacramental, that is, one transforming act and one ascending movement. And the very goal of this movement of ascension is to take us out of 'this world' and to make us partakers of the world to come. In this world- the one that condemned Christ and by doing so has condemned itself- no bread, no wine can become the body and blood of Christ. Nothing which is a part of it can be 'sacralized.' But the liturgy of the Church is always an anaphora, a lifting up, an ascension. . . . Only in the Kingdom can we confess with St. Basil that 'this bread is in very truth the precious body of our Lord, this wine the precious blood of Christ.'" (Schmemann, 42-43)
This contrasts strikingly with traditional Orthodox sacramental theology. Which of the Orthodox Church Fathers or synods affirmed that "In this world... no bread, no wine can become the body and blood of Christ"?
Perhaps it was Justin Martyr when he wrote, "...the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished, is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh.” (Justin Martyr, First Apology, 66, retrieved from http://www.stmarkboston.org/sacrament...).
Or perhaps Schmemann derives his sacramental theology from St. Cyril of Jerusalem: "Then having sanctified ourselves by these spiritual Hymns, we beseech the merciful God to send forth His Holy Spirit upon the gifts lying before Him; that He may make the Bread the Body of Christ, and the Wine the Blood of Christ; for whatsoever the Holy Ghost has touched, is surely sanctified and changed." (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, XXIII:7, retrieved from https://www.scripturecatholic.com/the...).
Or from St. Athanasius: "When the great prayers and holy supplications are sent up, the Word descends on the bread and the cup, and it becomes His body." (Athanasius, Sermon to the Baptized, quoted in Early Christian Doctrine by J.N.D. Kelley, retrieved from https://arizonaorthodox.com/sacrament...)
It is interesting that Schmemann strategically fails to quote that portion of the Orthodox Liturgy wherein the priest explicitly prays for the Holy Spirit to "send down" the Holy Spirit, "And make this bread the precious Body of thy Christ; Amen." (http://www.orthodoxyork.org/liturgy.html). Schmemann quotes large blocks of text from the Liturgy on the pages immediately preceding, yet he suddenly fails to reprint that portion of the Liturgy wherein the priest prays for the Holy Spirit to come down and transform the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ.
Perhaps this is because it would be difficult for Schmemann to explain why the priest would pray for the Holy Spirit to "come down", if he was already "in the Kingdom". Schmemann's theology seems distinctly American, having as it does more in common with John Calvin than with John Chrysostom:
"But if we are lifted up to heaven with our eyes and minds, to seek Christ there in the glory of his Kingdom, as the symbols invite us to him in his wholeness, so under the symbol of bread we shall be fed by his body, under the symbol of wine we shall separately drink his blood, to enjoy him at last in his wholeness" (John Calvin, Institutes 4.17.18, 1960:1381, retrieved from https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/orthod...).
"The priest standing there in the place of Christ says these words but their power and grace are from God. 'This is My Body,' he says, and these words transform what lies before him." (John Chrysostom, "Homilies on the Treachery of Judas" 1,6, retrieved from http://www.therealpresence.org/euchar...)
Mercifully, Fr. Schmemann does not speak with the same authority as Metropolitan Nektarios of Hong Kong and South East Asia, the latter of whom writes: "The Holy Eucharist is a sacrament, or mystery, and sacrifice. It is a sacrament according to which, through the prayer of the priest, the grace of the Holy Spirit descends and changes the natural elements of bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ." ("on the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist", June 26, 2016, retrieved from https://orthochristian.com/94688.html)
July 9, 2012
There are few books that I can point to as paradigm shifters. Perhaps Ridderbos' Paul, Van Til's Christian Apologetics, John Frame's Doctrine of God, and Mouw's He Shines In All That's Fair are the few that exploded my understanding of God's work in the world, both in terms of His work in creation and redemption. Schmemann's "For the Life of the World" has done just that for me.
For all of the material available on the subject of the sacraments, to my knowledge Schmemann's work alone analyzes the elements from a teliological perspective. Rather than focusing on the form and function of the sacraments (i.e. what constitutes a sacrament, who may partake of it, and how is it partaken), Schmemann carries the discussion a step further by considering why God, in His wisdom, purposed the sacraments in the first place.
Rather than an abbreviated and parenthetical episode in what is other the Christians Spiritual process of salvation throughout life, the sacraments offer both an eschatological perspective as to the original and ultimate purpose of the creation - a temple to bless God and man.
Within this rubric, one can see that the sacraments themselves foreshadow the future vision that all of reality will be sacramental. One need only recall Zechariah's vision of the holy cooking utensils (Zech. 14:20) to see that God's plan of redemption involves nothing less than the sanctification of all creation.
For that reason, the relationship between spiritual grace and physical blessing are combined into a single, unified whole, a whole that neither swallows the original components but properly distinguishes between both the spiritual and physical without separation. This relationship becomes then the basis upon which all metaphors may be accurately spoken. The form and the object are united yet distinguishable.
It is the sum total of these reflections that enable Schmemann to aim his theological pen against the secularism rampant throughout our society. The Kantian, Post-Enlightenment age of the privatization of religion has created a climate that is entirely non-sacramental. Religion and spirituality have little to no place for the physical and, for that matter, churches treat the sacraments as largely sentimentalities removed from the overall work of salvation.
Schmemann's work provides a sorely needed discussion of a topic largely missing in evangelical churches today: the role of the creation in the work of redemption, a subject captured most acutely in the sacraments.
For all of the material available on the subject of the sacraments, to my knowledge Schmemann's work alone analyzes the elements from a teliological perspective. Rather than focusing on the form and function of the sacraments (i.e. what constitutes a sacrament, who may partake of it, and how is it partaken), Schmemann carries the discussion a step further by considering why God, in His wisdom, purposed the sacraments in the first place.
Rather than an abbreviated and parenthetical episode in what is other the Christians Spiritual process of salvation throughout life, the sacraments offer both an eschatological perspective as to the original and ultimate purpose of the creation - a temple to bless God and man.
Within this rubric, one can see that the sacraments themselves foreshadow the future vision that all of reality will be sacramental. One need only recall Zechariah's vision of the holy cooking utensils (Zech. 14:20) to see that God's plan of redemption involves nothing less than the sanctification of all creation.
For that reason, the relationship between spiritual grace and physical blessing are combined into a single, unified whole, a whole that neither swallows the original components but properly distinguishes between both the spiritual and physical without separation. This relationship becomes then the basis upon which all metaphors may be accurately spoken. The form and the object are united yet distinguishable.
It is the sum total of these reflections that enable Schmemann to aim his theological pen against the secularism rampant throughout our society. The Kantian, Post-Enlightenment age of the privatization of religion has created a climate that is entirely non-sacramental. Religion and spirituality have little to no place for the physical and, for that matter, churches treat the sacraments as largely sentimentalities removed from the overall work of salvation.
Schmemann's work provides a sorely needed discussion of a topic largely missing in evangelical churches today: the role of the creation in the work of redemption, a subject captured most acutely in the sacraments.
Read
October 12, 2025Einige interessante Überlegungen über einzelne Sakramente/liturgische Elemente aber auch zum allgemeinen Verständnis davon, was Glaube in dieser Welt bedeutet.
Ein paar Gedanken:
Schmemann zeigt anhand der orthodoxen Liturgie, das eine Trennung zwischen "spiritual" und "material" usw. nur eine pseudochristliche sein kann. Christsein geht nur als Christ in der Welt, in der wir tatsächlich leben, und diese Welt ist Gottes Welt. Christ ist der, der die Welt so zu sehen lernt.
Christus ist "the life of the world", das verkörpert die Kirche. Sakramente wie Taufe und Abendmahl sind nicht nur zur individuellen Heilsvermittlung da, sondern kosmische, die Welt betreffende Ereignisse. Darin wird die Kirche selbst zum Sakrament für die Welt.
"A christian is the one who, whereever he looks, finds Christ and rejoices in him. And this joy transforms all his human plans an programs... making all his mission the sacrament of the worlds return to him who is the life of the world."
Lässt sich gut lesen, ist recht kurz. Man muss sich halt etwas aufs orthodoxe Sakramentsverständnis einlassen, wo man im Anhang des Buches nochmal mehr mit reingenommen wird.
Ein paar Gedanken:
Schmemann zeigt anhand der orthodoxen Liturgie, das eine Trennung zwischen "spiritual" und "material" usw. nur eine pseudochristliche sein kann. Christsein geht nur als Christ in der Welt, in der wir tatsächlich leben, und diese Welt ist Gottes Welt. Christ ist der, der die Welt so zu sehen lernt.
Christus ist "the life of the world", das verkörpert die Kirche. Sakramente wie Taufe und Abendmahl sind nicht nur zur individuellen Heilsvermittlung da, sondern kosmische, die Welt betreffende Ereignisse. Darin wird die Kirche selbst zum Sakrament für die Welt.
"A christian is the one who, whereever he looks, finds Christ and rejoices in him. And this joy transforms all his human plans an programs... making all his mission the sacrament of the worlds return to him who is the life of the world."
Lässt sich gut lesen, ist recht kurz. Man muss sich halt etwas aufs orthodoxe Sakramentsverständnis einlassen, wo man im Anhang des Buches nochmal mehr mit reingenommen wird.
April 11, 2023
Review to follow
February 10, 2025
A book to rekindle delight in Christ, his church, and his creation — especially for anyone wearied by vapid explanations of why the church exists and why we go to it, and tawdry, if sincere, expressions of spirituality. Father Schmemann’s is a voice to sit under alertly and attentively, with a willingness to entertain the truth of what is beautiful whether or not it makes sense.
A sampling:
“All that exists is God’s gift to man, and it all exists to make God known to man, to make man’s life communion with God.”
“It is only as joy that the church was victorious in the world, and it lost the world when it lost that joy, and ceased to be a credible witness to it…Joy, however, is not something one can define or analyze. One enters into joy.”
“…our entrance into the presence of Christ [in the Eucharist] is an entrance into a fourth dimension which allows us to see the ultimate reality of life. It is not an escape from the world, rather it is the arrival at a vantage point from which we can see more deeply into the reality of the world.”
“All generations, all philosophers have always been aware of this anxiety of time, of its paradox….Here again what the Church offers is not a ‘solution’ of a philosophical problem, but a gift. And it becomes a solution only as it is accepted as freely and joyfully as it is given. Or, it may be, the joy of that gift makes both the problem and the solution unnecessary, irrelevant.”
A sampling:
“All that exists is God’s gift to man, and it all exists to make God known to man, to make man’s life communion with God.”
“It is only as joy that the church was victorious in the world, and it lost the world when it lost that joy, and ceased to be a credible witness to it…Joy, however, is not something one can define or analyze. One enters into joy.”
“…our entrance into the presence of Christ [in the Eucharist] is an entrance into a fourth dimension which allows us to see the ultimate reality of life. It is not an escape from the world, rather it is the arrival at a vantage point from which we can see more deeply into the reality of the world.”
“All generations, all philosophers have always been aware of this anxiety of time, of its paradox….Here again what the Church offers is not a ‘solution’ of a philosophical problem, but a gift. And it becomes a solution only as it is accepted as freely and joyfully as it is given. Or, it may be, the joy of that gift makes both the problem and the solution unnecessary, irrelevant.”
December 24, 2025
This is my first book on the Orthodox Church. I don’t share their theological framework for the Christian faith but appreciate great thinkers and theologians with which we share Christian orthodoxy. I found some of his insights of Christianity and our culture are spot on. I enjoyed the first chapter on “man is what he eats” and the connection of food from the Garden of Eden and how it has affected us. He applies well to our current state and how we as Christians should live seeing our moments such as eating as a sacrament. Indeed everywhere we are even those moments when we eat alone, we are not alone. We share a meal of communion with God and are reminded of our dependance on him. This theology of the ordinary is how we should see what we do. Chapter 5, “The Mystery of Love” is also very enlightening. Marriage is related to the kingdom of God, it is a representation of the union of Christ and His Church. Thus God is active (we should allow him) in marriage, “three are married” and this changes how we live as a married couple. It reminded me how trivial the marriage ceremony is in our “evangelical” church and how we need to elevate it as a sacrament for the reason above.
His writing style reminded me of Dietrich Bonhoeffer which is hard to understand.
His writing style reminded me of Dietrich Bonhoeffer which is hard to understand.
December 22, 2012
Like Zizioulas and other theologians of the Eastern churches, Alexander Schmemann writes with a philosophical viewpoint, not an exegetical one.
Sometimes he says penetrating and acute things, as for instance (p. 27-28) that the Christ whom we preach is, after his resurrection, no longer recognizable to his own disciples until they have had their own consciousness changed by entering into the new reality which is the resurrection. This is both a claim about reality – that the resurrected Christ is a replacement for, and alternative to, the ordinary reality of the old creation – and a claim about epistemology – that this new reality can only be known by those who are a part of it.
The Eucharist is the crowning act of the larger liturgy by which the Church is constituted as this new creation, and by which she offers both herself and the world to the Father. For Schmemann, the essence of the church's liturgy is its ascension into Heaven itself so that Christians may "return into the world" – by which Schmemann seems to mean the life of Christians when they are not gathered together for liturgical worship – and reflect, like Moses, the "light, joy, and peace" of "that kingdom of which they were truly the witnesses."
This theory of liturgy ought, by rights, to involve Schmemann in an attempt to explain many of the utterances of the liturgy. After all, if worship is ascent into heaven, then it is a momentous thing – not at all the sort of thing that men could hope to devise on their own power, any more than they could make a perpetual motion device or a time machine. The builders of Babel tried to ascend to heaven with bricks and clay and failed. Otus and Ephialtes piled Pelion on Ossa and failed. And those who succeeded – Jacob with his ladder, Jack with his beanstalk – succeeded not because they were so very clever or wise, but because of magic far greater than any of their own abilities. Even so, if this sacramental life of the Church is to work, if it is to function, if it is to achieve any ends, it will have to be because God has set it up to work that way. If worship is of human devising, then it cannot take us to heaven.
But Schmemann does not claim that the utterances of the liturgy – "blessed is the kingdom of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit both now and unto ages of ages", "Lift up your hearts", etc. – have been dictated or prescribed by God. That, of course, would be one way to justify the belief that they accomplish so lofty a goal as ascent into heaven and participation in the life of the Resurrection in the presence of God. But Schmemann refuses to go that route. Research of that sort, he says, will involve one in the traditional niceties of theology about sacraments: "their number, their 'validity', their institution, etc." Schmemann does not want to approach the question from those well-worn perspectives – and understandably so, since such approaches, from at least the time of the Marburg Disputation, have proven to be limited in their ability to unite Christians and achieve consensus about worship and its workings.
Rather, Schmemann believes that the actions which these utterances performatively enact are hard-wired into the nature of Man, the nature of God, and the nature of the whole Creation. His project is to step back and look at the big picture, not focusing on particular liturgical acts or utterances in abstraction from the journey or procession into the presence of God that is the entire liturgy.
"In [a certain abstract] approach, what virtually disappeared from the sphere of theological interest and investigation was liturgy itself, and what remained were isolated "moments," "formulas," and "conditions of validity."
This is a fruitful approach. It reminds me of Lewis' "An Experiment in Criticism" in the way it flips on its head the usual approach to its subject. And rightly so: if worship is really what the Eastern churches say it is, then we should expect that it will do what Schmemann says it does: bring us into heaven, into God's presence, in order that we may be sent back into the world.
My major criticism of Schmemann is that he does not take cognizance of the Jewish background of the Eucharist. His explanation of the sacraments' meaning and working is essentially divorced from the 2nd Temple Judaism that gave birth to them and formed their original context. In my view, the reason the Church has failed to understand its own sacraments accurately is because, by the fourth century, it had lost its Jewish roots, or rather, had amputated them. And Eastern Orthodoxy, which puts the highest premium on the tradition of the very Fathers and Councils that amputated Jewish Christianity, has greater obstacles to the recovery of this understanding.
My concern to understand the Bible in 1st century terms puts me in a difficult position as a reader of Schmemann. I love what he says. It is a gem of a book, and beautifully expressed. But I must insist that it will only go so far. It will not succeed as a solution to the sacramental logjam produced by Christendom's warring sects. For even though what he writes is generally true, and not a sectarian Eastern understanding, it will nonetheless be perceived as an Eastern theological statement, and thus will not compel other traditions. And insofar as it ignores the Jewish antecedents of Christian worship and de-paschalizes the Eucharist by removing all connotations of Passover from it, Schmemann’s understanding of worship is removed from the facts that ought to be conditioning our interpretation of Christ’s utterances and the sacraments He instituted.
Sometimes he says penetrating and acute things, as for instance (p. 27-28) that the Christ whom we preach is, after his resurrection, no longer recognizable to his own disciples until they have had their own consciousness changed by entering into the new reality which is the resurrection. This is both a claim about reality – that the resurrected Christ is a replacement for, and alternative to, the ordinary reality of the old creation – and a claim about epistemology – that this new reality can only be known by those who are a part of it.
The Eucharist is the crowning act of the larger liturgy by which the Church is constituted as this new creation, and by which she offers both herself and the world to the Father. For Schmemann, the essence of the church's liturgy is its ascension into Heaven itself so that Christians may "return into the world" – by which Schmemann seems to mean the life of Christians when they are not gathered together for liturgical worship – and reflect, like Moses, the "light, joy, and peace" of "that kingdom of which they were truly the witnesses."
This theory of liturgy ought, by rights, to involve Schmemann in an attempt to explain many of the utterances of the liturgy. After all, if worship is ascent into heaven, then it is a momentous thing – not at all the sort of thing that men could hope to devise on their own power, any more than they could make a perpetual motion device or a time machine. The builders of Babel tried to ascend to heaven with bricks and clay and failed. Otus and Ephialtes piled Pelion on Ossa and failed. And those who succeeded – Jacob with his ladder, Jack with his beanstalk – succeeded not because they were so very clever or wise, but because of magic far greater than any of their own abilities. Even so, if this sacramental life of the Church is to work, if it is to function, if it is to achieve any ends, it will have to be because God has set it up to work that way. If worship is of human devising, then it cannot take us to heaven.
But Schmemann does not claim that the utterances of the liturgy – "blessed is the kingdom of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit both now and unto ages of ages", "Lift up your hearts", etc. – have been dictated or prescribed by God. That, of course, would be one way to justify the belief that they accomplish so lofty a goal as ascent into heaven and participation in the life of the Resurrection in the presence of God. But Schmemann refuses to go that route. Research of that sort, he says, will involve one in the traditional niceties of theology about sacraments: "their number, their 'validity', their institution, etc." Schmemann does not want to approach the question from those well-worn perspectives – and understandably so, since such approaches, from at least the time of the Marburg Disputation, have proven to be limited in their ability to unite Christians and achieve consensus about worship and its workings.
Rather, Schmemann believes that the actions which these utterances performatively enact are hard-wired into the nature of Man, the nature of God, and the nature of the whole Creation. His project is to step back and look at the big picture, not focusing on particular liturgical acts or utterances in abstraction from the journey or procession into the presence of God that is the entire liturgy.
"In [a certain abstract] approach, what virtually disappeared from the sphere of theological interest and investigation was liturgy itself, and what remained were isolated "moments," "formulas," and "conditions of validity."
This is a fruitful approach. It reminds me of Lewis' "An Experiment in Criticism" in the way it flips on its head the usual approach to its subject. And rightly so: if worship is really what the Eastern churches say it is, then we should expect that it will do what Schmemann says it does: bring us into heaven, into God's presence, in order that we may be sent back into the world.
My major criticism of Schmemann is that he does not take cognizance of the Jewish background of the Eucharist. His explanation of the sacraments' meaning and working is essentially divorced from the 2nd Temple Judaism that gave birth to them and formed their original context. In my view, the reason the Church has failed to understand its own sacraments accurately is because, by the fourth century, it had lost its Jewish roots, or rather, had amputated them. And Eastern Orthodoxy, which puts the highest premium on the tradition of the very Fathers and Councils that amputated Jewish Christianity, has greater obstacles to the recovery of this understanding.
My concern to understand the Bible in 1st century terms puts me in a difficult position as a reader of Schmemann. I love what he says. It is a gem of a book, and beautifully expressed. But I must insist that it will only go so far. It will not succeed as a solution to the sacramental logjam produced by Christendom's warring sects. For even though what he writes is generally true, and not a sectarian Eastern understanding, it will nonetheless be perceived as an Eastern theological statement, and thus will not compel other traditions. And insofar as it ignores the Jewish antecedents of Christian worship and de-paschalizes the Eucharist by removing all connotations of Passover from it, Schmemann’s understanding of worship is removed from the facts that ought to be conditioning our interpretation of Christ’s utterances and the sacraments He instituted.
Read
December 10, 2024"A Christian is one who, wherever he looks, finds Christ and rejoices in him." Still don't fully know what I think of sacramental theology, but I really enjoyed this book and thinking about it. It might be strange at times, but you gotta admit that Eastern Orthodox theology is pretty cool sometimes.
June 29, 2025
This book is such a gift to the Church! Capon in prose. Please reference Mikael’s review from 2024 for additional insights.
Christ is the logic of the cosmos. And weeping in the club, always, at the gift Rez has been to my faith.
Leaving this here: “The liturgy of the Eucharist is best understood as a journey of procession. It is the journey of the Church into the dimension of the Kingdom… The journey begins when Christians leave their homes and beds… for they are now on their way to constitute the Church, or to be more exact, to be transformed into the Church of God.”
Christ is the logic of the cosmos. And weeping in the club, always, at the gift Rez has been to my faith.
Leaving this here: “The liturgy of the Eucharist is best understood as a journey of procession. It is the journey of the Church into the dimension of the Kingdom… The journey begins when Christians leave their homes and beds… for they are now on their way to constitute the Church, or to be more exact, to be transformed into the Church of God.”
April 25, 2020
A beautiful account of all things as sacramental because worship, as the "epiphany of God," is thus "the epiphany of the world." As Thomas Merton says, every novice should read this book twice. I am thankful to revisit it now, five years after it first began my interest in sacramental theology. Christ is all in all, and all believers are His priests. Grace upon grace!!
"The only natural (and not 'supernatural') reaction of man, to whom God gave this blessed and sanctified world, is to bless God in return, to thank Him, to see the world as God sees it and — in this act of gratitude and adoration — to know, name, and possess the world ... [Man] stands in the center of the world and unifies it in his act of blessing God, of both receiving the world from God and offering it to God — and by filling the world with this eucharist, he transforms his life, the one that receives from the world into life in God, into communion with Him."
"The only natural (and not 'supernatural') reaction of man, to whom God gave this blessed and sanctified world, is to bless God in return, to thank Him, to see the world as God sees it and — in this act of gratitude and adoration — to know, name, and possess the world ... [Man] stands in the center of the world and unifies it in his act of blessing God, of both receiving the world from God and offering it to God — and by filling the world with this eucharist, he transforms his life, the one that receives from the world into life in God, into communion with Him."
May 8, 2023
Read again in 2024. Gets better every time. Just incredible.
Some true gold in here, a complete dismantling of secularism and rationalism. I’m not Eastern Orthodox therefore not in complete agreement of some doctrines presented, but a great read for anybody, especially those who have a low ecclesiastical view and low view of the sacraments. Will certainly prompt some thought to the Churches function in the restoration of society.
Some true gold in here, a complete dismantling of secularism and rationalism. I’m not Eastern Orthodox therefore not in complete agreement of some doctrines presented, but a great read for anybody, especially those who have a low ecclesiastical view and low view of the sacraments. Will certainly prompt some thought to the Churches function in the restoration of society.
March 7, 2021
This book surprised me by how poetic and beautiful it was. I knew it would be important to read; I didn't know it would be so refreshing and moving. It feels like Fr. Schmemann is simply bursting at the seams to help us see Jesus, the light and life of the world - and the Church, the sign of the kingdom of heaven. Such a clear and powerful read.
July 6, 2012
Outside of Scripture, the first 10 or so pages of this book are the most important words I've ever read.
I'd join the Orthodox Church, but that would be so Protestant of me that it seems wise to stay put.
I'd join the Orthodox Church, but that would be so Protestant of me that it seems wise to stay put.
February 3, 2009
Very good.
April 25, 2026
The focus and the true gem of this book is in its title and theme—The Church, through Christ, is to be the symbol and example of the love and joy of the Kingdom of God come to earth. Father Schmemann brings out the fullness of the Christian life beautifully, and refocuses us on the true end goal of the Church, which has very clearly wavered for a few decades.
It was a small but dense read. My critiques come from my deep protestant roots, so of course I gotta raise an eyebrow at Mary's perfection (even if they don't subscribe to the Immaculate Conception—which I always thought was in reference to something else, but I'll save face by not sharing that here.)
My other critique, also probably part of my reformed protestantism, was at some point wanting statements that were more concrete (Father Schmemann would probably throw up his hands in exasperation at hearing that.) I enjoy wrestling with an odd bold statement that demands the imagination get working to understand it. But after a while I start to lose the actual point of the statements one after the other, because he's writing academically while reintroducing the mystery of the sacraments and symbols. It's a similar experience to reading academic writing about music or poetry. I'll return to it in a couple years (after I learn more about the Orthodox Church too!) and gain even more from it I'm certain. It's definitely a blessing of a book and worth a wrestle for a Christian from any denomination.
Thanks Abram!
P.S. you should read the book even just so you can tell people you're reading a book by a man named Schmemann. It's fun to say and people always repeat the name after you say it. Schmemann. You'll be popular at parties.
It was a small but dense read. My critiques come from my deep protestant roots, so of course I gotta raise an eyebrow at Mary's perfection (even if they don't subscribe to the Immaculate Conception—which I always thought was in reference to something else, but I'll save face by not sharing that here.)
My other critique, also probably part of my reformed protestantism, was at some point wanting statements that were more concrete (Father Schmemann would probably throw up his hands in exasperation at hearing that.) I enjoy wrestling with an odd bold statement that demands the imagination get working to understand it. But after a while I start to lose the actual point of the statements one after the other, because he's writing academically while reintroducing the mystery of the sacraments and symbols. It's a similar experience to reading academic writing about music or poetry. I'll return to it in a couple years (after I learn more about the Orthodox Church too!) and gain even more from it I'm certain. It's definitely a blessing of a book and worth a wrestle for a Christian from any denomination.
Thanks Abram!
P.S. you should read the book even just so you can tell people you're reading a book by a man named Schmemann. It's fun to say and people always repeat the name after you say it. Schmemann. You'll be popular at parties.
February 16, 2025
“The Church is the sacrament of the Kingdom because she is the possibility given to man to see in and through this world the ‘world to come,’ to see and to ‘live’ it in Christ. It is only when in the darkness of this world we discern that Christ has already ‘filled all things with Himself’ that these things, whatever they may be, are revealed and given to us full of meaning and beauty. A Christian is one who, wherever he looks, finds Christ and rejoices in Him.”
This book is less an explanation of individual theological doctrines than it is an attempt at communicating, on paper, a whole way of seeing the world.
Schmemann, though at times hard to follow, is elegant and compelling. He gives to us an exposition of the Orthodox view of sacramental life—of all of life being a receiving and an offering back of the world to Christ, who is its Life.
If you want to know why Orthodoxy is so compelling to young evangelicals at the moment—evangelicals who grew up in the world of churches that felt like coffee shops where the coffee was free if only you would listen to an inspirational speaker for 30 minutes in exchange—this book is a good place to start.
This book is less an explanation of individual theological doctrines than it is an attempt at communicating, on paper, a whole way of seeing the world.
Schmemann, though at times hard to follow, is elegant and compelling. He gives to us an exposition of the Orthodox view of sacramental life—of all of life being a receiving and an offering back of the world to Christ, who is its Life.
If you want to know why Orthodoxy is so compelling to young evangelicals at the moment—evangelicals who grew up in the world of churches that felt like coffee shops where the coffee was free if only you would listen to an inspirational speaker for 30 minutes in exchange—this book is a good place to start.
June 13, 2026
I thoroughly enjoyed this and Schmemann's rich reflection on Eucharist and the liturgy. I would not recommend this to a young believer who is at all uncertain or dissatisfied with their tradition, as Schmemann paints a vivid and beautiful picture of Orthodox worship. Two follow up notes: 1. the author does not touch or handle the more controversial aspects of Orthodox practice, namely questions concerning justification and icon veneration in worship.
2. All of the most beautiful descriptions and essential elements of Christian worship that he highlighted are found in my Luthero-Anglican informed Presbyterian tradition and I found myself reinforced and thankful to be exactly where I am at in the family tree of the church.
Therefore, I was very thankful for the thoughtful theological reflection, and enriched to dive deeper in my own tradition to unearth the treasures of Christian worship, for the life of the world.
2. All of the most beautiful descriptions and essential elements of Christian worship that he highlighted are found in my Luthero-Anglican informed Presbyterian tradition and I found myself reinforced and thankful to be exactly where I am at in the family tree of the church.
Therefore, I was very thankful for the thoughtful theological reflection, and enriched to dive deeper in my own tradition to unearth the treasures of Christian worship, for the life of the world.
April 27, 2026
I currently have no intention of converting to Orthodoxy but nevertheless this book is applicable to the walk of Christians everywhere.
Each chapter I decided was my favorite before the next came and subsumed it. Schmemann writes with both conviction and confidence in lovely prose.
“It is through the Church that each one of us finds that the vocation of all vocations is to follow Christ in the fullness of his priesthood: in his love for man and the world, his love for their ultimate fulfillment in the abundant life of the Kingdom.”
(Chapter 5, The Mystery of Love)
Each chapter I decided was my favorite before the next came and subsumed it. Schmemann writes with both conviction and confidence in lovely prose.
“It is through the Church that each one of us finds that the vocation of all vocations is to follow Christ in the fullness of his priesthood: in his love for man and the world, his love for their ultimate fulfillment in the abundant life of the Kingdom.”
(Chapter 5, The Mystery of Love)
October 13, 2026
I think the two appendixes alone deserve 5 stars.
April 19, 2020
A few particular points I disagree with, but on the whole this is a beautiful, trustworthy, and life-giving work on Christ as the life of the world and his Church as the sacrament of the Kingdom.
"The Christian is the one who, wherever she looks, finds Christ and rejoices in Him. And this joy transforms all her human plans and programs, decisions and actions, making all her mission the sacrament of the world's return to Him who is the life of the world" (113).
Highly recommended.
"The Christian is the one who, wherever she looks, finds Christ and rejoices in Him. And this joy transforms all her human plans and programs, decisions and actions, making all her mission the sacrament of the world's return to Him who is the life of the world" (113).
Highly recommended.
February 15, 2025
I'm really not sure how exclusive this book is to Eastern Orthodoxy. As an Anglo-Presby, I found myself agreeing with most of Schmemann's arguments. Differences may be in practice. Generally, this is a helpful vision of Christian theology.
April 22, 2024
on a purely stylistic note, I could’ve done without so many scare quotes and random italicized words/phrases.
but this was such an enjoyable read! a lovely insight into Orthodoxy, especially the first couple chapters about food/the Eucharist/living a eucharistic life.
not sure I quite grasped the second half of the book. the marriage chapter was a little off-putting, but I think that’s purely a matter of denominational difference.
but this was such an enjoyable read! a lovely insight into Orthodoxy, especially the first couple chapters about food/the Eucharist/living a eucharistic life.
not sure I quite grasped the second half of the book. the marriage chapter was a little off-putting, but I think that’s purely a matter of denominational difference.
November 30, 2025
Hab nach der Hälfte aufgehört zu lesen, weil es mich nicht genug gepackt hat.
Schmemann hat vereinzelte crazy geile Gedanken die echt Spaß machen, geht viel um Liturgie und in welcher Weise sie die Theologie aus der Engführung des 2-Räume-Denkens retten kann. Hatte den Eindruck, das gelingt ihm dann nur so halb...hab ja aber auch nciht bis zum Ende gelesen...
Lohnenswert für alle Liturgen unter euch!!
Schmemann hat vereinzelte crazy geile Gedanken die echt Spaß machen, geht viel um Liturgie und in welcher Weise sie die Theologie aus der Engführung des 2-Räume-Denkens retten kann. Hatte den Eindruck, das gelingt ihm dann nur so halb...hab ja aber auch nciht bis zum Ende gelesen...
Lohnenswert für alle Liturgen unter euch!!
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