Furthest

Daily writing prompt
Share a story about the furthest you’ve ever traveled from home.

The furthest I have ever traveled from home is to the southern tip of Argentina: to Ushuaia in the State of Tierra del Fuego. The absolute furthest was to the end of Route 3, at Bahia Lapataia in the Parque Nacional Tierra del Fuego, within sight of the Chilean border. I was there in both 2006 and 2011.

A Major Assumption

The Image of Christ Pantokrator at Assumption Greek Orthodox Church

The assumption of which I speak is that of the Blessed Virgin Mary Theotokos, or “God Bearer.” Today Martine and I drove to Long Beach to visit the Greek festival at Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary Greek Orthodox Church.

According to both the Catholic and Greek Orthodox churches, when the Blessed Virgin died, she was taken up body and soul to heaven. Her feast day is celebrated by both religions on August 15.

There was music, dancing, Greek food (including scrumptious cookies), and a tour of the colorful church. The Assumption of the BVM Church in Long Beach is particularly colorful: The walls have painted images of literally hundreds of saints in addition to Biblical scenes from both the Old and New Testaments.

One of the saints depicted was Peter the Aleut, surnamed Cungagnak, who was martyred in 1815 after being tortured and killed by the Spanish in California. There are some doubts as to whether Peter ever existed, as the Russian Orthodox ministers on Kodiak Island said the Jesuits were behind the martyrdom. There were no Jesuits in California at that time, just mostly Franciscans. But it’s a nice story anyway.