Day: January 13, 2014

Temperatures will top 40 degrees in many parts of NSW this week.

Towns beyond the Great Dividing Range are likely to experience extreme heat as early as Monday.

Residents in Sydney’s western suburbs might be tempted to head to the beach by mid-week, with the mercury in Penrith expected to hit the high 30s from Wednesday.

Leap of faith: Members of the Greek community keep their cool during the Orthodox Church’s celebration of the Epiphany. Photo: Dean Sewell

Respite from the heat won’t be felt until Saturday, when there will be a cooler southerly change.

Weatherzone meteorologist Sam Brown said those on the coast will be spared record temperature highs, with sea breezes keeping temperatures down.

Temperatures for the Australian Open in Melbourne will be about 40 from Tuesday to Friday.

Sydney’s beaches were packed on Sunday. Several thousand members of Sydney’s Greek community turned out for the Greek Orthodox Church’s celebration of Epiphany at La Perouse.

The event is capped by the holy cross event, this year taken out by Theodore Pasialis, who was the first of 150-odd young men to retrieve a cross thrown into the water.

The West Australian

As the cross arced upwards from the priest’s hand and splashed into the Swan River, the crowd of young men rushed forward.

Dozens from the Greek Orthodox Christian faith plunged into the water at Matilda Bay Reserve to retrieve the Holy Cross, as part of the annual Epiphany Day celebrations.

Jason Saldaris was jubilant to retrieve the cross – seen as a great blessing – surfacing with it in hand and kissing it before bringing it ashore.

Greek Orthodox parish priest Father Elpidios Karalis, who hosted the annual Blessing of the Waters at Matilda Bay yesterday, said Mass attendance at Church was “stable”.

“There’s always room for improvement,” he said. “You see people on feast days, at Easter, at Christmas, but not everyone comes every Sunday.”

For winning the event, in which young men and women dived into the river to retrieve the cross, Mr Saldaris got a gold chain.

“The reason we throw the cross in the river is it sanctifies the Lord and all creation,” Father Elpidios said.

He recalled attending the event as a young boy, and said it was wonderful to see so many young families there.

Epiphany Festival

Spectators attend the festival at Yarra Bay. Photo: Dean Sewell

Theodore Pasialis’s feat in fishing a holy cross from the bottom of the ocean as part of the Greek Orthodox Church’s celebration of the Epiphany is supposed to bring him a year’s luck. So why does he feel bad?

Because it was not so much luck but arduous years of hard training that put him in front of the pack of more than 150 young men from the Greek Australian community in the 50 metre sprint from a barge in Yarra Bay at La Perouse.

The former elite swimmer and gold medallist in the men’s 1500 metres at the 2008 Oceania Swimming Championships has won the Blessing of the Waters race twice before, in 2011 and 2012. So “it may be controversial in the Greek community”, he laughs. “I feel bad going in for the holy cross event, because it is an unfair advantage”.

Several thousand members of Sydney’s Greek community turned out for the festivities with traditional Greek dancing and food – souvlaki, spanakopita and honey donuts called loukoumades – typical of a Greek glenti, or party.

Simultaneous events around the country have been celebrating the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist. The Blessing of the Waters ceremony commemorates “the sacredness of creation which gives us the responsibility to care for the world and care for one anther”, said Dr Philip Kariatlis, academy director at St Andrews Greek Orthodox Theological College.

The winner, Pasialis, 24, was a bit hazy on the spiritual underpinnings of the race. But he reckoned it was sheer luck that let him to find the cross. “That is the lucky bit. You need a bit of luck to see it”, he says. The prize? A small religious token – and a year’s luck.

Trinity Beach and Kurrimine Beach played host to the Greek Orthodox ceremony, which symbolises the baptism of Christ in the Jordan River.

While the rain put a dampener on celebrations at Trinity Beach, about 50 people turned out to see three young, single Greek men dive underwater to find a golden cross.

In the early days of Orthodox faith, only young sailors participated as a way of giving them good luck at sea.

“The weather didn’t help, but we still did what we had to do,” St John The Baptist Greek Orthodox Parish priest Father Menelaos Hatzoglou said.

“It was really enjoyable … The cross was found within 10 minutes and brought back to my hands.

“Then I blessed every diver and all the congregation as well.”

The crowd then returned to the parish hall for a traditional Greek barbecue.

Further south, the rain stayed away at Kurrimine Beach as between 100 and 150 people gathered to watch another three young men perform the same tradition.

“It was a bit windy, but it was a nice day,” Greek Orthodox Community of Innisfail and Districts president John Kotzas said.

“Everyone was happy. It’s a joyous occasion.”