[Matajic]

Dear Angelos: you are delving into rather tried and tired territory here (which I do not mean as a personal affront; simply as recognition that this is where such conversations almost always lead) - namely, taking the question of whether and why God allows heresy to survive/thrive, and transforming it into a much more generic question on whether people outside the Church can do good things. Of course they can; of course people in the Church are sinners. These are distractions from the true question. The true question is whether heresy itself, as a category and way of existing, can in any sense be seen as something that God purposefully allows to persist in order to benefit Christians; and here there is no possibility of that being answered 'yes' in any way that is consonant with patristic thought. It is simply inconceivable that God would intentionally employ darkness to foster light - He 'in whom there is no darkness at all'. You mustn't try to make your point by in fact side-stepping it all together into something which may emotionally resonate, but which doesn't in any way address the theological question.

As to the cultural question: I know of no sociological study in the world that would identify any culture as more secular than the USA. England may be, spiritually, a far more apathetic culture, and America a far more spiritually exuberant one; and both are heavily secular. But between the two, America is secularised to a complete different level.

INXC, Fr Irenei