Adam Worley - Church Visit 1

Church name: Holy Transfiguration Orthodox Christian Church
Church address: 28W770 Warrenville Road, Warrenville, IL 60555
Date attended: 10/2/2016
Church category: Orthodox Church

Describe the worship service you attended.  How was it similar to or different from your regular context?

The congregation was incredibly small, no more than thirty people.  The musical liturgy, icons, and incense were geared toward creating an understanding of being in the presence of God and the whole community of believers.  Most of the service was sung, but with only a couple dozen congregants including five choir members, it was not an overwhelming wave of sound.  The largest difference I noticed was the focus of the service.  My churches make the sermon the focus, with music being a bookmarking time for reflection, and communion a few minutes for deep prayer.  In this service, the Eucharist was clearly the focus, facilitated mainly by music, and the homily lasted for a relatively short time and focused on living life more than theology or even morality.  After the service, several different people welcomed us as newcomers, which was very different from at the almost-megachurches I’ve attended for twelve years or more.

How did the worship service illuminate for you the history and contours of global Christianity?

I had previously visited multiple Orthodox churches, so I was not particularly surprised by the service or the existence of this whole side of the faith.  The most surprising element to me was the number of former Protestants at Holy Transfiguration.  The priest and seemingly one member of every married couple grew up in another Christian tradition.  This meant that most of the members of the church were well-versed in their own theology and how it compared to other groups, as opposed to the many people of any tradition who do not truly understand why they practice a particular way.  Much of the service, including liturgy and icons, pointed to early Christian creeds and council decisions or traditional beliefs and associations that have fallen out of typical Protestant awareness, from Trinitarian language to beliefs about Jesus’ human parents.  This was probably one of the least historically/culturally unfamiliar Orthodox churches I could have chosen.

How did the worship service illuminate for you your personal identity as a Christian?

Again, the marginal impact of this service on me was small, since I previously attended an Orthodox church for a few weeks.  The biggest things for me were fairly unrelated to Orthodoxy, but instead to the congregation.  I am used to large groups of believers coming together for singing and a sermon, but here it was a handful gathering for worship, Eucharist, and a fellowship meal.  Community was the main focus, rather than teaching, but there were still several well-versed scholars who I talked with, whose knowledge was not limited to their own tradition.  I think I have unintentionally adopted a belief in a dichotomy between intellectual understanding and proper action, but this church seemed to have both, often residing in the same person.  This was comforting to me, since it showed that real Christians and communities could have the “whole package,” rather than just hope that someone else has the other half covered.