What Kind of State is This?
“We run eagerly to dances and amusements. We listen to pleasure the foolishness of singers. We enjoy the foul words of actors for hours without getting bored. Yet when God speaks we yawn. We scratch our heads and feel dizzy.
Most people would run rapidly to the horse track although there is no roof there to protect the audience from rain. Even when it rains heavily, or when the wind is lifting everything, they don’t mind bad weather, or the cold, or the distance. Nothing keeps them in the homes.
When they are about to go church, however, then the soft rain becomes an obstacle for them. If you ask them who Amos or Obediah is, or how man prophets or apostles there are, they can’t even open their mouths. Yet they can tell you every detail about the horses, the singers, and the actors.
What kind of state is this?”
-St. John Chrysostom, around 387 AD.
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