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The nuns kidnapped in December 2013 from their monastery of St Thecla (Mar Taqla) in the city of Maaloula, Syria have been released! Thanks be to God for their safe return, and thank you for all your prayers on their behalf. Please find more information on the AOCANA's website, here.
Father Alexis Baldwin
Three new Orthodox communities have formed in the Rocky Mountain Deanery. Two missions, Holy Prophet Elijah and St. Tikhon Enlightener of North America, and an Orthodox mission community which meets at Agia Sophia Coffee House all hold weekly Divine Services. Each of these communities began as an outreach effort of Orthodox Christians associated with the Rocky Mountain deanery.
Holy Prophet Elijah Mission — Durango
For several years Orthodox Christians of the Four Corners region gathered once a month for worship and participation in the Church’s sacramental life. Initially established in Farmington, NM and serviced by priests from Albuquerque and Santa Fe, it was soon evident that most persons involved were from the Colorado side of the border. Efforts were accordingly re-focused to establish the mission in Durango, CO, upon which the mission came under the omophorion of Archbishop Benjamin. Fr. Benjamin Huggins and his family arrived in Durango in July of 2013. For the first time in the rich indigenous cultural history of the “Four Corners”region, a small Orthodox community participates in a consistent cycle of services including all Feast Days, Vespers on Wednesdays and Saturdays, and Sunday Divine Liturgy.
The Patriarch Tikhon Russian American Music Institute held a remarkable Orthodox Master Class on February 24-27 at Holy Trinity Monastery in Jordanville, NY. This video captures the beauty and solemnity of the divine services better than any verbal description. Our sincere appreciation to Reader Peter S. Lukianov for his fine presentation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odcvv1qXerM&feature=em-upload_owner
In accordance with PaTRAM's master plan, Vladimir Gorbik has now shared his art at all three of the major Slavic-heritage seminaries in North America—St Vladimir's, St. Tikhon's, and Holy Trinity. We're asking you to help spread the good news throughout the Orthodox world: please post this link on your Facebook page and forward it on email to everyone you can think of — your priest, your choir members, and your musical colleagues, both Orthodox and non-Orthodox. Let's not keep this lamp under a bushel!
Also, if you haven't yet done so, please explore PaTRAM's constantly evolving website: www.patraminstitute.org. Here you will read about the next Master Class, scheduled for June 30 to July 3, 2014. Mark your calendars, and plan to attend!
submitted by
Vladimir Morosan
Chair, PaTRAM Promotion and Marketing Committee
GREAT LENT 2014
To the Reverend Clergy, Monastics and Faithful of the Diocese of the West
Let us begin the Fast with joy! Let us prepare ourselves for spiritual efforts! Let us cleanse our soul and cleanse our flesh! Let us abstain from every passion as we abstain from food! Let us rejoice in virtues of the Spirit and fulfill them in love, that we all may see the Passion of Christ our God, and rejoice in spirit at the holy Pascha!
(Lord I Call Stichera, Forgiveness Sunday Vespers)
Dearly beloved,
We are now on the threshold of the great spiritual effort of Great Lent. It seems a little strange to hear “let us begin the Fast with joy,” when the long seven weeks of prayer, fasting, almsgiving and repentance seems more than a little dark and somber. But we must always remember the words of Father Alexander Schmemann, who spoke of Great Lent as a “bright sadness.” The “sadness” is the realization of how far away we are from our Beloved and the effort it will take to come back to His embrace. But the “brightness” is the joy of our realization that He has not abandoned us, but has come down to us, become what we are, and goes to the grave itself to rescue us. The darkness of my life engulfed in sin always ends in the light and redemption of resurrection, if I so desire it with my whole heart and strive to make the journey. May it be so!
So we move into the difficult effort of return. We must guard against reducing our Lenten efforts to a “checklist” of dietary restrictions, the number of prayers we say and services we attend, the amount of spiritual reading we do and the number of times we confess our sins. All of them are absolutely necessary and indispensible, but must be done with sincerity and humility, trusting that God knows our weakness and strengthens us in our efforts. May we all truly repent of our sins and lament our separation from the Bridegroom. May we all feel the emptiness of true battle with our appetites and passions, opening our mouths only to nourish ourselves and not to consume our brothers and sisters.
I ask your forgiveness as we enter into this holy time of year and wish for all my faithful parishes and each and every one of you a most fruitful and joyous Fast. May we all rejoice in the celebration of the Lord’s Resurrection at the end of the bright sadness!
With love in Christ,
†Benjamin
Archbishop of San Francisco
The 2013 Diocesan Assembly in Santa Rosa, CA designated the St Petersburg Children's Hospice as the official diocesan Lenten charity for 2014. Please consider giving to this amazing organization. Collections taken during Lent may be forwarded to the diocesan chancery at 1520 Green Street for disbursement.
His Eminence, Archbishop Benjamin, will join the other hierarchs of the Western United States in a joint celebration on Orthodoxy Sunday weekend, March 8-9, 2014. Festivities will start on Saturday with a Youth and Young Adult Rally beginning at 4:00 pm. The guest speaker is Archimandrite Nathanael Symonides, who will speak on the topic "Gathered together in the Name of the Lord: Orthodoxy and Daily Challenges (Matthew 18:20)." Great Vespers with Icon Procession follows at 6:00 pm. The homilist will be His Eminence, Archbishop Joseph, who will preach on "The 21st Century Christian Martyrdom in Syria and the Middle East as a Whole."
Sunday morning, March 9th, Orthros will begin at 9:00 am, followed by the Hierarchical Divine Liturgy with Icon Procession at 10:00 am. The homilist will be Archimandrite Nathanael Symonides. The service will be followed by a lenten luncheon.
In addition to His Eminence, Archbishop Benjamin, the concelebrating hierarchs will be His Eminence, Metropolitan Gerasimos, Greek Orthodox Metropolis of San Francisco; His Eminence, Archbishop Joseph, Antiochian Diocese of Los Angeles and the West; and His Grace, Bishop Maxim, Serbian Orthodox Diocese of Western America. All services and activities will be held at St. Steven Serbian Orthodox Cathedral, 1621 West Gravey Ave., Alhambra, California. All Orthodox Christians are invited to attend.
Download the flyer here.
His Eminence, Archbishop Benjamin, and Archimandrite Alexander (Pihach) of the St. Catherine representation church in Moscow, represented the Orthodox Church in America at the enthronement of the new Primate of the Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia on February 9, 2014 in Presov, Slovakia.
The Czech and Slovak Church proudly and rightly celebrates its connection with Ss. Cyril and Methodius, the Evangelizers of the Slavs, who brought the Orthodox Christian Faith to Great Moravia, now a part of the modern Czech Republic. Metropolitan Rastislav is the Archbishop Presov and successor to Metropolitan Kristof, the former Archbishop of Prague. Interestingly, the primatial see alternates between the cites of Prague and Presov and thus, both republics that make up the totality of the Czech and Slovak Church.
In particular, we might note that many of the faithful of the Orthodox Church in America are descendants of immigrants who came to the United States and Canada from the northern region of Slovakia. Our own diocese has a parish in Calhan, Colorado that is largely composed of immigrants who left Slovakia and became ranchers in the American West.
His Eminence presented Metropolitan Rastislav with an icon of Ss. Cyril and Methodius along with St. Alexis Toth, who brought many of the Uniates from this region into the Orthodox fold. The icon was written by Nikolai Tsai a member of Holy Trinity Cathedral in San Francisco. Relics of St. Alexis were embedded in the icon.
The Churches of Antioch, Russia and Poland sent official delegations. Representatives of the Church in the Ukraine were also present
The annual Pacific Northwest Summer Camp has been set! The camp will run from June 30-July 3, 2014. There is a dedicated website set up for details:
Download the following items here:
ANNUAL MISSION DEANERY RETREAT
February 11th – 13th, 2014
Retreat Master:
Rev. Fr. Theodore Dorrance
Chair of the Commission for Missions & Evangelism
Metropolis of the West
“Essentials of Mission Building”
Location: Church of the Annunciation
13515 SE Rusk Road Milwaukie, Oregon 97222
The Church is a 25 minute drive from the Portland Airport. Take Freeway 205 South. Take Exit 13 Milwaukie/Highway 224. Turn RIGHT (west) on Highway 224 for 1.3 miles. Turn LEFT on Rusk road. After a hard right turn and then a hard left turn on Rusk Road the church driveway will be 25 yards up on the right.
Cost: $ 185.00 – Registration Fee includes two nights double occupancy lodging, and meals
$ 135.00- No Lodging - Retreat and Meals only
Send Registration Form and Check Payable to Church of the Annunciation
Attn: Mary Petry 13515 SE Rusk Road, Milwaukie, OR 97222
For information call 503-659-3646 or email at annunciationoregon@hotmail.com
You may also register online at www.dowoca.org
Schedule: The retreat begins on Tuesday the 11th at Noon with a Deli Buffet and Opening Moleben at 3:30 pm, and ends on Thursday the 13th mid-afternoon.
Download
Retreat Cover Letter
Retreat Flyer
Retreat Agenda
Registration Form
The Orthodox Church Capital Improvement Fund (OCCIF) has been established in our diocese as a resource to provide loans for building and capital improvements for parishes. It will also provide a way to invest in a venture that helps grow the Church. John Della Monica, Jr., President of OCCIF, asks for assistance in the following areas to enable the Fund to begin its work.
Securities Law: OCCIF will begin its operations with a diocesan-wide fundraising effort to generate as much capital as possible, allowing the process of as many qualified loans as can be supported, followed by investment for growth. OCCIF needs assistance navigating both state and federal securities law. We are now looking for someone to compassionately provide this level of expertise.
Accounting: to be successful, financial transparency is an absolute requirement. We need the compassionate services of a Certified Public Accountant (CPA). This individual or firm will be working closely with our bookkeeping staff, monitoring all accounts, transaction reporting, disbursements and financial filings. A professional relationship will be maintained with a separate CPA firm for all state and federal tax reporting.
Investment Banking: We need specific counsel on matters of investment strategies once the fund has reached a level requiring a fund manager. Pre-planning in these matters is paramount to the success of the fund and its managed growth. The greater the level of resources available, the greater lending source it can be to the diocese.
