I ran across this blog entry by an Eastern Orthodox young man...How would you respond if he told you this...
Theologically, I won’t touch on everything. But... the lyrics of the popular Protestant hymn, “In Christ Alone,” which everyone sung at one point in the ceremony. A song I loved, and love, but not exactly as I did....So I sang, and was one voice among many....But then came one point where I could not sing. As I stopped and yielded to everyone around me…. “on that cross where Jesus died, the wrath of God was satisfied!” rang forth in unison and remained in my thoughts even after I rejoined and we continued. A concept I’m familiar with. I’m familiar with the Atonement theory that suggests our sin, separating us from a Holy God, has so angered God that in order to satisfy His wrath, He chooses to spare us and inflict this wrath upon His Son, scoring, crucifying, and killing Him on a cross, spilling every last bit of His Blood in the most violent of fashion – to appease His anger. I’m familiar. I just think it is madness. So I couldn’t sing.
The Atonement as understood by Orthodoxy (as I understand it), begins with the understanding that God became Man because of love, and clothed Himself with our humanity for the sake of mans’ salvation. And it is because of love that Christ, the God/Man, took on all that we are that He might heal our humanity, perfecting us by His perfection, offering us all that He is. And it is because of love that He was voluntarily crucified on a cross, thereby defeating death by His death. And it is because of love that He ascended into heaven, in His ressurected and perfected Humanity, and was seated at the right hand of the Father, offering salvation to all without exception should we only participate in His life. And He was crucified because we hated Him, not so that His Father could unleash upon Him the fiercest violence imaginable. I believe these things.