One of the VERY frustrating things about becoming Orthodox is the growing realization that on some things, there are different voices that speak with authority that THIS is Orthodox teaching. Without a Catechism, this sort of thing (I'm discovering) can create real problems, especially for lay converts.

Over the past several months, I have agonized over what I heard one day in Church, that "we Orthodox" do not adhere to  penal substitutionary atonement. That term, it is said, is not found in the Bible or the early Church. That, it is said, was an 'invention' of Anselm. 

Doing some reading, gathering information from the internet, and the Bible, I remain confused. For example, one Orthodox priest cited these early fathers as proof that the Church fathers DID teach (penal) substitutionary atonement:

St Gregory Palamas:

"Man was led into his captivity when he experienced God's wrath, this wrath being the good God's just abandonment of man. God had to be reconciled with the human race, for otherwise mankind could not be set free from the servitude. A sacrifice was needed to reconcile the Father on high with us and to sanctify us, since we had been soiled by fellowship with the evil one. There had to be a sacrifice which both cleansed and was clean, and a purified and sinless priest" (Christopher Veniamin, trans. Saint Gregory Palamas: The Homilies (Waymart, PA: Mount Thabor Publishing, 2009) p. 124).

"Christ overturned the devil through suffering and His flesh which He offered as a sacrifice to God the Father, as a pure and altogether holy victim -- how great is His gift! -- and reconciled God to our human race" (p.125).

"For this reason the lord patiently endured for our sake a death He was not obliged to undergo, to redeem us, who were obliged to suffer death, from servitude to the devil and death, by which I mean death both of the soul and of the body, temporary and eternal. Since He gave His blood, which was sinless and therefore guiltless, as a ransom for us who were liable to punishment because of our sins, He redeemed us from our guilt. He forgave us our sins, tore up the record of them on the Cross and delivered us from the Devil's tyranny (cf. Col 2:14-15)"( p. 128f)."

Believe me, there are many more that could be cited. Contemporary writers such as Kallistos Ware and Patrick Henry Reardon (and recent convert Hank Hanegraaff) are other sources that speak of the blood of Christ that cleanses us from sin.

I have been a Christian for 45 years. 30 years in ordained ministry in the Episcopal Church. A few years as a Catholic layman, and now Orthodox. But now this serious departure from what I KNOW to be true-that "Throughout the New Testament the apostolic witness gives a central place to the theme of Christ’s redeeming blood, which was poured out in his sacrificial death on the Cross. For the whole human race this blood procures deliverance from sin and death." (Fr Patrick Henry Reardon). 

Some Orthodox writers suggest that this is a western invention (as said above), that Christ simply paid the price of sin (Death) and defeated death on the Cross. God, they say, did not need 'satisfaction' or 'the demands of justice met,' that the atonement of Christ by His blood was not necessary because God has always forgiven. The purpose of the Crucifixion, it is said, is THEOSIS, a Greek word meaning 'becoming like God', or as Protestants would call it, 'sanctification'. Not a 'judicial' act but rather ontological. I don't quarrel with that as a partial explanation, but it is incomplete (in my humble view) for it leaves out the atonement Christ made on the Cross by His blood. "the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin." (1 Jn. 1.7)

This is a HUGE deal for me. And again, without a Catechism (look at how thick the Catholic Catechism is!), it can be difficult for laity, would-be converts or new converts to know WHAT to believe.

I will never deny that Christ's Cross and His blood made atonement for my sin. The question is can I REMAIN Orthodox holding this view, one that many priests/scholars call 'heretical.'

Stay tuned.