Welcome

We welcome all visitors to our Divine Liturgy and services. While Holy Communion may only be received by prepared Orthodox Christians, our non-Orthodox guests are welcome to participate in our prayers and hymns and to join us in venerating the Cross and and receiving blessed bread at the conclusion of the Liturgy. Please sign our guest book and join us for refreshments and fellowship after the services.

Feel free to ask questions before or after the services. Any member of our Council or Congregation are glad to assist you. Literature about the Orthodox faith and this parish can be found at the candle desk.

Members of our Parish Council are:

Deborah Bray - Secretary

Natalie Kucharski - Treasurer

Glenn PenkoffLidbeck - Member at Large

Demetra Tolis - Member at Large

Phyllis Sturtevant - President

Sophia Brubaker - Vice President

St. Alexis Parish Calendar

Events of the Week

March 1 to March 1, 2015

Sunday, March 1

9:30AM Divine Liturgy

11:15AM Church School

Announcements

All parishioners of this parish are expected to receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation through participation in the rite of Confession. You may come to Confession before or after (with the exception of Liturgy) any service. You may “drop in” any time Wednesday afternoons, or you may schedule a date and time that best meets your needs.

A Special Announcement
Hello everyone! I am working on my gold award for girl scouts, which is focused on giving back to the community. For part of my project, I am going to be organizing a cookbook for our church. I know I have heard people say for a long time, “I love that recipe, I wish we had a cookbook..” Well, here we go! The cookbook will be divided into three sections: Lenten, Non-Fast foods, and desserts. Please feel free to submit more than one recipe!! There are so many good Paschal, Lenten, and even everyday dishes that all members of the Parish make. There will be a recipe template sent out by Father in an email, as well as in the bulletin. I can also print out copies to bring to church this Sunday for those who aren’t as computer-handy, if needed. All templates will be due back on March 14th (two weeks from this Sunday). The background to each recipe is optional, but highly recommended — feel free to tell the story behind each recipe (: Each cookbook will be sold in the church store, with proceeds going towards outreach. Can’t wait to put this all together! Thanks,
Nadia PenkoffLidbeck

(Templates may be found as attachments to this bulletin)

Food for All Garden

Dear all,

Great news! We now have a Facebook page! Thanks to the creative and diligent efforts of Beth Critchley and Elizabeth Borgnis, we went “live” yesterday and as of this writing we have 62 “likes” ! Many thanks to Miner Vincent and Gary Borgnis who wrote such lovely compliments about the accomplishments of our garden. Please go on Facebook and take a look – you will be cheered up by the fabulous color photos, I promise you!

Tomorrow afternoon (Saturday, 1-3 p.m.) we will be at the Sustainability-Palooza event at the Valley Shore YMCA in Westbrook. We will share a table with the Common Good Gardens, the Old Saybrook garden that has served as our model and inspiration for growing produce for the Shoreline Food Pantries. Their focus will be on composting, which is definitely the secret of their sustainability (12 years) and success (more than 8,000 pounds harvested in 2014). Please stop by to say hello, and enjoy browsing the tables of approximately 30 organizations while networking with kindred spirits. You can find out more details on the SSKP website, www.shorelinesoupkitchens.org, or read all about it in this article: http://www.shorelinetimes.com/articles/2015/02/24/news/doc54ecd0eb9f3fb046869617.txt.

Yesterday I wrote an article for the next edition of Clinton Events Magazine, which is due out at the end of March. I announced that the soil was warming up and seeds were ready for planting. We should be so lucky! It is hard to imagine we might actually be able to put anything in the ground a month from now, but who knows? Maybe Mother Nature will smile on us and lift this unrelenting cold. Our eagerness aside, warmer weather can’t come soon enough for the people who wait outside the Food Pantry each Wednesday evening to obtain food for their families… between 100 and 110, regularly, even in this bitter weather.

I look forward to being with you soon. Meanwhile, keep warm and safe!

Margaret

Health Ministry Network Meeting

Hello,

After a year of meeting with representatives of faith communities and healthcare organizations of the shoreline it has become apparent that there are many amazing people working to promote a faith/health connection in our communities of faith. If you are a healthcare professional, clergy person or someone interested in promoting health in your congregation please join us for the First Health Ministry Network meeting march 24^th from 7-8 pm. The meeting will be hosted at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Essex. If you have an existing health ministry or faith community nurse program or would like to learn more please attend. Call me with any questions at 860-767-0186 ext 211.Who: Nurses, Clergy, Lay people interested in the faith/ health connection.

What: An informational gathering to learn about health ministry opportunities on the Connecticut Shoreline, and connect with other nurses, clergy and lay people who are interested in opportunities to learn about and promote the connection between faith and health.

When: March 24^th 7pm-8pm

Where: St John’s Episcopal Church

3 Cross Street

Essex, CT 06426

Sponsored by Visiting Nurses of the Lower Valley Faith Community Nurse Outreach

Health Ministry and Faith Community Nurse ministry offers care for the whole person, mind, body and spirit,. Health Ministry promotes healing and health as wholeness, as a mission of a faith community to its members and the community it serves. Health Ministry USA affirms the church as a place of prevention of illness or "disease" as it teaches and supports us in living with "ease" physically, spiritually, emotionally and socially.

Religious communities often serve the basic needs of the members and the neighborhood. Through worship services, food pantries, and many other programs the mind, body and spirit are nurtured.

Visiting Nurses of the Lower Valley offers Faith Community Nurse services to shoreline religious communities. Health education programs, advocacy, blood pressure screening, networking and referral services are available. Deborah Ringen MSN, RN-BC Faith Community Nurse is available as a resource for existing health ministry programs as well as to help begin a new program.

Come join together in a network of caring. Share your experience and learn from others. Learn about community resources. Support each other in our endeavor to improve health in our community.

RSVP: 860-767-0186 ext 211 or dringen@visitingnurses.org

Deborah Ringen MSN, RN-BC Faith Community Nurse

I hope to see you there!

Deborah Ringen MSN, RN-BC

Faith Community Nurse

Visiting Nurses of the Lower Valley

Office: 860-767-0186

Cell: 860-581-3301

Prayers, Intersessions and Commemorations

Olga, Richard, Daria, Daria, John, Evelyn, Alla, June, Nina, Joan, Alex, Alan, Nadia, Glenn, Kathryn, Ivan, Elena & Jevon and their newly-born child, William, Christine, Andrew, Samuel, Kyra, Roderick, Albert, Barbara, Irene, Susan, Eva, Richard, Phyllis, Kathleen, Dionysia, Krystal, Robert and Ann, Edward and Susan, Gail, Ezekiel, Elisha, Sharon & William and their unborn child, and Nina.

Many Years! to Zachary and Michael Neiss on the occasion of their birthday!

We commemorate:

Sunday commemorating the Sundy of the Triumph of Orthodoxy!

Martyr Eudoxia of Heliopolis (ca. 160-170). Ven. Martyrii (Martyrius) of Zelenétsk (Pskov—1603). Martyrs Nestor and Tribimius (3rd c.). Martyr Antonina of Nicæa in Bithynia (3rd-4th c.). Martyrs Marcellus and Anthony. Virgin Domnina of Syria (ca. 450-460). Ven. Agapius of Vatopedi (Mt. Athos).

Hymns of the Day

Resurrectional Apolytikion in the 5th Tone

Let us worship the Word, O ye faithful, praising Him that with the Father and the Spirit is co-beginningless God, Who was born of a pure Virgin that we all be saved; for He was pleased to mount the Cross in the flesh that He assumed, accepting thus to endure death. And by His glorious rising, He also willed to resurrect the dead.

Apolytikion for Sun. of Orthodoxy in the 2nd Tone

We worship Thine immaculate icon, O Good One, asking the forgiveness of our failings, O Christ our God; for of Thine own will Thou wast well-pleased to ascend the Cross in the flesh, that Thou mightest deliver from slavery to the enemy those whom Thou hadst fashioned. Wherefore, we cry to Thee thankfully: Thou didst fill all things with joy, O our Saviour, when Thou camest to save the world.

Seasonal Kontakion in the 8th Tone

To you, Theotokos, invincible Defender, having been delivered from peril, I, your city, dedicate the victory festival as a thank offering. In your irresistible might, keep me safe from all trials, that I may call out to you: "Hail, unwedded bride!"

Saints and Feasts

March 01

Sunday of Orthodoxy

For more than one hundred years the Church of Christ was troubled by the persecution of the Iconoclasts of evil belief, beginning in the reign of Leo the Isaurian (717-741) and ending in the reign of Theophilus (829-842). After Theophilus's death, his widow the Empress Theodora (celebrated Feb. 11), together with the Patriarch Methodius (June 14), established Orthodoxy anew. This ever-memorable Queen venerated the icon of the Mother of God in the presence of the Patriarch Methodius and the other confessors and righteous men, and openly cried out these holy words: "If anyone does not offer relative worship to the holy icons, not adoring them as though they were gods, but venerating them out of love as images of the archetype, let him be anathema." Then with common prayer and fasting during the whole first week of the Forty-day Fast, she asked God's forgiveness for her husband. After this, on the first Sunday of the Fast, she and her son, Michael the Emperor, made a procession with all the clergy and people and restored the holy icons, and again adorned the Church of Christ with them. This is the holy deed that all we the Orthodox commemorate today, and we call this radiant and venerable day the Sunday of Orthodoxy, that is, the triumph of true doctrine over heresy.

March 01

The Holy Righteous Martyr Eudocia the Samaritan

This Saint, who was from Heliopolis of Phoenicia (Baalbek in present-day Lebanon), was an idolater and led a licentious life. Being beautiful beyond telling, she had many lovers, and had acquired great riches. Yet brought to repentance by a monk named Germanus, and baptized by Bishop Theodotus, she distributed to the poor all her ill-gotten gains, and entered a convent, giving herself up completely to the life of asceticism. Her former lovers, enraged at her conversion, her refusal to return to her old ways, and the withering away of her beauty through the severe mortifications she practiced, betrayed her as a Christian to Vincent the Governor, and she was beheaded, according to some, under Trajan, who reigned from 98 to 117, according to others, under Hadrian, who reigned from 117 to 138.

March 01

Andonina the New Martyr

Gospel and Epistle Readings

Epistle Reading

The Reading is from St. Paul's Letter to the Hebrews 11:24-26, 32-40

Brethren, by faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to share ill-treatment with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin.

And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets -- who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, received promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched raging fire, escaped the edge of the sword, won strength out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign enemies to flight. Women received their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, that they might rise again to a better life. Others suffered mocking and scourging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword; they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, ill-treated -- of whom the world was not worthy -- wandering over deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.

And all these, though well attested by their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had foreseen something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.

Gospel Reading

Sunday of Orthodoxy
The Reading is from John 1:43-51

At that time, Jesus decided to go to Galilee. And he found Philip and said to him, "Follow me." Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip found Nathanael, and he said to him, "We have found him of whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph." Nathanael said to him, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" Philip said to him, "Come and see." Jesus saw Nathanael coming to him, and said of him, "Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!" Nathanael said to him, "How do you know me?" Jesus answered him, "Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you." Nathanael answered him, "Rabbi, you are the son of God! You are the King of Israel!" Jesus answered him, "Because I said to you, I saw you under the fig tree, do you believe? You shall see greater things than these." And he said to him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man."

Wisdom of the Fathers

Moses... was himself saved by means of wood and water before the Law was given, when he was exposed to the Nile's currents, hidden away in an Ark (Exod. 2:3-10). And by means of wood and water he saved the people of Israel, revealing the Cross by the wood, Holy Baptism by water (Exod. 14:15-31). Paul, who had looked upon the mysteries, says openly, 'They were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud' (I Cor. 10:2). He also bears witness that, even before the events concerning the sea and his staff, Moses willingly endured Christ's Cross, 'Esteeming', he says, 'the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt' (Heb. 11:26). For the Cross is the reproach of Christ from the standpoint of foolish men. As Paul himself says of Christ, 'He endured the cross, despising the shame' (Heb. 12:2).

St. Gregory Palamas

Homilies Vol. 1, Homily Eleven para. 14; Saint Tikhon's Seminary Press pg. 123, 14th century

Peter, when after so many miracles and such high doctrine he confessed that, "Thou art the Son of God" (Matt. xvi. 16), is called "blessed," as having received the revelation from the Father;

St. John Chrysostom