On Saturday 19 October and Sunday 20 October we will have services for the Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost and in honour of Saints Sergius and Bacchus of Syria (+290-303 AD).  All-night Vigil will be served at 6.00pm on Saturday and Divine Liturgy will be served at 9.00am on Sunday.

On Saturday 26 October the Russian Orthodox Church of the Protection of the Mother of God (Moscow Patriarchate) in Blacktown will celebrate its parish feast-day and thirtieth anniversary.  His Eminence Sergei, Metropolitan of Singapore and Patriarchal Exarch of South-East Asia, will preside at the main services together with His Grace Bishop George of Canberra.  There will be a blessing of water at 8.00am.  The greeting of the bishop will take place at 9.00am, followed by Divine Liturgy, a moleben to the Mother of God with a procession around the church, and the laying of the foundation stone of the parish's new church.  At 1.00pm there will be a festive luncheon and concert at Saint Nicholas Serbian Orthodox Church, 33 Second Avenue, Blacktown.  More information is available from the Protection parish website here.  We encourage our parishioners and friends to attend and offer their support.

In parishes of our Diocese a collection is generally taken up every year during November to help the work of the Fund for Assistance to the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia.  The Fund for Assistance supports the moral-spiritual education of our youth, provides aid to our clergy, and distributes emergency relief to the missions of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia.  This year, the collection will be taken up in our parish on Sunday 3 November.  Collection envelopes will be available in church from Saturday 2 November.  Those who wish to make a donation but who are unable to be in church on this day may make a direct donation to the Fund for Assistance here.

On Saturday 2 November and Sunday 3 November we will have services for the Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost and in honour of Saint Hilarion the Great of Gaza (+371 AD).  As Saturday 2 November is Saint Demetrius Saturday, a day of commemoration of the departed, there will be a general memorial service at 5.00pm that day, followed by Matins (rather than the longer All-night Vigil) at 6.00pm.  Divine Liturgy will be served at 9.00am on Sunday.  Following Divine Liturgy a collection will be taken up to benefit the Fund for Assistance to the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia.

On Monday 4 November Our Lady of Kazan Convent in Kentlyn will celebrate its feast-day and sixtieth anniversary.  His Grace Archbishop Gabriel of Montreal and Canada with preside at the main services together with His Grace Bishop George of Canberra.  There will be a blessing of water at 8.00am.  The greeting of the bishop will take place at 9.00am, followed by Divine Liturgy and a moleben to the Mother of God with a procession around the church.  Afterwards there will be a festive luncheon in the convent hall.  More information is available from the convent website here.  We encourage our parishioners and friends to attend and support the convent, the oldest monastic establishment in our Diocese.

On Saturday 19 October and Sunday 20 October we had services for the Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost and in honour of Saints Sergius and Bacchus in Syria (+290-303 AD).  All-Night Vigil was served on Saturday evening and Divine Liturgy was served on Sunday morning.  In his sermon the parish rector spoke about the life and witness of another saint commemorated on this day, Saint Jonah, bishop of Hankow, Manchuria (+1925).

On Saturday 5 October and Sunday 6 October we had services for the Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost and in honour of the Conception of Saint John, the Forerunner and Baptiser of the Lord.  All-Night Vigil was served on Saturday evening and Divine Liturgy was served on Sunday morning.  In his sermon the parish rector spoke about the wondrous events surrounding the conception of Saint John (Luke 1:5-25), of the moment of conception as the beginning of each life, and of the ways in which God’s will can be accomplished through love in marriage.  Following the service the 2019 Annual General Meeting of our parish was convened.

On Sunday 6 October our parish held its 2019 Annual General Meeting.  The 2019 Annual Report was presented and accepted.  Vladimir (“Rick”) Golovin, Anna Kourbatov, Anne Nielsen, Nina Golovin, Kate Marcotrigiano and Alla Karmadonoff were elected to serve on the 2019-20 Parish Council.  Alla Karmadonoff and Ludmilla Alexandrovsky were elected Child Safety Contact Persons, and Rick Golovin and Anna Kourbatov were chosen as parish delegates to the Nineteenth Diocesan Assembly. 

Our 2019 Annual Report, including the independently audited 2018-19 Financial Statements, is now available.  The 2019 Annual Report will be presented to our parish Annual General Meeting (AGM) this coming Sunday, 6 October 2019.  A copy of the report is available in PDF form here.  Copies have been emailed to parish members this week .  We encourage our parishioners and friends with questions or comments in relation to our Annual Report to contact us.

On Thursday 26 September and Friday 27 September we had services for the Great Feast of the Exaltation of the Life-Giving Cross of the Lord.  All-night Vigil with the blessing of wheat, wine, oil and five loaves was served on Thursday evening and Divine Liturgy was served on Friday morning.  At Divine Liturgy prayers were offered for peace in Ukraine and for Orthodox unity.

On Friday 20 September and Saturday 21 September we had services for the Great Feast of the Nativity of the Mother of God.  All-night Vigil with the blessing of wheat, wine, oil and five loaves was served on Friday evening and Divine Liturgy was served on Saturday morning.  In his sermon the parish rector spoke of what is known concerning the circumstances of the birth of the Holy Virgin and of the significance of the feast-day.

On Saturday 14 September and Sunday 15 September we had services for the Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost and in honour of the Translation of the Relics of Saints Peter and Fevronia of Murom, exemplars of love, faithfulness and family life.  All-night Vigil was served on Saturday evening and Divine Liturgy was served on Sunday morning. Following the Prayer before the Amvon there was a moleben to Saints Peter and Fevronia at which all the married couples in our parish were commemorated by name.  Immediately after the moleben the parish rector read the prayers of blessing over a new seven-branched lamp stand for our altar, three new candle stands for our church, a beautiful copy of the “Khabarovsk” Icon of the Mother of God (a gift from Evgenia Druganova and her family) and an icon of the Apostle Paul (a gift from the Douriaguine family in memory of Reader Paul Douriaguine).  At the end of the service an announcement was made concerning the forthcoming parish Annual General Meeting.

The July 2019 issue of “Word of the Church” (“Церковное Слово”), the official journal of the Australian-New Diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, is now available in our parishes.  As usual, it contains a range of interesting articles in both Russian and English.  In Russian: “Богородице-Казанский Монастырь готовится отметить 60-летие”; “Православный Богословский Институт Святых Кирилла и Мефодия”; “Храмы и их история память о Романовых за Рубежом”; “О неприкосновенности жизни человека с момента зачатия”; and more.  In English: material concerning the twentieth anniversary of the Holy Fathers Mission in Warrnambool, Victoria; an article about the July 2019 residential school of the Saints Cyril and Methodius Orthodox Institute; an interview with Metropolitan Onuphry (Berezovsky), Primate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church; lives of the Orthodox Popes of Rome; and an article about why some priests can refuse to be spiritual fathers.  Copies are $5.00.

On 29 May 2019 His Grace Bishop George of Canberra advised parish rectors and monastic superiors that the Nineteenth Diocesan Assembly of the Australian-New Zealand Diocese would be convened at the Saints Peter and Paul Diocesan Cathedral in Strathfield, NSW, in November 2019.  Commencing on the evening of Thursday 14 November and concluding on the afternoon of Sunday 17 November, the Assembly will coincide with Diocesan celebrations of the thirty-fifth anniversary of Metropolitan Hilarion’s consecration to the episcopacy on 10 December 1984.  As all Diocesan clergy will be participating in the Assembly and associated commemorative activities, the only services in our Diocese on Saturday-Sunday 16-17 November will be at the Strathfield Cathedral.  Information about the Eighteenth Diocesan Assembly, held in Cabramatta in November 2016, is available here.

A group of young families working under the auspices of the Intercession of the Holy Virgin parish in Cabramatta, NSW, is again organising a camp for Russian and other Orthodox children and young people aged 8-17 to be held in Toukley, NSW - here on the Central Coast - from 15 December - 20 December 2019.  The cost will be $425.00 per person, or $399.00 if payment is made by 30 September 2019.  For those interested, more information is available here.