Posted by Mihalis on November 09, 2000 at 11:40:37:
I was wondering how other children of Greek immigrants find the Greek church in various parts of the world. Does the church meet your expectations? Do you feel that it provides you with the spiritual growth that you need? Do you feel that the church reaches out to the young generations or are they too set in their ways? Do you understand the services and traditions?
Personally, I have always loved the church. I find now, however, that compared to my wife's church (Catholic) there is very little education going on. Perhaps this is isolated to my own particular church. Sometimes, I feel as though all this church is about is money and donations. I certainly have no trouble with contributing....but what am I getting from it? Am I receiving the spiritual guidance that I seek? Furthermore, this might have something to do with the language. The services are still mostly in church greek of which I can only understand about half. A further insult occurs in that my wife is not allowed to receive communion in our church (yet they never miss a chance to ask her for a donation). My impression is that the Greek church in Greece is not like that.
Before one of you "holier-than-thou" or "shame-on-you" compatriots of mine get set to flame this message....be aware that I speak Greek exceptionally well and am quite well-versed in most parts of Greek culture. It's ok to sit there and say "ellinismo!" and dangle our heritage in my face, but a man or woman need more than heritage...they need meaningful spiritual lives with God and Jesus Christ. I am concerned that they North American version of our church is rapidly becoming one where I have no place.
I am very interested to hear some of your thoughts on the current situation of our church.