Tag Archives: Chrism

Glorify God in Your Body

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Orthodox believers stand in line to kiss the relic, the right hand of St. John the Baptist, which was brought to Russia from Montenegro, in Christ the Savior Cathedral in Moscow.

Don’t you know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, which you have received from God, dwelling within you, and that you are not your own? You have been bought and paid for. Therefore glorify God in your body. (1 Cor. 6:19-20)

“Don’t you know?” St. Paul asks the Christians in Corinth. “Your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit,” he tells them. He is picking up on what he has just told them about taking each other to court. “What you are doing is inappropriate for anyone who has been washed-illuminated-sanctified in the Name of Christ and by the Spirit of God.”

“Illumination” or “enlightenment” was an early name for baptism. Plunging into the baptismal water, the new Christian is enlightened by the light of Christ, the light that filled the darkness of Hell and destroyed the realms of darkness and death. The new Christian is also sanctified, anointed by the Holy Spirit. Literally anointed. Not just metaphorically. The newly baptized was liberally anointed with chrism, the perfumed and sanctified oil that conferred the gift of the Holy Spirit. This sanctifying oil glistened in the candlelight by which those present at the baptism could see.

The body of the new Christian belongs to God as much as the new Christian’s soul does. Baptism is not just a spiritual experience. It is a physical experience that changes a person’s physical situation as much as it changes a person’s spiritual situation. Because a person’s body is washed and anointed, that body becomes a holy thing to be treated with respect, i.e. venerated and honored. Because a body is a holy thing, to be treated with respect and honor, it is inappropriate to treat the body in any disrespectful way. Some of those inappropriate, disrespectful ways involve sex but there are other inappropriate, disrespectful behaviors that do not involve sex.

Material things–including the bodies of the baptized but any material thing–can communicate the presence and power of God. Material things can communicate the power and presence of the Holy Spirit. One of the respectful, honorable ways we treat these sanctified material things is to kiss them.

Even after the baptized person dies, the body is still a holy thing and the remains–i.e. the relics–of the person are venerated and honored. The relics of the baptized dead are kissed and honored with incense, whether the person was a heroic saint or not. The baptized dead are saints by virtue of their baptism and their relics are treated accordingly.

Treating a person in a respectful manner during a sexual encounter goes hand-in-hand with venerating the relics of the saints. Bodies are important. They are holy. They are washed-illuminated-sanctified. Far from being irrelevant to ultimate salvation, the body is the means whereby God is glorified.

You are washed-illuminated-sanctified

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Baptism is always by immersion in the Orthodox Church. If we die and rise in the water, then there should be enough water to drown our sinful selves in. Arising from the water, the person is always anointed with chrism by the priest [i.e. confirmed], no matter how old they are. The chrism is washed off at the end of the service using water from the font and with the words of 1 Cor. 6:11.

You have been washed, you have been made holy, you have been justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God. (1 Cor. 6:11)

St. Paul is urging the Christians of Corinth to refrain from suing each other in civil courts. He says that they could find trustworthy members of the parish to settle an argument rather than “washing the dirty laundry” of the parish in public court in front of pagan judges. He points out that the Church–the Body of Christ–will judge even the angels on Judgement Day and that as the Body of Christ it would be better for them to settle disputes without involving the sinful world which they will be called to judge at the End of Time. He reminds them that they were once immoral and notorious sinners themselves but now they have been washed [i.e. baptized] and sanctified.

The baptized Corinthians are washed-sanctified-justified. These are taken to be three aspects of one reality: they are in a new, right relationship with God. They are justified. (In Greek, the same word means “justified” and “made righteous.” It can also mean “vindicated.”) It is therefore now appropriate that they be the judges rather than the judged.

However, the reception of the gift of salvation is not a one-time event but a life-time process. St. Paul employs the verb “to save” (sozesthai) in the past tense (“we have been saved,” Rom 8:24; Eph 2:5); in the present tense (“we are being saved,” 1 Cor 1:18; 15:2), and in the future tense (“we will be saved,” Rom 5:10). He can think even of justification as a future event and part of the final judgment (Rom 2:13, 16).

These words of St. Paul, reminding the Corinthians of their new status in the Kingdom of God, are used to wash the chrism from the newly baptized in the Orthodox Church. The candidate for baptism is always anointed with chrism after their immersion into the baptismal waters, no matter how young they are. Later, as the priest dips a small sponge into the font and then uses it to wipe the chrism from the person’s head-hands-feet, he says, “You are baptized. You are illuminated. You are sanctified. You are justified. You are washed: in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.” He keeps repeating these phrases until all the chrism is wiped off. Baptized into Christ’s death and resurrection and anointed with the Holy Spirit, the person is a new creation.

Immersed in the waters of baptism and sanctified by the holy chrism –whether in 1st century Corinth or 21st century New York–the newly justified child of God faces the challenge to live up to the righteousness given at baptism and to integrate it into their life thereafter.

The idea that Christians should not take their problems to civil courts eventually led to a separate church court system to resolve issues among church members. Such church courts still exist but deal primarily with issues among clergy or about church membership.