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Glite Dictionary
Greek Orthodox Church

Greek Orthodox Church

1 4.1
The main Christian church in Greece that follows the Eastern Orthodox tradition
  • proper noun
translation icon : Iglesia Ortodoxa Griega
  • Below, Israeli President Moshe Katzav and Patriarch Irineos of the Greek Orthodox Church inspect the mosaic floor at Megiddo in January 2006.

Examples

  • He introduced himself, and the first question he asked me was: "Are you a Christian?" "Yes, I am." "What denomination do you belong to?" "The Christian Greek Orthodox Church," I said.

    Academic text (2014)

  • Cairns was chrismated into the Greek Orthodox Church at St. Nicholas in Virginia Beach.

  • The head of the Greek Orthodox Church opened the convention with a prayer: "O God,

    Blog text (21)

  • The Greek Orthodox Church still uses the Septuagint.

    Blog text (9)

  • There's a Greek Orthodox church in my town that puts on a Greek Festival too!

    Blog text (6)

  • The law was passed under the Greek Constitution of 1911, which, like the present 1975 Constitution, established the Greek Orthodox Church as the "dominant religion" of the state and forbade proselytism.

    Academic text (1997)

  • The Greek Orthodox Church uses as its symbol the Greek (equilateral) cross, not the Latin cross. The more sectarian the display, the closer it is to the original targets of the establishment clause, so the more strictly the clause is applied.

    Academic text (1995)

  • The head of the Greek Orthodox Church opened the convention with a prayer.

  • The Greek Orthodox Church, to which 98 percent of Greeks belong, considers abortion a sin.

Synonyms

Greek Church
vsGreek Orthodox Church
4.6

The main Orthodox Christian church in Greece that governs itself

emphasizes the established official status rather than a plain national label

Surface Forms

Greek Orthodox Church main

Morphology

Greek + Orthodox + church

The phrase is fully compositional: 'Greek' indicates national/ethnic affiliation, 'Orthodox' denotes the Eastern Orthodox denomination, and 'church' names a Christian body. A B1 learner who knows these words can readily infer it refers to the Christian church of Greece (part of the Eastern Orthodox tradition), and this modifier+noun structure is cross-linguistically commonplace.

Etymology

Greek Orthodox Church is named for two ideas: Greek because its services and people use Greek, and Orthodox from a word meaning 'right belief' or 'right worship'. It grew in the old Greek-speaking Christian world, so the name shows it is the main Greek church that keeps the traditional Christian way.