Sunday
Hours: 9:00 AM
Divine Liturgy: 9:30 AM
Confessions Prior to all Divine Liturgies
Welcome to St. Paul the Apostle Orthodox Church - Freehold, NJ
Mission Parish of the American Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Diocese of North America
Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople
Sixth Sunday of Matthew
Upcoming Church Schedule:
Sunday July 20, 2025
The Hours - 9:00AM
Divine Liturgy - 9:30AM
Prophet Elias
Please stay after Divine Liturgy for the Blessing of Vehicles which will take place immediately following Liturgy.
All victims of the recent Flood in Texas. Our prayers go out to the victims and their families.
Please keep in your minds and hearts our parishioners, family, and friends in need of our prayers. May God grant them peace, health and happiness for many blessed years!
Please pray for Catechumens and inquirers, for those preparing for Marriage, for Expecting Mothers, Seminarians, and for those serving in the Armed Forces and Civil Authorities.
Please pray for Jacob Cochran, son of Father David and Pani Andrea.
Please pray for the healing of Rebecca (Becky) Ream, daughter of Pani Anna Marie Slovesko (and of Fr. Michael Slovesko of blessed memory).
Please pray for the health of baby Noelle.
Parish News:
Date September 28, 2025 for a special Community Outreach Parish Event. We invite all of our parishioners to join us as we participate in a WALK FOR LIFE which will benefit ZOE FOR LIFE, a Christian Orthodox Program serving mothers in crisis pregnancies who CHOOSE LIFE for their pre-born children.
Stay tuned for more information about this event!
FOR FURTHER THOUGHT:
Zoe for Life is a Christian Orthodox Community Outreach program that serves local mothers who need assistance and want to choose life for their unborn babies.
Zoe for Life depends fully on donations and help from the public. This program is sucessfully helping mothers everyday by providing supplies, emotional support, doctor and medical care, and shelter for young mothers who need help as they choose LIFE for thier babies.
Pray for the unborn!
O Holy Theotokos, pray for us!
Good News!
This September, The American Carpatho - Rusyn Orthodox Diocese Seminary is welcoming 8 new seminarians for the Fall Semester! Let us pray for these men as they embark on a journey to fulfill the Divine Call!
Please support our diocesan seminary bookstore:
If you have any religious items to purchase such as icons, jewlery, books, and various Orthodox decor, please visit: www.orthodoxgoods.com
Also, please continue to pray for vocations:
O Lord, the High Priest of God's people, You have shown us that it is Your will that men be called to the service of Your Holy Church. From the ranks of fishermen, You called Andrew and Peter and James and John, and made them and their successors in every age to be the "fishers of men." We, your people in this age, call upon Your great love to inspire for our churches, young men to be Your future priests. Touch their lives with Your Holy Spirit; give them the courage to answer Your call and the strength to work all the days of their life for Your service. Continue to shower upon our Diocesan Seminary Your choicest blessings and make us aware of her needs so that it may continue to be a place where the souls of those called to Your service may be trained and prepared to teach and preach, to pray and labor, to forgive and heal - to care in every way as priests of Your fold, O Good Shepherd. You told us with Your precious lips, "Without me, you can do nothing." As we call upon Your Name for more vocations, O Great High Priest, hear us and have mercy.
2025 Stewardship and Census Form
Reading is under copyright and is used with permission, all rights reserved by: American Carpatho-Russian Diocese
Reading is under copyright and is used with permission, all rights reserved by: American Carpatho-Russian Diocese
Reading is under copyright and is used with permission, all rights reserved by: Holy Transfiguration Monastery
Prokeimenon. First Tone. Psalm 109.4,1.
You are a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.
Verse: The Lord said to my Lord: Sit at my right hand, till I make your enemies my footstool.
The reading is from St. James' Universal Letter 5:10-20.
6th Sunday of Matthew
The Reading is from Matthew 9:1-8
At that time, getting into a boat Jesus crossed over and came to his own city. And behold, they brought to him a paralytic, lying on his bed; and when Jesus saw their faith he said to the paralytic, "Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven." And behold, some of the scribes said to themselves, "This man is blaspheming." But Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, "Why do you think evil in your hearts? For which is easier, to say 'Your sins are forgiven,' or to say 'Rise and walk?' But that you may know that the Son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins" he then said to the paralytic -- "Rise, take up your bed and go home." And he rose and went home. When the crowds saw it, they were afraid, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to men.
Elias of great fame was from Thisbe or Thesbe, a town of Galaad (Gilead), beyond the Jordan. He was of priestly lineage, a man of a solitary and ascetical character, clothed in a mantle of sheep skin, and girded about his loins with a leathern belt. His name is interpreted as "Yah is my God." His zeal for the glory of God was compared to fire, and his speech for teaching and rebuke was likened unto a burning lamp. From this too he received the name Zealot. Therefore, set aflame with such zeal, he sternly reproved the impiety and lawlessness of Ahab and his wife Jezebel. He shut up heaven by means of prayer, and it did not rain for three years and six months. Ravens brought him food for his need when, at God's command, he was hiding by the torrent of Horrath. He multiplied the little flour and oil of the poor widow of Sarephtha of Sidon, who had given him hospitality in her home, and when her son died, he raised him up. He brought down fire from Heaven upon Mount Carmel, and it burned up the sacrifice offered to God before all the people of Israel, that they might know the truth. At the torrent of Kisson, he slew 450 false prophets and priests who worshipped idols and led the people astray. He received food wondrously at the hand of an Angel, and being strengthened by this food he walked for forty days and forty nights. He beheld God on Mount Horeb, as far as this is possible for human nature. He foretold the destruction of the house of Ahab, and the death of his son Ohozias; and as for the two captains of fifty that were sent by the king, he burned them for their punishment, bringing fire down from Heaven. He divided the flow of the Jordan, and he and his disciple Elisseus passed through as it were on dry land; and finally, while speaking with him, Elias was suddenly snatched away by a fiery chariot in the year 895 B.C., and he ascended as though into heaven, whither God most certainly translated him alive, as He did Enoch (Gen. 5:24; IV Kings 2: 11). But from thence also, after seven years, by means of an epistle he reproached Joram, the son of Josaphat, as it is written: "And there came a message in writing to him from Elias the Prophet, saying, Thus saith the Lord God of David thy father, Because thou hast not walked in the way," and so forth (II Chron. 21:12). According to the opinion of the majority of the interpreters, this came to pass either through his disciple Elisseus, or through another Prophet when Elias appeared to them, even as he appeared on Mount Tabor to the disciples of Christ (see Aug. 6).
