The sacrament of the brother/sister in the life and thought of Paul Evdokimov and Mother Maria Skobtsova

This article by Father Michael Plekon, drawn from a lecture delivered in 2002 at Saint Vladimir's Seminary in New York, offers a theological and biographical study devoted to two major figures of the Russian emigration: the nun Maria Skobtsova and the lay theologian Paul Evdokimov. Drawing on a rich bibliography and numerous excerpts from their writings, the author shows that these two thinkers share a common central principle: the inseparability of love of God and love of neighbour, articulated through the Chrysostomian notion of the "sacrament of the brother." The article establishes that their concrete commitment to the poor and the marginalized was inseparable from their theology, but constituted its living expression. It thus brings to light an incarnate ecclesiology, grounded in the Incarnation and the "liturgy after the liturgy," a distinctive contribution of Russian Orthodox theology developed in exile during the twentieth century.