Home || Ministries & Organizations || Our History || Calendar ||
Contact Us || Donations
HJ Clergy Corner: August 2007
DIG BENEATH THE SURFACE AND YOUR’E SURE TO FIND THE TRUTH!
Fr. Michael Pappas
Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church
San Francisco, California
Far before computers and the Internet, as we know and use them, came into fashion, sixties pop-philosopher Marshall McLuhan, coined the
phrase the “global village.” Not until meeting author Janey Bennett, did I truly appreciate the implications of that phrase.
Shortly after reading a 2003 Op Ed I’d submitted to the local Stockton, California, daily, The Record, opposing the war in Iraq, Janey
telephoned me. She was a perfect stranger who shared her time between Bellingham, Washington, and Hornby Island British Columbia. As I
remember, we spent less time discussing the editorial than we did the book she was writing, The Pale Surface of Things.
As the book takes place on the island of Crete and one of its chief characters is a Greek-American priest, educated at Holy Cross seminary
in Brookline (she had no idea I’d gone to Holy Cross, myself), Janey wanted to get her facts straight and thought I might be just the right
person to answer a few questions. Those few questions led to what has blossomed into a wonderful four-year on-line friendship that culminated
in our meeting in person for the first time just last month, during her recent trip to San Francisco.
In the course of passionately marking up manuscripts and scribbling thoughts in margins, I began to fall in love with the book’s characters,
scenic landscapes, gripping plots and subplots. To quote the author, “Archaeology, goats and dogs, honor, ethics, lies and betrayals are part
and parcel of all that happens when two cultures abrade.”
This book is truly a page-turner, the constant collision of two plots. At the outset we meet the awful, bumbling Douglas Watkins. When this
young American archaeologist runs from his impending marriage and a secure future and finds himself in the traditional world of a Cretan
village, he is forced to confront the feelings he’s avoided all his life: rage, fear, envy and shame; all this as he becomes the central
pawn in a vicious family vendetta.
Then we are introduced to Fr. Dimitrios that sharp Greek American priest, raised in, of all places, Daly City, California. To understand his
role, we are reminded that during World War II, that particular Cretan village suffered terrible reprisals at the hands of the Nazis. Dear
Father Dimitrios, the present day priest is the grandson of the priest at that time. His ministry has called him back to Papou’s village to
restore the Church’s tattered iconography, a metaphor for the more profound work he endeavors -- to heal the deep wounds remaining from the
war. Love, loyalty, power and death all pass through the days of the story as it unfolds across the face of western Crete. Cretan enthusiasts
will not be disappointed.
Hot-off-the-press, this book has already received accolades from Metropolitan Sotirios of Toronto, and authors Eleni Gage and Harry Mark
Petrakis. Janey will be giving a reading at the prestigious Book Store West Portal in San Francisco, on Wednesday, October 3rd at 7:00pm.
For more information please visit www.PaleSurfaceOfThings.com.
Fr. Michael Index
|
