I am not sure what the story is, but I have noticed lately that a lot of things are scheduled on Sunday mornings, when I would normally be at church. This isn't just in Boston, it happened in California too. We were somewhat less social in California, so I don't think I noticed it as much, but it still happened sometimes.
This is so frustrating to me, because I can't always skip the event, and I can't always change it around. I've had a 5K race, brunch with my sister-in-law, and now a "welcome party" for the new baby of my husband's new colleagues. We ran the 5K because we had friends in from out-of-town, plus we were leaving on a trip that day (so I probably wouldn't have gone to church anyway; we were done with the 5K long before church would have been over!). We moved brunch to lunch, so it would start after church was finished. But this welcome party... I could theoretically not go, but these are my husband's new colleagues, and a new baby, so I want to be congenial. I am not thrilled about it, though. It starts at 11 AM, so it's definitely too early for me to even almost be done with church.
In my hometown, churchgoing is an important event, so unless you are scheduling things with people whom you KNOW don't go to church, you don't schedule anything until after noon on Sunday. Heck, my sister's conservative Christian private school didn't even give homework on Wednesdays, because they expected that everyone would be at church on Wednesday nights (okay, I admit, I think this is going TOO far).
If this keeps happening, I am going to have to be more forceful about saying no. It really is frustrating for me to try to keep this balance of going to church regularly and maintaining my relationships with others.
Thursday, August 09, 2007
Friday, August 03, 2007
East Coast/West Coast differences
Now that I've been to three different churches here on the East Coast, I have noticed a few differences between these services and the ones at the two churches I used to frequent back West.
1) They really do morning services here- this is the service that happens before Badarak. One of my churches didn't do morning service AT ALL, and the other did it kind of quietly, and finished and had a pause before they went into Badarak.
2) At the beginning of the Badarak, the priest walks around the sanctuary with the little cross handkerchief for everyone to kiss. I had no idea what this was the first time I saw it.
3) Way more English. All the sermons are in English. I think that is because in the particular areas where I have gone to church, there aren't very many new immigrants. Maybe there are some who are my mom's age and came over in the late 1960s, but I am not sure if there are any people like my friend out in California, who came over from Baghdad three years ago. I know that there are a lot of Armenians who have come to the US from Armenia and other former Soviet republics, but I don't think they are settling in Boston. I know the Nashville Armenian community has a number of these new immigrants, as does Glendale. Even when I was teaching my undergrads, the Armenian students I had, who were 18, 19 years old, were mostly born overseas and came over to the US as children. The use of English is a welcome difference for me, since I barely speak any Armenian at all.
1) They really do morning services here- this is the service that happens before Badarak. One of my churches didn't do morning service AT ALL, and the other did it kind of quietly, and finished and had a pause before they went into Badarak.
2) At the beginning of the Badarak, the priest walks around the sanctuary with the little cross handkerchief for everyone to kiss. I had no idea what this was the first time I saw it.
3) Way more English. All the sermons are in English. I think that is because in the particular areas where I have gone to church, there aren't very many new immigrants. Maybe there are some who are my mom's age and came over in the late 1960s, but I am not sure if there are any people like my friend out in California, who came over from Baghdad three years ago. I know that there are a lot of Armenians who have come to the US from Armenia and other former Soviet republics, but I don't think they are settling in Boston. I know the Nashville Armenian community has a number of these new immigrants, as does Glendale. Even when I was teaching my undergrads, the Armenian students I had, who were 18, 19 years old, were mostly born overseas and came over to the US as children. The use of English is a welcome difference for me, since I barely speak any Armenian at all.
Wednesday, August 01, 2007
About Me
I started a new blog about eating in Boston, so I am changing my "About Me" to make it more generic. However, I think that the "about me" that I currently have is really informative for this blog, so I want to save it for posterity.
About Me
I am a half-Armenian woman in her late 20s who, although baptized and chrismated into the Armenian Apostolic Church as an infant, grew up in a town without an Armenian Church. As an adult, I have recently started attending Armenian Church regularly. This blog is about my experiences as a rather late newcomer of sorts to my Mother Church.
About Me
I am a half-Armenian woman in her late 20s who, although baptized and chrismated into the Armenian Apostolic Church as an infant, grew up in a town without an Armenian Church. As an adult, I have recently started attending Armenian Church regularly. This blog is about my experiences as a rather late newcomer of sorts to my Mother Church.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
