Day 17 - Lutherans Don't Sit in the Front Row

Empty front row - very Lutheran.

I went to church today at a Brazilian Lutheran Church.  A few people spoke English, but the service was in Portuguese.  I was able to converse with a number of people.  It was mainly the older members who spoke English, which I thought was interesting.  It was a multi-national service, as we had people from Germany, the US (me) and all parts of Brazil.  And one thing I found out about Lutherans the world over - they don't like to sit in the first pew.

The church itself is small, we had about 15 last week, and maybe 30 this week.  I was told that it is one of two Lutheran churches in Niteroi, a city of 600,000 people.  The other Lutheran church is affiliated with the Missouri Synod.  This one is affiliated with the ELCA.  All the music was played by the pastor on her guitar.  Their hymnal is a tiny little book with thin pages that contains the entire Bible, the hymns, the settings and the catechism.  The hymns only had words - there were no notes.  That was ok though - I had a hard enough time reading Portuguese and trying to pronounce the words correctly.  Following the melody was easy in comparison.

The pastor at the pulpit.

Of course I didn't understand the sermon, so I didn't feel too bad about my mind wandering.  I got the gist of it, which was that God is our Father.  It was an appropriate topic since its Father's Day here in Brazil.  When we got to the Nicene creed, I followed along in English.  If you think remembering the new creed is hard, trying remembering it when everyone else is speaking a different language!  The Lord's Prayer was easier.  I have lots of practice saying the older one when people are using the newer one.  So I followed along, and the prayer had the same cadence in Portuguese, which was really cool.


It was a communion Sunday - which they once a month.  It was a very different experience.  This church is very progressive because they let children take communion.  It's a hot topic, one which was part of a talk we got last week after church.  There were slides and everything.  Anyway, in this church, everyone takes communion at the same time.  We went up to the alter and stood in a circle around it.  Then the bread gets passed around in a small bowl.  The person passing you the bowl says, "The body of Christ given for you."  (Though of course they say it in Portuguese.)  Then you take the bowl and a piece of bread (whole wheat) and pass it to the next person.  Then the pastor comes around with a common cup.  Or if you wanted grape juice, you could grab a double shot of that from the altar.  When we were done, we all held hands and prayed together before going back to our seats.  It was a much more intimate experience than what I'm used to, and definitely less of a personal one.  It was the kind of thing I would have expected at a youth retreat.

Communion. The woman in the wheelchair is receiving the host (bread) from the woman on her left holding the bowl of bread.  The girl to her right is holding grape juice.

After communion, the kids who had been in Sunday school until communion, told us what they had learned in Sunday school.  I was unsure if this was a common occurrence or not.  Since it was Father's Day, it may not have been.  Last week there were no kids because everyone was on winter break.  I was told that normally Sunday school is before church, but it was the end of winter break so no one got up early enough to do Sunday school before church.  Time is a very fluid thing here in Brazil.  The only part that I understood from their lesson was that they made their own grape juice.  You can't see it in the picture because the red headed boy is holding the cup with two hands.

After church it was time for coffee - and these cookies that are pure sugar.  I was told they're made like marshmallows.  The woman who made them was 82 years old.  She spoke English rather well and was telling me how she's struggling to learn the computer.  She said speaking German or English is easy because she's been doing it all her life, but learning how to use the computer is hard.  Everyone stood around drinking coffee and eating cookies.  The coffee in Brazil is very strong, and you drink it in tiny little teacups, like what you would see in a little girl's play tea set.  In fact my daughter has cups the right size for Brazilian coffee. :)  They also aren't ashamed to add sugar to it.  One of their sugar packets probably contains what would be in 2 or 3 of ours.

The guy taking pictures is a pastor from Germany who had been a pastor in the south of Brazil and he and his wife were in town visiting friends.   The lady in the green coat in the first picture was my translator.  She sat next to me during the service and kept up a running commentary on what was going on.  Last Sunday when we met she asked where I was from.  I told her Virginia.  She said, "Oh I'm going there in October to visit friends!"  I asked her where in Virginia, and she told me Charlottesville.  I told her, "That's where I work!"  It really is a small world.