A Man in Full

Fr. Alexander Schmemann (+1983) in later years 

In recent years, there has been a great deal of debate about the writings of Fr. Alexander Schmemann (1921-1983), the former dean of St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary in New York and one of the foremost Orthodox theologians of the 20^th century. There are many people throughout the Orthodox world who view him as a radical, ecumenist reformer who wanted to see something akin to Vatican II in the Orthodox Church. On the other side of the fence, there are those who believe that his writings are relevant to the way that we see ourselves and the Church today and that they should be used for restricting. I take neither of these positions.

I was introduced to Fr. Schmemann's writings when I was a teenager. My home parish had a bookstore that contained a little book called “I Believe.” This was the first in a three volume set of sermons that were broadcast into Russia by Fr. Alexander via Radio Liberty. I recall reading this book over the course of several days and finding that it resonated with me very deeply.

The main reason for why I found resonance with Fr. Schmemann's writings was that he made religion simple. As anyone who has worked in radio will tell you, it is necessary to get the message across in the most cohesive and concise way possible. When religion and theology is under discussion, that kind of advice can be difficult to heed. However, Fr. Schmemann was so good at what he did that he brought thousands of people to the Orthodox Church and received letters from all over the Soviet Union thanking him for his broadcasts.

In his radio sermons, Fr. Schmemann speaks from the heart about the hard truths of human experience. He does not begin his series on the Nicene Creed with the first words, but rather uses the idea of what faith is. He talks about a study conducted in France wherein believers were to defined to ask what faith was and how it worked in their lives. In one of his broadcasts, he examined several of the most popular answers and gently demolished those with which the Orthodox Church does not agree.

Obviously, there is a great deal that is lost in translation. Russian is a language that is lyrical and almost poetic. When listening to these broadcasts online, one not only feels the power of the message that is being conveyed. One also hears the bass baritone voice, a voice akin to that of the great operatic singer Chaliapin that is speaking directly to its listeners.

Fr. Schmeman wrote numerous theological books and articles. “For the Life of the World” is probably his most important. It is an examination of the Sacrament of Holy Communion and the Divine Liturgy from many different angles. It is also an attempt to make us see how important the Divine Liturgy and the Eucharist is to our daily lives. As a matter of fact, Fr. Alexander Schmemann was an extremely vocal advocate for frequent Holy Communion, which was not common during his first years in America and yet is more common today.

In order to understand Fr. Alexander Schmemann’s life, however, it is necessary to read his journals. In the volume set that was published in Russia and the excerpts that have been translated in America, one gets to know the man behind the curtain. For most of his life, Fr. Alexander struggled to reconcile the many different threads that made him a man in full. He struggled with church politics in America and yet he also participated in them, he was a Russian living abroad and yet he also tried as hard as he could not to be a Russian.

The tremendous struggle recorded in these personal diaries during the last ten years of his life allow us to see that he was neither the renovationist demon of the conservatives nor the radical of the liberal of the Orthodox Church. Instead, Fr. Alexander Schmemann was a man just like any other. Someone who was working out his salvation in fear and trembling and trying to figure out what it all meant. This is the man that we do not see in our constant debates over his legacy and yet this is the only version of him that matters. May his memory be eternal!