THE ORTHODOX UNCANNY VALLEY

The black and white vestments of our bishops, rooted in the sober dignity of the Ancient Church of the West, are more ancient and more canonical than the jeweled imperial robes adopted in the East after the fall of Constantinople, when the Turkish Sultan granted the Patriarch the regalia of the former Byzantine Emperor, making him the head of the Christian millet under Islamic law. This political accommodation introduced into Orthodox practice vestments that were never part of the Apostolic or conciliar tradition. In contrast, the early canons prescribe simple garments of wool or linen, and the Fathers uniformly upheld modesty and spiritual authority over ostentation. Our bishops, following the example of saints like Patrick, Columba, and Benedict, wear garments that reflect humility, purity, and continuity with the Apostolic age (not the pomp of fallen empires) and thus remain more truly Orthodox than those who have forgotten the simplicity of the Gospel for the spectacle of imperial splendor.

ORTHODOX LARPING, SCRIPTURE, THE FATHERS, AND THE TRUTH OF HUMBLE AUTHENTICITY

By Bp. Joseph (Ancient Church of the West)

INTRODUCTION

In these latter days, as the Church continues her mission to the ends of the earth, a peculiar distortion has emerged among certain small and self-fashioned “Orthodox” bodies, what may rightly be called a "liturgical uncanny valley." These groups, often uncanonical and operating outside the historic episcopate of the Undivided Church, seek to imitate the grandeur of imperial Byzantium, yet fall just short in material, in tone, and in spirit. Their vestments mimic Eastern splendor, but they are sewn with plastic thread or gathered from eBay. Their chapels imitate Hagia Sophia, but are built in converted garages. They strive to speak with ancient authority, yet sound borrowed, assembled, contrived. And the result? Suspicion. Mockery. Isolation. Not always because their doctrine is wrong, but because they do not pass the smell test. Their efforts ring hollow, because what they display externally does not arise organically from their history, their culture, or their context.

PATRISTIC WISDOM

The Fathers teach us to discern with spiritual sight, not with the eye alone. As St. Irenaeus of Lyons warned, “Error, indeed, is never set forth in its naked deformity… but it is craftily decked out in an attractive dress… that the inexperienced may be led by resemblance to suppose it to be the truth.” (Against Heresies, I.2.1) He speaks of heresy, but the principle holds: something may resemble truth, yet be alien to it.

MAN LOOKS UPON THE APPEARANCE

This is the very danger of the uncanny valley in Orthodoxy, which is a distortion not only in material but in ethos. For true Orthodoxy is not merely the replication of vestments or tones, but the reception of the Apostolic spirit in unbroken succession of the laying-on-of-hands and fidelity to the Gospel of the Ancient Church. The Lord said, “Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment” (John 7:24). And yet, ironically, it is appearance that increasingly defines the limits of legitimacy within world Orthodoxy.

Why this addiction to appearance? Because, from the fall of Constantinople to the present day, Eastern Orthodoxy has largely survived as a state religion. The imperial Church, married to the sword of empire, grew to understand itself in terms of wealth, majesty, and visible triumph. The bishop became not a father of the poor, but a prince of the realm, wearing his pectoral Panagia as the ancient Roman governors wore their insignia aurea (the golden necklace of an official, representing his rank and power). His vestments were no longer signs of humility but robes of magnificence and courtly power. This was the world of Chrysostom’s bitter lament: “Nothing is more fallacious than the [glorious] life of the priest… and I say this not as one accusing, but grieving and weeping.” (On the Priesthood, Book III)

IMPERIAL ROT

Indeed, St. John Chrysostom, himself the Patriarch of Constantinople, saw the rot of imperial glamour as a deadly trap. He condemned the opulence of the clergy in his own day, writing, “Of what honor is gold, when Christ is crucified?” and “Shall we clothe Christ in purple and gold, and leave His members to go naked?” (Homily on Matthew 50)

Contrast this with the first centuries of the Church: the bishops were martyrs, confessors, servants. They wore wool and linen. They traveled by foot. They lived among the poor. When St. Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, was burned alive by pagans in AD 156, he wore not a mitre but the crown of humility. He carried no jeweled staff, but the simple wooden staff of a shepherd, and only were beautified by the faith of the Apostles.

CANONICAL BASIS

Canon 27 of the Council of Elvira (early 4th century) required clergy to wear only white linen and dark wool as vestments in the Church. Canon 12 of the Council of Carthage (AD 419) reaffirmed the simplicity of the clerical life. These were not accidental details, but were an expression of the mind of Christ, who “though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor” (2 Corinthians 8:9). To deviate from this spirit is to deviate from Apostolic Christianity.

CONTEMPORARY PROBLEM

And yet today, the Church is often measured not by her doctrine or her holiness, but by her presentation. Ukrainian and Macedonian Orthodox churches, though embroiled in canonical disputes, are still treated with redeemable legitimacy by world Orthodoxy. Why? Because they look the part. Their clergy wear the right brocade. Their chants sound familiar. Their processions are gilded, in imitation of the Byzantine Emperors. They are “within the tradition.” They embody the “Orthodox aesthetic,” and that is now, tragically, enough for their Churches to be received and regularized by the large Patriarchates.

ANCIENT SIMPLICITY

The West, however, offers another path. In the Western Rite, especially in its ancient form preserved from the rite of St. James of Jerusalem and lived through the saints of the British Isles, we find no compulsion to replicate the jeweled courts of Byzantium. Our liturgy predates the assumption of power, wealth, ornate rubrics, and multitudinous and servile lower clergy. Instead, we follow the model of our fathers: St. Cuthbert in his cave, St. Columba in his coracle, St. Patrick in the wilderness, St. Benedict in his robe of black. These were not lords of empire but Apostles of Christ. Their vestments were simple, their churches were humble, made of stone and wood from the local streams and forests, and their lives radiant with divine light of holy simplicity. As St. Basil the Great declared, “It is not the richness of the vestment but the purity of the soul which recommends the minister to God.” (Letter 219) And yet today, too many confuse ornate vestments with true authority. But the Apostle reminds us, “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: who… made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant” (Philippians 2:5-7). Is the Church not called to bear His image? Are we not called to be herbed as the servant, and thus follow our Lord?

OUR CHURCH'S PRACTICE

In our Church, practicing the ancient rite of St. James and committed to the difficult missionary frontiers unreached by the gold and glory of the Byzantine East, we wear vestments of theological significance, not imperial spectacle. Our bishops, clothed in black and white, as bishops were in ancient days, represent death to self, and the simplicity of the Cross. Our cope, worn only at the Holy Eucharist, reflects the mantle of Christ who “took a towel and girded Himself” (John 13:4) before He washed the feet of His disciples. It represent that we are acting “in persona Christi,” and is the highest pinnacle of the Christian liturgical tradition. This is the vesture of true hierarchy, which is given to whomever presides over the Holy Eucharist.

We do not mix and match, because we are not pretending. We do not need to steal from Byzantium, because our patrimony predates the conversion of Constantinople. We do not mimic to gain legitimacy. We inherit, because the same Spirit who dwelt in Sts. Polycarp, Patrick, and Porphyrios breathes also in us.

The Canonical Dress of Our Bishops is Rooted in the Ancient Church and the Simplicity of the Scottish Patrimony


The Canonical Cope is the Eucharistic Vestment of Our Patrimony, Representing the Work of the Clergy “In Persona Christi”


The Crosier Represents the Pastoral Office, and the Hand Cross Represents the Pastoral Ministry - “Take Up Your Cross and Follow Me”


The Liturgy of St. James in Our Patrimony


The Black and White Episcopal Garments, Covered with the Beautiful Garment for the Eucharist, Representing Christ’s Ministry in the Church


In Our Worship, We Reflect the Unbroken Continuity of the Church, East and West

RESISTING BYZANTINE MISDIRECTION

The Byzantine canonist Theodore Balsamon once declared that all rites must conform to the “God-loved” Constantinople. This was a lie. He misreported and mistranslated the First Council of Nicaea to say such a thing. It is a “commandment of man”, and so it holds no authority. We must keep the ancient tradition in the purity of a humble faith, and do all that which our Ancient Fathers handed down to use The Spirit blows where He wills. The Light of Christ has illumined Britain, Gaul, Syria, and India, and not only Byzantium. As St. Irenaeus wrote, “Where the Spirit of God is, there is the Church” (Against Heresies, III.24.1), and not where the garments glitter the brightest or the chanters add the longest “tararem.”

TOWARDS A PASTORAL APPLICATION

We do not dwell in the uncanny valley. Others do, laboring under the mistaken view that this is where holiness is found. Others attempt to recreate what they do not understand, or pull on a false face in order to convince others of their authenticity and worth. But we stand on the mountain top, clothed not in pretense but in Divine Light of Providence. And though the world may mock our simplicity, and Byzantine acolytes, “twice the son of perdition” as their courtly cradle masters, may rant and rage at our lack of submission to their innovations and developments as “invalidity,” heaven does not. For God has chosen what is foolish in the world to shame the wise, what is weak to shame the strong, and what is lowly to confound the glorious (1 Corinthians 1:27-29). He has called the poor and the weak in the Third World to be the future of the Christian Faith.

We are not ashamed of the humility of the Ancient Church, for in it we see the very form of Christ, who came not to be served, but to serve.

A COLLECT FOR HUMBLE AUTHENTICITY AND PASTORAL MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH

O God, whose Kingdom is not of this world, and whose holy Apostles forsook all that they had to follow Thy Son in the way of the Cross: Grant unto us grace to be content with holy simplicity, to despise the ornaments of pride, and to seek only the beauty of holiness; that, being clothed in righteousness and love, we may reflect the light of Thy glory to all nations, through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.