"One Accord"

Excerpts from Christian writers Past and Present

The ultimate destiny to which we are summoned, is nothing less than our theosis: our deification and transformation by the Holy Spirit into members of the body of Christ, joined in the Son to the Father, whereby we become true partakers of the divine nature. In the words of St. Athanasius: 'The Son of God became human so that we might become divine.' But, then, this must be a corporate destiny, as it is only through our participation in the community of Christ's body that any of us, as a unique object of divine love, can enter into full union with God. Our spiritual lives, therefore, cannot fail also to be social lives. - For the Life of the World - Toward a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church, Introduction, paragraph 3