Tag Archive for: Archbishop Tiran Nersoyan

Mystery Behind the Curtain: Archbishop Tiran, 3

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Armodoxy for Today: Mystery behind the Curtain

So there I was at the altar of the Holy Cross Armenian Church in New York with the most knowledgeable man in the Armenian Church. With the Lenten curtain draped behind us, we stood in this narrow space looking up at the altar. Archbishop Tiran Nersoyan, now in his twilight years, had invited me out to New York, to offer a position as editor of the St. Nersess Journal. We spent three days together, having coffee, talking, more coffee and every so often breaking for meals.

At this moment we were at the altar, and I was talking to him about “mystery,” a word that seems to be at the center of religiosity. Things we cannot answer or describe we designation into the category of mystery. Years earlier, when I was writing my thesis in collage, I had the pleasure and honor of interviewing Archbishop Tiran about the Armenian Genocide, and how in the face of such a horrendous and monumental atrocity such as genocide, we, Armenians, can maintain a belief in a good and all-powerful God? That is, if He is good and all powerful, why would he allow genocide to take place. His answer, to this day, I have not forgotten. He replied with a snicker, as if to say, how can you be so naïve. “If you live in the jungle, and you are attacked by a tiger, why would you blame God?”

How simple is that? If we live in a jungle we have to comply with and accept the rules of the jungle. Throughout my years as a parish priest I have stood with families dealing with the worst of the worst news and prognoses. It is there, at those moments, that theology has to come alive – it has to make sense in life. Archbishop Tiran was giving a practical response to the problem of evil. Why is there cancer? Because we’ve polluted our environment and our bodies. Why are there accidents? Because people are careless and imperfect. Why is there theft? Why violence? Why evil? We live with wants, jealousies, desires, and the freedom to act on our feelings of pride, envy, anger, sloth, covetousness, gluttony and lust. Yes, the fabulous seven and all their forms!

There we were, in front of the altar. He had asked me about the 12 candles and I got that one wrong. How could it have been the 12 signs of the zodiac? It didn’t figure, but then, I was there to discover “mystery” and that it was.

“God gives us a mind. He gives us reason,” said the archbishop. “We cannot put reason to one side when we can’t answer a question and call it mystery.” Saying that, he tried me again. “Why does the church have four walls?”

I wasn’t going to get this wrong. There couldn’t be another zodiac-type answer. “The four evangelists!,” I exclaimed boldly. “Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, these are the four walls that encase the church.” I had this; I knew it. But the old archbishop laughed one more time.

“The church has four walls to keep the roof up,” he said with a smile that let us both know that the master still the upper hand over the students.

Mystery is important to acknowledge. But life has real parameters. Just as it is necessary to keep a roof atop a building with four walls, we need to answer many of the dilemmas we create and or encounter. Those three days in New York, with Archbishop Tiran were precious and gave me clarity and focus. As for the St. Nersess Journal, it didn’t happen. Archbishop Tiran died a few months later before he had finalized his wishes. It was, in a sense, a blessing that it didn’t happen. As a result, the year after, we established and published, “Window, View of the Armenian Church,” a journal of contemporary Armenian Church thought. From 1990 to 1995 we brought a light through that window which will be the story of another day.

We end with the words of a layman, and a scientist of the genius type, no less, Albert Einstein, regarding mystery. The most beautiful thing that we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are closed. The insight into the mystery of life, coupled though it be with fear, has also given rise to religion. To know what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive forms – this knowledge, this feeling is at the center of true religiousness.

This is the third and final installment of Mystery: My three days with Archbishop Tiran  

Listen to previous days:

#1 – Christian Courage – Archbishop Tiran – epostle

#2 – Mystery Too Deep – Apb. Tiran, more – epostle

 

Mystery Too Deep – Apb. Tiran, more

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Armodoxy for Today: Mystery too Deep

The first hymn which is sung at the Divine Liturgy of the Armenian Church is  Khorhourt khorin. It sets the tone of entire Liturgy. I remember the first time I read the translation of those words, “Mystery, deep, inscrutable, without beginning…”

The words to the hymn as well as the entire Divine Liturgy were translated by Archbishop Tiran Nersoyan, of blessed memory. He was one of the brilliant minds of the Armenian Church in the 20th century. His accolades are many, but among the top was his vision for having an Armenian seminary in the United States. He founded the St. Nersess Armenian Seminary. He was elected Patriarch of the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem, and served as Primate of the Eastern Diocese.

1978 was a special time in my life. I had just returned from the Seminary of Holy Etchmiadzin and entered the Seminary at Claremont. As an Armenian student in this Methodist Seminary, I relied heavily on Archbishop’s Divine Liturgy translation for research comparisons and thesis development. 1978 also happened to be the centennial celebration of Albert Einstein’s birth. Not far from Claremont was Cal Poly Pomona, and I was able to enroll in a class simultaneously about Einstein, tailored for the non-scientist. It was there that I found this most meaningful quote by Einstein. “The most beautiful thing that we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are closed.” He pointed to mystery and the awe awakened by that mystery. In essence, Einstein was uncovering a truth expressed by the Armenian Church for centuries.

In 1989 I received a letter from Archbishop Tiran, while I was pastoring at the St. Andrew Armenian Church in Cupertino, California. We had met only casually, but to receive a letter by the revered archbishop, the “Encyclopedia of the Armenian Church,” for me, was like being called out at a concert by the superstar on the stage because he recognized me! Me? Yes, you!

Yesterday I gave you the background of that letter. Today, as promised, I continue the story of our exchange. The letter was an invitation to edit a theological journal for the St. Nersess Seminary. His generous letter was flattering, and his offer to edit the journal was more than I could have imagined at that point in my ministry. He invited me to come to New York to meet with him to discuss the detail. I went there and spent three of the most memorable days in my life, just being around and living around this giant of the Armenian Church.

I visited the archbishop in his New York City apartment, in the Washington Heights area. It was next to the Holy Cross Armenian Church on 187th Street, a church which was infamously the site of the 1933 Assassination of the Archbishop Levon Tourian.

During my stay with the Archbishop Tiran, I want to say we discussed many topics, but it was more like he talked, and I listened. I was in awe of his intellect, and how he organized his thoughts. Indeed, what we knew from a distance, was even more pronounced in person, he was the Enclopedia of Christianity and a specialized volume of that encyclopedia focused on the Armenian Church.

On the second day of my visit Archbishop Tiran took me into the Holy Cross Armenian Church. It was the Lenten season and the curtain was closed. We came up the center isle and he pointed to the spot where Archbishop Ghevont was assassinated on Christmas day 1933. With his killings began the ugly divisions among the Armenian people and the Armenian Church in America. (Journalist Terry Phillips writes about the assassination in his book, Murder at the Altar.) He had the vestments of the murdered archbishop, with blood stains still uncleaned, pointing to where he was brutally stabbed during the service that day. Against this reality, the esoteric and spiritual discussion of mystery was going to be hard-find.

Archbishop Tiran took me up to the altar. With the curtain closed behind us, we stood in this narrow space in front of the main altar of Holy Cross. I began the conversation, citing the beautiful words with which he translated, Khorhourt Khorin…. Each of his words were selected perfectly for his translations. The word, “inscrutable” intrigued me. So with that admission, we began a conversation on mystery.

In Armenian Orthodoxy, you understand that God is beyond explanation. If you can describe God, then He isn’t God. Mystery – khorhourt – is the catch-all term for the Divine realm. With the groundwork laid, Archbishop Tiran asked me if I knew why there were 12 candles on the altar? “The 12 disciples,” I answered, “the twelve points of light.” He laughed. He had a very kind laugh that let you know he was amused. “No, the candles are in reference to the twelve signs of the zodiac.” I thought he was putting me on. The Zodiac? Isn’t that what Nancy Regan was being ridiculed for? Then, I looked in the Armenian Church calendar (Oratzuyts) published annually in Holy Etchmiadzin and there they were – the twelve signs, printed on the pages of the calendar. Mystery was fairly deep, in fact maybe too deep, until he asked me one more question, one which sent me over the top in its simplicity and explained Mystery in what we now refer to as in Armodox manner.

Until then, the prayer, Khorhourt khorin as translated by Archbishop Tiran Nersoyan, O mystery deep, inscrutable, without beginning. Thou that hast decked thy supernal realm as a chamber unto the light unapproachable and hast adorned with splendid glory the ranks of the fiery spirits…

Christian Courage – Archbishop Tiran

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Armodoxy for Today: Christian Courage

Archbishop Tiran Nersoyan, of blessed memory, was one of the brilliant minds of the Armenian Church in the 20th century. His accolades are many, but among the top was his vision for having an Armenian seminary in the United States. He founded the St. Nersess Armenian Seminary. Intellectually, his translation of the Holy Divine Liturgy (1950) is still the foundation upon which other translations are offered. He was elected Patriarch of the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem, and served as Primate of the Eastern Diocese.

He was brilliant and sharp. In his senior years he would attend Summer Conferences at the St. Nersess Armenian Seminary, where young students would have the chance of a lifetime to engage in conversation with him. To many of us, he was a walking encyclopedia of the Christian Church, and the special volume on the Armenian Church. He was a pioneer in many respects. As a bishop he courageously challenged some of the rules of the Church. For instance, as a Primate he saw the tremendous need for clergy in the post-Genocide diasporan church and so he ordained a group of priests before they were married. One of the laws of the church is that if a candidate for the priesthood is to marry, marriage must take place before ordination. But as a primate he made the decision that the need for priests outweighed the respect of the rule. The Church refers to this as economia which allows for discretionary deviation from the letter of the law in order to adhere to the spirit of the law and charity. It takes clear vision and courage to takes these bold steps and Archbishop Tiran’s choice to ordain the priests were truly an act of economia.

In 1989, I was pastoring the St. Andrew Armenian Church in Cupertino, California. We published a small newsletter called The Nakhagoch (meaning the “First Call” a play off of St. Andrew the Disciples nickname of being the Nakhagoch, that is, the first called disciple of Jesus Christ. Each edition of the paper would include my pastoral message and commentary about social events. Archbishop Tiran wrote me that year. I had met him only casually, but to receive a letter by the revered archbishop, for me, was like being called out at a concert by the superstar on the stage because he said he recognized you! Me? Yes, you!

The letter was an invitation to edit a theological journal for the St. Nersess Seminary. Archbishop Tiran had read my articles and wanted to place me in charge of a journal for religious thought at the Seminary. In particular, he had read a piece I had written for the San Jose Mercury News about the 1988 film, “The Last Temptation of Christ.” The film was based on Nicholas Kazantzakis’s book by the same name. Kazantzakis was better known as author of “Zorba the Greek.” I had read the “Last Temptation” in college and it helped me form much of my expressions of theology. The epic movie, directed by Martin Scorsese, hit the theaters that year and was causing a stir. Christian groups and churches were protesting the movie – threatening to close down theaters and sponsors – because the film dared to present Jesus in human light. The last temptation of Christ, Kazantzakis imagined, was Jesus on the Cross, being approached by the Tempter, who offers him a “normal” life, with wife and kids, if he abandons the Cross. Spoiler alert: he doesn’t. But that didn’t seem to matter with the movie-going public of the time.

Kazantzakis’s story flirts with Christology, a topic which divided the Christian Church, particularly in the early centuries. In seminary we studied the Council of Chalcedon (451AD) and the variations of Christological expressions extensively. I was not about to touch any of these points in a newspaper article, rather I questioned our fear and doubt. Why would we be afraid to think and struggle with our Faith?  And especially with the main character of our Faith, namely Jesus Christ? Receiving Archbishop Tiran’s letter – the foremost authority on our Church’s Christology – and his approval of the article and my positioning, was a boost of confidence that I needed at that early point in my ministry. Even more, his encouragement emphasized the need the bridge the gap between theoretical and practical theology.

Jesus came to us. Jesus lived in a real world and spoke to the issues and problems of this world. He made the Divine Realm accessible to everyone. As a Church, we pray, Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. It takes Christian courage to be the instrument to bring thy will from heaven to earth.

Tomorrow, we’ll look at what happened when I accepted Archbishop Tiran’s invitation.  and found myself in a place that was too deep. Join me.