Brothers and Sisters,
Greetings in the Name of the Lord.
Our Annual Stewardship Campaign continues. The Finance Committee needs your 2027 Budge Pledge information to be entered into REALM by this coming Saturday, October 31. You can find all the necessary information on Discord. Ray W. is available if you have any questions or if you need any assistance with REALM.
Also, this coming Saturday, the Youth Advisors will be hosting St. John’s first annual Trunk-or-Treat! The event will begin at 6:00 PM, with Vespers and continue outside with an evening of games, treats, and fun for the whole parish. Families are invited to decorate their trunks and provide treats, as well as volunteers to help with games, snacks, drinks, and cleanup. There are lots of ways to participate, and we’d love for everyone to help make this an exciting event for our parish! Please see the signup in the email version of the newsletter for all the details and to choose how you’d like to help. If you have any questions, please reach out to any of the Youth Advisers in the Discord channel, #three-holy-youths.
Fasting Days
Wednesday, October 28, Friday, October 30
Daily Services
There will not be any daily services this week, as Father Aidan will be at the Diocesan Clergy Brotherhood Retreat.
Today, October 25 The Sixth Sunday of St Luke
Orthros 8am
Divine Liturgy 10am
Fellowship Hour Noon
The Bible Study, The New Testament Edition 1pm
Tuesday, October 27
Inquirer’s Class 7pm
Wednesday, October 28
Fall Theological Seminar 7pm
Saturday, October 31
4pm St Thomas School
5:45pm Great Vespers
Sunday, November 1 The Fifth Sunday of St Luke
Orthros 8am
Church School 8:15am
Divine Liturgy 10am
Fellowship Hour Noon
Youth Church School 1pm
Finance Update
This week we sent out an announcement that focused on the deficit in our giving. This is a run-down of the bigger picture.
Here’s how we are doing on our 2026 General Operating Fund contributions which are used to pay for our ongoing daily operations:
$485,000 – our 2026 operating budget (92.9%) of total pledged contributions.
12-months – our operating period of Jan to Dec. We are 9 months (75%) through the period.
We have spent $357,476 (73.7%) of our budget.
We have received contributions of $333,540 (63.9%) of pledges.
This creates a deficit of -$23,936 to date.
Here’s how we’re doing on our Temple Fundraising contributions:
36 months - our fundraising collection period is Sep 2024 to Aug 2027. We are 25 months (69%) through the period.
$1,500,000 – our fundraiser goal.
We have received pledges of $1,438,804 (96%) of goal.
We have received contributions of $1,135,748 (79%) of pledges.
Thanks to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and thanks to each of you for your continued generosity. Let’s all make sure that we are staying current on our pledged contributions. (and, if you have not made a pledge and would like to, just speak with Ray W.).
Coming Up
Dr. Mengyu H. continues to lead this year’s Fall Theological Seminar. The group is discussing the now-classic text Norms and Nobility by David Hicks, and an outline of the book and Mengyu’s notes have now been posted on Discord. But if you are involved in Classical Education, then you have probably heard of the book, but this is a chance to actually talk about it—and if you have pre-school age children, if you are interested in Orthodox education, or Orthodox schools, or the future of our culture and society, then you need to be in the parish house on Wednesday night (we’re no longer going to be offering a distance option for these sorts of activities). The group will begin promptly at 7pm; the seminar will run through Wednesday, November 11, and everyone is welcome.
On Saturday, November 7, we will be celebrating the Feast of St Raphael of Brooklyn. We will offer Orthros at 6am and Divine Liturgy at 8am. St Raphael is The Good Shepherd of the Lost Sheep in America; his icon and relic adorn our nave, so this is a wonderful opportunity to pray for all those that we love who are not yet part of the Church or who have fallen away from the Faith.
If you haven’t seen the video of the new temple, it is streaming on Substack. Please check it out and share it with lots of folks. If you have questions about anything you say, just about all of those will be addressed on the Substack in the weeks ahead, so tune in often.
Working on the Building
If you want us to get into that new temple as soon as possible, there are four things you can do this week:
Join us in offering The Akathist for a New Temple each week. Copies are available in the bookstore and online; a recording is available on Discord, and there is a group that meets on Discord each Friday at noon to offer the service.
Join us for the 6am Wednesday Morning Divine Liturgy and reverence the reliquary of St Eanswthe.
Check to make sure that you’re current on your Three Year Commitment to our Building Program. If you have not make a commitment to our Temple Fund, please check with our Finance Guy, Ray W.; he’ll get you set up.
Take out a (totally free) subscription to our Substack, Come See Something Beautiful, read through Father Deacon’s Seraphim’s instructional slides that are attached to this newsletter, and like/comment on/restack/forward each of the three weekly posts.
Our Moment of Grace and Courtesy
Water bottles are now a ‘thing’ in our culture. Those containers come in all sorts of sizes, and folks often carry them where ever they go. However, we should not bring water bottles with us into the Divine Services. To begin with, it’s simply not necessary: we can leave our bottles on the shelves above the coat racks, and, if we need to hydrate, we can simply step outside of the services and get a drink (or even use the water fountain). But bringing water bottles with us into the Divine Services is also dangerous: when we set bottle on the floor or even under one of the chairs, we are creating a fall hazard that, given how crowded our nave is, could potentially cause injury to a number of people. So, our ushers will be reminding us that, unless we are a parish musician, we need to leave our water bottles in the narthex.