Wednesday, October 03, 2007

Classic Quotation from Fr Georges Florovsky

“Thus, ‘tradition’ in the Church is not merely the continuity of human memory, or the permanence of rites and habits. Ultimately, ‘tradition’ is the continuity of the divine assistance, the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit. The Church is not bound by ‘the letter.’ She is constantly moved forth by ‘the spirit.’ The same Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, which ‘spake through the Prophets,' which guided the Apostles, which illumined the Evangelists, is still abiding in the Church, and guides her into the fuller understanding of the divine truth, from glory to glory.”

Protopresbyter Georges Florovsky, “The Ethos of the Orthodox Church,” The Ecumenical Review, Vol. XII, No. 2, January 1960