Deification is known by it’s having left behind an intellectual search for the face of God, and imperceptibly replaced with an ever increasing awareness of “being with” God, an ever increasing awareness of “being enveloped by” the Blessed Trinity. We only know others through our spending time with them, yet we only know the Divine Others through stepping out of time, with the Divine Others dwelling in our hearts, in the depths of silence and solitude.
Elias
Protestants are lost with the concept of deification. Roman Catholics are somewhat alarmed and mystified by it. But Orthodox Christians, Eastern Catholics, have been living in this reality for as long as the earliest of Christ’s followers.
To be clear (especially for Protestants), deification does not mean to “become God” or to “become a god” in any sense of the term. We will never become God. We are created by Him and we are finite creatures. However, we know, both from the Scriptures as well as from the early Church Fathers, that we are to be found in Him. We are being made like Him. We no longer live but Christ lives in us.
Each day we are are called to forget ourselves. In a very real sense, we are called to die. And from our death, from the point of being forgotten, Christ is seen. And when Christ appears, we will also appear with Him.
One Voice United 