Coming Home: Reflection on Attending Emmanuel Episcopal Church
By John B. Amos
I’ve spent all but four years of my life in Orange, and I love the town. Betsy and I raised our three children there. But my roots–my real roots–are in Rapidan.
I deep connection to Rapidan include:
- My great grandparents lived in the two-story schoolhouse just up the hill from the bridge, next to my Aunt Lavie Faulconer’s house.
- My great grandfather worked on the original construction of the Rapidan Dam in 1910.
- For several decades before the little historic schoolhouse/library was fixed up, it served as my great grandfather’s tool shed.
- My Aunt Gertrude’s maiden name was Hughes. Her brother, Royce ran the store right across the street from where we’re now sitting.
- My father was part of the last class to attend Mitchell’s school. He often thumbed a ride back to Rapidan after baseball practice.
- My parents’ first home was a converted milking barn they rented on the Bresee farm behind the Rapidan Milling Company, which by the way, employed most of my aunts and uncles.
- I grew up attending Lower Rapidan Baptist Church, where the Rev. Floyd Binns served as a sort of circuit preacher together with Crooked Run and Cedar Run Baptist churches.
- One of my favorite possessions is the “Historic Rapidan” cap that Amy Payette gave me for speaking at a Foundation meeting.
- And finally, I’m pretty sure if I get in my car with no particular place to go, it will drive itself to Rapidan.
The place has a hold on me and always has.
So when Betsy and I started attending Emmanuel a couple of years ago, it really did feel like coming home. Every time I make the six-mile drive from Orange, I remember all those times I rode with my parents or grandparents from Orange to the little brown stone Baptist church just across the way. Every time I come down the hill and pass Waddlell’s as I approach the mill, I remember family gatherings for September birthdays at my Aunt Lavie’s house. Every time I cross the bridge, I think back to the floods of the 1990’s and all the stories my dad told me of similar floods from his childhood.
And every Sunday I walk into Emmanuel, I think about the full circle I’ve come, from Baptist to Episcopalian: from no creed to creed; from no formal liturgy to the beauty of the Prayer Book; from 45-minute sermons to 8-minute homilies; from communion once a month—as an almost afterthought—to the centrality of the Holy Eucharist each week. From grape juice to wine. From Rapidan back to Rapidan.
It seems very much as though I’m ending right back where I began, the same person but changed, different, and a more mature Christian, I hope.
Betsy and I have been involved deeply in three churches over the course of our married life: Burtonsville Baptist in Burtonsville, Maryland, when we first got married; Orange Baptist on Main Street in Orange for close to 20 years and St. Thomas Episcopal for another almost 20. Attending Emmanuel is the most at home I’ve ever felt in church. And I know the same is true for Betsy. The people are real. Their faith is palpable. The service is formal without being stiff. People wear jeans and shorts. The desire to reach out to those in need, to help the “least of these” plays a central role in the life of the church and was apparent from the first Sunday we attended. The care for each other and for the wider world shows. Jesus calls us the salt of the earth and the light of the world, and that makes most sense to me when I’m in Emmanuel Church.
I’ll wind this up with a comment about the frescoes above the altar in the sanctuary, painted by Megan Marlatt. I’m grateful to whoever was on the vestry when they made the decision to commission that artwork. The pictures capture the church perfectly. I meditate on them at some point during every service.
Together, they tell the history of the church in flood times. My favorite is the one on the far left that looks like a womb. The church, surrounded by floodwaters, is safe in the womb of God. But wombs not only protect, they birth new life into the world. That painting reminds me that Emmanuel is constantly being reborn, day after day and year after year. I’m glad to be a part of this latest incarnation.
Amen.
