Tuesday, August 13, 2013
Monday, August 12, 2013
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| Odd that the signage lacks any English at all. Not as inviting as it could be. |
(ROCOR-EAD) - On Saturday, August 10, the Russian Orthodox faithful of Brooklyn, NY celebrated a joyous occasion in the life of the Eastern American Diocese – the blessing of a new church. With the blessing of His Eminence, Metropolitan Hilarion, a new parish was formed in the beginning of 2013, named in honor of the Holy Hierarch Joasaph, Bishop of Belgorod. This is the fourth church of the Eastern American Diocese to be opened up in Brooklyn over the past 15 years.
With such a large number of immigrants from the former Soviet Republics coming to Brooklyn, specifically to Brighton Beach, the opening of a new church able to accommodate their spiritual needs is welcome news. "We are extremely glad and thankful to the Lord for sending us this church," said Eugenia Zaporozhets, warden of the parish’s adult Sunday school, who immigrated to Brooklyn from Russia. Like so many of her compatriots, she grew up in an atheistic country that persecuted Christians and tried to convince the people that God simply did not exist. "We grew up in the Soviet Union and did not go to church. If we did go to church, it was to inform on our classmates. That was our life, and that is why we are grateful to God for our church and our priest, who teaches us how to live properly as Christians."
The Eastern American Diocese has been actively encouraging missionary work among this burgeoning immigrant community, whose members yearn for spiritual and moral guidance. It is our Metropolitan’s missionary vision that the Russian Orthodox Church is in a unique position to lead these people on the path toward salvation: "Our Church Abroad was founded by Russian immigrants and refugees. Because of this, we are able to speak to those who left everything behind in search of a new life, while reminding them that a truly fulfilling life can only be rooted in the commandments of Christ."
The First Hierarch’s vision was echoed by New York City dean Archpriest Alexander Belya, who believes that there is a need for many Orthodox churches in Brooklyn to accommodate those who are searching for Christ, yet know very little of the Faith. "A person who wishes to be renewed, to become better, to live with God, understands that he must attend God’s church, and today that opportunity has been afforded to the residents of this neighborhood."
Just because there is a large Orthodox population in the New York Metropolitan area does not mean that the process of opening a new church will be without challenges. In a borough like Brooklyn, it is not easy or affordable to rent, let alone buy a suitable building or space for worship. Nonetheless, under the direction of the newly appointed rector, Archpriest Boris Oparin, parishioners were able to rent a small storefront in Brooklyn’s Bensonhurst neighborhood and transform it into a cozy Orthodox temple.
Although the space is not large, the new church is well-adorned, with a handcrafted iconostasis and many icons, some of which are printed on canvas and mounted on the walls, giving the impression that the church is fully frescoed. While the outward appearance of a church may not be the most important factor in determining the spiritual health of the parish, an aesthetically pleasing temple will help attract passersby and hopefully spark an interest in the Orthodox life. "Look how cozy it is here – you come in and immediately feel a different mood," Zaporozhets said. "I sometimes keep watch at the entry and candle counter, and greet newcomers. After visiting the church for the first time, many of them are overwhelmed by a feeling of grace and peacefulness, and assure me that they will return on a regular basis."
The particularly prayerful atmosphere can also be attributed in part to a collection of icons and sacred items that the newly established parish received from St. Nicholas Church in Millville, NJ. Unable to overcome recent hardships, St. Nicholas Church was forced to close its doors; but the parishioners desired that the contents of the church continue to serve as implements of prayer. "As sorrowful as it may be to see a parish close, Christ’s Church must minister where the people are," said diocesan secretary Archpriest Serge Lukianov. "The remaining parishioners of St. Nicholas Church recognize this, and selflessly donated the contents of their church to help give birth to a new parish. In this way, St. Nicholas Church will always live on in Brooklyn."
A special plaque has been installed in the narthex of St. Joasaph’s Church, acknowledging the vital role that St. Nicholas Church played in the parish’s opening and adornment, and encouraging the faithful of Brooklyn to pray for the repose of the faithful in Millville.
After several months of preparation, the parish was finally ready to welcome its ruling bishop and the First Hierarch of the Russian Church Abroad, His Eminence, Metropolitan Hilarion, who held an Archpastoral visit to Brooklyn on August 10th in order to perform the lesser blessing of the church and lead the first Hierarchal Liturgy. His Eminence was co-served by Fr. Serge, Fr. Boris, Hieromonk Tikhon (Gayfudinov; cleric of the Synodal Cathedral of the Sign in New York City), Protodeacon Igor Panachev (cleric of St. Nicholas Patriarchal Cathedral in New York City), Protodeacon Leonid Roschko, and Deacon Michael Wengrin (clerics of St. George’s Church in Howell, NJ). Fr. Alexander Belya was also present for the Liturgy and prayed in the altar.
During the Liturgy, a special commemoration was held for the repose of His Beatitude, Metropolitan Anthony (Khrapovitsky), the first Primate of the Russian Church Abroad, in honor of the 77th anniversary of his blessed repose.
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In his sermon upon completion of the Divine Liturgy, Metropolitan Hilarion addressed the faithful and congratulated them with the blessing of their new church. The Metropolitan noted that "the opening of new churches is a great grace from God to all the people." He called on the parishioners to follow in the footsteps of their patron saint, the Holy Hierarch Joasaph of Belgorod, and to imitate him in their own spiritual lives. Understanding that the physical construction of a church is only the first step in building a parish community, the Metropolitan urged parishioners to focus their attention on the spiritual needs of the parish by genuinely living a life in Christ. "I wish all of you physical and spiritual strength, patience, and health, that this community might grow not only in number, but especially in spirit and sanctity – St. Joasaph loved to observe this in his flock. Always strive to be closer to God – grow closer to Him, pray to Him constantly, and He will cover you with His almighty grace."
A diocesan Gramota was then presented to Fr. Boris and Matushka Tatiana Oparin for their selfless labors and substantial personal investment in founding the parish. Accepting the Gramota, Fr. Boris reminded parishioners that any award received by a rector is first and foremost an award bestowed on his faithful parishioners. After the Liturgy, a bountiful luncheon was offered in the parish refectory, during which many congratulatory remarks and words of encouragement were offered on behalf of the new parish.
With God’s help, the future of St. Joasaph’s Church is indeed a bright one. Witnessing the brotherly love and unity among the parishioners, it is obvious that the newly blessed church building will soon be outgrown. The parish already has its own Sunday school, in which approximately 40 students are enrolled, thus fortifying the future generation in the salvific virtues of the Orthodox Faith. Grounded in these blessed precepts, the energy and faith of these young men and women give us hope that even more churches will need opening in the near future.
(Sofia Globe) - The Bulgarian Orthodox Church Metropolitan of Sliven, Yoanikii, has issued a statement objecting to reported plans for a monument to Roman Catholic Pope John XXIII in the seaside town of Nessebur, saying that John XXIII did not deserve this and the move would create tensions between Orthodox Christians and Roman Catholics.
Met. Yoanikii of Sliven
John XXIII, Pope from October 1958 to June 1963, was Papal Nuncio to Bulgaria from 1925 to 1935.
The plan for a statue of him to be erected at the isthmus of the town was inspired, according to the municipality, by him having given the equivalent of half a million leva to feed Macedonian refugees.
John XXIII’s career also includes having acted to assist Jews seeking to escape the Nazis’ Holocaust, including Bulgarian Jews. Currently, he is on the path of beatification, reportedly expected to happen before the end of 2013, along with the late Pope John Paul II.
Nessebur mayor Nikolai Dimitrov was reported as having told daily Trud that the plan to put up a statue to John XXIII was supported by the town’s people and would strengthen cultural and historical tourism.
But, in a lengthy statement on the website of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church in the town of Sliven, Yoanikii called on Nessebur municipality to reconsider its decision, which the statement described as an “insult” to the Orthodox Christians of Nessebur and to the patrons of the town, including Jesus, Mary, John the Baptist, St Stephen, the archangels Michael and Gabriel, and saints Sophia, Dimitar, Paraskeva, Theodore and Clement.
The statement said that in the “short time” (1925/35) that John XXIII, then Angelo Roncalli, had served, it was not possible that he had performed so many good deeds as for this to be described – as the municipality had – as “undoubted merit” qualifying him for a monument.
The statement said that Roncalli’s biography did not record a 1926 donation to feeding children of refugees from Eastern Thrace and Aegean Macedonia.
Roncalli had helped with funding for victims of the 1928 earthquake in Bulgaria, had facilitated the marriage agreement between king Boris III and princess Giovanna, a Roman Catholic, and he helped to save Bulgarian Jews from the Holocaust. “But these are his contributions to the Bulgarian state, irrelevant to Nessebur.”
Even if Roncalli donated money to feed the children of refugees, this single act did not warrant a monument.
“It is well known that the southern Black Sea resorts, already from the early Middle Ages, have been and are today Orthodox Christian communities. This is proven by dozens of medieval Orthodox churches and monasteries in the city and its surroundings. In these places there has never been more than a compact Catholic community, except for a small one in the region and another in Malko Tarnovo with the Eastern Rite.”
The Sliven statement said that the fact that most tourists visiting Nessebur “profess the Catholic religion is not a reason for there to be a monument to a Catholic Pope”.
“Nessebur is visited by quite a few representatives of other faiths and in striving for the development of so-called pilgrimage tourism, should monuments be erected to their spiritual leaders?”
Pilgrimage tourism in Nessebar will develop not because of a monument to the Pope, but because of the presence of medieval Orthodox churches and monasteries and other Christian monuments on the territory of the municipality, Yoanikii said.
“The erection of a monument to the Catholic Pope will rise to tensions between Orthodox and Catholic faiths in which for centuries there have been dogmatic and canonical differences.”
Nessebur mayor Dimitrov said, “I deeply respect Metropolitan Yoanikii, but I think someone has misled him. I shall be meeting him next week. We have not stopped helping the Orthodox Church in Nessebur, and that with serious donations, so I do not see why anyone should be offended. This is about history and the flow of more tourists”.
Friday, August 9, 2013
(Church of Jerusalem) - On Tuesday the 24th of July/6th of August 2013, His Beatitude Theophilos, Our Father and Patriarch of Jerusalem conducted the monastic initiation of two deacons of the All-Holy Church of the Resurrection, namely Ioannis Ioacovou who was given the name Juvenalios and Alexandros Hadjipavlis, renamed Agapios.
This tonsure took place according to a decision by the Holy and Sacred Synod which took into account the good novitiate and diaconate of these two young monks.
After the rite, His Beatitude congratulated the tonsured monks on their new mission to meet the obligations of monastic life at the Holy Sepulcher.
Thursday, August 8, 2013
(Christian Institute) - Switzerland is holding a competition to rewrite its national anthem because it currently focuses on God.
Over £7,000 is being offered as a prize for rewriting the song, which is called the Swiss Psalm.
The man in charge of the competition claims Swiss society is “religiously neutral”, but in a 2010 census two thirds identified themselves as belonging to a church.
Prayer
Competitors are asked to include values from the Swiss constitution such as democracy and solidarity, and the tune could also be revised.
But Lukas Niederberger, who is in charge of the competition, told the BBC: “The real problem is above all the text.”
“Officially the anthem is a psalm, a prayer, but of course we have an open society, religiously neutral.
Atheists
“We have atheists, no single god, so this anthem is a difficulty”.
He also said: “Many people are conservative and the anthem is emotional, but if a composer creates a super song, then we can change the tune too.
“But that’s a bit difficult for conservative people, so we say the contestants don’t have to change the music”, he said.
Surrender
One verse of the current anthem, which dates back to the 1800s and was officially adopted in 1981, reads: “When the morning skies grow red / And o’er their radiance shed / Thou, O Lord, appeareth in their light.
“When the Alps glow bright with splendour, Pray to God, to Him surrender,
“For you feel and understand, For you feel and understand / That he dwelleth in this land. That he dwelleth in this land.”
No religion
The winner will be decided by a 25-member judging panel which includes people from the literature, sport and yodelling communities.
The competition will begin in January next year and run for six months. The prize – of 10,000 Swiss Francs – will be awarded in 2015.
According to the 2010 census, as well as those who identified as religious, 20 per cent said they had no religion.
A few weeks ago some men who formed a parish in Taiwan under Moscow were excommunicated. Now a gentleman from the Philippines has been excommunicated.
(OMHKSEA) - Dear Brethren in Christ,
By the grace of God my unworthiness happens to be the canonical Orthodox Bishop and Metropolitan in this end region of Southeast Asia and for six years I try to properly respond, as much as I am capable of doing, to my most weighty episcopal duties.
As your Bishop and spiritual Father when I see the waves of separation, schism and heresy threatening my ecclesiastical Eparchy I have to take measures and no to remain neglectful and indifferent.
I regret to inform you that the following individual, who resides in Philippines,
Felipe Balingit
pretends to be an Orthodox Monk and Clergyman, participates at the services of schismatic groups, creates new schismatic groups and thus he excommunicated himself and abandon the Orthodox Church-the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. I consider him as stranger to the Body of the Orthodox Church and I inform you that he has no the right to call himself as “Orthodox Christian” and to participate in the Holy and Sacred Sacraments of the Orthodox Church.
If any laity or clergy join him he shall have no partnership with us or with the Orthodox Church in general. I pray for his repentance and his return to the Orthodox Church.
My beloved Brethren,
Beware also of all those who come to Philippines and try to do missionary work without the Hierarchical blessing of the Canonical Orthodox Metropolitan. Beware of those who come to you and preach and celebrate the Divine Liturgy without to have my written permission and blessing. Surely he is not excluding the missionaries from the Church of Antioch already in-country. Beware of those “who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but within are ravenous wolves” (Matthew 7:15) Their purpose is to divide the Church and the Orthodox faithful as their motives are the destructive passion of the controlling spirit and the “virus” of ethnophyletism.
May the Lord Jesus Christ save you from the injuries of the adversary and keep you as a good seed for all kinds of virtues and keep you all in true faith with good works and obedience to your Canonical Bishop and to your Spiritual Mother, the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.
+Metropolitan Nektarios
of Hong Kong and South East Asia
(USA Today) - Emergency workers and community members in eastern Missouri are not sure what to make of a mystery priest who showed up at a critical accident scene Sunday morning and whose prayer seemed to change life-threatening events for the positive.
Even odder, the black-garbed priest does not appear in any of the nearly 70 photos of the scene of the accident in which a 19-year-old girl almost died. No one knows the priest and he vanished without a word, said Raymond Reed, fire chief of New London, Mo.
"I think it's a miracle," Reed said. "I would say whether it was an angel that was sent to us in the form of a priest or a priest that became our angel, I don't know. Either way, I'm good with it."
Carla Churchill Lentz, mother of the teen who was critically injured, said emergency workers have told her there is no way her daughter should have lived inside such a mangled car. Of the priest, she said, "I do believe he certainly could have been an angel dressed in priest's attire because the Bible tells us there are angels among us."
The scene unfolded Sunday morning. Katie Lentz, a sophomore at Tulane University, was driving from her parents' home in Quincy, Ill., to Jefferson City, Mo., where she has a summer internship and planned to attend church with friends. The Mercedes she was driving collided with another vehicle on a highway near Center, Mo. The accident crushed Lentz's vehicle into a ball of sheet metal that lay on the driver's side, Reed said.
Reed's team and emergency workers from several other jurisdictions tried for at least 45 minutes to remove the twisted metal from around Lentz. Various pieces of equipment broke and the team was running out of choices. A helicopter waited to carry Lentz to the nearest trauma center. Though Lentz appeared calm, talking about her church and her studies toward a dentistry degree, her vital signs were beginning to fail, Reed said.
"I was pulled off to the side by one of the members of the" helicopter evacuation team, Reed said. "He expressed to me that we were out of time. Her condition looked grim for her coming out of that vehicle alive. She was facing major problems."
At that point, Reed's team agreed to take the life-threatening chance of sitting the vehicle upright so that Lentz could be removed from it. This is dangerous because a sudden change in pressure to the body can be critical, he said.
That's when Lentz asked if someone would pray with her and a voice said, "I will."
The silver-haired priest in his 50s or 60s in black pants, black shirt and black collar with visible white insert stepped forward from nowhere. It struck Reed as odd because the street was blocked off 2 miles from the scene and no one from the nearby communities recognized him.
"We're all local people from four different towns," Reed said. "We've only got one Catholic church out of three towns and it wasn't their priest."
Reed and the other emergency workers were on their knees. The priest of about medium build, maybe 6-feet-tall, stood above them.
"This priest approached Katie and began to pray openly with her," Reed said. "He had a bottle of anointing oil with him and he used that."
Another firefighter who had been watching said it appeared as if the priest also sprinkled Reed and two other emergency workers nearby with oil.
Everything happened quickly after that. Twenty emergency workers pulled together and sat the car upright, Churchill Lentz said. Katie Lentz's vital signs improved and a rescue team from a neighboring community suddenly appeared with fresh equipment and tools. Lentz was removed and rushed to the hospital.
With Lentz gone, the rescue team prepared to clean up, Reed said.
"We all go back to thank this priest and he's gone," he said.
Initially, they assumed he had to get to his home church to lead Sunday services. But then they looked at their photos of the scene.
"I have 69 photographs that were taken from minutes after that accident happened — bystanders, the extrication, our final cleanup — and he's not in them," Reed said. "All we want to do is thank him."
Meantime, the Missouri State Highway Patrol reports a 26-year-old male was arrested Sunday on charges of DWI, failure to drive on the right half of the roadway and second-degree felony assault. He was treated and released from a local hospital, according to the report.
The Facebook page of Lentz's mother, Carla Church Lentz, indicates Lentz is on the mend despite suffering two broken femurs, a broken tibia and fibia, broken left wrist, nine broken ribs, a lacerated liver, ruptured spleen and bruised lung.
Churchill Lentz said her daughter has undergone two surgeries at Blessing Hospital in Quincy, Ill., and will undergo two more, but has been upgraded from critical to serious and is doing well.
"She sustained a lot of injuries, however, her face is beautiful, her teeth are perfect, she is sunshine, and everyone who's contacted us — those emergency personnel, the Missouri State Patrol, the deputies, the firemen — they are all saying the same thing, she never cried, she never screamed, she would just say, 'pray for me and pray out loud.' "
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