(G) Feast of St Markella (1962)

Details: Created on Tuesday, 15 December 2020 23:54

The Feast Day of St Markella (July 22/August 4) as celebrated at the then Parish of St Markella in 1962. This Divine Liturgy was celebrated by Archimandrite Petros Astyfides, Fr Eleutherios Moschos, Hieromonk Akakios Mouskos, and Deacon Nikodemos Kalantis. Heard reading the Creed of Faith is Gerontissa Siglitiki. This is the earliest known recording of Divine Services celebrated at the Parish (later Cathedral) of St Markella. The parish was established by Arch. Petros in 1954, eight years before this recording was made, and ten years after he escaped persecution in Greece and came to America. Less than four months after this Divine Liturgy was served (Nov29/Dec12) Archimandrite Petros was ordained to the Episcopacy as Bishop of Astoria. He would later be elevated to the rank of Metropolitan of Astoria. At the time of this recording Arch. Petros was under the omophorion of Bishop Dositheos of New York, who was a Hierarch of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Fr. Eleutherios, one of the Chian Six, served the Church of St Spyridon in Detroit for many years, and eventually left America and lived on the Holy Mountain until he reposed on April 21, 2020, aged 97. The Deacon Nikodemos Kalantis is now an Archimandrite serving the Church of St Mark of Ephesus in Montreal. Gerontissa Siglitiki resides at the Cathedral to this day, with her Sisterhood around her there.

We have left the glitches in the recording intact. What is heard is the distortion of the sound at the point when the old Wollensak reel-to-reel recorder is turned off. This was done periodically to save tape. Unlike digital recording magnetic tape reels were very limited in their available recording time.

Orthodox Awareness

A Miracle of Saint Spyridon

This miracle of Saint Spyridon took place in Mandra, Greece in 1926.

It was 12/25 December, 1926. The state Church of Greece adopted the Papal calendar and with the help of the Greek government persecuted all those who did not accept the Papal calendar. The faithful Orthodox Christians of Mandra woke up and headed to their Church to celebrate the Feast of Saint Spyridon. When they reached the Church they saw that the door to the Church had been secured with chains and the faithful could not enter. Before leaving the Church to return to their homes they stuck their candles on the door. As soon as the last person placed his candles on the door

the chains broke and fell. The faithful, confirmed in their Faith, entered the Church and celebrated the Feast of Saint Spyridon.

The miracle was reported the next day by the newspaper Skrip.

Missions

Saints Peter and Paul Orthodox Mission, Tucson, Arizona

Saints Peter and Paul Orthodox Church is a beautiful mission parish near downtown Tucson, a city in southern Arizona. It was started in 1997 by Father John Bockman, who was a missionary Priest formerly serving missions in Tennessee and Massachusetts since 1990. Father John served the faithful in Tucson and the surrounding area in his home Chapel until his repose in November of 2000. His wife, Presbytera Valerie, continued to make her home Chapel available for the mission, with clergy from Saint Nectarios Orthodox Church in Seattle and His Eminence, Metropolitan Moses of Toronto (then of Portland), visiting to provide the Divine Services.

Youth

2023 Youth Conference

Please join us for the 2023 youth conference in Chicago, IL! To learn more, visit the home page or visit the conference website.

Ask A Priest

Fasting

Q. There seems to be a lot of variation in how people observe fasting, but my confessor told me to fast from oil on Wednesday and Friday. Oil is a pretty vague category, though, and I was wondering if I could get a more explicit description of what kinds of food and drink are excluded on strict fast days. Read more...

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