St Mary Orthodox Church

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Christ is in our midst! He is and shall be!
Welcome to our home on the web. Protection Church (also known as "St. Mary Orthodox Church") is an Orthodox Christian parish in Fairfax County, Virginia, dedicated to the use of English in all of our worship services. We are a congregation in the Romanian Orthodox Episcopate of America (ROEA), an Archdiocese of the Orthodox Church in America (OCA), which received its canonical independence (autocephaly) from the Patriarchate of Moscow in 1970. Our hierarch is His Eminence Archbishop Nathaniel (Popp), who resides at the Episcopate headquarters (affectionately known as the Vatra--Romanian for "hearth") in Grass Lake, Michigan.
Our parishioners are a diverse, hospitable, downright friendly bunch, drawn from many religious, ethnic, and professional backgrounds. For example, about one-fourth of our adult membership has Romanian ancestry; roughly 35% run the gamut of other historic Orthodox homelands or ancestries (Greek, Russian, Arab, Ukrainian, Eritrean, etc.); and nearly 40% are converts from other faith groups or religions. We revel in the multi-ethnic, pan-Orthodox flavor of our community!
As a result of our unusual composition, but, more importantly, in harmony with the Divine Commission of our Lord as revealed in the New Testament gospels, we have adopted evangelism (martyria) and service (diakonia) as our special missions to northern Virginia and environs. We exist as an Orthodox community to witness on behalf of the life in Christ, and to serve the spiritual and material needs of the local community in which the Lord has planted us.
We are truly thankful and praise God the Holy Trinity for all the blessings that He has bestowed upon us in the twenty years of our existence as a parish community. We are, all of us, walking together on our spiritual journey to the Kingdom of God the Father. We are positively excited about the life-changing gospel of Our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ. We are deeply appreciative of the spiritual treasures of Orthodoxy that the Holy Spirit has nurtured and safeguarded throughout the centuries.
We invite you to join this holy campaign to bring the fullness of faith to our friends and neighbors. Please join us for worship and fellowship. If you know someone who may be seeking an English-speaking Orthodox community, please tell him or her about us. All visitors will receive a good ol' southern welcome!