This weeks' podcast features my prayer partner, Ina O'Dell, talking about her recent trip to Rome and her search for evidence of the earliest Christians there. She is a dynamite researcher, and before the trip had put together her own tour-guide booklet. Did you know that in Rome the Liturgy was offered in Greek until the 4th century? Listen in at: _http://audio.ancientfaith.com/frederica/ina1_pc.mp3_ (http://audio.ancientfaith.com/frederica/ina1_pc.mp3) or dial 857-488-4644 to listen to it as a "phonecast". Second half next week. This is the first of a two-parter. Ina is the wife of our deacon Mark, and so she is called Shmassey Ina; Shmassey is the title of a deacon's wife, as Khouria is the title of a priest's wife. Its one of those things that there is just no equivalent for in English. As American Orthodoxy keeps putting down roots, there still seem to be some terms that just can't be expressed in English, like "Theotokos" or "nous" in Greek. It's the same case here; Western Christianity just doesn't have a title for the wife of an ordained man. In Roman Catholicism they didn't have wives, of course, and Protestantism doesn't accord the pastor's wife the same sort of affectionate-motherly-spiritual-leadership role she has in Orthodoxy. So, though it was automatic to call priests "Father", it wasn't clear what to call "Mother." Thus every Orthodox ethnicity retains its own term, and in a Greek church I'm called "Presbytera," in a Russian church I'm "Matushka," in a Romanian church "Preotesa," in a Ukrainian one "Pani Matka," and on through a half-dozen other options. Since Holy Cross is an Antiochian church, our titles are the Arabic ones, Khouria and Shmassey. A Protestant woman who's done a lot of writing about her faith told me once that she had visited a convent where the predominant language was Russian. She was alone in the church looking around when a nun came in and seemed rather concerned about her being there. the nun didn't speak English, but pointed at the woman and asked "Orthodox?" The woman said, "No, Presbyterian." At that, she told me, the nun's whole demeanor changed; she beamed and became very friendly, and took her by the hand and led her to look at each of the icons in turn. This lady asked me, "Why was that? Do Russian Orthodox nuns have a particular love for Presbyterians?" After I got through laughing, I told her what the nun must have thought she'd said; she thought she was a "Presbytera".
******** Frederica Mathewes-Green www.frederica.com **************Start the year off right. Easy ways to stay in shape. http://body.aol.com/fitness/winter-exercise?NCID=aolcmp00300000002489
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