This chapter covers the arrangement of churches and objects of liturgical use. Though there is variety in Orthodox churches, there is much unity across places and times. Like the Old Testament tabernacle, the Orthodox temple consists of three major areas: the sanctuary (naos), the nave (kyrios naos), and the narthex. The Greek word naos means temple and it is often translated into English with the word church, and modern Greeks still refer to “churches” as temples. The nave is a Latinate word that means ship; it is called the main temple, the kyrios naos, in Greek. Each of these three areas of the Orthodox temple has specific functions. The Eucharist and Epiclesis transforms the bread and wine at the altar in the sanctuary. Chanting, healing prayers, confession and epistle readings happen in the main temple, the nave. The catechumens were taught, and certain types of penitents worshipped from the narthex. All members of the Church (ekklesia in Greek) were expected to commune. This important connection between the arrangement of churches and communion is not mentioned by Metropolitan Hilarion. There were not two groups of Christians, communing people and non-communing people each week that can be discerned from the patristic sources. There were different categories of penitents that were defined under ecclesial canons. They were asked to demonstrate their faith and reconciliation for certain weighty or specific sins committed after baptism, apostasy, heresy, adultery, murder/killing, for example. In the narthex, all-night vigils and panikhidas, memorials for the departed were conducted, and people were made catechumens. It’s the place where catechumens wait for illumination and where penitents usually wait for confession nowadays.
At a Sunday divine service, the liturgy of the catechumens starts first, then the liturgy of the faithful, those who are communicants of the Most Precious Body and Blood of Christ. Likewise, there seems to be only two groups that the ancient Church knew of: communicants and catechumens. Christians were excommunicated, put outside of communing in the Church, with the hope that they would return, but not used as retaliation. Penitents technically were performing reconciliatory actions for certain sins committed after baptism. All Christians, in fact, must constantly reconciliate themselves to others before receiving communion, and it is one of the major criteria for communicants in Orthodoxy, since “the kiss of peace” mentioned in the Gospels precedes communion closely, a symbol or sign of unity and reconciliation. The “sign of peace” then is one of the most important outward symbolic gestures one can give during the liturgy toward your brothers in Christ and the Eucharist because it reveals the inner disposition of the heart, the nous of a person.
Candle lighting is an important feature, often not found in Protestantism or Roman Catholicism nowadays, in the arrangement of temples. Candles represent offerings and the chandelier, the polykandelion, is sometimes lit and swung back and forth during feast days and in monasteries, as well as in icon corners of Orthodox homes. The nave (kyrios naos) is traditionally decorated with frescoes, mosaics, and icons, and it contains the iconostasis that separates it from the sanctuary, where “royal gates” are found. These doors symbolize the entrance of the King of Glory, where Christ Himself comes out to feed all the people His life-giving food. The showbread of the ancient Jews, like the Eucharist, were meant to show Israel that the One God Alone is the source of life and paradise, which no substance could replace. If material things are not the ultimate source of life, then some Christians from our own culture may argue that these sacred objects and their ritual organization for worshipping God are just unnecessary, even contrary and distracting to our experience of God. But the principle has been forgotten among some Christian groups that what happens in the heavens happens on earth. The next chapter discusses the importance of symbolism in the liturgical vestments of the Orthodox clergy and hierarchy, and it has implications too for how lay Orthodox Christians dress during or outside the liturgy.