Saint John the Baptist Greek Orthodox Church
Publish Date: 2025-02-16
Bulletin Contents
Schedule of Services
Special Services
You are invited
Stewardship News
News & Events
Assembly of Bishops News
Saints and Feasts
Gospel and Epistle Readings

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Saint John the Baptist Greek Orthodox Church

General Information

  • Phone:
  • 408.605.0621
  • Street Address:

  • 9th and Lincoln

  • Carmel-by-the-Sea, CA
  • Mailing Address:

  • PO Box 5808

  • Carmel-by-the-Sea, CA 93921

Contact Information

Priest: Father Ion Coman


[email protected] | 408.605.0621

Services Schedule

 

Weekend services: the weekend schedule is fixed for most of the year. The services take place in Carmel-by-the-Sea, at All Saints Church, lower level, 9th and Lincoln.

Saturdays: 5:00pm Vespers

Sundays:   8:30am Matins

                   9:45am Liturgy

Week-day services: during the week we may celebrate the major feast days of the Church either in Carmel or in Salinas. Please check the calendar! The schedule pattern is:

Wednesdays:  6:00pm Paraklesis

Eve of feasts: 6:00pm Vespers

Feast days:    8:30am Matins

                       9:45am Liturgy

Past Bulletins


Schedule of Services

Note: Our services are posted on Zoom unless specified otherwise.   

Friday, February 14
    6pm Akathist (2): Saint Nektarios
Saturday, February 15 Saint Anthimos of Chios (since 1992)
    5pm Vespers
Sunday, February 16 Sunday of the Prodigal Son
    8:30am Matins
    9:45am Liturgy
    12pm Catechism Class
    12pm Sunday School
Monday, February 17
    7pm p.m. The Evening Book Forum
Wednesday, February 19
   10am The Morning Book Forum
    6pm Paraklesis
Friday, February 21
    6pm Vespers + Matins (reader service)
Saturday, February 22 Saturday of the Souls
    5pm Vespers (reader service)
Sunday, February 23 Judgment Sunday (Meatfare Sunday)
    8:30am Matins
    9:45am Liturgy
    12pm Catechism Class
    12pm Sunday School
    6pm Vespers
Monday, February 24 The First and the Second Finding of the Head of Saint John the Baptist
    8:30am Matins + Liturgy


 Zoom with video here.  For more information, go to  //www.stjohn-monterey.org/parish-calendar

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Special Services

The Second Triodion Sunday. This Sunday we will hear the parable of the Prodigal Son, the most beautiful passage of the Bible. The theme that is meant to prepare us for Lent is of repentance.

The events in the diagram are hyperlinked. Click on it to download the pdf file in which you can explore the whole season.

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You are invited

A Ministry led by the Parish Council

Invite your family and friends to this
culinary delight and joyful transition towards Lent

 - - A Fundraiser for the Building Fund - -
- Great Food and Fellowship -
+ Sunday, February 23 +
 
You are cordially invited to join us for our Meatfare (Apokreatiko) celebration:
Sunday, February 23rd 
Following the Divine Liturgy
to mark our final day with meat before Lent.

 
As a fundraiser, the event counts on your generosity
to significantly contribute to our Building Fund
for the acquisition of a new church property.
Bring your friends!

A donation for the meal is requested.

For those unable to attend, or for those who wish to contribute in advance, donations can be made online HERE 

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Stewardship News

YOUR 2025 PLEDGE

The 2025 Stewardship Campaign needs you! We have reached 80% of our Stewardship Goal in 2025 pledges, with 33 pledges made for the year, so far.

Remember, we DO NOT roll over the pledges from the previous year. We require a new commitment each year.

Fill in the 2025 Pledge Card for 2025 HERE.

Living the Gospel


2024 END OF THE YEAR BOTTOM LINE

Finally, the 2024 financial report is completed. It was a great blessing that our Stewardship Goal was reached and exceeded (thank you all!), and that, becasue of your the generosity, we almost met the budgeted expenses (yes!!). However, we had some additional expenses that were not budgeted, thus ending the year with a deficit of $11,000. One can still contribute towards correcting this shortcoming by donating HERE.


THANK YOU ANGELINA!

We take this opportunity to thank the Fellowship teams for providing for our community and our many visitors. We especially thank Angelina for leading this effort for many years, despite the hardship of being so far from Carmel. Angelina has ended her term as the ministry leader and she will be greatly missed - her dedication, hard work, kindness and sacrificial offering at all times. We have enjoyed our Agape Meal every Sunday after Liturgy as our main venue for connecting and for welcoming and embracing our guests. Thank you Angelina!


FELLOWSHIP TEAM LEADER OPENING

With Angelina stepping down from this very important responsibility, we are in need of a new leader. This is a chance to serve with immediate impact and to lead our most important ministry - the Fellowship team.

The responsabilities of this role incolve mostly communication and management, including:

  • maintaining balanced Fellowship teams
  • scheduling the teams participation
  • overseeing substitutions
  • organizing quarterly meetings with all teams
  • work with the Parish Council to organize special events

Please contact Father Ion if you woud like to consider accepting this blessed role.


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News & Events

SATURDAY OF SOULS

Please note that there will be no liturgy on the Saturday of Souls (February 22) as Father Ion will be out of town. Instead, the Vespers and Matins (redear services) will be prayed on Friday evening. We will remember our departed on Saturday of the Ascetics (March 1) and on the Saturday of Saint Theodore's Kollyva Miracle (March 8).


BASICS of ORTHODOXY

A Ministry led by Edward Mar

The class offers to those who explore the Orthodox faith the space to learn and find answers to their many questions. All our members are invited to join and connect with those who explore our faith. The class will meet after the Agape Meal on Sunday, March 9, to begin working on:

Basics of Orthodox Spirituality - Part 1:

The Concept of Salvation
The Ascetic Life
The Nature of Man

Education, Living the Gospel


ADULT SUNDAY EDUCATION/ CATECHISM

A Ministry led by Father Ion

The class meets this Sunday after lunch in the chapel of Saint Nektarios on alternating Sundays with Basics of Orthodoxy.

 Living the Gospel


OUTREACH MINISTRIES

Ministries led by Despina Hatton

LADIES I-HELP:  

  • Tuesday, March 4. Cooking: 4pm. Dinner with the ladies: 5pm.

FOOD BANK:

  • Tuesday, March 11 9:00 -10:30am @St Francis Xavier Catholic Church, Seaside.

 

Community


BOOK FORUM

A Ministry led by Kathy Shaw

There are two groups that meet on two days of the week: Mondays and Wednesdays. The same reading will be covered in both sessions every week - no need to attend both! The new expanded hours are:

  • Mondays, from 7pm
  • Wednesdays, from 10:00am.

We will begin reading Great Lent: Journey to Pascha, by Alexander Schmemann. It is a short, yet powerful text. We have a few copies at the bookstore. You may also check it out online here. 

 Education, Community


CHURCH UNIVERSITY

A Ministry led by Father Ion

The Church University will end its five-year activity at the end of the month, right before Lent. We thank God for the opportunity to come together in learning and in fellowship for the glory of His name.

Worship, Education, Community


WELCOMING AND HOSPITALITY: SERVING THIS SUNDAY

 Ministry looking for a leader

Thank you for your effort and participation in bringing a dish to share for our Agape Meal. If you cannot participate when it is your turn, kindly lmake other arrangements for someone to cover for you and let your team leader know.     

Please contact Father Ion if you feel called to lead this ministry.

Sunday, February 16
   Parish Council: Mary Kanalakis
   Greeter: Anthony Zavitsanos
   Agape Meal: PINK TEAM - Thank you to Nadia, Maria, Rania, and Christine D

Sunday, February 23 – Meatfare BBQ
   Parish Council: Mary Kanalakis
   Greeter: Nadia Zajicek
   Agape Meal: ORANGE TEAM - Thank you to Melanie, Miriam, Marissa, and Irene.

Community


ONLINE RESOURCES

Most of our services and some ministry meetings are available online. Zoom with video here. Liturgical texts at Ages Initiatives here.

GETTING IT?

Have you been receiving communication from the church via text? If not, it is because you have not signed up yet. It is brief, fast and simple. Simply text #yes# to 22300.

Note: You must be already enrolled for phone calls from the church in order to extend to text messaging. Let Father Ion know if you would like to sign up for both services.


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Saints and Feasts

February 16

Sunday of the Prodigal Son

Through the parable of today's Gospel, our Saviour has set forth three things for us: the condition of the sinner, the rule of repentance, and the greatness of God's compassion. The divine Fathers have put this reading the week after the parable of the Publican and Pharisee so that, seeing in the person of the Prodigal Son our own wretched condition -- inasmuch as we are sunken in sin, far from God and His Mysteries -- we might at last come to our senses and make haste to return to Him by repentance during these holy days of the Fast.

Furthermore, those who have wrought many great iniquities, and have persisted in them for a long time, oftentimes fall into despair, thinking that there can no longer be any forgiveness for them; and so being without hope, they fall every day into the same and even worse iniquities. Therefore, the divine Fathers, that they might root out the passion of despair from the hearts of such people, and rouse them to the deeds of virtue, have set the present parable at the forecourts of the Fast, to show them the surpassing goodness of God's compassion, and to teach them that there is no sin -- no matter how great it may be -- that can overcome at any time His love for man.

February 16

Saint Pamphilus the Martyr & his Companions

This Martyr contested during the reign of Maximian, in the year 290, in Caesarea of Palestine, and was put to death by command of Firmilian, the Governor of Palestine. His fellow contestants' names are Valens, Paul, Seleucus, Porphyrius, Julian, Theodulus, and five others from Egypt: Elias, Jeremias, Esaias, Samuel, and Daniel. Their martyrdom is recorded in Book VIII, ch. 11 of Eusebius's Ecclesiastical History, called The Martyrs of Palestine.

February 16

Saint Flavianos, Patriarch of Constantinople

February 17

Saint Theodore the Tyro, the Great Martyr

Saint Theodore who was from Amasia of Pontus, contested during the reign of Maximian (286-305). He was called Tyro, from the Latin Tiro, because he was a newly enlisted recruit. When it was reported that he was a Christian, he boldly confessed Christ; the ruler, hoping that he would repent, gave him time to consider the matter more completely and then give answer. Theodore gave answer by setting fire to the temple of Cybele, the "mother of the gods," and for this he suffered a martyr's death by fire. See also the First Saturday of the Fast.

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Gospel and Epistle Readings

Matins Gospel Reading

First Orthros Gospel
The Reading is from Matthew 28:16-20

At that time, the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw Him they worshiped Him; but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age. Amen."

Epistle Reading

Prokeimenon. 1st Mode. Psalm 32.22,1.
Let your mercy, O Lord, be upon us.
Verse: Rejoice in the Lord, O ye righteous.

The reading is from St. Paul's First Letter to the Corinthians 6:12-20.

Brethren, "all things are lawful for me," but not all things are helpful. "All things are lawful for me," but I will not be enslaved by anything. "Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food" -- and God will destroy both one and the other. The body is not meant for immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God raised the Lord and will also raise us up by his power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I therefore take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never! Do you not know that he who joins himself to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For, as it is written, "The two shall become one flesh." But he who is united to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. Shun immorality. Every other sin which a man commits is outside the body; but the immoral man sins against his own body. Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God? You are not your own; you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body and in your spirit which belong to God.

Gospel Reading

Sunday of the Prodigal Son
The Reading is from Luke 15:11-32

The Lord said this parable: "There was a man who had two sons; and the younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the share of the property that falls to me.' And he divided his living between them. Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took his journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in loose living. And when he had spent everything, a great famine arose in that country, and he began to be in want. So he went and joined himself to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed swine. And he would gladly have filled his belly with the pods that the swine ate; and no one gave him anything. But when he came to himself he said, 'How many of my father's hired servants have bread enough and to spare, but I perish here with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me as one of your hired servants.' And he arose and came to his father. But while he was yet at a distance, his father saw him and had compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. And the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.' But the father said to his servants, 'Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet; and bring the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and make merry; for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.' And they began to make merry. Now his elder son was in the field; and as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. And he called one of the servants and asked what this meant. And he said to him, 'Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has received him safe and sound.' But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, but he answered his father, 'Lo, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command; yet you never gave me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends. But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your living with harlots, you killed for him the fatted calf!' And he said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. It was fitting to make merry and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.'"

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