On Tradition-Maxxing
On Substack Notes I coined a term: tradition-maxxing.
I came up with the term after reading the viral essay I’ve Been Orthodox for Over Five Years. How Am I Feeling Now?, in which the author, Edwin Robinson, shares some of the desolation following his conversion to Orthodoxy. Many of us have been tracking the broader discourse about young men gravitating toward Orthodoxy or Roman Catholicism. And for my own part, I’ve written about some of the toxicity displayed by many of these converts. A good deal of this—the conversions, the online vituperativeness, and the desolations described by Robinson—is due to tradition-maxxing: the neurotic search for the oldest, thickest, most authoritative, and most demanding Christian tradition available.
If you spend much time online, you’ve probably encountered the suffix “-maxxing.” “Maxxing” emerged from internet culture to describe the relentless optimization of some aspect of your life. There is gym-maxxing, looks-maxxing, productivity-maxxing, finance-maxxing—all expressing the conviction that with enough effort, discipline, and the right strategy, you can maximize your performance in a particular domain.
And when it comes to Christianity, tradition becomes another thing to maxx. There is always another Church Father to read, another saint to venerate, another fasting rule to adopt, or another vigil to observe. The theology can always be deepened, the ascetical practices made more rigorous and severe, and the apologetical posture sharpened and made more combative. And most importantly, there is a more “authentic” and authoritative tradition to convert to and join. Everything in the tradition—theology, authority, asceticism—can be maxxed.
And yet, as I read Robinson’s essay, and after years of witnessing tradition-maxxing, we are starting to see some of its fruits. To be clear, there are many Protestants who have converted to Orthodoxy and Catholicism who have been richly blessed and find themselves joyful and at rest. Such converts are not tradition-maxxers.
The tradition-maxxers are those for whom religious striving is neurotic and egoistic. The tradition-maxxer experiences the tradition as a mountain to climb. The tradition becomes an arena for distinction, similar in function to educational credentials, fitness, wealth, or cultural sophistication. The tradition becomes an accomplishment that differentiates me from the masses. The religious quest is no longer about formation but status: What does this say about me compared to others?
But such a pursuit will eventually bear its darker fruit. Egoistic superiority. Scornful apologetics. Out-group hostility. Burnout. Or, as Robinson describes, post-conversion desolation.
But let me also mention a more benign personality trait that can fuel tradition-maxxing, one less about pride than a certain kind of nerdiness or romanticism. This is where I, myself, can be prone to tradition-maxxing. It’s a tendency that explains why so many Tolkien nerds are tempted by tradition-maxxing.
Specifically, some people simply love disappearing into a world, delving into obscure subjects, collecting arcane knowledge, and inhabiting richly textured universes. There is a romantic longing that gets satisfied by esoteric passions. Orthodoxy and Catholicism appeal to this longing, given their rich symbolism, historical depth, intellectual sophistication, and high beauty. Here is a world of saints, councils, liturgies, icons, monastic rules, ancient languages, theological distinctions, feast days, and centuries of accumulated wisdom. It is a world that is endlessly fascinating.
And it’s a fascination that powerfully appeals to romantic and fantasy-prone imaginations. Instead of simply going to church you imagine yourself praying the Hours in a monastery, reading the Fathers by candlelight, making pilgrimages, keeping rigorous fasts, and escaping the thinness and superficiality of modern life and low-brow evangelical culture. To be clear, there is nothing wrong with these longings. The desire for God is holy. But the danger with this sort of tradition-maxxing is that the fantasy, a sort of monastic cosplay, becomes more compelling than the reality. The imagined world becomes more captivating than the ordinary church filled with ordinary people.
After the initial excitement of a conversion fades, or when the fantasy meets reality, one discovers that the “long obedience in the same direction” is stubbornly mundane. No amount of tradition-maxxing can escape the boring and ordinary nature of Christian faithfulness, the quiet, undramatic work of becoming like Christ alongside a group of broken people. Day after day and year after year. And yet, it’s precisely there, in the midst of the ordinary, if we have the eyes to see it, where God encounters us with gifts of peace and joy.
I would think that the move towards Orthodoxy, or these old world traditions has to also, for some, be about running away from this very self-centered, materialistic, and fast moving impersonal society we find ourselves in. I find myself getting a lot more nostalgic than I would have thought I would be, comparing "back then" to now. I feel old now, in this way. On my recent trip to Italy, walking through Rome and the winding cobble stones along the coastal towns,.. and walking through medieval towns in Croatia, I was able to imagine myself in a different world, one where years and centuries were spent trying to reach the greatest human potential in the churches, the buildings, and the art. Instead, today is so much about spending time creating what brings immediate pleasures, immediate profit. So much garbage surrounds me daily. The Maxxing on Me era. There was a weight to the old beauty, the detailed longevity. For many of us, even those that are not nerds, this escape is tempting. I find myself spending a lot more time in nature, and in that, there is a bit of paganism. My worship is best done there, away from the bustle and in what is natural.
I appreciate the warnings and I think you make a great point, but “the thinness and superficiality of modern life and low-brow evangelical culture” is exactly why Christianity is so irrelevant to so many, and why teachers like Richard Rohr are so popular these days, because truth is also intuitively felt and I find myself looking toward the likes of Origen and Orthodoxy to bring an intuitive mysticism into things. I’ve well and truly left Pentecost and am quite conservative theologically after deconstruction/reconstruction, finding a home in a good local evangelical church ( Brisbane, Australia) but it’s teaching is so culturally mainstream and somewhat surfacy and my character is immensely curious ( somewhat neurodivergent methinks) that I need to swim and explore in those deeper historical waters, especially to counter what I feel are the dangers of the progressive drift. I can be open to some commonalities of perennial wisdom traditions with Christianity, I certainly understand their appeal as I’ve explored that world significantly, but firmly believe in the need to be grounded on the centrality of Christ and the Cross. This is where I find myself looking toward Eastern Orthodoxy et al. That overlap with the eastern mystical traditions and the development of the Western faith is something the early church had with the likes of the desert fathers, and interestingly, the Nestorians were helpful in aiding Buddhism enter China. For me, this makes Eastern Orthodoxy worth exploring with such ideas as hopeful Universalism and genuine ecumenical dialogue, though honestly, too much ritual leaves me cold. I view the faith as being very primitive indeed and would like to see it display itself even in our evangelical churches as more in a casual love feast / house church familiarity. Perhaps as Christendom continues to collapse and the post Christian world increases, the Church that rises from the ashes will reflect that original simplicity, with a heritage of a grounded theology with many of the cobwebs removed so we can display the unity Jesus prayed for. The post Christian world may be ultimately a good thing for Christianity. The Jesus movement certainly had that freshness, Gen Z or later might find it again.