From: jfurr@vtssi.vt.EDU (Joel Furr)
Newsgroups: alt.appalachian
Subject: from the alt.appalachian archive (Old Regular Baptists)
Date: 25 Aug 92 18:20:03 GMT
Organization: The Ohio State University Department of Computer and Information Science

Subject: Old Regular Baptists
From: burke@tss.com (Jim Burke)
Organization: Teknekron Software Systems. Inc.

My mother and grandmother belonged to the Old Regular Baptist church. In their
case, it was the Dorton Creek church in Dorton, KY (Pike County). My great-
grandfather, on my father's side, was an Old Regular Baptist  preacher.  While
I'm not a very religeous person, I have always found the Old Regular Baptists
to be a facinating religeon.  I'd like to  describe them and solicit comments
relative to other Appalachian churches or religions.

First of all, the ORB's are a rather strict church in terms of the lifestyle
they advocate.  They discourage women from cutting their hair or wearing
makeup or "men's" clothing (i.e. slacks) or immodest clothing. The denounce
the usual things like adultery, etc. which is pretty standard for the Baptists
in general.  It is the way the ORB's administer their churches and how they
conduct their church services that I find most interesting.

The first thing that would strike a visitor to an Old Regular Baptist "meet-
ing" would be the fact that no musical instruments are used.  Singing is lead
by one of the preachers, who sit behind the pulpit at the front of the church. 
The preacher leading a song will call out a few words of the song and then the
congregation will sing that part of the song.  The singing is not to a modern
tune, but is done more as a "chant" but with the voice inflections of singing. 
It is difficult to describe if you  haven't heard it.  Another thing that a
visitor would notice is that church members sit at the front of the church
surrounding the pulpit.  The men sit on one side of the pulpit and the women
sit on the other side. They do not sit together.  Visitors and non-members sit
in pews in front of the pulpit similar to most other churches.  At a typical
meeting, there with be three or four songs sung at the start.  As people are
still walking into the church one of the preachers will start a song.  As
church  members enter, they will usually walk around and shake hands with
every person present. There is a lot of hand shaking.  After the singing, one
of the preachers (the order is never pre-arranged) will get up and preach. 
The preaching style is very forcefull.  They believe that the preacher's words
are a result of being "moved by the spirit" and they do not prepare a sermon
or read from a text.  As the preacher begins to be "moved", he will often cup
his hand over one ear and rock back and  forth as he preaches with great force
and emotion.  The preaching sometimes sounds rather similar to the singing
except for the greater energy level.  After he is done, another preacher will
get up and preach.  At some point, one of the preachers will lead the congre-
gation in prayer whereupon the members will kneel at their pews to pray with
him.  Others usually bow their heads to pray.  During the preaching, many
times one or more of the women members will be "moved by the spirit" and will
begin "shouting". Shouting is a highly emotional expression of praise to God
and is often accompanied by waving of the hands, jumping up and down, and on
rare occassions, running down the aisle.  This kind of thing is probably what
gave rise to the term "holy rollers".  

An offering is never collected at an Old Regular Baptist church service.
Members will usually leave what ever money they can give to the church on the
pulpit at the end of the service.  Since nobody receives payment (even the
pastor, called the "moderator"), the only need for money is to pay the
electric bills and to maintain the church and grounds or to help somebody in
need.  Money is considered somewhat dirty and is never  requested.  People are
expected to do what ever God "puts on their heart".

Occassionally someone will have an ailment and they will ask one of the
preachers to "try on me".  They will describe their problem and the preacher
will lay his hands on the person and pray, sometimes silently and sometimes
not, to heal the person of their affliction.  There is never a "healing"
service or a big charade surrounding this.

The thing that strikes me the most about the Old Regular Baptists is their
sincerity.  This is one church that is not about money.  They ask people to
"get right with God" in the privacy of their own home or where ever and then
to present themselves to the church for baptism and membership.  Oh,  and
baptism is another difference between the ORB's and other Baptists.  The ORB's
only baptize out doors in a natural body of water, never in a baptistry inside
the church.  They scorn the idea of being baptized in "a bathtub" as they
would view it.

Anyway, I would be interested in hearing of other Appalachian churches, or
more about the Old Regular Baptists from other.  I'll post later about other
aspects of Appalachian culture.  Best wishes.