Hello all *waves*.
I am Kyrie, literally that name - my parents are a little odd
They told me they named me for the prayer, Kyrie eleison, but I got the first word of it as a name because Kyrie-Eleison as a name was too much of a mouthful for a child. I still sign myself Kyrie-Eleison a lot though, Kyrie on its own seems a strange name to give myself.
I've had an interest in Orthodoxy for years, that has sat bubbling at the back burner of my mind while my world has been turned upside down, right side up and upside down again repeatedly. Post-Traumatic stress, panic attacks, depression, a nervous breakdown and chronic fatigue syndrome later, I've ended up craving that which has been on my mind for the past six years.
I've been lurking the forums for the past few months, and I figured I'd state that I'm an inquirer, but a very nervous one because in Australia it seems that the orthodox community is very closed and culturally segregated, and it's hard to get past that if you have none of the backgrounds that Orthodox congregations usually are made up of here! I am German, Scottish, English, Swedish and Cornish... none of it useful
I first discovered Orthodoxy through my school's religion class. Fairly liberal Lutheran, our year level was divided up one day and sent on excursions (field trips) to different denominations churches in the area to look and ask questions, and fill out an assignment on it. Fairly run of the mill stuff, and to a 13 year old who had just started high school it wasn't particularly interesting, I've been raised in the church but attended (even if just visiting) most denominations at one point or another. But my group got sent to the Greek Orthodox church near the school, and there was something different about that church. We walked in and the teachers had asked whether we girls needed to cover our heads or anything, and been told no it's not necessary - but as I walked in I felt compelled to regardless, and took the scarf from around my neck and covered my hair. The smile the priest gave me that day has remained in my memory forever. There was something different about this church, something holy and I wanted to reverence it.
We asked the question, and had a brief summary of Orthodox worship from the priest, and then were allowed to walk around and look at the icons - beautiful ones, painted by a Greek iconographer, on the walls and the ceiling, larger than life. The church's patron saint is St Spyridon, but they also have a wall icon of St Kyriaki, which my classmates commented on - hey Kyrie, this is your saint. We left, did the assignment and went on with our lives. But I havent been able to get that church or the saint out of my mind.
Which brings us to 2007. I'm not quite sure what sparked it all again, but I've somehow ended up reading an awful lot of information on Orthodoxy, and listening to Ancient Faith radio online after hearing someone, somewhere talk about it. A couple months later, I'm more and more interested, and wanting to join in, somehow, in what you all seem to have that I feel I'm missing. I was baptised as an older child (about ten) in a Uniting Church - a mix of Wesleyan, Methodist, Congregationalist and Presbyterian churches, which has been a good church to me - the pastors I have had have had theology that bordered more on orthodoxy than the doctrine of the main church! But the last few years I've felt that that was right, but it was only part of something that must happen. And its reading about this that I think I've found the something else.
This is the hard part. My parents will support me regardless of what I do, as will my fiance (who is starting to read everything on the early church he gets his hands on), but the congregations (is that what you call them?) anywhere near me seem to have sporadic english services, and the rest in the ethnic language. I have a very minor grasp of Greek (very very little) and none of the others... so this makes things hard. I also don't have a car, don't drive, and neither does my fiance. The church that I attended on that day with school is accessible by a bus (without being too far away) but the others are far beyond my reach, and it's hard to try to find out anything about a parish when they seem to be closed community of migrants and their children, all speaking Greek/Russian/whatever.
We did think about attending one of them a while ago, because Troy (my fiance) offered to go with me, but when we rang up to inquire we got the basic details and that the next english service wasn't for a fortnight, and the impression that they werent really interested in us. I don't know if that's a reflection on the parish as a whole, but it made me nervous to try anything else. They said that they had a Greek service that Sunday and that we could come if we wanted to, but we chickened out - it was all just too foreign for two young, protestant raised people to jump into feet-first!
So I dont know what to do. I've been a liturgy junkie for the last few years, reading varing liturgical denominations liturgy and marveling at the beauty and reverence of it, and taking part in things like the reading and prayers for candles during advent (which I loved, it brought the Christmas season back to Christ rather than the hype) but coming in as nineteen and twenty three year old kids with noone that we know attending is just scary!
So that's me. Nice to meet you all, and any advice is very very welcome!
...there's not anyone who lives in Adelaide, South Australia here is there?
