Religious group revives itself on campus
The Orthodox Christian Fellowship has returned to campus, seeking to draw in more members than years past.
“This is the first year we’ve had a phenomenal amount of interest and activity in our chapter,” said John Meese, president of OCF.
Meese is a senior majoring in economics and Spanish. After arriving at the university four years ago, he found the chapter of OCF had gone inactive and decided to do something about it.
“I just started connecting with other students on campus who I knew were Orthodox, and we would meet once or twice a month,” Meese said.
Meese grew up in the Orthodox Church and was involved in related groups throughout high school, so when he came to Murfreesboro, he wanted to see the same sort of group at his university. Meese is now the Southeast Representative on the Student Advisory Board of OCF.
OCF has seen a growth in the number of people that come to the meetings, with their biggest meeting consisting of six people a year and a half ago, to Thursday’s meeting, with about 20 people in attendance.
“OCF is not here to compete with the other existing ministries on campus,” said Stefan Johansson, a senior majoring in philosophy. “For this semester, our goal is to find the other Orthodox that are here and bring them in.”
Meetings always open with a prayer, and sometimes there is a guest speaker. This semester, the group each member does a short 5-10 minute presentation on a saint of their choice at each meeting.
The OCF is open to all people interested in Orthodox Christianity.
A new member of the group, Katherine Alverides, former nursing major, says she enjoys the group because it is fun and loud.
“Iʼm trying to find people my own age in the Orthodox culture,” Alverides said.
There are some in the group who are not of the Orthodox faith, who are Protestant and agnostic. Those who are not Orthodox can participate in the group, but cannot serve in leadership positions.
Among the Orthodox members there are inquirers, who are those wishing to learn more about the faith. There are some catechized, which, according to Johansson is “the first official step in becoming Orthodox.” He is being catechized this Sunday at St. Elizabeth Orthodox Christian Church. The process of becoming catechized includes meeting with a priest, and ends in baptism.
The month of October is Orthodox Awareness month. The OCF will have special meetings with prayers in different languages and tables around campus to reach out to the community.
The members of the Orthodox Church maintain themselves as the original Christian Church. After splitting from Rome in 1054, the Orthodox Church rejected the papacy and decided to interpret the doctrine of Christ and the Apostles.
The group meets once a week on Thursday night 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. in Student Union Building 210, and the fourth Thursday of every month this group gathers in room 220 for a potluck, games and fellowship.
This post was updated on Oct. 4 at 3:09 p.m. In accordance with the comment below and an email, we struck the words that caused confusion. Sidelines regrets this error.
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Sinclaire Sparkman | Assistant News Editor
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For more information about the MTSU OCF Chapter, let us know or just drop by any meeting!
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I would like to clarify something that I think got misunderstood.
The Orthodox Church in no way interprets things “on its own terms”, the Church has always followed the path of the Apostles and Fathers (and Mothers) and continues to do so.
The schism with the Roman Church occurred because the Roman Patriarch at the time, Leo IX, was innovating doctrine and claiming universal supremacy over the entire Church and their Patriarchs. Historically, the Church has always had Patriarchs, they were (and still are) based in Jerusalem (Palestine), Antioch (Syria), Alexandria (Egypt), Constantinople (Turkey), Rome (Italy), and other areas eventually as well, but these are most well known. The other Patriarchs at the time of 1054 (which also included Georgia and Bulgaria) felt that Rome was in error, and long story short, this resulted in a schism.
Our Church is not defined by its “rejection of the papacy” nor are we innovators of any doctrine, that would fall on Rome. Anyone who does comparative theology will see that the Orthodox have maintained the pure doctrine through the lineage of the Fathers whereas the Roman Catholic Church has deviated.
The Orthodox Church STILL has Patriarchs (which today also include positions in Russia, Romania, Serbia, Ethiopia, etc…) of which the Roman “Pope” was one of many, but in the Roman Catholic Church today is the only one. We did not form out of a “split from Rome”, Rome was part of the One Holy Catholic (which means fullness) and Apostolic Church professing the Orthodox Faith, up until that point.
other than that, great article, so glad to have the exposure and it was a joy to have this opportunity!
Glory to God for this OCF group!
And yes, even with something struck, ” …and decided to interpret the doctrine of Christ and the Apostles” is a strange description, given that the Orthodox did not change just because the Pope of Rome left. =\
yea we’re submitting a different paragraph to fix that. ^_^