Our St. Vladimir parish family expresses its deepest condolences to our Parish Council member Igor Obertas (and to his whole family) with the repose of his father, Anatolii, on January 11, 2015. We ask the prayers of our parish family for the newly reposed and for his family. May his memory be eternal and may the merciful Lord grant comfort to the greiving!

We need help serving breakfast to families at the family homeless shelter, Alpha House, on Sunday February 8. If you can help please contact Addie Lanterman in church or via email at infor@stvladimiraami.org. This is a wonderful opportunity to live our faith in a very real way – by serving others (just as Jesus Christ came to minister according to this own words). Please join us!

Those who have had a chance to look at this year's annual calendar have no doubt noticed that Great Lent is coming soon! That is not a bad thing by any means, and it is good for us in a way to see those Lenten days coming and to prepare for them. A few things to note:

- the schedule for the first week will include three days of the full cycle of services beginning at 8:00 a.m.: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

- we will hold our Great Lenten Lecture Series again this year. We are working out details with our keynote speaker and once we have done that we will release the full schedule of lectures. As always there will be a lecture each of the Sundays of Great Lent.

- Vespers will be held on Sundays after the Great Lenten Lecture on March 1, 15, and 29. This is a very beautiful service that transitions us liturgically from the weekend back to the Great Lenten weekday paradigm, including the chanting of the Great Prokimenon. This will be the first year that we serve this service and we invite all to participate!

- we intend to serve Presanctified Liturgies on most Wednesday evenings and Friday mornings of the fast – more details to come soon

Please visit this link to sign up:

http://goo.gl/forms/XPCWdrfccl

Or send a note to info@stvladimiraami.org and ask to be added to the parish email list. You can always ask to be removed as well, but this is the best way to keep up to date with the latest information about our parish. We also have an email list for our Sisterhood, for our Brotherhood, for our Choir, and for our Readers. Drop us a note to get on the email lists you are interested in!

St. Vladimir’s Church School begins January 10. Classes will be held every Saturday afternoon at 5:00 p.m. through May 30 with the exception of April 11. We have condensed the classes to the greatest extent possible for the convenience of our busy families – we value your time. Please do us the favor of valuing the time of the teachers and other volunteers who make our Church School possible by being on time.

All children are urged to participate in the Vigil following Church School and in the Sunday (and other feast day) Divine Liturgies to the greatest extent possible by ringing bells, serving in the altar, singing, helping in the kiosk, and most importantly by being present in the church and praying with their parish family, AND ESPECIALLY by partaking of the Holy Mysteries. The Liturgy is not a spectacle or event that we watch, but a prayerful “work of the people” that we participate in through our prayerful involvement. Please contact Fr. Gregory with questions in this regard.

To learn more about our Church School please contact the Church School Director, Lilia Vershynin: 734-276-7548 or info@stvladimiraami.org

This is happening! Young people are starting to step forward to go to Daydovo Summer Camp – the only summer camp for special needs children in Russia run by the Church – this coming summer. Zhanna Skalitzky will be heading up this effort but more help is very much needed – please help if you can! Parents – please talk to Fr. Gregory or Zhanna about this ASAP. This is an outstanding opportunity for our young people to live their faith in a very active way. Their participation will help the campers, the campers' families, and frankly speaking, will also help themselves to grow in Christ. Age group is late teens and older. More coming very soon!

Please find the Nativity Epistle of His Eminence, Metropolitan Hilarion of Eastern America and New York, First Hierarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, at the links below.

English:

http://russianorthodoxchurch.ws/synod/e ... istle.html

Russian:

http://russianorthodoxchurch.ws/synod/2 ... istle.html

We are pleased to announce that we will celebrate Divine Liturgy on the third day of our Lord's Nativity, Friday, January 9. This day is dedicated to St. Stephen the Apostle and Protomartyr. Please join us tomorrow morning at 8:00 a.m. as we continue our feast of the Lord's Incarnation!

We ask parents to please keep an eye on their children during the Divine Services as regards playing with the sand in the candle stands and with candles. Those that work hard to clean the church every week have to work even harder because of the sand all over the floor and all over the pannykhhida table, as well as lots of drips of wax on the floor. We love kids and we always will! But we ask that parents exercise some oversight in this regard. Thank you!

Tomorrow the Holy Church marks the second day of the great feast of our Lord's Nativity with the celebration of the Synaxis of the Mother of God. At St. Vladimir's we will have Divine Liturgy for the feast at 8:00 a.m.

It happens quite commonly in the Church's calendar that the day after a feast has a special commemoration that is directly related to the feast. For instance, the day after the Annunciation is the Synaxis of the Archangel Gabriel, the day after the Meeting of the Lord commemorates the Righteous Symeon and the Prophetess Anna, and so forth.

Please join us tomorrow for Divine Liturgy as we continue our feast of the Lord's Nativity tomorrow as your schedule allows!