Coptic Communities?

dzheremi

Glory be to God!

The Lord has blessed me abundantly and it looks like I will likely be moving to Albuquerque, NM later in the year to continue my education. I have never been to Albuquerque specifically, only passed through en route to other places. So I searched for a Coptic church in the city on the Southern U.S. diocese website and found instead a "Coptic community" in Albuquerque, St. Pishoy Coptic Orthodox Church.

I understand that these communities are something less than churches, as there are also states that have both communities and churches (Louisiana has 1 church and 2 communities, for instance). But what exactly is a community? Is it just a group of Copts who don't have a specific church to worship in? I am curious, because the information on the website for St. Pishoy says "Services usually held every 2 weeks". I wonder if it's a specific place every time, or if you have to constantly call someone to find out, or...

Are any of you here on Tasbeha members of such a community, or have you visited/worshiped in one? I just want to know what to expect ahead of time, so that I'm not just wandering around Albuquerque, hassling anyone who looks Egyptian for information...  :P

Thank you in advance for any help or encouragement. I am very excited at the idea of having Coptic Orthodox anything in my general area, after going so long without. Community, church, Bible study...it is all wonderful!

jydeacon

Yes, as far as my knowledge goes that's what a community means in that sense. There is group of Copts in that area but they don't have a church or a serving priest for that community. Most likely a priest from near by states or the priest who has been assigned by HG Bishop Youssef will go there on a Saturday to hold the liturgy every two weeks, in a church being rented out or possibly someone's house, unless there is something specific he must do for his own church. I wouldn't use the word less per se, since a church is defined as a group of believers who gather for service. They probably don't have their own building and priest yet like I mentioned earlier.

Hope this helps a little bit, hopefully someone on here can give you something more concrete. 

God Bless

PopeKyrillos

yeah, i agree with jydeacon. The only thing is, I doubt its a house. Its probably going to be a church rented out.

PK

Viv

We had 2 communities in 2 cities next to ours.One of them just got a priest recently. They had their own church building, but they didn't have a priest, so our priest would visit them one week, and a priest from another city would visit them the next week. The other community is still a community; they use a Ukrainian orthodox church for their services and our priest visits them every other week. During times of the year like holy week, or christmas or other times where there are a lot of services, HH sends them a priest to spend a week or two with them.

dzheremi

Ah, thank you, everyone. So am I understanding you all correctly that a community would be recognized by the diocese as a full-fledged church only after it gets its own priest? If so, do any of you know the conditions that must be met for this to happen? I'm assuming there is probably some numerical threshold that needs to be reached or exceeded.

This is making me a little bit nervous that I might show up for liturgy and find only one or two families!  ;D (Not that I wouldn't still go, but I would think that such a small community could be an even bigger challenge for the outsider to attempt to become integrated into.)

Viv

[quote author=dzheremi link=topic=11020.msg133428#msg133428 date=1300660259]
Ah, thank you, everyone. So am I understanding you all correctly that a community would be recognized by the diocese as a full-fledged church only after it gets its own priest? If so, do any of you know the conditions that must be met for this to happen? I'm assuming there is probably some numerical threshold that needs to be reached or exceeded.

This is making me a little bit nervous that I might show up for liturgy and find only one or two families!  ;D (Not that I wouldn't still go, but I would think that such a small community could be an even bigger challenge for the outsider to attempt to become integrated into.)


I don't think it's a numerical threshold. The one community next to ours had more families than us. (I think we have 200?). Its just getting the funds together to build a church and support a priest's salary. Not everyone can come up with that kind of money right away, particulairly if its a large immigrant community that still hasn't settled. Or there are only a few families settled.

You'll probably find 20-30 families that use some other orthodox church building and have a priest that comes every other week for services. Why don't you go visit?