March 27 Lazarus Saturday. On Friday night Compline & Matins at 6:00 pm.
Liturgy on Saturday at 8:00 am.
Palm Sunday Vigils at 3:30/6:00 pm.
March 28 The Entry of Our Lord Into Jerusalem (Palm Sunday). Liturgies at 7:30/9:45 am.
Vespers & Matins at 6:00 pm.
March 29 Great & Holy Monday. The Hours with the Reading of the Gospel, Typica, Vespers & Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts at 8:00 am.
Bridegroom Matins at 6:00 pm.
Cathedral Cleric Delivers An Icon of St John (Maximovich) to St Panteleimon Monastery in Odessa, Ukraine
On Sunday, March 7, 2010, Protopriest Yaroslav Belikov, a cleric of our Cathedral, gave an icon containing a portion of the relics of St John of Shanghai and San Francisco to St Panteleimon Monastery in Odessa, Ukraine. At the end of Divine Liturgy, the Prior of the monastery, Archimandrite Arkady, along with a host of clergymen, brought the icon out of the altar to the middle of the church, and, placing it next to the life-giving Cross, performed a moleben.
At the end of the moleben, Archimandrite Arkady introduced Fr Yaroslav and invited him to say a few words. Fr Yaroslav spoke about the special character of our times, when the saint lived and showed us an example of a Christian approach to modern problems. It doesn't matter where one lives: at every time, and in any place, one must take his cross and follow Christ, which our great exiled saint showed us.
The worshipers, venerating the icon, sensed a great deal of spiritual consolation, and received paper copies of the icon of St John.
After the trapeza, Fr Yaroslav visited the Sunday school and spoke with the children. He told them about the temptations of the computer and internet: "It is actually not the computer, nor internet, or other material things, can be either good or evil. Everything depends on how the person uses them, what a person's attitude towards them is. Temptations stem from how we use these remarkable technologies, we can fail to notice how quickly time flies, and we are left with little time for that which is more important: prayer, contemplation of the Divine, real (and not virtual) relationships with our neighbor, our studies, etc. So do not be cross with your parents when they don't let you use the computer."
Parents in attendance asked questions about Orthodox life abroad. Fr Yaroslav talked about Sts Cyrill and Methodius Russian High School and of St John's Orthodox Academy. The children were interested in our students here who strive to lead an Orthodox way of life in non-Orthodox surroundings.
On Tuesday, March 9, His Eminence Metropolitan Agafangel of Odessa and Izmailovsk received Archimandrite Arkady and Fr Yaroslav at his residence. At the end of their meeting, Metropolitan Agafangel gave Fr Yaroslav an icon of the Host of the Saints of Odessa to bring to the Cathedral in San Francisco as a gift.
Epistle for the Nativity of His Eminence Kyrill Archbishop of San Francisco and Western America
CHRIST IS BORN! GLORIFY HIM!
No sooner was our Lord Jesus Christ born in Bethlehem, joining us under the most contradictory of circumstances, that His persecution began. Upon receiving the news of the Messiah’s Nativity from the three Wise Kings, the most wicked King Herod, in a fit of rage, sent his soldiers to slaughter all the boy babies who had been born then in those parts, from the infants to the two-year-olds. Herod’s crime is described in historical accounts. But the Evangelist St. Matthew reports that the Lord sent an angel to warn St. Joseph, in a dream, of the threat to the Holy Family, so that they might flee the vicious persecution.
So it was that the Nativity of the Son of God, amazing the shepherds and gloriously heralded by the heavenly hosts, had on the one hand inspired the Wise Kings to undertake a complex pilgrimage, that they might find God Incarnate, worship him and offer Him their gifts – while in the soul of the wicked, ignorant and idolatrous king (for Herod was not a righteous king at all, but prayed to idols), it only inspired a ferocious hatred and a stubborn obsession with asserting his ruthless personal agenda.
CHRIST IS BORN! GLORIFY HIM!
