Cathedral

This afternoon I took an over two-hour nap. Well-deserved, I might add! The kids and I started out the day at 8:30, for choir practice, at the church. (Zac doesn't sing in the choir, but he has to come with Hibi and me when it's time for choir to practice...and it didn't hurt that he was doing his altar-boying early, either.) We crammed, as in the last-minute study for a test that goes on in college, trying to brush up on the music that we didn't have nearly long enough to prepare for. Then, at a few minutes before 10 am, we went outside to await the cathedral-making.

Today our church became a cathedral. What does that mean? Well, traditionally, a cathedral is a parish that is the seat of the local bishop. We have no bishop in Portland, so it's more of an honorary title. And yet, it does denote that Holy Trinity has not only been around for 100 years, and is not only the oldest Greek Orthodox parish in the Pacific Northwest, but it has accomplished much in it's time, enough to be worthy of cathedral status. I think it's also a call to do more that's worthy of cathedral status. Our program that we started up last week, Cusina, is indicative of this.

The Orthros service, the church service before the church service, was conducted outside today, in a covered tent. Then, at the conclusion of Orthros (also called Matins, perhaps a more familiar term to western Christians) a procession was made from the tent to the front doors of the church. We had a traditional "door-opening", usually done at the consecration of a new church building.

We went on to have a beautiful service, complete with all the hierarchical elements. The choir did a bang-up job, even though we had only about two months to prepare for this, whereas when we did the centennial, we started special rehearsals 5 months before.

I had to check what time it was as I walked out of the church and into the hall for brunch, because Magpie Ima contends that she can "show me" long services! Her family is Jewish and also knows long services. But I am well acquainted with long, and we made pretty good time today for all that. It was 1:07 when I checked the time.

We then went on to have a delicious brunch, and then the unveiling of the new but temporary sign, wherein Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church has the "Church" part covered with a "Cathedral" sign. :-)

And then I drove my children home and crawled immediately into bed, at 3 in the afternoon, and after being on my feet from 8:30 to about 1:30. Ah, what a lovely nap!