Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page. It is also available as plain text as well as XML.

Converts find otherworldy home Rituals, mystery of local Russian Orthodox church attract Christians BY COREY GARRIOTT THE GAMECOCK Ancient traditions can be found I among us. I One is located past 12th Streel out on Knox Abott Drive. Tucked in a comer behind a tanning salor is St. Elizabeth the New Martyr an outpost of the Russian Orthodox Church outside ol Russia. Several USC students and grad uates, all converts, call it home. “The cycle of services, the cycle of feasts, the sacraments, the saints,” said Michael Allen, a 2001 USC graduate and an early con vert to Orthodox Christianity. “It’s a spiritual, transforming” experi ence, he said. The Rev. Father Mark Mancuso hopes others will agree — the church will open its doors to visi tors during its Easter services this weekend. On the Eastern calen dar, Easter comes a week later this year. The Western world knows Christianity as one of the Protestant denominations or the Catholic Church. But the majority of the East, including Russia, Greece and the Balkans, has pre served its own version of the Christian religion. The Eastern churches, eventu ally called the Orthodox Church, split from the West in 1054 when the pope and the patriarch of Constantinople mutually excom municated one another. The ex communications were not re scinded until the 1960s. “To the outsider, it’s exotic,” Mancuso said. For a generation that has seen its share of countercultures, Orthodoxy remains unexplored territory. It even claims the out side world is an illusion — the frontier of the real world lies just inside its doors. The liturgy is sung, not spoken. Incense burns through the can PHOTO BY COREY GARRIOTT/THE GAMECOCK The sanctuary of St. Elizabeth the New Martyr Russian Orthodox Church outside of Russia L, includes three podiums, which display icons conveying the literal presence of the depicted saint. * At the back is the iconostasis, which separates the room into a symbolic paradise and earth. CD REVIEW Before Braille exceeds bounds “RUMOR” Before Braille out of #☆☆☆☆ BY MEG MOORE THE GAMECOCK Before Braille’s “The Rumor” is not your average rock record. Then again, it also offers noth ing extraordinary. Striking that evasive chord between over-done and over-zealous, “The Rumor” maintains an intriguing level of music innovation while holding onto its straight-up rock soul. With titles such as “Paranoia Pays Off’ and “Low End of Luxury,” the album’s song line up seethes with pretension. It opens with the brooding, four and-a-half-minute “Prelude: Secret No. 1” — a veritable in strumental, save the last 45 sec onds when vocals are finally fil tered in. But instead of inundat ing itself with the avant-garde, Before Braille tactfully combines a progressive sound with dis torted, upbeat guitar lines, en snaring both rock fans and tor tured artists. But the band relies heavily on harmonies — a rarity in the rock world — often infusing its tunes with multiple vocal lines. On tracks such as “The Spanish Dagger,” the words almost bleed into the music, amplified to the same level as the guitars in a carefully constructed chorus of sound. Rapid, often-complex drum ming backs a majority of the songs on “The Rumor,” yet the < tracks range from ethereal to ex plosive. “Split Lip Envy” sounds like Dashboard Confessional’s acoustic rock, while “Paranoia Pays Off” rocks out. At times, the band references the straight ahead style of punk-pop, but at others the album seethes with prog-tinged instrumentals. This duality allows “The Rumor” to swim where a less-in- • tricate album would flounder — it fits into a mold, yet exceeds its bounds. Offering listeners an as sembly of innovative but ear Eriendly songs, Before Braille has produced a textured collection of solid tunes. Mixing the sparse ivith the intricately structured, the expected with the inventive, ‘The Rumor” reaches more than one realm of music listeners amid a single, 15-song sound scape. Before Braille will play April 10 at Senate Park. Comments on this story?E-mail jamecockmixeditor@hotmail.com dlelit service. Parishioners how before icons and, during Wednesday night’s healing ser vice, were individually anointed on their eyes and hands. The point of the ritual is to es cape the merely rational, Mancuso said. Singing the liturgy in particu lar tones, he said, “communicates to us not just rationally, but in our souls.” The iconography also tran scends reason. “The veneration we offer to the icons is communi cated to the prototype of the icon,” he said. “It’s not merely a rational representation.” For the Orthodox, St. Elizabeth supplies the essential parts of a functioning mysticism. The entrance, called the narthex, acts as a neutral zone be tween the illusory outside word and the religious life inside. The sanctuary is also separat ed into two rooms by the iconosta sis, a wall covered by icons. These two rooms represent paradise and earth. During mass, the priest passes between them through large open doors, acting as Christ did to bridge heaven and earth. Its student converts were at tracted by its mystery. Josh Robinson, a fifth-year re ligious-studies student, fell in love with the Eastern liturgy at an evening mass. “I heard the chanting and was immediately struck by the beauty of the service,” he said. The converts were often frus trated with their original religion. “One of my frustrations as a Protestant had been the preva lence of a Sunday-only attitude,” Allen said. “Until the Orthodox Church, I never knew a mystical Christianity existed.” The Orthodox Church already claims to be an otherworldly in stitution. Its doctrines themselves are even more sharply distin guished from some Western views. Orthodoxy understands scrip ture to be part of a broader tradi tion, said James Cutsinger, direc tor of undergraduate studies in the Religious Studies Department. That tradition includes “the Bible, the early creeds of the church, the decisions of the early church councils, the writings of saints and the teachings and doc trines of the church fathers,” Cutsinger said. Martin Luther, torchbearer for the Protestant Reformation, in sisted that “scripture alone is the word of God and the only true au The Orthodox find this position inconsistent, Cutsinger said, be cause it accepts earlier traditions but not the later ones. “Luther was a learned enough man to realize that the Bible had to be interpreted,” Cutsinger said. “He was willing to accept those early church councils as a stan dard for Christological matters.” . If you’re considering checking this out, head out to Cayce on the Blossom Street Bridge. After crossing it, continue through sev eral lights until you reach the Cherry Park Shopping Center. The church is to the right of a State Farm insurance outlet. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecockmixeditor@hotmail.com 9 www.dailygamecock.com i| trek SPEd/MD1 . I 1 mUSv _ UET\LVOMKS ths B?uar4l§ 7t)U WaiM* thz y y©3J ®)®g<gOr^(g n Ill We've Totally Re-invented The Portrait Studio Experience! PORTRAIT ■ innovations Wove totally re-invented the studio experience. 704-847-4927 • fax 704-847-4966 . csayers@portraitinnovations.com j - : . The Rev. father Marc Mancuso prays over the altar at a Wednesday night healing service. He anointed 1 the Orthodox in the community. PHOTO BY COREY GARRIOTT/THE GAMECOCK r i 1 0.«»"&r — 1 l'sav9&zl2\ ' IHUOSOR MB BTBRHIBI CHERRY SKY HUB DAY 0 PRODUCTIONS™ fcl JRAIIIG mm™ "BETTER IUEK TOMORROW" PARRY SHE! JASON TM ■: F SUNG IttNG ROGER EAR JOHN CHOmmacM ANNA CHEURG “DORRAIIRA CHARLES SSEHIAUIOUAIICaUlCHAEl J. GONZALES 3SSARDIIIEU TBYOOJUNG RAN SPAIRICf 10CIER E0CRE1 ;; "UNI HUANG ®GUSfAV0 SPOUARSKY MICHAEL MANSHLl MICHAEL COIL TROY CRAIG POOR h—sibJOUE ASAW ERNESTO M FOBONDA* JUSTIN UR .wERNESIO N. F0R0R0A JUSTIN UR ■ rR^ussisR "mm aSft® «•■■»*»«l* ffirffT m I EXCLUSIVE ENGAGEMENT I STARTS FRIDAY, APRIL 25TH! COLUM2|'^®RANDE SPECIAL ENGAGEMENT. NO PASSES M DISCOUNT COUPONS ACCEPTED 407*9898 Jjg Studio and General Management Positions Fast Track Career Development Path Paid Management Training Program Hiring Now For Our June Training Program • $30,000 Starting Salary plus Bonuses S • Paid Vacations, Holiday, Relocation and Benefits •Fun, High Energy Work Environment