Cradle and convert Orthodox

  • Fred­er­ica has an essay in this month’s “Sacred His­tory” in which she was asked to write about Ortho­dox church his­tory in Amer­ica. I think this is an excel­lent overview of the state of things right now with regard to eth­nic churches and con­vert churches and the slow process of estab­lish­ing an Amer­i­can Ortho­dox church.

    Deep in the heart of a typ­i­cal Amer­i­can city there is a mag­nif­i­cent old Ortho­dox church. The com­mu­nity housed here was founded about a hun­dred years ago, a gath­er­ing of fam­i­lies who had emi­grated from Greece, Rus­sia, Syria, or some other ethnically-Orthodox land. …
    On the out­skirts of town, in a strip shop­ping mall, there is an Ortho­dox mis­sion. Three years ago this priest was a Protes­tant pas­tor. He was able to do most of his the­o­log­i­cal train­ing by cor­re­spon­dence, while still work­ing in his pre­vi­ous con­gre­ga­tion, and spent just one year in res­i­dence at an Ortho­dox sem­i­nary. On the day of his chris­ma­tion (the ser­vice that makes a per­son a mem­ber of the Ortho­dox church), a cou­ple of dozen mem­bers of that old con­gre­ga­tion came with him. They are enthu­si­as­tic about this new faith, strongly com­mit­ted to each other, and exhil­a­rated by this adven­ture. They will talk to friends and neigh­bors about the excel­lence of Ortho­doxy whether the oth­ers want to lis­ten or not.

    You can read the whole essay here.

    And by the way, for another excel­lent per­spec­tive on the need for both cra­dle and con­vert ele­ments in a church, check out this arti­cle called “House Blend” by Fr. Jon Braun:

    In terms of the Ortho­dox Church and its estab­lish­ment here in North Amer­ica, I believe there is a grow­ing need for what might be called the “Ortho­dox House Blend.” I am talk­ing about a “house blend” in churches, if you will—a mix­ture that accom­mo­dates the many and var­ied back­grounds of peo­ple com­ing into Ortho­dox parishes.


    Related posts:

    1. The Ortho­dox con­vert list
    2. A Vic­to­rian take on the Ortho­dox Church
    3. Becom­ing Ortho­dox by Peter E. Gillquist
    4. Touchy Touch­stone
    5. Cruis­ing: But then again …

    March 31st, 2006 | Grace | 2 Comments |

2 Responses and Counting...

  • Erica 03.31.2006

    You know, some­thing I’ve noticed about my cra­dle friends and me. Almost all of us have a con­ver­sion expe­ri­ence. Some con­ver­sion expe­ri­ences less dra­matic than oth­ers, but it does seem like we recom­mit and almost recon­vert, except it’s just more com­ing home.

  • Grace

    Hey, Ran­dom Red­head! Good to hear from you.

    You know, it didn’t even occur to me that the chil­dren of con­verts would con­sider them­selves cra­dle — duh! Well, I envy you that, because there is some­thing about the peo­ple that have grown up in the church that you can’t acquire as a con­vert. And if you have a con­ver­sion expe­ri­ence on top of that, you’ve really got the best of both worlds.

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