Children from many Macedonian families could just be the luckiest in the Illawarra for this weekend – they get to open their second haul of Christmas presents in two weeks.
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The Macedonian Orthodox Church will celebrate its Christmas on Saturday, when the day falls according to the Julian calendar – which is still being followed by the Orthodox church in the Republic of Macedonia.
Before 9am hundreds of Orthodox parishioners are expected to queue outside the church of St Dimitrija of Solun, on Stewart St in Wollongong, for the service.
They will greet each other with “Hristos se rodi” (“Christ is born”), and reply with “Vistina se rodi” (“It is true, Christ is born”), while buying programs and candles.
Inside, the service will be conducted by the Very Reverend Alexandar Ivanovski, who is also planning to read a message from Archbishop Stefan of Macedonia, head of the mother church in the old homeland.
Wollongong’s large Macedonian population has been a feature of the city for generations. The 2011 Census found Macedonian was spoken at home for almost three per cent of people in Wollongong. This was slightly fewer than five years previous, but was still the highest rate of any language other than English.
The Julian calendar was introduced by Julius Caesar in 45BC and was in common usage until the late 16th Century when the Gregorian calendar was widely adopted. The Macedonian is one of several Orthodox churches which still use the Julian calendar.
