Above is the interior of Orthodox Church in Surakarta, which is the first Orthodox Church in Indonesia founded by Father Daniel in 1996.
The Priest in charge there now, Father Alexis, is a good friend of a Theravada Buddhist Monk, Bhante Pannavaro. Father Alexis always gives speech in a Theravada Temple every year in Vesak Celebration. He is quite knowledgeable in understanding of other religions, like Hinduism and Buddhism, as well as the traditional Javanese religion such as Kejawen. Sometimes people from Kejawen come to the church for friendly talk, to learn from each other, to deepen understanding about their differences and their similarity. They work together when it comes to learning and spreading about culture and traditional arts.
In Orthodox Church, this is the formation of your fingers when you're going to cross your fingers.
The index finger means the one and only God. The thumb means within God there is Word of God. The middle finger means that within God there is Spirit of God. By The Word of God people can learn about God, can learn truth and understand God. The Spirit of God shows that God is existent and that's what gives lives to people, it's the Might of God.
The ring finger and the pinkie means that God descended as Jesus, The Word of God comes into embodiment and becomes alive through Jesus Christ. The ring finger means Jesus is God in His true essence. The pinkie means He, despite is certainly God, is also a human. He was born to the world to show people that God truly understands people's suffering, understands how difficult it is for us to keep living and we tend to choose sins. He, however, has shown us that we can always defeat desire and eventually choose the way of God, choose the will of The Spirit.
Orthodox Church will celebrate Christmas on 7th January, in accordance with the orthodox calendar (ancient Gregorian calendar).
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