Race & Challenges with Becoming Orthodox - Father Moses Berry
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- Опубликовано: 6 июл 2023
- In this episode, Father Moses Berry discusses some of the challenges with becoming an Orthodox Christian.
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This is the fourth episode from my interview with Orthodox writer, speaker, and pastor, Father Moses Berry.
To learn more about Father Moses' work:
Website:
frmosesberry.com
Church:
unexpectedjoychurch.org/
The Brotherhood of St. Moses the Black:
mosestheblack.org/
The Ozarks Afro-American Heritage Museum:
oaahm.omeka.net/
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Black Female Catechumen Here. Thank You Father.
May his memory be eternal ☦️
This is great. I am of Indian background and interested in becoming Orthodox. I’ve started attending services and catechism classes but am not yet baptised (hopefully later this year). This is a challenge I have faced as well. Not only do the figures in the icons generally not look like me, most of the Orthodox Church is rooted in either Greek or Russian culture, which are not cultures I come from. So this talk is really valuable to me.
By the way, in case anyone is wondering about this, yes there is the Indian Malankara Orthodox Church, but that church is really very much geared towards a specific community of Indian Christians from Kerala who were converted many centuries ago by St Thomas, it’s not really a church I felt I could go to and be welcomed as I’m not from that community.
I’m attending a Russian Orthodox Church in which all the services are held in English.
Your youtube name doesn't look Christian. 😂
Your point about the saints of the church not looking like you is not important.
Jesus Christ was jewish, are we to not relate to His teachings because of His ethnicity?
What matters is that by joining the Orthodox church you join the ancient church founded by Christ Himself.
The Orthodox church is the unchanged church since the time of the apostles.
I am Indian Orthodox and it's true the community has been somewhat insular. I speak only English and was born in America to parents from Kerala, and sometimes in the past even I've felt out of place. That being said things have really changed over the last 2 decades and much has been done to share the Indian Syriac Orthodox tradition. Nearly everything has been translated into English from the original Syriac and is freely available. There are now misson churches dedicated to reaching out to other communities and there is new generation of American-born clergy inspired by the other Orthodox traditions seeking all peoples.
The main point though is that Orthodox Christianity has previously come to India, adopted some elements of the surrounding Indian culture, and yet remained firmly rooted within Holy Tradition. Christ descended for all mankind! Best wishes on your journey.
My husband’s patron Saint is St. Maurice of the Theban Legion he was a man of darker complexion. My Patron is St. Mary of Egypt…she is also darker….side note we were drawn to these Saints for their examples not how they looked.
May I simply say it's wonderful the faith has reached you. I hope the Lord will bless you by keeping you tight. I hope you find a patron that you can empathize soon. Lord bless you.
Also thank you for that bit of education. I never knew there was large enough community in India for a dedicated church. (Hope that made sense)
My dear brother from a different mother. Hoping you'll soon be up to visiting our island monastery, dear Father Moses.
I am glad to have grown up with icons that depicted Jesus his contemporaries with olive brown skin, and icons of saints from Africa and Europe and North America. Growing up only seeing a "white Jesus" seems to imply for many in America that Christ is for white people
When starting out, sometimes we do need superficial reminders that Jesus doesnt need to look precisely like me for Christ to be for me and that all of humanity can embrace Christ
That's just not true what you are saying. I have never seen Jesus depicting as some European white guy in America. It's rare if it's done. I think people look for racism were there is none. All races have been slaves or mistreated at one time.
Always love seeing Father Moses Berry. I'd love to be able to sit down and just have a long talk with him.
Memory Eternal, Father Moses
God rest the soul of thy servant Father Moses Berry
Has such a joyful presence. So happy to know he has resided in Missouri, and doing such beautiful work for racial equality in a grounded and loving manner. Thank you Fr Berry!
OK BRO BUT MISSURI HAS THE PETERSNEN FAMILY.... A GOD REASON NOT HITED BY A THERMONUCLEAR BOMB... GOD BLES YOU ALL CHRISTIAN ORTHODOX SISTERS AN BROTHERS.... GOD SAVES AMERICAN PEOPLE FROM REPTILE ZIONISTS AND ITS ADMINISTRATION OF USA... GLORY TO GOD/CHRIST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Father Berry. This man has the greatest name. I love him.
God rest his precious soul ❤ He taught me something and for that I'm eternally grateful 🙏
Greatly appreciate what Fr. Moses is conveying here regarding a noetic encounter with icons, and the love that empowers his perspective. Without that love and “joy of salvation” so many retreat into academic reduction and historicity, thereby missing the Faith for the form.
Ευλογείτε, Πάτερ ☦️
God Bless Father Moses ❤☦️
What a lovely man, and what a fascinating subject.
It never even occured to me that this would be a question, having such a mix of colours and backgrounds of people in my parish church here in England. We have Ethiopians, Eritreans and Chinese amongst the Romanians, Greeks and native British.
It grieves that the question of colour is such a prominant question in the USA. Although, not surprising with the awful history.
God bless you all.
Thank you for this Father! ☦️🙏🏾
It gives me so much joy to see Father Moses Berry again!
What about the Ethiopian Tewahedo Orthodox Church? They have many parishes here in America, and all their icons show black people. Their worship is authentic autochthonous African Christianity from ancient times. They have services in English and all their clergy are black Ethiopians like Moses the Black. Back in Ethiopia they have a huge autocephalous church with tens of thousands of priests and monks supporting the American missions with their prayers and wisdom.
@@james.p4579 Sebastian Brock has said the Chalcedonian schism is a result of VI c. rhetorical limitations, and Abp. Alexander (Golitzin) has said that the disagreement is the result of epigraphical ‘signing statements’ (similar in function to the egregious tendentious interpretations of the Phanar regarding Chalcedon Canon 28) that poorly represent the various parties’ points of view. He seems to be saying the same thing as Brock.
It’s not at all accurate to reduce the Ethiopian Orthodox witness to ‘prechalcedonian’ or Monophysite. They have an authentic autochthonous African Semitic expression of ancient Orthodox Christianity that we are sadly out of touch with because of errors in communication in the distant past. The fact that the Ethiopian church was headed by a foreign Coptic primate who exerted no administrative or teaching power over the local church but only spent his days in office ordaining the tens of thousands of clergy of Ethiopia vitiates your argument terminally. Only in the late XIX c. did the Ethiopian Tewahedo church become autocephalous.
Happenstance of geography and culture isolated Ethiopia from Rome (what you might call Byzantium). They were self-contained (with tens of millions of devout believers) and possess a richness of Semitic Christianity of which we Europeans can only guess at. Their clergy are so deeply learned through decades of intensive study and strict asceticism that our pampered seminarians don’t remotely approach. Only our best theologians and most sincere ascetics approach the dedication of Ethiopians priests and monastics.
I do pray that we can achieve henosis soon and reestablish communion with them but the Greeks will stand in the way of it. Russia will take centuries to heal from the heresies they’ve recently engaged. Maybe an ascendant American church can lead the way. The education of Coptic and Ethiopian hierarchs at St. Vladimir’s Seminary might help achieve that restoration of communion but the present leadership of the OCA does not possess the authority to make it happen. A few more men of Golitzin’s caliber are needed, if any such exist.
@@claesvanoldenphatt9972ll good points, unfortunately, the fact remains that at the present time both the Ethiopian and Coptic churches are not in communion with the rest of Eastern Orthodoxy. We can only hope and pray that communion will be restored in time, I have heard that efforts are being made in this regard, but also that progress is likely to be slow. I would like nothing better than to be in communion with our Ethiopian brothers, I love their church, services and liturgy. If it is true that Ethiopia is the resting place of the lost Ark of the Covenant then all the more reason to give them due honour. We can only hope and pray that communion will some day be restored by the grace of God.
@@shivabreathes we ought to love and respect the Ethiopians in their own regard as people with a special place in the world and not for any specific fabled items. If they have the Ark they aren’t interested in bragging about it. It’s a matter of faith like the rest of Ethiopian religion, uniquely its own and incomparable.
You seem to suggest that Ethiopia and her Church ought to be valued in relation to Eastern Orthodoxy, and that they are flawed because they aren’t the same as us. We ought to ask ourselves if we could do Christianity with the intensity Ethiopians do, rather than thinking of them as lacking something. They’ve been a world of autochthonous Christian tradition unto themselves for millennia.
Church isn’t a matter of laws and minimal definitions, it’s a lived tradition.
@@claesvanoldenphatt9972 As Orthodox, we are bound to believe the saints and the Ecumenical Councils. To say it is all semantic misunderstandings implies that the councils erred and were not led by the Holy Spirit.
Glory to Jesus Christ!
We Eastern Orthodox must look east to our Coptic, Ethiopian, and other so called Oriental Orthodox brothers.
We are one in Christ, we need to ask all Orthodox Saints to pray for us, especially those of us in USA.
Christ is in our midst.
I have been struggling for weeks with my feelings on this!!!! I have felt that the ICONS were too European! Especially know that the ICONS in Russia show the sacred ICONS with Black skin.❤❤
Memory eternal, Fr Moses! 🙏🏻❤️☦️
Well said father! I think this is what turns some people away when they see “Greek” or “Russian” etc on churches and we need to emphasize that you don’t need ti be this to be with us in communion with Jesus.
God bless you father.
Thank you Father❤🙏
Wise and insightful words Fr. Moses Berry. Thank you!
A living American Saint!
An American Church Father.
Fr Berry, please bless! Thank you for this wonderful message. I believe we are all victims of casting our eyes too low, instead of in Christ. As a result, regardless of our ethnicity, we tend to think about relatively stupid, earthly things, like race. This is clearly an example of the devil’s successful work in the US, where even many Orthodox are overly concerned about race and have gotten dragged into today’s politics and stupidity regarding race and identity. This is not a black thing but a people thing, and it is ridiculous.
With that said, many Orthodox do not realize that a large number of the early Church Fathers were of African and Arab descent, to the extent you even have ignorant people who believe St Spyridon was European. In fact, whenever we call a Saint “of Egypt” (St Mary, St Anthony, St Sisoes, St Poeman, St Makarios, etc) we mean they are of African descent. And when we say “of Alexandria” we mean of Greek descent. Though the ethnicity does not matter to God or to the Saints, it’s clear God ordained that we should remember where in this world He enlightened His people-and many, if not most, of those were far outside Western Europe.
Amen.
RIP 😞😞😞😞😞😞😞😞
Father, bless! IC XC NIKA ☦❤
❤☦️🙏
Father Berry are you really live?!
This is just a genuine question; why is Moses the most common bible-based African name? Perhaps it's simply a coincidence in my life. Please comment if this coincidence has been noticed by anyone else or if it's just me.
It's not just you. It's an interesting question.
Black America will begin to improve with repentance. That's what's so devastating about the social problems mindset that is programmed into Black American consciousness, the idea that the system is set up against you... paralyzes their ability to humbly own their wickedness and repent. And honestly the hatred for white folks is out of control, that has become so casual and unchecked. I'm younger than 30, for younger generations we grew up with a culture that coddles Black people and shames being white. Black folks will have an extremely limited access to the truth if they aren't able to see through the strong illusions their family, their history teachers, and their society taught them. Lord, Jesus Christ, have mercy on us Americans.
6:36 "It's all the devil's work that make us look at an icon and say, "it's too European for me".
1 Maccabees 3:48 says that the Greeks "laid open the book of the law, wherein the heathen had sought to paint the likeness of their images." So it might actually be a legitimate grievance. The Bible, for example, says that Moses was Egyptian and Sephora was Ethiopian, for example. The Queen of Sheba is also called "black and beautiful" in Song of Solomon 1:5. Ezekiel also say that our Lord has "the appearance of brass". So, it's not that the images are European per se. It's that the images are biblically and historically inaccurate.
In reference to Ezekiel, do you mean Revelation 1:15?
@@fireandworms "And he brought me thither, and, behold, there was a man, whose appearance was like the appearance of brass" - Ezekiel 40:3
@MiguelDLewis Yes I'm aware of that passage, what makes you think it's Jesus? It's a vision, and in Biblical visions the "man" is usually an angel unless indicated otherwise. Daniel 9:21 being an example. Angel literally meaning "messenger."
@@fireandworms Ezekeial 43 suggests it's Jesus but Ezekiel 40:3 coincides with Revelation 1:15 as you mentioned before. So either way, we know that Jesus, and the nation of Israel as a whole, descended from Egyptians, Ethiopians, and Chaldeans, not Europeans.
@MiguelDLewis I would agree Jesus descended from Middle Eastern folks and not Europeans, but I'm not sure why you think "brass" supports a dark-skinned African descent. The writers of the Bible had eyes, they knew what color brass was and is. It doesn't look like an African or an European skin tone. Brass is similar in color to gold, but less yellow and more red.
Many Middle Eastern folks, especially those with a slightly yellower than average complexion, could certainly be described as having "brass" colored skin. And that would fit the color of Jesus's skin in Orthodox depictions of Him such as the Christ Pantocrator in the Church of St. Alexander Nevsky in Belgrade.