1. The Russian Orthodox Church Outside
Russia (also called the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, and various acronyms),
is a semi-autonomous part of the Russian Orthodox Church formed after the
Russian Revolution of 1917. It separated from the main Russian Orthodox Church
in 1927, though the two groups agreed to restore "canonical
communion" in 2007. The Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russian has
historically considered itself as an insepareable part of the Russian Church
which was autonomous temporarily due to the domination of the Soviet government
over Church affairs.
2. All the Eastern Orthodox churches
are "autocephalous," which means that all of them are in full
communion, but each group is independent in its decisions. In some ways, the
different Orthodox Churches tend to function like denominations do in the Protestant
church, but there are more similarities among Orthodox churches than there are
between, say, an Episcopal church and a Calvary Chapel church.
3. "Church Slavonic" is the
primary language used in worship, although the local language is also used by
individual congregations. The church has parishes in 43 countries; most are in
the United States, but there are churches and communities on every continent
except Antarctica.
4. A number of traditions were
unfamiliar to me: standing during almost all of the divine liturgy service (for
those who are able to stand -- chairs were available and used by those who
weren't able to stand for the two-hour service); headcoverings for women (at the
service we attended some women wore hats, some wore lace kerchiefs, some wore long
rectangular scarves tied or draped, and a few didn't cover their heads); bowing
and periodically touching the floor during worship; purchasing and lighting
candles near icons located throughout the worship space; kissing icons (some
"what to wear at a Russian Orthodox Church" websites discouraged the
wearing of lipstick because the marks left after kissing the icon are difficult
to remove).
-- Mindy
No comments:
Post a Comment