Welcome to St. Ephrem Harp of the Spirit Oriental Orthodox Mission

Welcome to our Church!

We celebrate the Holy Qurbana (also translated Holy Qurbono)
of the Divine Liturgy of St. James of Jerusalem
according to the Syriac Malankara Rite of the Orthodox Church of India,
founded by the Apostle Thomas.

We hope your visit with us brings you the grace and peace of Our Savior Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit ~

If this is a first visit, you will have many questions about what we believe and why we worship as we do. We hope to share our Christian faith in a dialog of fellowship and understanding.

Worship in the Oriental Orthodox Church:
“Eucharist makes the Church”

As the Church Fathers bear witness, Eucharist makes the Church. Our faithful worship with one of Christianity’s seminal, most ancient, and some say most beautiful rites: the Liturgy of St. James of Jerusalem. This Syriac rite is wonderfully poetic, deeply biblical and very semitic. It’s really a lovesong — indeed "the Song of Songs" of Christianity’s major rites of worship.

The service is chanted in English, though its sprinkled throughout with blessings in Greek and praises in the Aramaic dialect of Syriac. The beauty of the Lord, which the Apostles saw in the Lord’s Transfiguration on Mt Tabor, shines through the liturgy like sunbreaks in our Pacific Northwest.


What we see and hear in the Liturgy:
first 2 paragraphs adapted from SOR at Catholic University
Most evident throughout the Syriac liturgy is its biblical background. The liturgy springs from the same semitic soil as the Old and New Testaments. The ‘saints’ of the Old Testament —Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; Moses, David and Nathan; and the three youths in the fiery furnace — are as familiar to us as the Apostles of the New Testament: all are witnesses to the mystery of Christ, "ever ancient, ever new."

A sense of awe and wonder pervades the Oriental Divine Liturgy, recollected in Isaiah’s vision of the Lord. With the angels we sing, "Holy! Holy! Holy!" Our praise redounds in doxologies throughout the liturgy, elevating the faithful into the Holy Mysteries.

Fervent, deeply biblical, and joyfully theological, our devotion to the Holy Mother of God embodies our faith, and expresses our faith in the Incarnate Word, Christ the icon of the invisible God. (Col 1.15)

Drawn across the sanctuary in the Oriental Church there is a Great Veil. This curtain symbolizes "the Great Veil in the Temple of Jerusalem" that was torn asunder (mk 15.38. And as well the curtain represents the veil of Moses on Sinai, and back to the very "Veil of Paradise" – all renewed and transformed through the Spirit of Pentecost. Thus the sanctuary itself is sacramentally venerated as the Holy of Holies.

The liturgical prayer of Christ in the Church "opens the doors" to Heaven, and so the Altar Veil is opened to show us that the Spirit overshadows us and Christ tabernacles among us. The whole Mystery of Christ, from the creation of the world to the Second Coming of Christ, is unveiled in the very origin of the Gospel Word:
"And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory,
glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth." (Jn 1.14)
And this very Gospel, this very Mystery of Christ, is embodied in the beauty and glory of the Eucharistic Liturgy, the Holy Qurbana.


Pentecost continues in the liturgy and life of the Church:

The outpouring and "overshadowing" of the Spirit upon the Body of Christ continues and grows across history. The Advocate animates and manifests the promise of Christ that the Lord is "Emmanuel, God always with us." And this promise abides in truth and love.

This animating Spirit in the Church is a work of power and authority – exousia – radiating from the original Pentecost Event. And from the Parousia of the Second Coming of the Lord in Glory, the Church's liturgy encounters the Lord just as the disciples did in "the breaking of the bread" on the Road to Emmaus (Lk 24). Now the faithful sacramentally participate in the mystical unveiling of the New Jerusalem. The veiling and unveiling of the Holy Place and the Holy Gifts on the Altar serves the veiling and unveiling of the Bride of Christ (Eph 5). Thus the Woman in the Church shares the Mysteries of the New Eve (Rev 12). Here we behold the reason and the mystery, why we veil and unveil the Altar, the Gifts, and most of all, our very selves: we are infinitely beloved and betrothed, we are icons of the Church.


A Note on History and Liturgical Development:

Of course, just as all the rites of the Church's eucharistic liturgies find their origin in "the breaking of the bread" of the Jerusalem Community (Acts 2.42) — and as all the rites undergo both an organic development within the patrimony of the Apostolic Sees, and various cross-seedings of cultures — we cannot define one rite as the sole originating rite of all the others. We do locate that origin, nevertheless, in the Mother Church of Jerusalem and her semitic soil and soul, blessed in the synergy of the Spirit and the Apostolic Tradition. And we profess with joy that the Angelic Choirs sing the Heavenly Liturgy as the "spirit and soul" of all liturgy.

"Liturgy" generally means the common work of the people, from the Greek "laos" (people) and "ergon" (work). But Christian liturgy is first of all Divine Liturgy: the work of Christ, God the Son present and acting through the Spirit in all the members of His Body, the Church. Thus the Divine Liturgy is the Heavenly Liturgy of all the Angels and Saints — but most of all the work of the Son who offers Himself to the Father and to us.


The living Gospel in the Spirit in the Church:

The whole story of Christ is the living Gospel encountered in the Body of Christ. The Spirit gives life to the Body of Christ, the Church. "Eucharistic liturgy makes the Church," and therein we experience the power and beauty of Christ Himself and all the love that He offers: it’s the Spirit that gives Life.

We offer in our worship, ever ancient and ever new:
the Living Lord — "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and forever."