St Nicholas, Wallsend
Categories: life
Date: 27 May 2012 08:08:54
One visit, and I think I may have found my home parish up here: St Nicholas, Wallsend, a parish in the Australian and New Zealand Diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church outside Russia. Very welcoming, both priest and parishioners, nearby [35 mins or so: still thinking in sprawling Sydney terms!] to me now and most likely where I will look at moving to, and there was lunch after the service: and pavlova! How could I do better? :) There was also a memorial service offered after the Divine Liturgy for loved departed family/friends which is always a blessing to be part of: praying for unknown brothers and sisters in Christ is always a blessing to be reminded of all those in God's Church, known and unknown, and of our duty to love all -- even after death.
There are services every fortnight, as the priest also serves a farther south down towards Sydney in the city of Gosford on the other weekends. One of the parishioners, the son of the parish's first priest, gave me a wonderful history of his life and the life of the parish, of which you can read on their website and which I will share in the coming weeks/months. For now, the church itself was mainly built by the parishioners from 1962 to 1964, with occasional work by tradesmen [and they were men back then...] as needed.
The services are bilingual, Church Slavonic and English, and they have Matins on Saturday evening as well as the Divine Liturgy on Sundays. The priest said his wife, who leads the choir for Matins, is always looking for people to help read and I said I was happy to read, but I would not inflict my chanting on anyone. Different in chanting styles compared to my parish in Sydney, where Byzantine chanting was normal, but Russian Chant is very beautiful and perhaps more 'easy' on the western-ear; but I love both.
Different in language also as at Sts Michael and Gabriel English was used around 90%+ of the time with the occasional Greek or Arabic. But I think I should pick up Church Slavonic in time: there is a lot of repetition in Orthodox services, and the services are generally the same [with some minor differences between the various jurisdictions] which makes it easier to follow. Even today I only had a small bit of confusion; mainly I knew by the actions of the priest and deacon and hearing some words of Church Slavonic ["Glory"; "Lord have mercy..."] I have heard previously where we were in the Divine Liturgy.
Thanks be to God that this looks like a good home parish for me. I look forward to getting to know the parish better and worshipping with the community of St Nicholas.