NEW YORK – Pascha 2015 is a bittersweet time for the Greek-American community. Judging from the brisk business of the food stores and restaurant reservations, they are starting to feel affluent again, but in Greece, their loved ones are more anxious than ever.
Fr. Nektarios Papazafiropoulos, Dean of St. Demetrios Cathedral in Astoria, was in the midst of the transition from last week’s bustle of school activities to the spiritual calm of Holy Week. He noted there were large crowds on Palm Sunday and senses an intensification of the spiritual lives of his parishioners.
It is not known whether the Greek crisis has made them more pensive, but Fr. Nektarios said “we must pray for them and God will strengthen them and help them overcome this crisis, as they have done in the past…We must all support Greece,” including by purchasing its products.
New Yorkers appear to have followed his lead.
Kostas Mastoras, owner of Titan Foods told TNH “This year Pascha sales are very strong.” He expects to set records this year and he is proud to present the new Titan. “We have completely renovated and it is a new store. All the display cases come from Greece,” he said, helping the economy there. “We offer cooked food, sweets and food supplies, including a new line of products from Mount Athos called Evlogia. There is honey, olives, even soap. They are authentic and original products.”
He congratulated TNH on its 100th anniversary. Every year for Christmas and Easter Titan orders 1000 copies of the paper and makes them a gift to appreciative customers.
Bill Tentolouris, owner of Mediterranean Foods I and II, told TNH “We have a number of new brands of olive oil now that there are more exports from Greece.”
He said the stores are offering many new products, such as prepared octopus and seafood for salads, a number of new brands of pasta and specialty olives.
Mediterranean III will open in May in the building the company just bought on 23rd Avenue. “It will be a big, modern store for the community, which we thank very much for supporting us through the years.
Vasilios Papavgeris, owner of the Plaza Meat Market in Astoria has seen brisk sales of lambs, goats, pork and all the ingredients for magiritsa soup, kokoretsi, and other specialties.
PASCHA CELEBRATION OPTIONS
Across most of the America Holy Saturday and Sunday Agape service congregations will have a choice of Pascha meals at their parishes, at home or in restaurants.
Make reservations early the communities restaurateurs told TNH.
Kyma restaurant in Roslyn, NY owned by Reno Christo, originally from Cyprus, opened around Easter two year ago will again celebrate with lamb roasting on spits and festive music. Traditional Pascha specialties are offered on Saturday after midnight, which will also be offered on as an addendum to their regular menu.
Residents and passersby in Midtown Manhattan will be greeted with the aroma and vision of roasting lamb on spits in the courtyard of Avra restaurant. “It will be a big feast, with live music by Olympia and dancing beginning at noon on Easter Sunday,” said general manager Arturo Cortes.
The large parish of St. Demetrios of Merrick, NY will be marking Holy Week in a huge tent of church grounds. Fr. Nikiforos Fakinos said the sanctuary, which was heavily damaged by a fire, will be ready by Labor Day. They will serve traditional magiritsa and meze with sweets after the Divine Liturgy on Holy Saturday.
There were record crowds for Palm Sunday at the Cathedral of Sts. Constantine and Helen in downtown Brooklyn, where Fr. John Lardas said his congregation is growing as young couples move in from Manhattan.
He looks forward to all the Holy Week services, especially the Good Friday procession through downtown Brooklyn when the his parish’s kouvouklion – the flowered bier of Christ -meets that of St. Nicholas Antiochian Cathedral when the Lamentations will be sung in Greek, English and Arabic.
The Church of the Annunciation on New York’s Upper West Side will have outdoor processions on Good Friday and Holy Saturday. The popular Good Friday fakes-lentil soup meal will be repeated, and on Holy Saturday they serve a lamb dinner with all the trimmings. Every parish loves its choice and chanters but Fr. Gilbert sang the praises of the Annunciations chief chanter Christos Stavropoulos.
Fr. Stamatios Sfikas, whose roots are in Chios, was just appointed Dean Annunciation Cathedral in Chicago, so he is looking forward to his first Holy Week experience there, and noted that on Good Friday there will be an outdoor procession for the first time in recent memory.
The parish will have opportunities to establish new traditions as there has been an influx of young professional and their families.
Orthodox Pascha has been celebrated in the Deep South since the mid nineteenth century in New Orleans, so Greek-style Easter in not new to them. Fr. Alexander Papagikos, pastor of Sts. Constantine and Helen in Fayetteville, NC loves the peaceful character of Holy Week there, although he does hope to revive the practice of Pascha feasts on church grounds. The parish is also Holy Week home for Orthodox military personnel at nearby Fort Bragg.
In the Reading, PA community of Sts. Constantine and Helen, a community widely praised – not least of which by Metropolitan Savvas of Pittsburgh – for its conspicuous absence of parish infighting, led by the steady hand of Fr. Tom Pappalas and assisted by 50-year-plus veteran Clergyman Fr. Spyridon Papademetriou, the congregation prepares not only for the Resurrection, but also for a contribution to the rebuilding of the St. Nicholas Church at Ground Zero. A special Benefit Concert will take place at Reading Area Community College’s Miller Center for the Arts on April 26, featuring Pianist Maria Asteriadou and Violinist Kurt Nikkamen.
Lower Midtown Manhattan, not far from Ground Zero, will witness a Good Friday procession by the parish of St. John the Baptist led by Very. Rev. Vasilios Bassakyros. The parish will offer a traditional meal to all – avgolemono soup, salad, lamb with potatoes, cheese pies, tsoureki, and wine, but not after the Resurrection service, but following “the Triumphant Divine Liturgy.”
“When they stay for the Liturgy and receive Holy Communion,” Fr. Bassakyros said, they receive the Light of the Resurrection, the eternal light, within themselves,” not just externally in the physical lamps of those who leave early. He noted that those physical lamps are reminders that “we are reflections of the eternal light of God that is within us, and if we stay for the liturgy, that is what we experience.”
The post Community Prepares for Pascha appeared first on The National Herald.