The Greek Orthodox Church

6:30am came very early this morning.  I was exhausted and didn't want to get out of bed, but forced myself because I knew I wanted to experience church here at least once.  Got ready to go and met the other girls downstairs by 7:20am.  A girl on our program, Rachel, invited us to go with her.  She's Greek and therefore Orthodox, and is also a theology major, so she was our little tour guide for the day and was gracious enough to explain to us what was going on and the reasons behind everything.

As usual, attempting to take the bus anywhere was quite the experience.  We ended up going to a different church than we wanted to because we missed our stop, changed buses to try and go back, then got on the wrong bus, but it was okay.  We attended service at St. Dimitrios here in Thessaloniki, and it was very different than any other church I've ever been to, to say the least.  The outside of the building was beautiful, but the inside was something else.  Wooden chairs with rich, red velvet seat cushions, silver and gold candelabras everywhere, ancient religious relics everywhere, lots of candles, a huge floor to ceiling and wall to wall painting taking up the entire back wall, marble columns and arches making up the walkways; it was truly extraordinary.

I'm not sure of any official names of any of the people or things we did, so bear with me.  Also, because the service was held in Greek, I'm not entirely sure of what was going on.  We got there at 8am, but the service hadn't quite started yet.  Rachel guided us to buy a few candles, and light them for ourselves and others we wanted to lift up.  While we sat down, she went around to all of the icons and kissed their pictures.  She explained to us that they don't worship the icons (although it very much seemed that way), but they use them for inspiration and as a way to communicate to God.  She also said they kissed their pictures, on either the hands or the feet, to show respect.  Throughout the entire service, there was a group of men singing;  I believe they were called "chanters".  There was a lot of sitting down and standing back up, and everyone would make the cross on their hearts after nearly everything that was said.  There was a group of men and boys in white robes carrying large gold crosses and bibles that paraded through the church multiple times.  At one point, the head priest stood up and delivered a message.  Rachel informed us that someone had recently passed away, probably in the past four days, so there was a short death ceremony held just before communion was taken.  A few more songs and prayers finished the service, ending about two and a half hours later.

Taking the bus back was a fiasco, yet again.  We weren't sure where to get off, and ended up riding it to both opposite ends of the city.  Another 2 hour adventure.  By the time we got home, I was starving and exhausted, and could barely keep my eyes open long enough to finish my leftover pizza before taking a nap.  Woke up around 3:30pm to catch up on blogging and attempt to start my paper I have due on Friday.  I rewarded myself with little breaks to read a chapter or two in my book.  I want to finish it because I want to know what happens, but also because I want to make sure to have it done before I have to give the Kindle back!

A few observations about church this morning (I hope this doesn't offend anyone):

-I already knew that the dress code for churches in Europe was very strict, and this was reinforced in Corfu when we weren't allowed to tour the church because we had on shorts and tanks.  Today, we were told to wear dresses that were at the very least knee length, nothing too low cut, and to have our shoulders covered.  Someone asked if we could wear pants, and Rachel said that they would need to be extremely nice dress pants.  Since we're tourists and visitors, open-toed shoes would suffice.  When we got there, there were locals in shorts, in tanks and strapless tops, open-toed shoes, and in pants.  It's not that I had a problem dressing this way, it was just confusing to me.  But I would rather be dressed too nice than not nice enough.

-We were also informed that we couldn't take pictures of the church because that was disrespectful, but some people were taking pictures all throughout the ceremony.  Right after we left, a tour group came in and was taking a bunch of pictures.  I was a little disappointed because it was so beautiful and I don't have any pictures to remember it by.

-There were two gift shops inside the church where you can purchase candles, pictures of icons, keychains, jewelry, etc.  Definitely not used to that.  Also, this seems a little more disrespectful than some other things we supposedly weren't allowed to do, but maybe that's just me.

-I understand that kissing the icons is just a part of their routine, and I respect that, but I can't imagine that to be sanitary.

-When they took communion, people lined up to drink from the same cup (again, can't be healthy) up front, and then took bread from large silver bowls lining the sides of the church.  I found it amusing that most people took at least three pieces of bread; one to eat now and some to stick in your purse for later.

-The non-stop chanting got old very quickly, and to be honest was a little creepy.


Got to Skype with my family and my puppy today, which always makes makes my day and gets me through the week :)

Last week of school and last week here in Greece starts tomorrow!  Crazy how time flies.