Please join us today for the Blessing and Cutting of the Vasilopita.
Mark your calendars! Stewardship Sunday is January 25th! We will have a guest speaker and a light luncheon will be offered by the Parish Council after the Divine Liturgy. Please plan to attend!
Please call or e-mail Fr. John in the church office with your news for the bulletin, this will help alleviate any duplications or conflicts with the master schedule of events. Thank You.
For those parishioners who wish to have their houses blessed this upcoming Epiphany season, please contact Fr. John to schedule a convenient time. Thank You.
Let us not forget our people in the nursing homes, hospitals or separated from our community. If you know of anyone in this situation please contact Fr. John. Thank You.
In the interest of accuracy please issue separate checks when making donations to different funds. Thank You.
An account has been established to support our permanent priest. To help build this account and our community, please see Maxine N. Calamos or Bill Winkler with your donations to this fund.
Schedule of Services for January 5th, 6th & 7th.
January 5th – Orthros & Royal Hours at 9:00 am. Great Vespers, Divine Liturgy of St. Basil and Blessing of the Waters at 7:00 pm.
January 6th – The Baptism of Christ – Orthros at 9:00 am. Great Blessing of the Waters & Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom at approx. 10:00 am.January 7th – The Synaxis of the Honorable, Glorious Prophet and Forerunner John the Baptist – Orthros at 9:00 am. Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom at approx. 10:00 am.
Saint Basil the Great was born about the end of the year 329 in Caesarea of Cappadocia, to a family renowned for their learning and holiness. Basil studied in Constantinople, then in Athens, where he formed a friendship with Gregory the Theologian. Through the influence of his sister Macrina, he chose to embrace the ascetical life. Upon returning to Caesarea, he entered a hermitage on the Iris River in Pontus, here he wrote his ascetical homilies. About the year 370, he was elected to bishopric and was entrusted with the Church of Christ, which he tended for eight years, defending Orthodoxy as a worthy successor of the Apostles. The Emperor Valens, and Modestus, the Eparch of the East, who were Arians, tried with threats of exile and torments to bend the Saint to their own view, because he was the bastion of Orthodoxy in all Cappadocia and preserved it from heresy when Aryanism was at its strongest. In his willingness to give himself up to every suffering for the sake of the Faith, he showed himself to be a martyr by volition. Modestus, amazed at Basil's fearlessness in his presence, said that no one had ever so spoken to him. "Perhaps," answered the Saint, "you have never met a bishop before." When Valens' son fell gravely sick, he asked Saint Basil to pray for him. The Saint promised that his son would be restored if Valens agreed to have him baptized by the Orthodox; Valens agreed, Basil prayed, the son was restored. But later the Emperor had him baptized by Arians, and the child died soon after. Later, Valens decided to send the Saint into exile because he would not accept the Arians into communion; but his pen broke when he was signing the edict of banishment. He tried a second time and a third, but the same thing happened, so that the Emperor was filled with dread and Basil was not banished. The truly great Basil departed to the Lord on the 1st of January, in 379, at the age of forty-nine. His writings are replete with wisdom and rich are the gifts he sets forth in the doctrines concerning the mysteries both of the creation (his Hexaemeron) and of the Holy Trinity (On the Holy Spirit). Because of his eloquence, he is honored as "the revealer of heavenly things" and "the Great."
Parish Council Members
Liz Skinner, President Steve Giannopoulos, Vice-president
Maxine Calamos, Treasurer Bill Nosal, Vice-treasurer
Mitzi Saffos, Secretary Ward Bromaghim
Thomas Harris David Moody
John Manolis Carrie Swann
Ted Saffos
