The Orthodox Church: Second Edition Book

Worshipping God nearly every Sunday in a Russian Orthodox church during my year in Kazakhstan introduced me to the deeply complex, yet simply beautiful worship of God that is found in Orthodox Christianity. For those several months, it was enough to be ministered to by the beauty of the liturgy, to grow in understanding of its meaning, and to gain basic understanding of Orthodox history and teaching. For several years thereafter, I've longed to deepen my understanding of these last two topics, and I looked to Bishop Kallistos Ware's book to aid that process.

Naturally, the book presents the history and the theology of the Orthodox Church from an Orthodox position. There are indeed times in the historical section in which Ware comes across as defensive, even over non-doctrinal matters. On the other hand, he is very objective in the ecumenical sections, presenting the various viewpoints on the current dialogue with other Christian movements (which is, by the way, quite active, and of which he is somewhat the head), while still masking his own views. Altogether, the book is an enlightening read about an oft-misunderstood tradition to which all of Christianity owes much (ever heard of the trinity?). The book was not able to answer all my questions about this 2000-year old church, but it is hard not to walk away from it in deeper awe of a church that has survived centuries of persecution, developed some of Christianity's most complicated theological claims, undergone NO REFORMATION, converted whole countries, developed the richest liturgical worship that at least I've ever witnessed, and some of whose members have led such exemplary lives of Christian suffering and virtue that words become useless in seeking to describe them. I highly recommend this book to any Christian seeking to understand the history of his/her own faith.