Each year I find myself reminding people, and quite frankly
becoming exasperated, about the truth of Joseph and Mary. As Orthodox
Christians we teach that Joseph was a righteous old man in his seventies when
he, by lot, was blessed to be the caretaker for the Panagia, the Theookos and
Ever-Virgin Mary. Furthermore the Church AFFIRMS that since she was a virgin
before conceiving Christ, while she was pregnant with Christ, and after Christ
was born – why we call her Ever-Virgin – Joseph and Mary NEVER HAD SEXUAL
RELATIONS.
This idea of ever-virginity is difficult for most western
Christians to accept since, for at least 200 years, the west has considered
Joseph as a young man engaged to Mary “just staring out their life” when he
discovered she was pregnant. The west uses as their defense for their position
that so-called brothers of the Lord mentioned in Matthew 12.47 as evidence that
Mary “must have had” sexual relations with Joseph. How else could He have had
brothers? The west ignores Christ’s reply whey He says, “For whoever does the
will of My Father in heaven is My brother and sister and mother.” (Matthew
12.50)
Without this verse, there is no scriptural evidence that the
Panagia, the Ever-Virgin Mary, and Joseph had sexual relations; the west is
left only with the emotions of a young man starting out his life alongside his
young wife. Who could possibly doubt they were sexually active? What young
seventeen year old boy and thirteen year old girl, a “newlywed” couple, would
remain virgins? By today’s sexual standards, this would be unheard of,
especially in the context of such a high teenage sexually active society as we
have today.
I then return to the ANCIENT teaching that Joseph was an elderly
widower with children who had been chosen by lot from among the righteous men
to be betrothed to the Panagia. In recent years even Orthodox Christians with
whom I have spoken struggle with this notion of an elderly Joseph, but not from
any sense of spiritual piety or historical evidence. Many today simple cannot
stand to see an old man being betrothed to a young girl despite the ancient
writings of the Church.
Our society has become so hyper-sexualized that many, by
their own admission to me, are grossed out by seeing and elderly Joseph appear
in Christmas plays. Refusing to break from the contemporary hper-sexualized
society we live in today, and consider that Joseph was righteous and holy, many
today prefer to visualize Joseph as a young man. Many are more comfortable “expecting
sexual relations” between a young Joseph and “Virgin” Mary than a celibate
elderly Joseph caring for an EVER-Virgin Mary.
Ah, the ever present “Christmas Pageant” produced by Sunday
Schools around the country. Orthodox Christians have felt the need to “fit in”
so terribly with our American culture, we insist on annual Christmas pageants,
forgetting that the Protestant West “needs” them since they have no liturgical
or iconographic life in their Church. Without the annual Christmas Pageant, most
Protestant Churches look and sound “no different” during Christmas than any
other day of the year. Without the richness of Orthodox hymnography and
iconography, Protestants are left with “the stage” to experience Christ.
The theological fall-out of Christmas Pageants is that most
are written by and for Protestants, perpetuating Protestant theology and
tradition. And what is left, are Orthodox Christians holding on to traditions
that teach our youth incorrect history and theology, when all we needed to
teach was Orthodox Tradition in the first place. And if seeing an elderly
Joseph walking up the Church aisle during the Christmas Pageant is uncomfortable,
a better option would be to acknowledge just how far away from God our
contemporary idea of sexuality has come, but at least our youth would know the
truth about Joseph and the EVER-Virgin Mary.
No comments:
Post a Comment