Brothers and Sisters,
Happy Feast!
House Blessings are in full swing! If you have not yet had your domicile sanctified, please check the schedule printed at the conclusion of this newsletter, and then be on the watch for that all important confirmation email.
Our Calendar
Fasting Days
Wed, Jan 12 and Friday, Jan 14; we are once again back to the regular fasting schedule (in which we go without meat, most kinds of fish, dairy, oil, wine, and hard liquor; if you need to modify the normal fasting schedule, please check with your spiritual father).
Daily Services
Monday, January 10 through Thursday, January 13: Orthros 5am. (There will be no daily vespers this week and no daily services on Friday, Jan 14, due to House Blessings. If you plan on attending the daily services, it’s generally a good idea to check the day before to make sure that the service will be offered; sometimes pastoral situations require a change of plans, and the service cannot be offered on that particular day).
Seth Hart will be at the online chanter’s stand, offering the First, Third, Sixth, and Ninth Hours this week on ZOOM: 1st hour @ 6:45; 3rd hour @ 8:45; 6th hour @11:45; 9th hour @3:45. Please also check the schedule for the festal services, but see the emailed newsletter for the log in information:
Tuesday, Jan 11
Orthodoxy 101 7pm
Saturday, January 8
St Thomas School 4pm
Great Vespers 6pm
Sunday, January 16
The 12th Sunday of St Luke
Orthros 8am
Church School 8:15am
Divine Liturgy 10am
Fellowship Hour Noon
St Thomas School
On Saturday, January 15, Polly Thurston will lead the discussion of Chapter One and Two, in Volume V, “Sacraments in the Orthodox Understanding; Baptism and Chrismation” https://theforerunner.squarespace.com/blog/2021/5/9/orthodox-christianity-vol-iii-ch-2.
In order to participate online, send an email to remote.meetings@theforerunner.org by this coming Thursday, January 6; you will also need to keep your camera on during the session.
Coming Up
If you are not yet on a Fellowship Hour Team, we could sure use your help! Just get in touch with Misty Wright, and she will get you set up with a fun group of people that you can serve with in the coming year.
Beginning this coming Tuesday January 11, Reader Matthew Groh (with assistance from Luke Cloud and Stephen Guerra) will hold a weekly class called Orthodoxy 101. The class will deal broadly with basic topics important to people who may be new to Orthodoxy and will allow extended time for questions and answers. This class is intended for anyone looking for a basic, foundational understanding of Orthodox faith and practice. It should be especially appropriate for inquirers and catechumens. The class would also be a good first step for someone trying to go deeper in their understanding of the Orthodox faith. The basic format will be to read for about 15-20 minutes on a pre-determined topic, followed by questions on that topic and/or other topics. It should not require extensive out-of-class study and the format of the class will hopefully lend itself to being something to which someone could invite interested friends. The first topic will be "The Orthodox Understanding of the Incarnation" and we will be reading from St. Athanasius' On the Incarnation. Orthodoxy 101 will be held each Tuesday at 7pm in the parish house and will last an hour. Online participation will also be available through the zoom link in the emailed newsletter.
Every year for close to twenty years, we participated in the Rally for Life on the fourth Saturday in January. However, given the increasing intensity surrounding the issue, as well as the on-going public health concerns, instead of gathering at the gates of the state capitol on that Saturday, we now gather in our temple, and, together, we will offer The Service for the Victims of Abortion. This coming year, that will happen on Friday, January 21; it will be a lot less public than the Rally for Life, but it will also be an opportunity for lots of folks who were never able to participate in the rally to join us as we pray for all children and all parents. By Orthodox standards, the service is pretty short, but we will start promptly at 7pm, and we will offer up to the Most Holy Trinity our prayers for those folks who are victims of the great moral evil of our age.
Camp St Raphael will be offering two one-week sessions this coming summer at it’s new location at Cross Point Camp in Kingston, OK: June 26th - July 2nd and July 3rd - July 9th. Staff applications will be available online in January and camper applications in February. You can check out the website www.campstraphael.org or contact CSR’s Executive Director Gayle Malone at Gayle@campstraphael.org.
Our 2022 Annual Meeting
Per the requirements of our Parish Constitution, we are announcing that our 2022 Annual Community Meeting will take place on Sunday February 13. Thanks to the hard work of all our council members, you have already received, via email, a Parish Announcement to which was attached the agenda and all the reports for the meeting. Please read through the reports carefully, and, if you have any questions, speak with Bessie Jacob, our Parish Council President, or Father Aidan. At the meeting in February, we will review the reports that are attached to this newsletter, and we will vote for the folks who will serve on the Parish Council.
The ballots for the council elections will be distributed, filled out, and collected at the beginning of the Annual Meeting. Our parish clergy will count the votes during the course of the meeting, and the election results will be announced at the conclusion of the meeting. As usual, there will not be any provision for online voting; if you will not be able to attend the meeting on Sunday, February 13, then you must make arrangements to get a paper ballot from Father Aidan, fill it out, and return it prior to him the actual meeting on February 13.
Per the requirements of our Parish Constitution, three members of the Parish Council will be cycling off at the end of 2021: Nick Crown, Demetry Zozulya, and Jerry Juliano. However, Jerry is eligible to run for a second term, and we also have three other folks who have agreed to run for the council, so the 2022 nominees for the council elections are: Elena Cabeza de Vaca, Sandi Andrew, Jerry Juliano, and Michael Cotton. Please thank Nick and Demetry for their service these past six years; please thank Jerry, Elena, Sandi, and Michael for their willingness to run for the council, and please start praying now about which of them you will vote for during the election on February 13.
Of course, you cannot go wrong with any of the candidates that have agreed to run for the council. However, our constitution also allows for nominations from the floor at the Annual Community Meeting. Nevertheless (and this is a very important Nevertheless), since our constitution also requires that everyone nominated be 1) over 18 years of age 2) a member of our parish for at least 12 months, 3) a regular participant in the Holy Mysteries of Confession and the Eucharist, and 4) a consistent financial contributor to our community, it’s extremely important to A) check with the person you wish to nominate and B) check with Father Aidan before making the actual nomination during the Annual Meeting. That way, we can avoid any awkward and embarrassing moments.
Our Moment of Grace and Courtesy
Please do not allow your children to climb on the icon stand in the center of the nave. When children try to pull themselves up on to the stand, they risk injury and accident. Parents, grandparents, and godparents should instruct children to reverence the icon by simply touching it, or, if they are too short and would like to see the image for themselves, then they should ask an adult to assist them.
an unworthy priest
aidan
The Happy Priest is a publication of Life At A Dead Run Media, which is a subsidiary of One Take Productions. Our IT Guy is Jerry Juliano; our Webmaster is Seth Hart; our Keeper of Lists is Father Andrew Wilson; our Roving Reporter is Trillian Astra; our equine skijoring team prefers to use lead horses without riders, and our Spiritual Advisor is Elder Galaction of the Holy Mountain.