Whether or not Christianity is inherently leftist has been a popular question recently. First, a new wave of articles on Vitalism (my critique thereof can be found here) appeared on Substack, then, after it subsided, the “He Gets Me” Super Bowl ads brought the question back. From what I have gathered, the two main positions being represented in regard to Christianity’s political leanings are, a) Christianity is inherently leftist, and liberalism is, more or less, a secularized Christianity, and b) Christianity’s true essence is to be found in the Crusaders.
Against both of these options, I would like to present third position. Christianity has nothing to do with politics, and if it does, it is only a minor implication of the Faith’s essence. Acknowledging that background effects views, and that the signifier “Christianity” has been used to signify “Roman Catholicism”, mostly, and then “Protestantism”, secondarily, in this debate, up front it should be said that I am writing from an Orthodox background, and since, for the Orthodox, monasticism is at the core of our spirituality, this will effect my views. Two of the three authors I will be quoting were themselves monastics, after all, and while this does not mean that Orthodoxy is a faith only for monks and nuns, it means that all are called to an ascetic struggle (you can see why someone like me who believes in the denial of the will would be opposed to something like Vitalism).
Beginning with Elder Mitilinaios, who has the abbot of the monastery of Komnineiou and Saint John the Theologian in Stomion, Larisa, Greece, and who was one of the most popular Greek Orthodox preaches of the 20th century, says the following,
“If one were to ask, 'What is Christianity?' we could say: the restoration and re-creation of all [creation], and its participation in the life of the eternal God. If we truly come to acknowledge this, then we will begin to love God with all the power of our soul. The sad thing is that we do not have a clear understanding of the essence of Christianity. We mostly see with a narrow-minded scope, and more often than not we see it as a cultural—social—moral system. How many times have I told you these things? Not so, beloved. Christianity aims to restore and re-create what has fallen, to de-corrupt the corrupt, and to immortalize that which entered the space of death. It aims to make everything new, and to find its way back to God, including man and the entire universe. This is the essence of Christianity..."1
Things are descended in terms of their essence, and accidents. A thing’s essence is what is really is, and what it must be. Human nature is the essence of being human, for example. A thing’s accident is what could, or could not be, present in a thing without the identity of that thing changing. Humans can have red, or blonde hair, black or brown hair, and still remain a human. A hammer, in its essence, hammers, it is capable of hitting a nail in a precise, purposeful, way. Hammers are accidentally wooden, or metal, because neither material is necessary for a hammer to be a hammer. The essence of Christianity, says the modern day church father, is the restoration of creation, and its participation in God. Christ became incarnate so that Man’s nature would be restored to its former glory, and that man might be through grace what God is by nature. Let us turn to Saint Athanasius who, in On the Incarnation, describes the necessity of the Incarnation in a way hitherto unmatched. While lengthy, this passage is necessary to understand the context of the fathers we will be quoting.
“The making of the world and the creation of all things have been taken differently by many, and each has propounded as each has wished. Some say that all things have come into being spontaneously and as by chance, such as the Epicureans who, according to themselves, fantasize that there is no providence over the universe, speaking in the face of the clear and apparent facts. For if all things came into being spontaneously without providence, as they claim, all things would necessarily have simply come into being and be identical and without difference. Everything would have been as a single body, sun or moon, and regarding human beings, the whole would have been a hand or eye or foot. But, now, this is not the case: we see, here, the sun, there the moon, there the earth; and again regarding human bodies, here a foot, there a hand, and there a head. Such order indicates that they did not come into being spontaneously, but shows that a cause preceded them, from which one can apprehend the God who ordered and created all things.
Others, amongst whom is Plato, that giant among the Greeks, declare that God made the universe from preexistent and uncreated matter, as God is not able to make anything unless matter preexisted, just as a carpenter must already have wood so that it may be used. They do not realize that saying such things is to impute weakness to God: for if he is not himself the cause of matter, but simply makes things from pre-existent matter, then he is weak, not being able without matter to fashion any of the things that exist, just as the weakness of the carpenter is certainly his inability to make any required thing without wood. According to the argument, unless there were matter, God would not have made anything. How would he then still be called "Maker" and "Creator, if he had his ability to make from something else, I mean from the matter? And if this is so, as they thus have it, according to them God is only a craftsman and not the Creator of being, if he fashions underlying matter but is not himself the cause of matter. He could in no way be called "Creator, if he does not create matter, from which created things come into being.
Others, again, from the heretics fabricate for themselves another creator of all things besides the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, being greatly blinded even in what they say. For the Lord said to the Jews, "Have you not read that he who made them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, 'For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and will cleave to his wife, and the two will be one flesh." Then, referring to the Creator, he says, "What God has put together, let not man put asunder" (Matt 19.4-6). How then do they introduce a creation alien to the Father? For if, according to John, encompassing all things in saying, "all things were made by him and without him was nothing made" (Jn 1.3), how could there be another creator besides the Father of Christ?
These things, then, they fantasize. But the inspired teaching and faith according to Christ casts out their vain talk as godlessness. For it knows that neither spontaneously, as it is not without providence, nor from pre-existent matter, as God is not weak, but from nothing and having absolutely no existence God brought the universe into being through the Word, which it says through Moses,
"In the beginning God made heaven and earth" (Gen 1), and through that most useful book of the Shepherd, "First of all believe that God is one, who created and framed all things, and made them from non-existence into being, as also Paul indicates when he says, "By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which appear" (Heb 11.3). For God is good, or rather the source of all goodness, and one who is good grudges nothing, so that grudging nothing its existence, he made all things through his own Word, our Lord Jesus Christ. Among these things, of all things upon earth he had mercy upon the human race, and seeing that by the principle of its own coming into being it would not be able to endure eternally, he granted them a further gift, creating human beings not simply like all the irrational animals upon the earth but making them according to his own image (cf. Gen 1.27), giving them a share of the power of his own Word, so that having as it were shadows of the Word and being made rational, they might be able to abide in blessedness, living the true life which is really that of the holy ones in paradise. And knowing again that free choice of human beings could turn either way, he secured beforehand, by a law and a set place, the grace given. For bringing them into his own paradise, he gave them a law, so that if they guarded the grace and remained good, they might have the life of paradise--without sorrow, pain, or care- besides having the promise of their incorruptibility in heaven; but if they were to transgress and turning away become wicked, they would know themselves enduring the corruption of death according to nature, and no longer live in para-dise, but thereafter dying outside of it, would remain in death and in corruption. This also the Divine Scripture foretells, speaking in the person of God, "You may eat from all the trees in paradise; from the tree of knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat. On the day you eat of it, you shall die by death" (Gen 2.16-18). This "you shall die by death," what else might it be except not merely to die, but to remain in the corruption of death?
Perhaps you are wondering for what reason, having proposed to talk about the Incarnation of the Word, we are now expounding the origin of human beings. Yet this too is not distinct from the aim of our exposition. For speaking of the manifestation of the Savior to us, His necessary also to speak of the origin of human beings, in order that you might know that our own cause was the occasion of his descent and that our own transgression evoked the Word's love for human beings, so that the Lord both came to us and appeared among human beings. For we were the purpose of his embodiment, and for our salvation he so loved human beings as to come to be and appear in a human body. Thus, then, God created the human being and willed that he should abide in incorruptibility; but when humans despised and overturned the comprehension of God, devising and contriving evil for themselves, as was said in the first work, then they received the previously threatened condemnation of death, and thereafter no longer remained as they had been created, but were corrupted as they had contrived; and, seizing them, death reigned.
For the transgression of the commandment returned them to the natural state, so that, just as they, not being, came to be, so also they might rightly endure in time the corruption unto non-being. For if, having a nature that did not once exist, they were called into existence by the Word's advent [parousia] and love for human beings, it followed that when human beings were bereft of the knowledge of God and had turned to things which exist not -evil is non-being, the good is being, since it has come into being from the existing God--then they were bereft also of eternal being. But this, being decomposed, is to remain in death and corruption. For the human being is by nature mortal, having come into being from nothing. But because of his likeness to the One who Is, which, if he had guarded through his comprehension of him, would have blunted his natural corruption, he would have remained incorruptible, just as Wisdom says, "Attention to the laws is the confirmation of incorruptibility" (Wis 6.18). And being incorruptible, he would have lived thereafter like God, as somewhere the Divine Scripture also signals, saying
"I said you are gods, and all sons of the Most High; but you die like human beings and fall like any prince" (Ps 81.6-7).
For God has not only created us from nothing, but also granted us by the grace of the Word to live a life according to God. But human beings, turning away from things eternal and by the counsel of the devil turning us towards things of corruption, were themselves the cause of corruption in death, being, as we already said, corruptible by nature but escaping their natural state by the grace of participation in the Word, had they remained good. Because of the Word present in them, even natural corruption did not come near them, just as Wisdom says, "God created the human being for incorruptibil ity and an image of his own eternity; but by the envy of the devil, death entered into the world' (Wis 2.23-4). When this happened, human beings died and corruption thenceforth prevailed against them, becoming even stronger than its natural power over the whole race, the more so as it had assumed the threat of the Deity against them through the transgression of the commandment. For even in their transgressions human beings had not stopped short of any defined limits, but gradually pressing forward they had passed beyond all measure: from the beginning they were inventors of evil and called death and corruption down upon themselves; while later, turning to vice and exceeding all lawlessness, not stopping at one evil but contriving in time every new evil, they became insatiable in sinning. For there were adulteries and thefts everywhere, the whole earth was full of murders and plundering. There was no concern for law regarding corruption and vice; every wickedness, individually and jointly, was being carried out by all. Cities warred against cities, and nations rose up against nations; the whole world was torn apart by factions and battles, everyone competing in lawlessness. Even acts against nature were not far from them, but as the witness of Christ, the Apostle, said, "Their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural; and in the same way also the men, leaving aside natural relations with women, were consumed with their desire for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due reward for their error" (Rom 1.26-7).
For these reasons, then, with death holding greater sway and corruption remaining fast against human beings, the race of humans was perishing, and the human being, made rational and in the image, was disappearing, and the work made by God was being obliterated. For as I said earlier, by the law death thereafter prevailed against us, and it was impossible to escape the law, since this had been established by God on account of the transgression. And what happened was truly both absurd and improper. It was absurd, on the one hand, that, having spoken, God should prove to be lying: that is, having legislated that the human being would die by death if he were to transgress the commandment, yet after the transgression he were not to die but rather this sentence dissolved. For God would not be true if, after saying that we would die, the human being did not die. On the other hand, it was improper that what had once been made rational and partakers of his Word should perish, and once again return to non-being through corruption. It was not worthy of the goodness of God that those created by him should be corrupted through the deceit wrought by the devil upon human beings. And it was supremely improper that the workmanship of God in human beings should disappear either through their own negligence or through the deceit of the demons.
Therefore, since the rational creatures were being corrupted and such works were perishing, what should God, being good, do? Permit the corruption prevailing against them and death to seize them?
What need was there for their coming into being at the beginning?
It was proper not to have come into being rather than to have come into being to be neglected and destroyed. The weakness, rather than the goodness, of God is made known by neglect, if, after creating, he abandoned his own work to be corrupted, rather than if he had not created the human being in the beginning. For not making him, there would have been no one considering the weakness, but once he made him and created him out of nothing, it was most absurd that his works should be destroyed, and especially before the sight of the maker. It was therefore right not to permit human beings to be carried away by corruption, because this would be improper to and unworthy of the goodness of God.
But just as this had to be, so also on the other hand the consistency of God lies against it, so that God should appear true in his legislation concerning death. For it was absurd that God, the Father of truth, should appear a liar for our profit and preservation. What then had to happen in this case or what should God do? Demand repentance from human beings for their transgression? One might say that this is worthy of God, claiming that just as they were set towards corruption by the transgression, so by repentance they might again be set towards incorruptibility. But repentance would neither have preserved the consistency of God, for he again would not have remained true if human beings were not held fast by death, nor does repentance recall human beings from what is natural, but merely halts sins. If then there were only offence and not the consequence of corruption, repentance would have been fine. But if, once the transgression had taken off, human beings were now held fast in natural corruption and were deprived of the grace of being in the image, what else needed to happen? Or who was needed for such grace and recalling except the God Word who in the beginning made the universe from non-being? For his it was once more both to bring the corruptible to incorruptibility and to save the superlative consistency of the Father. Being the Word of the Father and above all, he alone consequently was both able to recreate the universe and was worthy to suffer on behalf of all and to intercede for all before the Father.
For this purpose, then, the incorporeal and incorruptible and immaterial Word of God comes into our realm, although he was not formerly distant. For no part of creation is left void of him; while abiding with his own Father, he has filled all things in every place. But now he comes, condescending towards us in his love for human beings and his manifestation. For seeing the rational race perishing, and death reigning over them through corruption, and seeing also the threat of the transgression giving firm hold to the corruption which was upon us, and that it was absurd for the law to be dissolved before being fulfilled, and seeing the impropriety in what had happened, that the very things of which he himself was the Creator were disappearing, and seeing the excessive wickedness of human beings, that they gradually increased it to an intolerable pitch against themselves, and seeing the liability of all human beings to death-having mercy upon our race, and having pity upon our weakness, and condescending to our corruption, and not enduring the dominion of death, lest what had been created should perish and the work of the Father himself for human beings should be in vain, he takes for himself a body and that not foreign to our own. For he did not wish simply to be in a body, nor did he wish merely to appear, for if he had wished only to appear he could have made his divine manifestation through some other better means. But he takes that which is ours, and that not simply, but from a spotless and stainless virgin, ignorant of man, pure and unmixed from intercourse with men. Although being himself powerful and the creator of the universe, he prepared for himself in the Virgin the body as a temple, and made it his own, as an instrument, making himself known and dwelling in it. And thus, taking from ours that which is like, since all were liable to the corruption of death, delivering it over to death on behalf of all, he offered it to the Father, doing this in his love for human beings, so that, on the one hand, with all dying in him the law concerning corruption in human beings might be undone (its power being fully expended in the lordly body and no longer having any ground against similar human beings), and, on the other hand, that as human beings had turned towards corruption he might turn them again to incorruptibility and give them life from death, by making the body his own and by the grace of the resurrection banishing death from them as straw from the fire.
For the Word, realizing that in no other way would the corruption of human beings be undone except, simply, by dying. yet being immortal and the Son of the Father the Word was not able to die for this reason he takes to himself a body capable of death, in order that it, participating in the Word who is above all, might be sufficient for death on behalf of all, and through the indwelling Word would remain incorruptible, and so corruption might henceforth cease from all by the grace of the resurrection. Whence, by offering to death the body he had taken to himself, as an offering holy and free of all spot, he immediately abolished death from all like him, by the offering of a like. For being above all, the Word of God consequently, by offering his own temple and his bodily instrument as a substitute for all, fulfilled in death that which was required; and, being with all through the like [body], the incorruptible Son of God consequently clothed all with incorruptibility in the promise concerning the resurrection. And now the very corruption of death no longer holds ground against human beings because of the indwelling Word, in them through the one body. As when a great king has entered some large city and made his dwelling in one of the houses in it, such a city is certainly made worthy of high honor, and no longer does any enemy or bandit descend upon it, but it is rather reckoned worthy of all care because of the king's having taken residence in one of its houses; so also does it happen with the King of all. Coming himself into our realm, and dwelling in a body like the others, every design of the enemy against human beings has henceforth ceased, and the corruption of death, which had prevailed formerly against them, perished. For the race of human beings would have been utterly dissolved had not the Master and Savior of all, the Son of God, come for the completion of death.
Truly this great work supremely befitted the goodness of God. For if a king constructed a house or a city, and it is attacked by bandits because of the carelessness of its inhabitants, he in no way abandons it, but avenges and saves it as his own work, having regard not for the carelessness of the inhabitants but for his own honor. All he more so, the God Word of the all -good Father did not neglect the race of human beings, created by himself, which was going to corruption, but he blotted out the death which had occurred through the offering of his own body, and correcting their carelessness by his own teaching, restoring every aspect of human beings by his own power. One may be convinced of these things by the theologians of the Savior himself, taking their writings, which say, "For the love of Christ constrains us, as we judge this, that if one died for all, then all died; and he died for all that that we should no longer live for ourselves but for him who died and rose" from the dead, our Lord Jesus Christ
(2 Cor 5.14-15). And again, "We see Jesus who, for a little while, was made lower than the angels, crowned with glory and honor because of the passion of death, that by the grace of God he might taste death on behalf of all' (Heb 2.9). Then, he also points out the reason why it was necessary for none other than the God Word to be incarnate, saying,
"For it was fitting that he, for whom are all things and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through sufferings" (Heb 2.10). Saying this, he means that it was for none other to bring human beings out from the corruption that had occurred except the God Word who had also created them in the beginning. And that the Word himself also took to himself a body as a sacrifice for similar bodies, this they indicated, saying, "Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of them, that through death he might destroy him who has the power of death, that is the devil, and might deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong bondage" (Heb 2.14-15). For by the sacrifice of his own body, he both put an end to the law lying against us and renewed for us the source of life, giving hope of the resurrection. For since through human beings death had seized human beings, for this reason, again, through the incarnation of the God Word there occurred the dissolution of death and the resurrection of life, as the Christ-bearing man says, "For as by a human being came death, by a human being has come also the resurrection of the dead; for as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive" and that which follows (1 Cor 15.21-22). For now we no longer die as those condemned, but as those who will arise do we await the common resurrection of all, which God, who wrought and granted this, "in his own time will reveal" (1 Tim 6.15; Titus 1.3).
This, therefore, is the first cause of the incarnation of the Savior.”2
For the Christian, what matters in life is not to be good per se, but to draw ever closer to God, and in so doing, gradually become transfigured, even as Christ Himself was transfigured. Drawing close to the Creator of all, who willingly suffered death for His creation will have the consequence of growing in love, humility, patience, temperance, and the rest of the virtues, but these virtues are not the ends of the Chrisitan life; they are fruits from a good tree, but are not the good tree itself. Against those who try and make Christianity about good morals, rather than the redemption of human nature from corruption, Elder Mitilinaios quotes a recent saint,
“Father [Saint] Justin Popovich, who suffered greatly for the Faith, writes in his book: Man and God-Man, “Christianity can only be the salt of the earth with its God-human power, the salt which can preserve man from corruption and evil. A Christianity adulterated and mixed with various humanisms, becomes worthless salt, flavorless and bereft of its saltiness. Such salt, according to the inerrant words of the Savior, cannot be made useful again but will be thrown out and trampled underfoot as worthless. Every attempt and endeavor to equate Christianity with the spirit of this age, with the fleeting movements of some historical periods, with political parties and states, removes from Christianity its very special character which renders it that unique God-human religion of the world. It turns it into salt-less salt.”3
This is not to sideline, or discredit the good deeds done by Christians, or to cast doubt on the many political leaders who have been glorified the Church, like Saints Constantine, Justinian, Irene, Theodora, Vladimir, or Nicholas II, but to say that this is not the essence of Christianity. Father Seraphim Rose, writing to the Catholic monk Thomas Merton, says something applicable here,
“You speak of "Christian action," "the Christian who manifests the truth of the Gospel in social action," "not only in prayer and penance, but also in his political commitments and in all his social responsibilities." Well, I certainly will say nothing against that; if Christian truth does not shine through in all that one does, to that extent one is failing to be a Christian, and if one is called to a political vocation, one's action in that area too must be Christian. But, if I am not mistaken, your words imply something more than that; namely, that now more than ever before we need Christians working in the social and political sphere, to realize there the truth of the Gospel. But why, if Christ's Kingdom is not of this world? Is there really a Christian "social message," or is not that rather a result of the one Christian activity—working out one's salvation with diligence? I by no means advocate a practice of Christianity in isolation; all Christianity—even that of the hermit—is a "social Christianity," but that is only as context, not as end. The Church is in society because men are in society, but the end of the Church is the transformation of men, not society. It is a good thing if a society and government profess genuine Christianity, if its institutions are informed by Christianity, because an example is given thereby to the men who are a part of that society; but a Christian society is not an end in itself, but simply a result of the fact that Christian men live in society.
I do not, of course, deny that there is such a thing as a Christian "social action"; what I question is its nature. When I feed my hungry brother, this is a Christian act and a preaching of the Kingdom that needs no words; it is done for the personal reason that my brother—he who stands before me at this moment—is hungry, and it is a Christian act because my brother is, in some sense, Christ. But if I generalize from this case and embark on a political crusade to abolish the "evil of hunger," that is something entirely different; though individuals who participate in such a crusade may act in a perfectly Christian way, the whole project—and precisely because it is a "project," a thing of human planning—has become wrapped in a kind of cloak of "idealism."4
It is not bad to strive to live a moral life, or to desire the betterment of your community, but for the Christian, this is done for the benefit of men, not society as such. As Christians we know that this world will pass away. This is not to give into callous disregard, which would be acting contrary to Christ, who suffered for the world, to but to turn our attention away from the transitory, and to the eternal. Civilizations come and go, but the souls who live in these civilizations will last forever. Once a struggle turns from helping people, or our people, in the case of a national struggle, to helping society as such, civilization as such, or the nation as such, and the human face becomes hidden behind signifiers, and abstract ideals, then the Christian way has given to humanistic idealism.
Soren Kierkegaard, the great protestant philosopher, puts it well,
“Shall I seek to secure a position that corresponds to my abilities and strengths, so that I can be effective in it? No, you shall first seek God’s Kingdom. Shall I give all my fortune to the poor, then? No, first you shall seek God’s Kingdom. Shall I go out and proclaim this teaching to the world, then? No, you shall first seek God’s Kingdom.”5
Using one’s abilities, helping the poor, and preaching the Gospel are all certainly good things, but these are secondary to, or accidents of, Christianity.
Christianity is neither right-wing or left-wing, because the Faith is about the redemption of Man, and his union with Christ, not any political agenda. As much as the Christian faith has nothing to do with leftist Super Bowl commercials, it has just as little to do with the Crusaders. The confusion arises because Christianity’s critics on the right, be they vitalists or neo-pagans, have a worldly view of life. For neither group is there a complete restoration and deification of Man, and so this theandric union at the heart of Christianity is ignored, and only secondary matters are considered. For the Christian right, attempting to convert political allies, confusion is unintentionally brought in through the tactics of promoting Christianity as the vanguard of traditional morality, the only hope against Muslim immigration, and the great weapon against degeneracy. Both sides lower Christianity to its accidental properties. Going back to our example prior, the debate is not unlike trying to discover what it means to be human by debating hair color, and forgetting human nature entirely.
So, were the Superbowl Ads Christian? No, they were not because they tried to make something otherworldly into a political bludgeon, it tried to lasso the sun and bring it down to be used as a sofa. Let us turn from such silly considerations, and look at what Christianity is really about.
History, Catacomb. “Elder Athanasios Mitilinaios: On Christianity and ‘Social Justice.’” Elder Athanasios Mitilinaios: on Christianity and “social justice,” July 8, 2023. https://gregorydecapolite.blogspot.com/2023/07/elder-athanasios-mitilinaios-on.html.
Athanasius, Translated by John Bher. On the Incarnation. Saint Vladimir’s Seminary Press. Yonkers, New York. 2011. 50-60
History, Catacomb. “Elder Athanasios Mitilinaios: On Christianity and ‘Social Justice.’” Elder Athanasios Mitilinaios: on Christianity and “social justice,” July 8, 2023. https://gregorydecapolite.blogspot.com/2023/07/elder-athanasios-mitilinaios-on.html.
Rose, Seraphim. “A Letter to Thomas Merton, 1962.” Orthodox Christian Information Center. Accessed February 16, 2024. http://orthodoxinfo.com/ecumenism/merton.aspx.
Kierkegaard, Soren. Translated by Bruce h. Kirmmse. The Lily of the Field and the Bird of the Air: Three Godly Discourses. Princeton University Press. Princton, New Jersey. 2016. 17
Christos Yannaras’ Heidegger and the Areopagite might be helpful too. It’s shorter than the rest, and gets into the knowledge of God in light of Heidegger and Nietzsche
Since you are looking pretty deep, I would recommend these works (which can answer things more deeply than I can):
Saint Gregory Palamas’ In Defense of Those Who Devoutly Practice a Life of Stillness
(This is the classic work on hesychasm)
Father Nikolaos Loudovikos’ A Eucharistic Ontology
(This covers the dialogical relationship)
Father Alexander Schmemann’s For The Life of the World
(The main difference between sacraments and magic)