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Submitted
October 22, 2005
The
Lost Generation
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Written by the Very Rev. Vladimir Berzonsky
The phrase, "The Lost
Generation," has been used more than
several times to describe those out of touch with
their roots. Gertrude Stein branded the young
American expatriate writers in Paris like
Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald with that
definition. Later the label was applied in America
to the generation living between the world wars
that had lost touch with their heritage and
traditional values, drifting along while
projecting on society their rejection of standards
that give meaning to existence. Faith, family and
government all fall under the scrutiny of doubt
leading to rejection. It's the nourishment of our
fiction, television and motion pictures. Call it
clichΞ and you are attacked as hypocrite,
traditionalist or simply out of touch with
reality.
We have our own version of the type, and they are
all too prevalent among our spiritual families. I
know how St. Paul feels in the above verse from
Romans. So many of the generation of my parents,
children of immigrants, have fallen away from
Christ. Following the post-funeral meal, and as I
am about to leave, somebody will approach with a
comment such as: "You ought to have known
my mother. She was always praying. She never
missed church. And Pap? He was a founder of the
parish." "How interesting," I
say, but what about you, I think. Yet I
understand. The Church is for him something left
behind long ago, in his childhood. He may visit
the parents for the paschal foods, but not share
the lent that went before the feast. Blessings
have no meaning for one more acquainted with
curses. Like so many, he or she has become the
Orthodox Christian version of the lost generation.
Press them as to why they abandoned the Church of
their parents, and we know before they speak we
will hear the same response: "The services
were too long. I never understood a word in the
foreign language, and my parents were forcing me
to pray. I didn't see that it helped them or made
them better."
Truth is, they long ago chose to worship another
deity. Christ warned us not to try serving God and
mammon simultaneously - but that is an enormous
temptation in a capitalist society such as ours.
Mammon is a jealous, rapacious god. He is never
satisfied. He never leaves his followers alone. He
demands constant attention, and he never promises
anything other than instantaneous gratification.
And there is no hope for a life beyond the grave.
This is not hidden. All the above is spelled out
in TV commercials and bumper stickers: You only
go around once. It doesn't get any better than
this. He who dies with the most toys wins.
Mammon's devotees laugh, but with a macabre,
hollow tone.
Some try hanging onto the Church like a button on
its last thread. They may bring a basket of food
to be blessed for Pascha, but they don't really
believe in the power of blessings. They attend
baptisms and weddings, but always behind a
pectoral camera on view to show they're there for
a photo op, not to worship. They pay their
respects at funerals and wakes, but looking at
them while preaching one notices that their eyes
glaze over.
They are obsessed with acquiring money. They are
told that money doesn't buy happiness, yet they
don't believe it. They will not officially become
Church members, because they cannot afford to
belong. They will not sing in the choir or offer
to serve in some parish endeavor because - to use
the motto of the Mammonians, the defining phrase
that should be set up between the goalposts along
with John 3:16 - Time is Money, a
ridiculous phrase, but they actually believe it.
They feel that the Church will be there when they
need it, like the public library. The difference,
however, is that at least their taxes support the
library.
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