What we've been learning about typical Greek students

Between Christmas and Easter I was on two campuses regularly with small groups of our students, getting on with evangelism to strangers, hoping for two things: first, to sow the seed of the word to whomever we could and, second, to grow confidence and skill among the members of IFES Greece.

We anticipated this being a small beginning, and it has been, but here's a couple of observations.

This conversation lasted an hour

Typical Greek unbelievers fall into three broad categories. The largest group could be described as apathetic atheists. This means that the vast majority of our approaches to people are rebuffed immediately with total indifference and unwillingness to engage. It's not surprising: we don't resent them for it. They have no reason whatsoever to engage with us. Apart from the fact that there is an inherent level of suspicion about anyone who wants to talk religion or spirituality of Jesus, it is not in the Greek social make-up to profer interest in strangers. Greeks are warm and close to those with whom they are warm and close, and aren't like the English, with their sense of obligation to be friendly to total strangers. (That's an observation, not a value judgement - there and pros and cons of both types of relationality!)


Another group are the crusading atheists - the communists. They sincerely believe that the USSR is the utopia we should all be aiming for. It was the happiest, most free society that there has ever been - and it's capitalist propaganda that tells otherwise - and Greece needs to become a Marxist state. They are therefore committed - in a friendly, non-violent way - to the removal of God from society. 

This is the entrance to the Law school. Not hard to see what the most visible ideology is.

I have found them to be the easiest to talk with, but they are dedicated to their cause and are reluctant to discuss Jesus specifically. Some of them are still Orthodox, but atheist ones! (Yes, I know, that ought to be oxymoronic. But it seems frequently possible to be vociferously communist and retain a sense of loyalty to Orthodox roots. I think the pattern is that they remain actively communist through their youth, then revert to more 'practicing' Orthodox when they get married and have children, because the baptism of their children becomes a pressing issue. Having said that, it may be that we are at a watershed, and the current generation of Greek young people may be ones to buck that trend and reject Orthodox roots even into their family life).

The final main group are the sincere Orthodox. This is the smallest group by far, and it's also hard to talk with such folks about Jesus because the veil of institutional religiosity is heavy. It may be that some have real, saving faith. It's hard to discern, and it's not our responsibility to do so, but it seems highly unlikely that significant numbers know and trust Christ. It seems theologically tricky to be a 'good Orthodox' and be a real believer, because to be so one needs to accept and trust things that make the gospel an entirely other gospel. (This isn't the place to go into detail on that).

Sorry for the quality. On the left are two lads reading a New Testament we gave them, and on the right one of our members is chatting to the students in the first picture. ALL of the posters and banners are urging a Marxist uprising.

Scattered among these main types are those who have a real hunger for truth. Not many people are offering truth. Our challenges are to keep proclaiming it, to learn the skills to engage with each person we meet, unique and precious as they are, and to gather and mobilise more believers to be active in proclamation and public in good works.