It's All Greek to Them

We went because of its dome, an extremely large half a globe, covered in gold. On our way to services in Denver's Temple Emmanuel on a Friday evening, we spotted the dome; it isn't exactly subtle amid the large brick houses of the wealthy neighborhood. Nary another gold covered dome in sight, truth be told.

Inside, there is possibly less subtlety. The dome, inside, is covered with iconographic paintings, anchored, front and center, with a super-sized vision of someone called Theotokis and a baby with exceedingly large and adult-like hands on her lap. Jesus, as you may have guessed, and the Greek Orthodox version of Mary.

Theotokos, to the Greeks, is what Mary is to Roman Catholics, magnified tenfold. Judging by the iconography all above and all around us, she is probably more important than Jesus. Or perhaps it is just this cathedral, named for her: The Cathedral of the Assumption of Theotokos. We had a fair amount of time to browse the ceiling, as everyone was standing when we entered, the sounds of a well-tuned choir filling the domed environment without discrimination. Domes have amazing acoustical value. If I was designing a church, it would definitely be shaped like a dome. It made me think of how insane prophets of old must have felt when the Voice of God came at them out of the wilderness: "That you, God? Where are you?" Sound seemed to emanate from no particular place, yet to fill every place. Ben says it's much the same or maybe better, in India's Taj Mahal. Underlying the choir's melodious murmurings in Greek, I eventually discerned another vein of words, a deep and sonorous voice, chanting also in Greek.

Behind the tall gold pillars that separated what I can only call the "Holy of Holies" from the more public altar area, came clouds of gray and yellow smoke. Gold crosses on the backs of satiny ivory gowns were just about all we could see of the four priests gathered around the inner altar. They chanted and muttered and bowed to the ornately bejewelled and silvered book in front of them, kissing it and each other in a ritual that we in the pews stood silently to observe. To the right of the Holiest sanctum, looking for all the world like a collection of Heckle and Jeckle imitators, a varying collection of black-robed priests huddled, like magpies on a telephone wire. Like magpies, they whispered among themselves, as did the congregation.

The congregation in a Greek Orthodox cathedral apparently has very little to do. The liturgy invites few responses; there is no participatory singing. I suspect that Roman Catholic services were much like this not so very long ago, before the liberalization that pretty much did away with Latin in their churches. After experiencing two religious services within one week which each conducted their observances largely within the bounds of a foreign language, I have to admit I see the point of retaining unfamiliar language. I think the Catholics are pretty much doomedd, since they removed the incomprehensibility of Latin from their services, making the idea of God seem like something common sensical or rational, faith something we can understand and articulate to others and ourselves rather than ineffable, inscrutable, ineluctable. The Greeks still know how to guard the mystery, hence the unarguable nature of their belief. Even Mary pales beside Theotokos. When it comes to God, being distanced is good. How much easier to uphold the Divine Mystery if it is only analyzed and discussed with words that are unintelligible? In the domed church I would create, there would definitely be a foreign language spoken by the priests. Maybe I'd use Laura-Claire's made-up language. No one but Mady and LC and Mariel would understand any of it. Perfect for a religion!