DEVIL’S ADVOCATE: THE CLIMAX OF THE CYPRIOT DRAMA

Every year during Easter in Cyprus two miracles happen simultaneously. It is the period when, in addition to the Divine Drama, two human dramas also reach their climax, both performed by the undisputed drama queens, the Cypriot Christian fanatics: piousness and hypocrisy.

Two supposedly conflicting concepts that Christ himself fought against and practically fell victim to when he opposed their absolute simultaneous incarnation: the Pharisees. He never could have imagined, when he was climbing Golgotha, that two millennia later Pharisaism would be the main feature of his official representation on Earth. Then again, perhaps he did know, and precisely that was the point.

During Holy Week, the Isle of Saints becomes what its most famous nickname indicates, when on the other 51 [weeks] an ‘r’ after [the Greek letter] gamma makes the third word more in keeping with the reality of the natives. [Translator’s note: Author is playing with the Greek words for ‘saints’ and ‘savages’] At the flip of a switch, the vast majority of a people prone to lying, cheating, fraud, deceit, corruption, mockery, shit-heartedness, the spreading of poison online, verbal and physical violence, hooliganism, indifference, couldn’t-give-a-damn attitudes, oppression of the weak and vulnerable, xenophobia and hatred of anything that doesn’t fit into the outdated boxes of their mind, while embracing and practicing the darkest, most anachronistic and misanthropic aspects of the official Church (which, mind you, they rarely step into)… on Holy Monday and for the rest of the week they are transformed into the most formal, orderly, devout, and deeply religious Christian with strong, even excessive, doses of fasting, faith, prayer, piety, devotion, reverence, contemplation, and repentance. Like a reverse ‘The Purge’, where for one week of fasting and churchgoing a year you make up for the other 51, during which you were an undisputed son of a bitch.

And this is where the second paradox occurs at the same time. You continue to be an asshole. Because you’re unable to practice your religious duties as genuine Christians do, that is, with humility, modesty, honesty, love for your fellow man and fasting not only from gluttony but also from lying, hatred, envy, greed and the other deadly sins (see [the movie] Seven again for the full list), noooooope, you have to do it hypocritically, a la carte and at the expense of other people, who are usually worse off than you.

But show me your shepherd and I’ll tell you who you are. While world religious leaders such as Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew preach love, peace and reconciliation through their Easter message, the Archbishop of Cyprus continues where the departed one left off, unleashing through his Easter encyclical a racist attack against all migrants and refugees living or entering the Isle of Saints. A characteristic extract from this pure, Christian, love:

“We should then realise the grave danger that comes from the entry into our territory of illegal Muslim migrants, deliberately by Turkey, with the aim of altering the demographic character of the free areas as well; and work systematically to prevent this entry. The danger posed by these illegal immigrants is enormous, with repercussions for our country’s education and economy, and with the visible possibility of their use as a fifth phalanx in the event of a conflict. We are neither racist nor xenophobic. We defend our right to remain in the land of our fathers.”

Plenty of hysteria, silly conspiracy theories and Trump-like fake news mixed with the hay of choice of the domestic hay-eaters: anti-Turkish nationalism. And thousands of ‘good Christians’ listen to this bullshit on Resurrection night and nod their heads in approval, muttering “amen”. And Jesus can’t just show up to kick them out of the temple again. The merchants of counterfeit faith, cheap patriotism and glorified misanthropy.

Over the last 15 years, the inhabitants of this island, at least the vulnerable and the less privileged, i.e. almost two-thirds [of the population], have been subjected to state incompetence, corruption, scandals, economic collapse, unemployment, price hikes, the erosion of institutions, anachronistic public education, chaotic public health and a daily life that is governed by a pervasive sense of degradation, insecurity and futility. Have you ever heard any priest chastise the real enemy of our existence, which is of course the rotten, corrupt and sometimes criminally incompetent state itself and by extension those who make it up and the silent majority who sustain it with their votes and our fucking mentality? Ηeavens, that’s what a brave radical, anti-establishment and pro-people stance looks like, lest we be called communists and told we’ll be unable to show up at heaven’s door where someone planted two greens. [Translator’s note: reference to popular Greek song]

So the external enemy, Turkey and the refugees-minions it sends to forcibly Islamise us and corrupt our ‘civilisation’ of 96 fires overnight, thousands of firecrackers and the setting of schools on fire, the one that has been uniting fascists, idiot neo-nazis, national socialists, conspiracy theorists, Christian Talibans, incels and common criminals under the Holy Shroud of ‘patriotism’ for half a century with tremendous success.

Why fight among ourselves, when we might as well be united against an idealised external enemy, in utter disregard for the known, tangible and far more dangerous internal one, which will continue to parasitically live on undisturbed at our expense?

The navel of the world? Remove the [Greek letter] ‘m’ from the first word, so that it too is closer to reality. [Translator’s note: word play with the Greek words for navel and the phallus]

Source: DEVIL’S ADVOCATE: THE CLIMAX OF THE CYPRIOT DRAMA

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