"This is as exciting, maybe even better, than the first day we moved in," parishioner Kelly Jo Lemm said.

About 30 parishioners gathered outside the church at 401 Lewis Ave., to join in blessing the cross before it was placed atop the church. The event was a "day long waited for," the Rev. Joseph O'Brien said.

"The cross is the ultimate symbol of humility and the ultimate symbol, not of death, but of life," O'Brien said. "That's what we are putting on top of our church, a symbol of life."

"We've had our cross, well, kind of in a suitcase of so many years, this dream is finally here," Lemm said.

The large, metal cross was made at Sprocket's Machine and Welding Inc. in Billings.

Parishioner Curt Thompson said the cross is "another part of the whole" of the church.

"Everything in Orthodoxy means something," Thompson said. "There's nothing that's meaningless."

But the placing of the cross has added meaning, several parishioners said: It is a symbol outside the little yellow church that lets everybody know it is a Christian church.

Orthodox has been around 2,000 years, O'Brien said, and there are many Orthodox Christians, although not as many in America as in Europe.

"People don't know much about it," O'Brien said. "They are familiar with various Protestant faiths and with Roman Catholics, but who are the Orthodox?"

O'Brien said "Orthodoxy is a very aesthetic faith."

"The idea is to live the faith," he said, "by following rules, not laws that serve as guidelines. We're big on tradition, and those traditions are to help us progress."

"Our rites are very formal, elaborate. But those are peripheral. It's who we are - or hope to be by the grace of God - that really counts."

The cross placed on Saturday reflects the unique character of the Orthodox Church in the United States, according to church literature.

The bronze-colored metal cross combines two styles of crosses - budded and Slavic - which together "reveal the faith which transcends every ethnic, social or national identity," it states.

The budded Cross, considered to be of Greek or Byzantine design, has three-fold points. The "budding" represents new life and budding forth from the wood of the Cross of Christ revealing it to be not an instrument of death, but of life everlasting.

The three-barred cross which overlays the budded cross was adopted and popularized in Slavic Orthodox lands. The design is early Byzantine in origin and is generally thought of as a "Russian cross". The upper arm of the three-barred cross represents the inscription nailed over Christ's head. The lower, slanted arm represents his foot rest. The slanted bar always points upward to its right, toward the cross of the thief who confessed Christ.

On the budded cross are the letters IC XC, an ancient "so-called monogram" of Christ. The IC is derived from the Greek spelling of Jesus and the XC is from the Greek spelling of Christ.

Copyright 2002 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

BY BECKY SHAY Of The Gazette Staff

Published on Sunday, April 21, 2002.