Kinda surprised you'd say that, K. It's much easier, in some ways, to be a Christian when Christianity equates to persecution, danger, and poverty then it is when it equates to wealth, power, and influence.
"The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church" ... it was a Westerner who said that, and (as St. Jerome tartly said) he died "not a man of the church".
But I think what he said in this instance rings true.
Tertullian?
“It’s much easier, in some ways, to be a Christian when Christianity equates to persecution, danger, and poverty then it is when it equates to wealth, power, and influence.”
I never had to suffer for my Faith, C. Its always been good times, though stories have come down through the family. Every Sunday, though, I go to Liturgy with people who did hide their icons and worship in secret, and/or be beaten and have had relatives killed. The Communists killed distant relatives of mine for the sole reason that they were Orthodox Christians during the Civil War after WWII. Some of those people were good Christians, some not so good. None to my knowledge became depraved.
Frankly, while I do think that The Faith flourishes under persecution, I think it does that with a small minority of the faithful. Were it otherwise, the Middle East, places like Turkey and Albania would be filled with Christians to this day and we know they are not. I don’t buy the argument that its easier to be a Christian under persecution than in a situation of freedom as in the West. I think that’s a cop out. Power, wealth and influence are precisely what lead hierarchs to the floor of hell. The laity, monastics and lower clergy, however, don’t have that excuse.