Orthodoxy is Catholic and Apostolic when it sings its wisdom songs to transmit its mysteries to the hearts of mankind as a whole, free of all tribal narrowness and self-interested shallowness. It does not exist to tell the ethnic Orthodox they are right to belong to their tribe of ethnic Orthodoxy or to confirm the ethnic Orthodox in their self- interested exclusions. It arises in the light of the glory of resurrection as it turns us back into Christ at centre in the midst. It communicates wisdom through prophecy and prayer, the uncreated Word that dissolves our logismoi into God’s uncreated creative logoi. It extracts the healing medicine of the Spirit of Truth from the poisons of delusion in order to cure Orthodoxy of its prevailing pathologies.
Apostolic Orthodoxy looks strange and unfamiliar to many ethnic orthodox, and is sometimes mistaken for heresy when its catholicity is confused with shallow relativism. Wisdom is often confused with Gnosticism by those who are unfamiliar with Patristic Tradition. Prophecy is confused with Montanism and prayer with Messalianism by those who are ignorant of Patristic wisdom and resist the opening of the eye of the heart. Jurisdictional orthodoxy in the diaspora insists that to be Orthodox we must be canonical, fully aware that the canons declare the Church is one and that its division in the diaspora into many competing jurisdictions violates the canons. Such contradictions sometimes go unnoticed when Apostolic Orthodoxy is unknown or mistaken for its parodies.
Integral Orthodox wisdom is Catholic and Apostolic in ways that are not always transparent to the jurisdictional Orthodox, because the awakened heart is rare among them and its prophecy and prayer unknown. When persecution of the heart arises, it spreads like a virus until it has infected communion with confusion and destroyed union with division. The pages of the Synaxarion are littered with persecutions of Orthodox Hesychasts by the canonical orthodox, but this is often taken for granted and so its wounds are left unhealed. Apostolic Orthodoxy is Catholic because it lives from the wholeness of Christ crucified, and its mission is Apostolic because it partakes of the glory of his resurrection. But it is crucified over and over again, bearing a martyr’s witness to the glory of the Cross of unselfish love. Its wisdom is integral because it lives from love of enemies and prays for all who persecute the glory of Christ’s healing love, not knowing what they do.