Our Master tells us that, if we would follow Him, we must take up our cross. We must deny ourselves. What is more, He forewarns us that the world itself will deny us and hate us for being His disciples.

To be a Christian, then, is a serious matter. We glory in the Cross. We imitate Jesus, who came not to do His own will but the will of His Father. Although he was in the form of God, he humbled himself and took on our form, and as man He was obedient even to death, death on a cross.

Every breath is given us to praise the Lord. imitating His obedience, we do not to seek to get our own way. This is why Orthodox Christians wear a cross and make the sign of the cross on their person. This obedience is contrary to the way we would live if we did not know Christ and if we did not find His Holy Church, where the way of salvation is open to us. It is a wisdom contrary to the values of the world. Our cross puts us at enmity with the devil, who is the one who manipulates the way the world works.

This is why the Church does not fit in. It is not contemporary. The orthodox services are long. They do not work with our schedules. Their beauty is a challenge to our culture and its values. Why? Because they take us into the Kingdom of God, where we are to be transformed and where we see the world restored to its proper state. The Church, then, is given us not to help us get by in the world but so that we can be adorned with God's untreated Beauty. This is the reason why the Cross is our glory.