Brothers and Sisters,
Greetings in the Name of the Lord.
This coming Friday, February 2, we will close out this Festal Season with the Feast of the Presentation of our Lord and Master in the Temple. On Thursday, February 1, we will offer Great Vespers at 7pm; on Friday, the day of the feast, we will serve Orthros at 5am and Divine Liturgy at 7am. Join us as we finish up the celebration we began back on December 25th!
Our Calendar
Fasting Days
Wednesday, January 31, and Friday, February 2 (though there is a blessing for wine and oil since the 2nd is also a feast day)
Daily Services
Monday, January 29—Friday, February 2: Orthros 5am; Vespers 5pm (but check the schedule for the festal services; please remember that if you plan on attending the in-person services, it’s always a good idea to check the day before and make sure the regular schedule will be observed).
Seth Hart and friends will be at the online chanter’s stand, offering the First, Third, Sixth, and Ninth Hours this week: 1st hour & 3rd hour: 8:30 a.m.; 6th hour & 9th hour: 3:30 p.m.
Fr. Andrew, Seth Hart, and Matthew Groh and many other folks continue to broadcast daily readings from spiritual books online. They are now reading “Wounded By Love: The Life and Wisdom of St Porphyrios”. The schedule is as follows: M-F at 12pm.
Also, our online team will now be reading the Daily Synaxarion on Discord. Just look for this channel: #synaxarion
Tuesday, January 30
Orthodoxy 101 7pm; you can also access the group on Discord
Thursday, February 1
Great Vespers for The Presentation 7pm
Friday, February 2
The Feast of the Presentation
Orthros 5am
Divine Liturgy 7am
Saturday, February 3
St Thomas School 4pm
Great Vespers 6pm
Sunday, February 4
15th Sunday of St Matthew
Orthros 8am
Church School 8:15am
Divine Liturgy 10am
Fellowship Hour Noon
St Thomas School
On Saturday, February 3, we will have our first Practical Saturday Class of 2024. Father Aidan will lead the discussion of spiritual disciplines—fasting, prayer rules, spiritual reading, the importance of The Psalter, confession, having a spiritual father and close relationships in the parish, chastity, stillness—we will be covering it all, and it will be an In-Person Only Session, so plan on joining us in the parish house at 4pm
Coming Up
Our 2024 Annual Community Meeting will be on Sunday, February 11. All the information for that meeting—the agenda, the reports, the candidates for parish council—can all be found in the email edition of this newsletter.
It’s time to plan for summer camp! Every year, The Order of St Ignatius generously provides each parish in the archdiocese with scholarship money. This year, the Order will give St John’s $1,000 to be divided up among no more than 10 campers, but we need to sign up for this scholarship money by March 1. So, if your child is registered for Camp St Raphael, and you would like to access some of the scholarship money, send an email to Father Aidan as soon as possible and get on the list.
Our Moment of Grace and Courtesy
Our Fellowship Hour Teams do a great job of providing us with fruit during our post liturgy meal, but, a lot of times, those orange peels and apple cores end up scattered across the property. Apparently, a lot of us figure that, if it’s biodegradable or if animals might eat it, then it’s not actually trash, and we can just throw it on the ground (or allow our children to do so). But it takes a number of weeks for those items to degrade, and, in the meantime, our property looks really nasty. Also, while wild animals will eat orange peels and apple cores, we don’t really want to attract those kinds of critters—after all, we don’t want any of our young children coming face to face with skunks or coyotes. So please place all food items in the proper trash receptacles and make sure your children do, too.
an unworthy priest
aidan