An e-book by Fr Michael Butler

It has always been my pleasure to show our parish church to visitors when they come, and to explain its structure and some of its furnishings, and tell why they are there. People have unanimously found this kind of explanation helpful in understanding the Church and her worship. During several of these presentations to visitors, members of the parish have asked to be in attendance, and they likewise found the explanation of the temple to be interesting and helpful.

Recently, someone asked me if I would put down on paper, in booklet form, what it is that I usually say, and I thought it was a good idea. One of our parishioners, who has begun to publish e-books of her own, has inspired me to put the material on our parish website for the benefit of anyone who cares to have it. That is how the present work came to be.

What follows is a general description of a standard Orthodox church building, the furnishings which typically fill it, the arrangement of the Icons, etc., along with particular notes about the arrangement of things at St Innocent’s.

I expect the list of topics to grow as I write, because, well, because in my hands, that’s how things typically work out. So, what was supposed to be a booklet, will no doubt metastasize into something huge. But that is okay, because I expect to enjoy writing it, and I think somebody, somewhere, might find it interesting, at least, and inspiring, at best.

A note about the approach I will be taking. What I hope to be describing is a fully appointed and decorated traditional Orthodox temple. In all its particulars, it might not exist in any one place. Aspects of it are certainly missing at St Innocent’s. For example, there is no proper dome on our church, neither do we have an Icon of Christ Pantocrator in the ceiling looking down at us. Be at peace about that. We, like all churches, do the best that we can with what we have.

Another note on my approach is that I will be bringing to the descriptions the fruits of my own studies in Church history, Patristics, archetypal psychology and comparative religion. I think you will find these fields of study will enrich our understanding of things that are traditionally Orthodox and that they will confirm our faithfulness to Christ and to His Church.

I suppose the best place to begin is outside the temple at St Innocent’s, in what we call the vestibule, or the entrance way. Why start here? Well, because this is where we begin our encounter of the sacred space that is both St Innocent’s and, really, any Orthodox temple. And there is something I need to draw your attention to, after you greet your friends, and hang up your coat, and pick up your bulletin. I need to draw your attention to the two little icons of the angels that flank the doors into the narthex of the church.

(By the way, clicking on the images will make them bigger, and easier to see the details.)

They have curved tops because they were originally a diptych (a pair of icons with a hinge between them so that they can be folded up like a book). When I first saw them, I knew exactly what they were actually for and where they needed to go, so I bought them, took off the hinges, and had them put up in the vestibule. Why?

Well, let’s look at them more closely and you will see. On the left side is Archangel Michael, and on the right, Archangel Gabriel. Michael has a scroll in his hand, while Gabriel is writing on one. The scroll that Archangel Michael is holding says, "I am the general of God ... those who enter with an impure heart I shall strike down with my sword." Yikes! That isn’t very friendly. Well, he is a general in the heavenly army, and we know how those military types can be.

Maybe Archangel Gabriel has a less threatening message on his scroll. After all, he was the angel of the Annunciation, delivering a nice message about the selection of Mary to be the Mother of God, and he is sometimes depicted carrying a stem of Easter lilies (much less threatening than Michael’s sword). Gabriel’s scroll says, "I shall write down the state of those entering." Yikes, again!

Why do they have such stern messages?

Well, in the first place, these two archangels are guardians. Remember that God placed the cherubim with a flaming sword to guard the gate of Eden and the way to the Tree of Life, after Adam and Eve ha been driven out (Gen 3.24). So guarding important doorways and important things is within their line of work.

(We find guardian spirits at the entrance of temples in other religions, too, especially in the Far East. A few samples are below.)

The archangels in our vestibule are stern because they are guarding someplace that’s important. It’s so important that it matters who goes in and how they go. It’s because they’re guarding a holy place, a sacred place, and you don’t just shilly-shally into holy places mindlessly, ignorant of the fact that you’re entering someplace special.

Be grateful that they're on duty; they're on our side, after all.

So give some thought to it, next time you enter into the church. In the e-book, Orthodox Christian Observance, there will be a description of how properly to enter an Orthodox church.

But there is something further. Consider, too, that the Holy Fathers have much to say about the subject of guarding ... our hearts. For example, St Symeon the New Theologian says, "Our holy fathers ... abandoned all other forms of spiritual labor and concentrated wholly on this one task of guarding the heart, convinced that through this practice they would also possess every other virtue, whereas without it no virtue could be firmly established. Some of the fathers have called this practice stillness of the heart, others attentiveness, others the guarding of the heart, others watchfulness or rebuttal, and others again the investigation of thoughts and the guarding of the intellect. But all of them alike worked the earth of their own heart... And our holy fathers have also spoken in their writings about guarding the heart, as those who wish can see for themselves by reading what St Mark the Ascetic, St John Klimakos, St Heyschios the Priest, St Philotheos of Sinai, St Isaiah the Solitary and Varsanuphios, and the entire book known as The Paradise of the Fathers, have to say about the subject" (Philokalia 4, pp. 71-72).

Maybe there is some kind of correspondence between an Orthodox temple and a human heart?

We’ll look at that later.