Eternal Sadness

“In Orthodox consciousness, sin is not simply a particular act, a concrete transgression that the Church has power to absolve when the sinner repents.  Rather, I would say that sin is a kind of eternal sadness, the knowledge of the immense betrayal of God by man and, through man, by the whole creation.  One cannot be a Christian and be free of that sadness, that knowledge, that burden which the saints know better than anyone else.  The ‘instant salvation’ preached by hard-core evangelicals and often championed by the charismatic movement (‘Joy! Joy! Joy!’) cannot abolish the sadness and irreversibility of sin.  It has been committed; it is forever a scar on the creation, even in its ultimate glory.  So one cannot be Christian and forget about that.  And thus, for as long as this world exists, there cannot be prayer without repentance, without acknowledgment of sin, without a cry to God for forgiveness.”

Father Alexander Schmemann, The Liturgy of Death