But worse. How much did the Church of the East suffer, and how much does she still suffer, by the overthrow of the empire by the Turks in 1453--by the overthrow of the empire, and the domination of a powerful, unscrupulous, and fanatical race, down through the 600 years succeeding! How would the Church in these islands have stood such fiery trials? Would we have continued an enterprising missionary Church through it all? It might be good for us to try to understand that, when a despotic Sultan stands over you, allowing you to breathe on condition of no proselytising, the conditions are not favourable to well advertised missionary effort. All that can be done in such circumstances, and under such conditions, is to hold fast to the faith, and let the light shine, which the Greek Church actually does.
Since the tenth century, Russia stands to the credit of Greek missionaries. Not that Russia can be considered much credit in the meantime by the West; but the ground for hope in Russia is the Christian element that has entered into her national life. And our Protestantism has not yet succeeded on the same national scale in missionary effort, a fact which ought to incline us to think less of the stagnation of the Greek Church. But why refer specially to Russia as a product of Greek missionary effort? Would Rome, or the Church of the Reformation in the West, be what they are to-day, but for the zeal and devotion of that Church in bye-gone days?
It is an easy matter for us in these days, with our national liberty and recognition of the Christian faith; with the noble souls around us who are the products of centuries of grace; with wealth, and all that Christian work calls for to its aid, to look disparagingly upon the Church of the East, the mother of us all, as she lies in sore straits despoiled of her splendour, and trampled under the heel of the Turk. Well we know the theory of cross-bearing, but, in comparison with the Church of the East from the very earliest down to the present day, we know but little of its practice. Our laurels are not too firmly knit upon our brows: let us take heed, and let us exercise the grace of charity and a spirit of sympathy.
But our prejudices, which are, as usual, due to imperfect knowledge, culpable or otherwise, charge this Church, which claims to be Orthodox, with being heretical in doctrine and worship. To put the common view, this Church, which is the repository of Apostolic doctrine, and from which we, in common with others, have derived, has, along with the truth, a large admixture of error, which renders her dangerous and to be avoided.