Project Home

Western Places to Visit

Eastern Places to Visit

Cornerstone Christian Center
Woodbridge, Virginia

by Anthony Santistevan

My first encounter was to the Western religion of Christianity. To be more specific it was to a Protestant Christian church. The name of the church is Cornerstone Christian Center. This is a non-denomination church. As a Roman Catholic, I had never seen worship such as theirs. I never even once thought of ever stepping outside of my Catholic boundaries to attend another religion's "mass". Let me tell you about this amazing experience.

First of all a am a Roman Catholic and have been tightly wrapped around the Catholic faith ever since I could understand its teachings. The Catholic Church's mass is much different from that of a Protestant Christian's. The Catholic mass is more focused on the hour of Jesus' death. The Catholic Church is very strict on things like genuflecting, confession, and many other rituals that we do. A typical Catholic mass usually lasts anywhere from 1 hour to 1 ½ hours. During our communion process we, now, only receive the body of Christ (the bread) not the blood (the wine). Only the priest takes in the blood of Christ during the mass. A typical Catholic Church is filled with statues of the Virgin Mary, Joseph, Saints, Jesus, and many crucifixes. The first part of the mass is usually in the form of listening to readings from the Bible and the second half is focused more around receiving communion. From what I've learned, the point of all this is to prepare us as Catholics, our minds, our bodies, and our hearts to receive the body of Christ. An entire life of never stepping foot into another church is why I was so shocked with my experience at the Christian church.

Week's prior to the visit, I made arrangements so that I would be going to the Christian church with one of my mom's close friends. The morning of the visit, my girlfriend and I made the short journey to the Cornerstone Christian Center. We met my mom's friend in the parking lot and we all began to walk to the doors of the church. The outside of the church was shaped sort of like a dome making it look like an arena of some sort. We all walked in and stood in the foyer of the church. In the distance we could hear beautiful Christian music being sung. We were about 15 minutes early and my mom's friend, Sandy, began to explain some of the things that go on during a Christian mass. She, herself, hadn't been to church in months so this was a visit to get her back into the thick of things. She said that there was going to be a lot of dancing, singing, and clapping. My girlfriend (who is also Catholic) looked at me with nervousness. I too became nervous at the very fact of stepping foot into the church of a different religion. Then Sandy said something that completely shocked both my girlfriend and I. Sandy said to expect people to speak in tongues, meaning people shouting out in different languages other than their own. We didn't believe this and began to enter the worship area. I first noticed that there wasn't any pews like in a Catholic church, instead there were just chairs. There were also no figures or statues of anything religious what so ever. This meant that it was non-denominational. In the front were a podium, a big keyboard, and a big pull-down screen. Then the service began.

I was now really nervous. I didn't know if I had to participate or if it was ok to just observe. The service began with singing and dancing and everyone was doing it. The words of the songs were projected onto the screen so everyone could sing, no excuses. So I did. The people were spinning and clapping and really seemed to be filled with such joy. My girlfriend just starred at me holding my hand the whole time, she was very shocked and nervous. I gave a look of ok and she too felt better and began to dance and sing. We must have sang for a good 40 minutes before we were told to sit down. At this point it was time for some bible readings. Everyone pulled out their bibles including myself and began to read along with the pastor, Pastor John Reid. He read scriptures and the preached, and his preaching seemed to be so powerful that it seemed that he was talking to you and only you. Then a miraculous event happened, as the pastor continued preaching a woman stood up and began to shout in a language that I had never hear of, she was speaking in tongues! The even sent chills throughout my body leaving both my girlfriend and I with our mouths hanging open. After the reading it was time for communion. During this time bread and wine were passed out to everyone, something that I wasn't used to at all. Towards the end of the service the pastor asked for people to come up to the podium to be absolved of their sins. This was the most truly shocking part. We as Catholics are used to sitting individually with the priest while confessing our sins, behind a closed door. The Christians just go up in front of everyone, kneel down momentarily and then are absolved by the pastor, all at one time. This was very different. The service lasted well over two hours and was ended with more singing. We all walked back to our cars and told Sandy that it indeed was a wonderful and learning experience and then left.

As a final thought, I came to realize that even though Catholics and Christians are somewhat similar religions as far as what they believe, they are very different on how the practice their faiths. My girlfriend and both left with a new perspective on religion and religions in fact. We were both very glad to have visited this Christian church and were very honored to have acquired this newfound knowledge. This was an amazing experience and only hope that my second visit to an Eastern religion is as fulfilling. 

Return to top