Greek gods prepare for comeback
Helena Smith in Athens
Friday May 5, 2006
Guardian
It has taken almost 2,000 years, but those who worship the 12 gods
of ancient Greece have finally triumphed. An Athens court has
ordered that the adulation of Zeus, Hera, Hermes, Athena and co is
to be unbanned, paving the way for a comeback of pagans on Mount
Olympus. The followers, who say they "defend the genuine traditions,
religion and ethos" of the ancients by adhering to a pre-Christian
polytheistic culture, are poised to take their battle to the temples
of Greece.
"What we want, now, is for the government to fully recognise our
religion," Vasillis Tsantilas told the Guardian. "We will petition
the Greek parliament, and the EU if that fails, for access to
worship in places like the Acropolis, for permission to have our own
cemeteries and, where necessary, to re-bury the [ancient] bones of
the dead.
About 98% of Greeks are Orthodox Christian, and all other religions
except Judaism and Islam had been banned.
Yet the pagans say as many as 2,000 Greeks have signed up to their
movement. Mr Tsantilas, 42, a computer scientist who came to
paganism after toying with Buddhism, Taoism and Islam, said
worshippers perceived the ancient gods as the "personification of
the divine".
But Greece's powerful Orthodox Church takes a less charitable view,
accusing the worshippers of idolatry and "poisonous New Age
practices".
Father Eustathios Kollas, who presides over the community of Greek
priests, said: "They are a handful of miserable resuscitators of a
degenerate dead religion who wish to return to the monstrous dark
delusions of the past."