Main news for 26 September 2025

In every age there have been discussions in the Church about what Tradition is. For many, the very concept of Tradition is associated with hoary antiquity, with something whose roots go deep into history. Young churches and communities, as a rule, are denied traditionality for this reason: after all, in their case there is usually no centuries-long history in view. Yet Paul's words to Timothy say that the question of Tradition is by no means a question of the antiquity of the elements from which it is formed. For Paul calls Timothy precisely to hold fast to Tradition, even though the Church's history at that time counted only a few decades.

What, then, forms its foundation? And what are its distinguishing features? First of all, the foundation of tradition is faithfulness, faithfulness to that "which you have learned." Without such faithfulness, of course, there can be no talk of any Tradition: the bearer of any tradition is such only as long as it remains for him the natural and organic form of his own existence, both spiritual and existential. A person for whom the tradition he declares remains something external is not its bearer, even if he knows it well enough, just as a person is not a native speaker of a language merely because he studied it as a foreign language, even if he speaks that foreign language fluently. But when it comes to language, the question is resolved simply: it is a matter of a language learned in childhood, as everyone learns his native language. There are, of course, traditions learned in childhood as well, grounded in a tribal or national myth received then, in childhood. This language and this myth are what actually form what is usually called a tribal or national self-awareness. But Tradition cannot be learned from childhood: people are not born Christians; they become Christians. Here everything is grounded in personal spiritual experience, reinforced by the experience of sacred Scripture.

Why does Scripture play such an important role here? Of course, not because the Bible contains ready-made answers to every question. The point is different: it reflects the typical experience of communion with God, characteristic of all times. Certainly, if not all, then a very great deal of what is described in the biblical books was described by, or from the words of, those to whom the described events happened for the first time in human history. But "for the first time" does not mean "never again": what the pioneers of the spirit described then becomes part of the experience of many, many others, though, of course, there is no question of mass scale here: the "little flock" remains little. And these many can always turn to the experience of their predecessors in order to compare that experience with their own.

This is how genuine Tradition is born: not from antiquity, but from essential, spiritual unity connecting all who walk the path of righteousness and seek the Kingdom. For God, the path of righteousness, and the Kingdom are the same in every age. Unlike changing human fashion, they do not change with the years. And the Kingdom unites all who have become its inhabitants. Regardless of era, language, or religion.