Millions of households will fill out their 2021 Census across the country today. Already, 10 million households have filled out their forms after the Australian Bureau of Statistics allowed people to complete the questionnaire ahead of time.

Fr Gerasimos, the parish priest of St George Church in Rose Bay held a discussion on the Greek identity ahead of tonight’s Census with comedienne and Logie Award Winner Effie Stephanides.

Together, they discussed the Greek identity, dissecting components of the Greek identity: birthplace, language, ancestry and religion.

“That explains why so many people would say they are Greek but wouldn’t necessarily say they were born in Greece. So many are born in other parts of the world,” Fr Gerasimos said, pointing to Greek Egyptians, Greek cultures of Italy, and others.

“For some, as in those born in Asia Minor or modern-day Turkey, there’s no way they’re going to call themselves Turkish. That’s like oil and water for us and the Turks.”

Effie spoke of the many languages Greek speak, regarding dialects and Greek sign language.

Fr Gerasimos spoke about traditions and values, philosophy of life.

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“That’s not all evident,” he said.

“I think identity is a complex thing,” Effie said. “It is such an adored culture by the Greeks. We use being Greek as an excuse for everything.”

“It is natural for us and for others who identify as being Greek would want to hold onto that,” she said.

“Religion for us is not just a personal thing, it is a community thing,” Fr Gerasimos said.

Effie spoke of the many Orthodox religions eg. Coptic, Serbian, Russian etc. “Everyone knows what being a Catholic means, because it is in movies and the masses know what being a Catholic is,” she said, adding how the Greek Orthodox religion is more the “bigger picture” more about “tradition” and less about “guilt”, calling it an “easy-going religion” encompassing everything from koulouria to name days to fashion.

“So I think its role is bigger than answering the big questions. It’s answering the day-to-day community questions,” she said.

“Some people write Orthodox Christian in the Census because slowly as the generations go by they no longer identify with the ethnic marker, and if you look at it historically, Greeks have been calling themselves Christian most of the time, Orthodox Christian when comparing themselves with other denominations, and Greek Orthodox Christian is 150 years old,” he said, adding that a couple of hundred years ago, Greeks would just say they were “Christian”.

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