The Great Lenten Lecture Series is coming again this year! More details will be available soon, but we don’t want anyone to be concerned – WE WILL have a lecture each Sunday (and perhaps more often!) of Great Lent following the Divine Liturgy (during coffee hour). More information soon to come!

As is our tradition at St. Vladimir’s (a pious tradition found throughout the Russian Orthodox Church) we urge all our family and friends to attend as many of the services as possible during the first week of Great Lent (beginning with the very important Forgiveness Sunday Vespers), with the goal of confessing and partaking of the Holy Mysteries on either Saturday, February 28 (Theodore Saturday) or Sunday, March 1 (The Sunday of Orthodoxy). Let us begin our Great Lenten journey of repentance and preparation for the feast of feasts, our Lord’s Glorious Resurrection, by forgiving each other and partaking of the Cup of Life together as a parish family!

Fr. Gregory, Elizabeth, Maria, Michael, and Natalia invite everyone to their home to celebrate Fr. Gregory’s name’s day on Thursday, February 12 beginning at 6:00 p.m. If you don't know where their home is located please contact Fr. Gregory. Please join us!

We are pleased to announce that with Bishop Peter's blessing the weekend of February 15 we will have a soon-to-graduate senior from our diocesan seminary and his wife visiting: John and Nonna Buckley. John is a candidate for ordination and could eventually help replace Fr. Joseph. As most of you know, Fr. Joseph will be tonsured a Riasaphore Monk (the middle stage of monasticism – between “novice” and “monk” in the fullest sense of that word) and will be leaving the parish to pursue monasticism in earnest after Bright Week this year.

Fr. Gregory will point out John and Nonna at the Divine Services this coming weekend. Please welcome them warmly!

Please don’t miss this wonderful Russian tradition – our Sisterhood’s annual Blini Dinner! Immediately following the Divine Liturgy on Sunday, February 15 please join us to enjoy these pre-Lenten treats as we empty the meat and eggs out of our refrigerators! Invite your friends! Tell your neighbors! Don’t miss it!

The date of the annual parish meeting has been set for Sunday, February 15, immediately following the Divine Liturgy. This is also Meatfare Sunday and we will have our annual Blini dinner that day as well. We combined these two activities last year and both were very successful! We assume many people came for the annual meeting and stayed for blini. But perhaps it was the reverse? In any case, it worked well and we will do it again. Please find all the information contined in the annual meeting mailing (which you will soon receive if you have not yet) at this link:

http://stvladimiraami.org/flyers/annualmeeting2015.pdf

Please note that we have made a change to the schedule of services for March 4, 2015. Originally we had scheduled Presanctified Liturgy that evening, but due to an unavoidable conflict we cannot hold Liturgy that evening. We appreciate your understanding and ask forgiveness for any inconvenience.

http://www.stvladimiraami.org/calendars ... lendar.pdf

Did you know that we have a You Tube Channel where we post videos regularly? Today the children's play from Sunday and the Sunday sermon were posted for viewing. There is a lot there! Please check it out:

www.youtube.com/StVladimirChurch

Beginning March 1 we will have a lecture each Sunday of Great Lent as is our usual practice at St. Vladimir's. The weekly lecture will take place during our weekly meal on these Sundays. The schedule is shaping up nicely and all details will be released very soon. For now, please plan to join us for this year's Great Lenten Lecture Series. You may also want to take note of a small addition to the service schedule this year. On March 1, 15, and 29 we will serve the beautiful Sunday Great Vespers after the scheduled lecture. At this service we transition from the weekend paradigm to the weekday paradigm of Great Lent, including the changing of the color of the church from purple to black (as you may recall is done each year at Forgiveness Vespers). Please join us!

LATE BREAKING NEWS! Dr. Roy (Andronik) Robson has confirmed that he will be with us to give the keynote lecture on March 15! Dr. Robson's area of expertise is Slavic Studies, specifically Russian Orthodox Old Belief, and he has written several books on this subject, including one on the monastery of Solovki as a refuge for Old Believers following Patriarch Nikon's reforms. Dr. Robson is an Old Believer himself and grew up in the Nativity of Christ parish in Erie, PA. He was the second reader on Fr. Gregory's doctoral dissertation. You will not want to miss this lecture!

See more on Dr. Robson here:

http://www.gradschool.usciences.edu/faculty/robson-roy

The feast of our Rector's patron saint, St. Gregory the Theologian, falls each year on January 25/February 7. At St. Vladimir's we will make this feast with Vigil at 6:00 p.m. on February 6 and Divine Liturgy on February 7 at 8:00 a.m. Generally Fr. Gregory and his family welcome the St. Vladimir's family to their home on this day, but since St. Gregory's feast falls on a Saturday this year they will instead host a reception in honor of St. Gregory beginning at 6:00 p.m. on February 12 - the secondary feast of St. Gregory. All St. Vladimir's family and friends are invited! Learn more about St. Gregory the Theologian at the links below. And please join us for the Divine Services on the feast of St. Gregory the Theologian as your personal schedule allows.

English:

http://oca.org/saints/lives/2015/01/25/ ... tantinople

Russian:

http://days.pravoslavie.ru/Life/life304.htm