Saint Peter the Aleut Orthdox Church
Abita Springs, Louisiana
Russian Orthodox Autonomous Church (ROAC)
Want to meet?
Would you like to meet with me for a one-on-one discussion prior to coming to our church? I would love to meet you and talk over a cup of coffee.
About Our Parish
We are Orthodox, but not Jewish
We are members of the Russian Orthodox Autonomous Church. Our mother Church in Russia consists mainly of Orthodox Christian Russians that had been secret Christians during the era of Soviet rule. Today, our brothers and sisters in Russia are still persecuted by the Russian government for adhering to the pre-Soviet Russian Orthodox faith.
You may wonder why we, as mostly Americans, would want to be members of the Russian Church. Russia had been a Christian nation long before America was even discovered by Europeans. This is the major reason why we chose to receive our faith from our mother Church in Russia. The essence of Christianity is humility; we humble ourselves by receiving our faith from people who have been maintaining it for a thousand years and most recently under the most grave threat of persecution.
The word orthodox means that which is established; already accepted. This is a description of our Christianity— we seek to accept the Christian faith as it was delivered to the Apostles once and for all. We wish to add nothing to the original ancient faith, nor to we wish to take anything away from it either.
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Currently, we are worshiping in a building behind the Rector's home. This is a small but suitable location until we can raise enough funds to transition to a commercial location.
We face many challenges as a mission parish trying to establish ourselves, but with God's inspiration and our perspiration we are bringing the original Christian faith to the people of our area. We want you to come and be a part of our humble mission and help us build our parish into a thriving center of God's love and compassion for all around us. You can see our Parish Bylaws here.
We are Catholic, but not Roman
The word catholic means universal. This means that the faith and practice we maintain is universal. It is universal in two ways: 1) The spatial dimension—It is what Christians believe everywhere around the world. The Orthodox Christian faith exists everywhere. 2) The temporal dimension—Our faith is what Christians have believed in and practiced throughout the two thousand of the Church’s existence. Anything that has been added to the Faith we reject. This would include many things that are accepted in Roman Catholicism that were not present in ancient Christianity (e.g., papal infallibility, the immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary, Purgatory, the universal jurisdiction of the Pope, etc.)
We are not non-denominational, we are pre-denominational
The Orthodox Church is not a denomination of Christianity— it is Christianity. We have been maintaining our faith and doctrine long before the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century. Today there are over 20,000 different Protestant denominations all claiming that they have “discovered” or “reformed” the Church. Our Lord, Jesus Christ, promised us that His Church would be led into ALL truth (John 16:13) by the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost and the Gates of Hell (Hades) would not prevail against His Church until He returns (Matt. 16:18). Therefore, if Christ is not a liar, then His Church can never have disappeared nor could it have anything but the truth. This Church of Christ’s is not something that will form in the future nor does it need a human being to “reform” it. The path for Christians has been established; Christ has founded His Church, and it is only whether we choose to follow His commandments or not.
We are evangelical, but not Protestant
Orthodoxy strives to be obedient to Christ’s commission to “Go therefore and make dsiciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matt. 28:19). We want to share our faith with the world, and within our communities. We present the original faith, rather than an opposite reaction to another tradition. The Orthodox Church is neither Roman Catholic nor is it Protestant.
Our parish is looking for people who want to live and believe the same Christian faith that our early Christian brothers and sisters had. We are not interested in building an empire, we only want to say our prayers together and work out our salvation in fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12).
