First Visit to an Orthodox Church – Part 1 (Notes)


Frederica Mathewes-Green (source)

1) What’s all this commotion?




i) OLIC comments: Some of this depends on the Church that you visit. Various parishes are more or less “punctual”, and may have more or less movement. Orthodox people are comfortable showing up anywhere during the first half hour or more of the service. Orthodox liturgy on Sunday morning is a seamless transition from the Morning Prayer (Matins) to what is called the Divine Liturgy. If you are not familiar with the structure of the prayer cycles you will have no clue where you are in the services. In fact if you ARE familiar, half the time you won’t know where you are. Our suggestion to newcomers is for a few services don’t try to follow service books unless you have someone beside you who is VERY familiar with what is going on. The changeable hymns, seasonal differences etc. make it impossible to put together a worship book for every service, much like the song service and scripture reading/sermon topic during a protestant worship. It is more important to grasp the “culture of worship” of the early Church before learning the exact structure, words and parts. If you listen carefully to the prayers you will hear scripture. 90% or more of the prayers are straight from scripture. You will hear scripture used in worship in a way you never dreamed.

2) Stand up stand up for Jesus.


i) OLIC comments: One of the scary things about attending an Orthodox worship service is not knowing when to sit, stand or kneel. A rule of thumb is do what the majority of the people seem to be doing. As Frederica says, there is variation in practice so you might see a few people who will stand when everyone else is sitting or kneeling. This is where “personal piety” is a premium in Orthodox worship. We do what we have been taught in worship. Some parishes sit during the hymn about Mary, but some are taught to stand before the “Queen Mother”, the Mother of God (you wouldn’t sit in front of Queen Victoria or even the President’s wife). But again the demon of judging has to be kept in check.

3) In this sign.


i) OLIC comments: The sign of the cross is one of those rome-o-phobia bugaboos for most protestants. You can look at it several ways. One is it is like wearing a cross only you can’t forget it when you “put it on” every time you think of God in Trinity or remember something that touches your heart. We are literally covering ourselves with the cross of Christ and reminding ourselves we are taking it up when we make the sign of the cross. The other thing is in every culture people know how to curse someone with their hands. In the culture of the kingdom of Christ we know how to bless someone with our hands.

4) What? No Kneelers?




OLIC comments: This was one of the things that actually attracts people to Orthodoxy: prostration before God. Sometimes we feel we need to do something other than sit there or stand during a worship service. We read in the Bible about people bowing down to the earth before God and also to those in authority like kings and angels etc. This is indeed one of the things that is hard to get used to doing and you might feel awkward but, hey, if you do it when everyone else is doing it, don�t worry.

 Posted by at 8:07 pm