Why Are There Armenian Protestants?

[Azat]

WOW. Juggs, I have to say I am really amazed. I am not kidding. You will never hear anything like that here. I am not kidding.

[Accelerated]

I guess it all depends on the priest: but yeah, we got a lot of help. And we met this Russian family who migrated a few months earlier. Father was Russian, mother was 50/50 Russian/Armenian (though she didnt look anything Armenian), and they got the same deal from our church....

 

I also know a number of families who sent their kids to a private Armenian School, in Sydney. Couldnt afford the fees, so they didnt pay, or payed whatever they could afford. This is a normal school (not a sunday school), and being private did not recieve any financial assistance from the government (untill last few years - change in laws).

[DominO123]

Just in LA each year we hear about 1-2 people who donate over a million dollars to the church. I personally know of one individual very well who donated 100K twice in a year and just 2 months ago made a 500K donation.

Azat, can you do me a favour? Please tell that guy that there is a Domino that really need 100k.

[Azat]

I tell him that the Azat Foundation is always in need of money too. No help.

[Arad9]

Just because there is corruption in a church it doesn't mean there is no God. Whose fault is it that there is coruption? Do you want the priest to do all the work without you lifting a finger to help? If you think there are things wrong in the church, do somthing about it, don't just stand outside and throw rocks. If there is corruption let us be good examples and get involved to correct the situation, not just complain about things. As for me i love the Armenian church i will do what i can to help and try to be a good example

[Stormig]

Just because there is corruption in a church it doesn't mean there is no God.

 

I don't remember anyone having said that, unless you are making preamble to something else.

[Boghos]

The Armenian Church is too comfortable on its role as a "national" church. It enjoys a kind of natural monopoly that has the unusual characteristic of allowing its clients to opt out. That is why the Church is in decline, because it doesn´t fulfill the needs of the majority of its "natural" members, even if that is not such a complex proposition.

 

It is true that some people mistake faith in God for faith in Church, but that is usually out of convenience, ignorance or both.

 

The Armenian Church not unlike many other Armenian institutions has structural problems that are self evident. I will not bore you with detail but take for example education. One would expect Armenian priests to be highly trained and well versed in many subjects, after all resources exist for that, and such people are needed. Unfortunately that is not the case. If a church is to assume a true national character it has to be a step ahead and for that you need education and even before that a very specific selection process. Other peoples with "national" churches have always practiced that, it reinforces the pride of belonging...

 

I am not denying that there are good things in the Armenian Church but as an institution it is too weak to assume any important role. Certainly a much smaller institution than many like to believe. And probably much less important than most assume.

 

As a final note: it is my contention that many if not most Armenians are as paradoxically as it may sound, anti-clerical. But this is an altogether different story that I may come back to in the future.

Edited September 14, 2003 by Boghos

[America-Hye]

Are all these churches just mere BUREAUCRACIES?? There is little of Jesus remaining in any of them left. The prevailing discussions center on doctrinal and financial matters.

[axel]

When speaking of the Church, one should distinguish between the visible Church, the temporal institution, and the invisible one, the mystical entity which is the union of all the faithful in spiritual communion, through the ages.

 

As to the vociferous critics who attack the visible Church in order to discredit the invisible one: He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. (John 8:7)

[America-Hye]

Axel,

 

Who designated YOU as the Armenian Ayatollah? Who authorized you to pronounce Armenian "FATWAS?"

[axel]

??? I think you need some rest.

[America-Hye]

As long as there are people with your mentality, I will never rest.

[Arad9]

Some people like MJ make it seem that we should start another church because there are corruptions. One person (Azat) says church is all about money. at least go during the blessing of the grapes you get free grapes. I thing we have to pay for special events but i agree that it's overdone at some churches.

The Church is not just about interpreting the scripture, it’s about badarak and recieving Christ body and blood in communion.

[Azat]

Dear Arad, I do not go to church because I am a non believer not because I think the church charges too much money or anything like so. In my original post I was just trying to tell you the state of the 3-4 churches in Glendale, but I have been inside MANY others and I feel that they were much different, especially our ancient churches in Armenia. But then again i was there inside for the beauty and of the church and not for spiritual reasons.

[axel]

As long as there are people with your mentality, I will never rest

 

how can you be so intolerant and still pretend to promote tolerance?

[America-Hye]

I am not intolerant of a diversity of beliefs. What I have a problem with is religious institutions that impose their belief structure on society. When someone like Domino attacks the Church, he is not attacking the word of Jesus but a corrupt bureaucratic institution.

[axel]

And I still fail to see what justifies your calling me an armenian "ayatollah" issuing "fatwas". I was only defending the invisible Church. Is that position intolerant? Is it not to be tolerated?

 

This "hye" forum is rather strange. One cannot even defend the Armenian Church without being aggressed.

 

PS: You seem to be obsessed with ayatollahs these days. You first started calling Naïri a female ayatollah (this was hilarious, I mean really). Now it is me. Who's next? This is not very reassuring as to your present state of mind.

[axel]

What I have a problem with is religious institutions that impose their belief structure on society

 

No one forces you to enter the Armenian Church. You are free to be part of it or not.

 

BTW, by participating in a forum and developing your ideas, you are trying to rally people behind them. You're trying to impose your own "belief structure" on the HyeForum microsociety.

[America-Hye]

Axel,

 

I have never been a member of the Armenian Church. My parents were both raised as Armenian Catholics. I was raised by them as a Protestant, after problems I had with church personnel at a tender age. Only one of my grandmothers was raised in the Armenian Church and she left it when she married my grandfather, an Armenian Catholic. However, since about 95% of Armenians belong to the Armenian Church, almost every time I have to communicate with Armenians, I have to deal with the menatlity that has been instilled in them by the Armenian Church, a place where animal sacrifice is still conducted, a place where some of the views are very backward and dogmatic.

 

My belief structure is one that accepts and tolerates diversity. I am not trying to force anyone to leave the Armenian Church. It is just that the Church has drifted from the precepts upon which it was founded and has become a bureaucratic, dogmatic institution.

[axel]

My belief structure is one that accepts and tolerates diversity

 

That is not true. you do not accept ayatollahs

 

You basically accept people who share your belief structure. There is not much merit in such a position. Orthodox christians are usually more "tolerant" than you are. But "tolerance" is not a christian value in itself. Love is. One does not tolerate what one considers to be evil which is why tolerance cannot exist in the absolute. If it does, it amounts to criminal indifference. For that reason, no ethical belief structure can be based on the absolute of tolerance.

 

You seem to draw far-reaching conclusions from a personal experience. This is fundamentally wrong.

 

Your view of the Church as a mere institution is a secular one. This is where you are mistaken. Being physically part of the Church does not imply being spiritually part of it, that is, attending church offices or bearing a cross does not make one a true christian. I guess we agree on this point.

 

From the same article I already quoted in this thread:

 

The focus of Orthodox worship is not on the personality of the priest, nor is it focused on meeting the needs of individuals, or on contrived emotional experiences -- the focus is on God. Unlike Protestant churches, in which the church rises or falls on the personality of the minister -- one need not even like the priest personally, and he can still worship in that parish, because we are there to worship God, not to hear a good and stirring sermon. It certainly a nice touch to have a priest with a good personality and who can give a good sermon -- but that is icing on the cake, not the cake itself.

 

The Church is not the sum total of individuals who are Christians, it is a community. Christ came to build His Church, not to establish a school of thought, or to save individuals apart from a community.

[MJ]

Arad,

 

I am not advocating the starting of a new Church. Only Jesus Christ may start one (assuming that we are talking about a Christian Church.) It would be good enough, I think, if others, including the Armenian Church join the Church of Christ.

 

What I am trying to say is that Armenians are free people, or are at least supposed to be such. They may choose to be protestants, muslim, judaists, pagan, atheists, etc. They can date blacks or asians, can be homosexuals, can marry “others,” and so on.

 

I am also saying that Armenians have no obligation to the Armenian Church. To the contrary, the Armenian Church has obligation to Armenians and the humanity, and Jesus Christ above all.

 

I think that the above should bring to conclusion what I was trying to say.

 

As far as your question of my “definition” of Church is concerned, I get it from the New Testament, in particular Mathews and Acts (I think). In Mathews Christ says whenever two or three people get together in His, He is there. In Acts we learn that the Church is the body of Christ. There are also other similar instances which lead to similar deductive conclusions.

[Arad9]

America-hye. what's wrong with Animal sacrafice?

MJ are you talking about the cult Church of Christ? Is this the "church" where to be a christian HAVE TO BE Baptized by the church of Christ?

 

I'm not saying you are not free. Judas was free to betray Christ. Jesus didn't force him to keep on believing in Christ, nor did He force Judas to betray Christ.

Here is where MJ gets his defenition of a Church matthew 18:15"If your brother sins against you,[2] go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. 16But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that 'every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.'[3] 17If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector.

18"I tell you the truth, whatever you bind on earth will be[4] bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be[5] loosed in heaven.

19"Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. 20For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them."

 

Now let the people be the judge wether this verse is refering to a defenition of a Church

[America-Hye]

Next sunday WE will have a ritual sacrifice of Arad on the altar of our local Armenian Church. This lamb of God will be slaughtered so that the "Gods" will be pleased. Does this sound like Christian thinking to you??????????

[MJ]

Dear Arad,

 

I am surprised that you would question that in order to become Christian one has to be baptized in the Church of Christ. That is the only Church that Christ has established and He has explicitly said that it is His Church. That is [baptism] basically the definition of being a Christian.

 

As to the definition of the Church, again, I think the Mathews 18:20 along with passages similar to the Church being the body of Christ do shed proper light on what Church means.

 

I suspect that by saying Church you mean a building with a cross on the top and people in black outfit performing baptism, wedding and burial ceremonies.

 

To finalize, Church means body of Christ where two or three or more people get together in His name. What’s your problem with it?

Edited September 15, 2003 by MJ

[MJ]

Arad,

 

I also wanted to add the following:

 

Juda has not betrayed Christ. Quit the contrary, being one of the most devoted disciples of Christ (along with Peter) he has done what the Lord had commanded to him. If one could trace betrayal in Juda's actions that would be only the fact of his hanging of himself. But when he pointed Jesus to the Roman solders, he did what Christ had earlier commanded him to do.

 

And if we have to talk about the betrayals, it is the Armenian Church which has betrayed Christ by not obeying one of the Lord's most fundamental commandments to go and make disciples of all nations... How do you do that if you establish "Armenian" Church?

 

It is interesting that many years ago, in a discussion one of the most glorious Armenian bishops told me that the history of Armenia may be seen as God's punishment to us for betraying the above commandment. I am conveying this just as a food for thought.