History

Saint Anthony Greek Orthodox Church of Springfield, Illinois was founded in the 1940s by a small group of Greek Orthodox families in the state capital, one of the oldest and most consequential cities in America's heartland. The parish took its name from Saint Anthony the Great, the celebrated third and fourth-century Egyptian monk whose life of prayer, fasting, and spiritual combat in the desert made him the father of Christian monasticism and one of the most revered saints in the Orthodox calendar. But the choice of patron carried a more immediate meaning for the Springfield community: the name honored Anthony Kerasotes, a member of the parish's founding community who served as a physician in the United States Navy and was killed in the Second World War. The Kerasotes family, prominent theater owners whose circuits stretched across the United States, contributed significantly to the construction of the house of worship at 1600 South Glenwood Avenue, which stands as the community's home to this day.

Through the decades since its founding, Saint Anthony has evolved from a congregation composed largely of Greek-American families into one of the most diverse Orthodox Christian parishes in the Midwest. Prayer is offered in six languages at each service, reflecting a congregation that has grown to include Orthodox Christians whose roots trace to Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Americas, drawn to Springfield by the university, state government, and the broader life of the capital city. In recent years the parish has experienced steady growth even as many mainline churches have seen declining attendance, a pattern attributed to the parish's vibrant liturgical life, its deep sense of community, and the universal appeal of a form of Christian worship largely unchanged for more than a thousand years.

Saint Anthony Greek Orthodox Church at 1600 South Glenwood Avenue in Springfield serves the Orthodox Christian faithful of central Illinois as a parish of the Greek Orthodox Metropolis of Chicago within the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, one of the fastest-growing Orthodox communities in the state and a welcoming home for all who seek the ancient faith of the Apostles in the heart of Lincoln's hometown.