Dispassion vs. Apathy and our intended existence

by Andrea Elizabeth

Dr. Farrell states, “The ignorance occasioned by the dialectic of the passions (pursuit of independent, unauthorized pleasure) which make man dependent on sensory knowledge only is dispelled by constant recollection and spiritual knowledge of the Incarnate Logos in all the fulness of His logoi through the Sciptures (! sounds sort of sola scripturaish, will withhold judgment as he’s already stated the Sacraments, which are in the Scriptures, are necessary). Dispassion, the true free choice in the cosmos of eternal, distinct but undivided and equally good virtues and goods, a personal recapitulation of His passionless Passion, is the ultimate goal, the vision of God in Christ.

It is there, in heaven that the final satiety of man’s natural free choice will experience the boundless fulness of objects of choice, each limitless, each equally good and without any opposition to each other. In heaven there will be not hesitation nor ignorance of the outcomes of the activity of the will.

For St. Maximus this is the premier mystery of the Church, for this Vision of God, being the Vision of Christ, is fundamentally ecclesiological.

…as the center of straight lines that radiate from Him, He does not allow by His unique, simple and single cause and power that the principles (logoi) of beings become disjoined at the periphery, but rather He circumscribes their extension in a circle and brings back to Himself the distinctive elements of beings which He Himself brought into existence. (!)