No disease of the spirit is more insidious, deceptive and destructive than false religiosity, which can be defined succinctly as religious legalism and exhibitionism. Jesus condemned it outrightly. He warned against those whose lives are measured by ceremonials rather than the holiness, mercy and love of God; and those whose evil motivations, intentions and improprieties are cloaked in the respectability of externals of religious faith and life. False religiosity is a cruel hoax and a betrayal of authentic religious faith. The practitioners of such artificial faith shut the Kingdom of heaven against men, for they neither enter themselves, nor do they allow those who would enter to go in (Mt. 23:13).
- From Great Week and Pascha in the Greek Orthodox Church, by Fr. Alkiviades Calivas, p. 31.
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