By Ellina Buettner
Baltimore Watchdog Staff Writer
About 600 people adorned in black dresses and suits gathered around St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church in Baltimore on Friday night, holding candles and engaging in half Greek, half English conversations with one another as they followed Father Michael Pastrikos in a procession around Greektown in honor of Jesus’ funeral.
Directly behind him were several parish men holding up the Kouvouklion, a large structure decorated with fresh flowers that housed the Epitaphio, a symbolic fabric with an image of Jesus printed on it. Together, the two pieces represented Christ’s tomb, which at midnight the next day would be considered empty and celebrated all over again in a similar manner but with fireworks and light-colored attire instead.
“Good Friday is about everyone getting together, getting ready to see Christ being hung,” said Marina Protopapas, a member at St. Nicholas’ for 20 years. “It’s like the tradition. Everyone who comes here, their parents have come here [first], and even if it’s an hour drive, they continue coming here because this is a Greek, Greek church.”
While the local Wal-Mart and Dollar General stores have been spending the first week of April selling leftover chocolate bunnies, jellybeans and baskets for a quarter of the price, Baltimore’s Greek community has just begun its series of festivities to celebrate Pascha, or Greek Easter.
Set up in accordance to the Julian calendar—as opposed to the Gregorian calendar that the Roman Catholic Church and most of the Western World follows— Greek Easter is always celebrated on the Sunday that follows the Jewish Passover, which typically falls a week or so after the American Easter.
“It’s the most significant holiday because it’s the sacrifice, the miracle of the resurrection,” said Polyvia Parara, a University of Maryland visiting professor who teaches Greek history and language. “Here [American Easter], it’s just go to the church, sing and that’s it. It’s quieter.”
The Athens native said the holiday is what Christmas is to Americans, and that in Greece, the celebration lasts from the Sunday before Pascha to the Sunday after. Schools and most businesses are closed during the course of these two weeks, and the government shuts down from Holy Thursday to Easter Monday. Aside from that, Parara says the way Pascha is celebrated in Greece is almost identical to that in Baltimore.
“They try to keep the traditions and the culture that they brought from the homeland,” said Nora Kefalas, former president of the Ladies Philoptochos, a philanthropic organization.
According to Kefalas, the commemoration begins with the Lenten season, when Greek Orthodox Christians are encouraged to fast from all foods that contain blood— including meat, fish and dairy—for 50 days prior to Easter Sunday. The objective is to purify themselves before Pascha, and they are allowed to break the fast only on the Day of Annunciation and Palm Sunday.
Although many Greek Orthodox Christians are not devoted to the fast to that extent—most abstain just on Wednesdays and Fridays— there are some who do participate for the full 50 days, including Kefalas and Marina Protopapas’ family. The strictest abstention comes on Good Friday to honor Jesus’ death, when “not even olives or olive oil” is permitted, Parara explained. “Just bread and tomato soup.”
However, almost everyone engages in the fast during all of Holy Week because of its spiritual significance. The church hands out a list of foods to either avoid or eat each day, and members are highly encouraged to stick to it. For example, Holy Thursday consists of a vinegar-based diet because that is what Jesus was given to drink while He was crucified.
“For tomorrow night, after Jesus goes up, you start to eat anything you want,” said George Vonakis, a member of St. Nicholas’ since the 1970s. “The people cook Sunday all day long.”
By Saturday night, after the midnight service with fireworks, members are free from the fast and eager to eat meat again. The tradition is to share a special lamb soup —symbolizing the sacrifice Jesus made on the cross— with family around 1 a.m. in honor of the resurrection. Members also take their candles home that night and use it to burn a cross on the frame above their front doors, which represents the light of Christ dwelling with them.
Then on Sunday, once the 11 a.m. church service ends, families come together again to indulge in a big rotisserie lamb that’s been cooking for hours, along with other cultural dishes including pastitsio, Greek lasagna, and dolmades, stuffed grape leaves. For dessert, there’s tsoureki, a braided sweet bread that represents the Holy Trinity, and red hard-boiled eggs, which symbolize the blood of Jesus. There’s a tradition for family members to gently bump the eggs with one another to see whose will crack first.
“My favorite part is going to church with family, getting together in homes, and just coming together to celebrate the resurrection of Christ,” Nora Kefalas said.
While Pascha is a special time for food and family gatherings, Sofia Vourvoula, a member of St. Nicholas’ since it opened in 1962, instead spends most of the day at the gravesites of her husband and daughter. She was the first person to get married in the church, and she used to sew dresses, along with buttons on men’s suits, by hand.
“I go to the cemetery, and I get carnations and I put them in the cemetery,” Vourvoula said in broken English. “They smell nice. I go to my husband and daughter all by myself. I have to.”
The 85-year-old spoke about living in Baltimore since emigrating from Greece, her grandson’s job working on computers, and her birthday that just passed on March 9. During the liturgy, she cleaned someone’s pair of glasses with a soft cloth she pulled from her black purse and scolded a few women for wearing pants, not missing one sign of the cross in the process.
When it was time to go outside for the procession, she linked arms with the lady next to her and stayed there as she walked Greektown with the rest of her home church members.
“1962,” Vourvoula said. “I know everyone, and everyone knows me.”