In the world


I was fortunate to see many different faces of Orthodoxy.

In the Finnish town Kuopio I met a local young woman who showed me the frescos made by a Japanese Orthodox iconographer (I forgot the name). The unusual combinations of colours were typically Japanese, they looked striking together with the very Byzantine lines and shapes but the mixture somehow worked. The woman herself stunned me with a description of the workshops organized by her church: the participants were carving their own gravestones. I had read about such an ascetic practice of the monks but it was one thing to read and another – to see the real person very enthusiastically speaking about it.

I went to Turkey, first to Constantinople where Orthodoxy is still present despite the current reality. I experienced it in the Church of Agia Sophia where I was pushed and nearly struck by the security for my attempt to cross myself before the heavenly beautiful mosaic depicting Jesus Christ. The church itself was experienced as an embodiment of Orthodoxy, organic and breathing, magnificent and warm at the same time, and very personal. I also saw the Christian quarters of Fener, some of them burnt down, some to be burnt down, and the residence of the Ecumenical Patriarch where I attended the Liturgy.
After Constantinople was Cappadocia, the land of the great Cappadocian Fathers whose icons I painted sometime before then. Catacombs, frescos, mostly of laconic earthly colours, hermits’ cells in an autumn landscape of cold sky, dry brown grass with patches of snow, and sheep scattered on the hills.

The Cappadocian caves, strangely enough, have something in common with the spirit of old Scottish (Celtic, or speaking otherwise, Orthodox) churches and the latter, in turn – with those of Novgorod (an old northern town in Russia). Perhaps it is the severity of the landscapes and the way in which the architects approached their materials that connects them. The cave churches, the Celtic triangular churches, and the Novgorod white churches, with their cupolas the colour of iron all looked incredibly convincing, as they were molded in their landscapes.

I also attended the very English church in London where Metropolitan Anthony of Surozh was serving. I got much help from his writings while my first years in the Australian town in nowhere so it was very significant for me, even although the Metropolitan was no longer alive.


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