Perspectief 2019-44

Perspectief 12 The Dispersion of the Syriac-Orthodox Throughout the World in the Diaspora burdens and places more responsibility on the shoulders of the parents and the clergy to direct the faithful in the right way, the way of God. But in the secular state of America or Europe today, usually the tide is against the Church. … Bring in the example of the so-called Böckenförde-paradoxon or Böckenförde-dictum: “The liberal secular state lives on premises that it cannot itself guarantee. On the one hand, it can subsist only if the freedom it consents to its citizens is regulated from within, inside the moral substance of individuals and of a homogeneous society. On the other hand, it is not able to guarantee these forces of inner regulation by itself without renouncing its liberalism.” [Ernst-Wolfgang Böckenförde, Staat, Gesellschaft, Freiheit, Frankfurt, 1976, p. 60.] 5. Assimilation and Identity Problem Back in the homeland, generally there is no dichotomy between the religious and national identity of the person. Furthermore, national identity is a Western concept that emerged with the French Revolution and until recently was a foreign notion to Middle Easterners. In other words, it was the faith and the religious aspect that largely determined the identity of the person and not the ethnic background. For example, if a member of the Syrian Orthodox community converted to Islam, s/he would no longer be considered a Syriac, but a “gentile” and vice versa. As has been stated above, the first and to a greater degree the second generation of the Syriac faithful immigrants to America became Americanized and have been lost to the Church and the faith of their forefathers. This was because the Church was not in a position to address their needs and meet some of their challenges in the New World. Here, for the sake of convenience, one has to make a distinction between the spiritual identity and eth- nic or cultural identity of the person. The church may have gone wrong because she emphasized preserving the cultural identity over the spiritual one and consequently lost most of her faithful. From a Christian perspective, there is nothing wrong with becoming Americanized or Europeanized, but it is certainly lamentable for a person to lose his/her faith and spiritual identity. In fact, if the church is able to preserve and maintain the Or- thodox faith and nurture this in her children, she will not only preserve the spiritual identity