Enter, stage right, a man in a black robe with a gold vestment ...

As Lauren mentioned, the Orthodox service was pretty sparse, people-wise. We drove up to the old Lewisburg Grange Hall, a beautiful old building with wood paneling and heavy, creaky wood floors. It was a perfect setting for the seemingly frozen-in-time service that we were to experience. As soon as we entered the hall, this wonderful old woman named A greeted us. I think she was about to adopt us, she was so excited. We all (4 of us) chatted a bit, then we went up the stairs into the service (chapel?) room, which was a big, open, dimly-lit room with lots of candles and gold and red icons. My immediate thought was I love the decor. Followed by why are all these nice old women kissing things? I'll return to the kissing in a moment. We found out the priest (father?) was going to be 15 minutes late, so we went downstairs with A, who explained a bunch about Orthodoxy to us. The central point was that Orthodoxy is the "true" church (like I haven't heard that before!) but particularly that it has retained the true liturgy while everyone else, starting with the Catholics, have forsaken all of that. The liturgy, I guess, is part of their epic 6-hour weekly ritual that starts Saturday evening (which we attended) and continues Sunday morning. I'm not sure exactly what distinguishes the liturgy from the rest of it, but I can say that the 2+ hours we attended were virtually just the same things over and over. But I get ahead of myself. When we were downstairs with A, she showed us icons (again, I thought about how nice they would look in my living room). Finally, Father B arrived and our lady A joyously welcomed him; he was wearing a long black robe and said he'd spent the day "tubing" with the Orthodox kids. I wondered if he'd worn that black robe all day.

So the ceremony started. Father B came out in his black robe, but now with a gold robe over it, kind of Star Trek leader-like, with a big neck thing and a weird hat. He ritualistically blessed every icon, then every thing in the church, including my scarf, lying over on a bench (thank you). We were told that Orthodox people like to stand and do they ever: we didn't sit for the next two hours. Father B had a strong voice and would call out, quickly and magically, singing to the Lord. I thought that our presence was entirely superfluous at this ceremony: we were just watching this guy with OCD have a long ritual with his God. I mean, it was bizarre. And the singers (four of them?) sang along, sometimes repeating what the Father had said, sometimes just singing. And we would stand ... I kept looking at the old ladies in front of us, one of whom came up and told us, after about an hour, "that was Vespers and now is time for Psalms, and then we'll have [something else] and then we're done!" and I was thinking, Jesus, you must have thighs of steel. Because I was getting shin-splints from standing in one place for so long. Every once in a while, Father B would walk around the room and bless everything again, and we'd all slowly turn, always facing him as he made his way. Then he'd disappear behind the wall of icons at the front of the room, dim the lights, and change into another outfit. Gold, then black, then a different hat, then he'd reappear and start sing-chanting again, kissing icons, swinging his giant incense ball around. This is not a religion that favors interaction, it was more like we were the audience at a play and this guy got to do all the fun stuff. Another guy got to read every once in a while, and then the singers got to sing, but Lauren and I and the old ladies just stood around, feeling vaguely nauseated from all the incense smoke. Or that's just me. After about an hour and a half, I was truly excited to get to bow every once in a while, if only to relieve the building pain in my back from standing up.

Then the other congregants (all 5) went up to kiss some book and get blessed or something, but Lauren and I hung back. So this old lady looked at us and motioned for us to go up, which we did, very hesitantly. I went up to the Bible and just kind of bowed to it, as I felt that we weren't on kissing terms yet. Then I cupped my hands before the priest as I'd seen others do, and he put his hand in mine and I knew I was supposed to kiss it, but I felt uncomfortable, so I kind of made a kissing noise to the air and then moved away quickly.

Lauren and I left after 2 hours and 15 minutes, with "only about 20 minutes left" in the ceremony. And we were, of course, invited to the next day's service (9 to 12, followed by a potluck). I felt a little guilty because I know that this church is trying to establish itself in the U.S. and all that, but I think they need to change with the times a bit. Only old ladies with strong thighs and close relations with God can stand the service of the Orthodox.