The Universal Call to Holiness is dumb (but necessary(?))

notes on sin, sanctity, & religiosity in the mothaland(s)

So my recent trip to the motherland(s) made me think back to some of the points I made in previous articles about Bad Catholics, Orhthobros, and the virtues (and vices) of cultural religiosity.

Also, in our Interintellect salon on religion in a globalized world (recording is now online),

Shadi Hamid

brought up his recent article in Foreign Affairs which made me further question the value of the universal call to holiness. (Shadi, Bill Cavanaugh, and Milbank were awesome…you should really watch it).

I thought I’d revisit some of these ideas in a new post.

cracksinpomo

A post shared by @cracksinpomo

I went to the (Orthodox) liturgies for the vigil and the feast of the Dormition (aka Assumption) on a small island in the Aegean. And I was struck by (1) how irreverent, bourgeois, and secular Greeks have become and (2) how much Christianity remains embedded in the culture.