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The Diocese’s Thriving Parishes Project visited St. Innocent Orthodox Church in Tarzana, CA the weekend of December 13-14. The Church Health Team had its daylong training beginning Saturday morning. Parish Rector Archpriest Yousuf Rassam served a molieben to St. Herman of Alaska at 9:00 in honor of his feast day, after which official training in administering the church health survey commenced. The Thriving Parishes Project Program Director addressed the whole parish community after coffee hour on Sunday.
Fr. Yousuf was the celebrant at Great Vespers on Saturday, as well as at the Divine Liturgy Sunday morning. Over 80 people attended the service, which was served in English, Romanian, Slavonic, Greek, and Spanish. These many languages accurately reflect the diversity found in the parish.
Interestingly, when it was founded in 1955, St. Innocent Church became the first Orthodox parish in the Diocese (if not the Orthodox Church in America/Metropolia) to serve predominantly in English. It benefitted in its early history from annually inviting Protopresbyter Alexander Schmemann to be a resident lecturer for a week-long visit. Its founding priest, Archpriest Sergei Glagolev, was a renowned church musician, whose arrangements are used in many OCA parishes to this day.
St. Innocent sent many of its members off to seminary to serve the greater Church over the years, including Archbishop Alexander Golitzin, Dennis Dorko, David Koles, David Cowan, John Sochak, Joseph Fester, Christopher Wojcik, Bartholomew Wojcik, John Anderson, and Nicholas Roger Neiman. The Diocese’s Protodeacon George Golitzin (St. Nicholas Church, San Anselmo, CA) also grew up at the parish. Matushka Vickie Federoff (married to the retired Fr. Alexander Federoff, St. John of Damascus Church in Poway, CA) is also a native daughter and product of the parish.
The St. Innocent community is excited to continue its legacy of serving the Church by spreading the Gospel of Christ in Tarzana.
The Diocese of the West is the geographical district of the Orthodox Church in America consisting of the Western United States. The diocese has active parishes in Montana, Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, Washington, Oregon, California and Hawaii. San Francisco is home to the diocese’s cathedral, Holy Trinity, as well as the Chancery offices. The diocese is led by His Grace Vasily, Bishop of San Francisco and the West.
