Update for the week Friday, May 31, through Thursday, June 6, 2013
THIS WEEKEND
ARCHDIOCESE CONVENTION – The 2013 national convention of the Antiochian Archdiocese will be held July 21-28 in Houston TX, hosted by St. George Antiochian Orthodox Church. For information and registration see http://www.achouston2013.com. Register by Saturday, June 1 for Early Bird savings!
SCHOLASTIC ACHIEVEMENT AWARDS – The Nicholas G. Beram Veterans Association announces its 47th annual Scholastic Achievement Awards, a program to encourage and support the education of students of Arabic-speaking backgrounds. High school seniors can obtain an application with instructions by visiting the web page at: www.stjohnd.org/ngberam or by contacting our Church Office. All applications must be postmarked no later than Saturday, June 1, 2013.
VESPERS – Great Vespers will be held this Saturday, June 1, at 5:00 pm.
THEOPHANY SCHOOL – You are invited to An Evening of Art, the 13th Annual Benefit and Auction for Theophany School, on Saturday, June 1, beginning at 6:30 pm, at Apollo Restaurant in Norwood. Join them for a cocktail party and celebrate an evening filled with art, raffles and prizes. For more information see http://theophanyschool.org/news-and-events/events/13th-annual-benefit-evening, or contact Emily Pappas, Director of Theophany School, at 781-444-3058, or via email at theophanyschool@gmail.com.
SUNDAY SERVICES – Services at St. Mary begin at 8:45 am (Orthros) and 10:00 am (Divine Liturgy) through Sunday, June 30; during July and August we change to Summer Hours – Orthros: 8:15 am, and Liturgy: 9:30 am.
NEW ANNOUNCEMENTS
WHAT WAS MILLENNIALISM? – And why is Revelation the only book of the New Testament that slowly lost favor (in the East), after initially being universally accepted? These are some of the things we will be considering in next week’s Bible Study. The Bible Study at St. Mary, sponsored by the Fellowship of St. John the Divine, meets every other Thursday and is based on a lecture series originally broadcast on Ancient Faith Radio. Join us at 7:00 pm next Thursday, June 6, in the church library, for a discussion of the Canon of scripture (http://orthodoxbiblestudy.info/the-canon-part-5) and Translations and Versions (http://orthodoxbiblestudy.info/translations-and-versions). For more information contact Marianna Sayeg (mksayeg@gmail.com) or Fr. Antony (frawhj@gmail.com). New members are always welcome!
FEAST OF THE ASCENSION – Services for the Ascension will not be held at St Mary Church on the evening of Wednesday, June 12. Area churches holding services include:
St. George West Roxbury: June 12, evening Liturgy 6:30 PM;
St. George Norwood: June 12, evening Liturgy 6:00 PM;
St. Nicholas Lexington: Thursday June 13, Orthros 8:45 AM, Liturgy 10:00 AM.
PARISH SECRETARY – Marilyn Robbat will be out of the office during the summer months of June, July and August for knee surgery. Please keep her in your prayers. Barbara Shoop will be filling in for her during this time. If you need any assistance, please do not hesitate to call Barbara in the office at 617-547-1234.
GREETERS NEEDED – We’re looking for Summer Greeters – please help out! Volunteers are needed for Sundays in July: 7, 14, 21, 28 and August: 4, 11, 18, 25. As a Greeter, you will welcome people into the Church and help to direct visitors upstairs to the Liturgy, as well as keeping an eye on the Vestibule, Hallways and Entrance ways during Church. Arrive at Church 15 minutes before Liturgy. Greeting time ends when Communion starts. Please contact Buddy Mabardy at 781-729-6303 or e-mail: buddy@cjmabardy.com. Summer Hours are: Orthros: 8:15 am, and Liturgy: 9:30 am. Summer might be a GREAT time for you to start participating in this Ministry!
TANGLEWOOD OUTING – Join your music-loving friends from St. Mary’s as we carpool out to Tanglewood after Liturgy on Sunday, July 28. We’ll picnic on the lawn and listen to music by Dvorak (Carnival Overture and New World Symphony) and Prokofiev (Piano Concerto), with pianist Garrick Ohlsson. (For more information see http://www.bso.org/Performance/Detail/48875) The concert starts at 2:30; lawn tickets are $19.00 (pay at the door). Bring lawn chairs if you want them, and picnic food for yourself and to share. For more information and to let us know you're coming, especially if you'll need a ride, contact Melissa Nassiff by email (mnassiff@gmail.com) or phone (508 877-7483).
REMINDERS
CHRIST IS RISEN! – Truly He is risen! To learn how to say the Paschal Greeting in more languages than the ten or so we use at St. Mary's, check out this site which has text and voice recordings for over 250 languages: http://www.srbigham.com/en/langues.html.
FOOD FOR HUNGRY PEOPLE - Boxes were due on Palm Sunday. Please return them to the Bengarri this Sunday if you have not already done so.
NO FASTING – There is no fasting on Wednesday or Friday, not only during Bright Week, but until the Feast of the Ascension (June 13), for the whole forty days. (This is the decision of the Holy Synod of the Church of Antioch.) This cessation of fasting, however, is purely voluntary; you may fast if you wish.
HABITAT FOR HUMANITY - Join us on Saturday, June 15 for St. Mary's first team Habitat for Humanity project! The location will be either in West Roxbury or Dorchester. We won't know the exact type of work until the day before - could range from painting to landscaping to building a wall. The FSJD will pay for part of the $62 per person fee, but volunteers will need to cover the remainder. We have 12 slots - please contact Phil Straghalis (phil@newtonfireandflood.com) to claim your spot on the team, or for further details.
GRECIAN FESTIVAL - Ss. Constantine & Helen Church, Cambridge, will be holding their annual Grecian Festival Friday thru Sunday, June 14, 15, 16, from 11:00 am to 11:00 pm – featuring live music, Greek cuisine & pastry, crafts, prizes. Drawing June 16. FREE Admission. Proceeds to benefit the Church Building Fund. For more information, call 617-876-3601.
PICNIC/MAHRAJAN – St. John Church Dedham will hold their 2nd Annual Church Picnic/Mahrajan on Saturday, June 15, from 1:00-8:00 pm, with live Arabic music by Fouad Hajjar and Ensemble from 3:00-800 pm – featuring American and Arabic food, dancing raffles, children’s games, face painting, and more. Admission: $10.00/Adult; Children under 12 free. For further information, please contact Alan Cardoos at apcardoos@mac.com, Gail Kurker at gkurker@gmail.com, or Rick Ahto at rickahto@gmail.com.
OCMC MISSION TO ALBANIA – The Orthodox Christian Mission Center (OCMC) is sponsoring a 3-week Missionary trip to assist the Church in Albania, which began last Sunday, May 26. The group consists of Fr. Luke Veronis, Fr. Alkiviadis Calivas, our own Jamil Samara, and students from Hellenic College, Holy Cross, St. Vladimir's and St. Tikhon's Seminaries: Andrew Calivas, Andrew Otto, Anthony Jonas, Chris Chininis, Hannah Pappas, Jennifer Cowles, Kevin Mellis, Luke Bullock. Nicholas Mueller. Nikoletta Evangelatos, Olenka Zharsky and Sebastian Mot. Please keep them in your prayers.
PARISH LIFE CONFERENCE – The 2013 Parish Life Conference for our diocese will be held June 27 – 30, 2013, at the Wyndham Hotel in Andover, MA, hosted by St. George Church, Lowell. For Registration, please go to: https://www.antiochianevents.org/event/96, or go to St. George’s site: http://www.saintgeorgelowell.org. Please feel free to e-mail the Chairperson, Soraya or Co-Chair, +Rt. Rev. Fr. Leonard at: LowellPLC2013@gmail.com. Book your hotel rooms at: http://www.wyndham.com/groupevents2013/BOSAM_STGEORGE/main.wnt.
PRISON MINISTRY: Please donate unwanted past issues of Orthodox magazines such as The Word, OCMC or other periodicals to prison ministry to hand out to inmates. Please remove any personal mailing address for security purposes and give them to Mitrophan Chin.
STREAMING VIDEO – St. Mary’s Church services are broadcast live each week through an internet video stream. If you can't attend a service in person or want to share this ministry with a friend or loved one, the live stream can be viewed at www.stmaryorthodoxchurch.org/live during regularly scheduled service times (see the schedule of services below or online). If you have questions or comments about this ministry please contact us at live@stmaryorthodoxchurch.org.
VIDEO EDITING HELP WANTED – We are looking for volunteers to assist with some basic video editing to post the sermons and lectures from St. Mary's online. If you have experience with digital video editing, please let Jamil Samara or Erick Straghalis know you are interested in helping by emailing live@stmaryorthodoxchurch.org.
PHOTOGRAPHERS AND GRAPHIC DESIGNERS WANTED – Are you a photographer or a graphic designer and want to share your talents with St. Mary Church and her ministries? We are looking to get you involved to help photograph the divine services and events and to design promotional material for events and programs at our parish. Please contact Jamil Samara at webmaster@stmaryorthodoxchurch.org with any questions and to let him know that you are interested in getting more involved.
PARKING RESTRICTIONS – Please do not park in the Church parking lot if you need to leave quickly after church. Cars parked there will be staying until the end of coffee hour.
Additionally, do not park beyond the sign that prohibits parking at the corner of Inman Street and Bishop Allen Drive. (An orange cone will be placed in that No Parking area.) It is difficult for large vehicles to turn the corner if cars are parked there. Failure to heed this warning may result in the City preventing parishioners from parking on Inman Street. Your cooperation is appreciated.
And remember, there is no parishioner parking in the church parking lot Monday through Friday until after 6:00 pm.
THIS SUNDAY'S VOLUNTEERS
GREETER: Mary Winstanley O’Connor
COFFEE HOUR: Philip Straghalis
LITURGICAL SCHEDULE FOR THIS WEEK
Saturday, June 1: Great Vespers 5:00 pm
Sunday, June 2: Matins 8:45 am; Divine Liturgy 10:00 am
SCRIPTURE READINGS for Sunday, June 2, Sunday of the Samaritan Woman:
Epistle: Acts of the Apostles 11:19-30
In those days, those apostles who were scattered because of the persecution that arose over Stephen traveled as far as Phoenicia and Cyprus and Antioch, …there were some of them… who on coming to Antioch spoke to the Greeks also, preaching the Lord Jesus. … And a large company was added to the Lord. So Barnabas went to Tarsus to look for Saul; and when he had found him, he brought him to Antioch. For a whole year they met with the church, and taught a large company of people; and in Antioch the disciples were for the first time called Christians
Gospel: John 4:5-42
… There came a woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink." … The Samaritan woman said to him, "How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?" For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, 'Give me a drink,' you would have asked him and he would have given you living water." … Jesus said to her, "Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst; the water that I shall give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw."
LOOKING AHEAD
Saturday, June 8: Great Vespers 5:00 pm
Sunday, June 9, Sunday of the Blind Man: Matins 8:45 am; Divine Liturgy 10:00 am
Thursday, June 13, Feast of the Holy Ascension: No Services at St. Mary
Saturday, June 15: No Vespers at St. Mary
Sunday, June 16: Matins 8:45 am; Divine Liturgy 10:00 am
Saturday, June 22: Great Vespers 5:00 pm
Sunday, June 23: Pentecost
Thursday - Sunday, June 27- 30: Church and office closed – Parish Life Conference
Saturday, July 6: No Vespers at St. Mary
Sunday, July 7: Summer hours begin: Orthros 8:15 AM, Divine Liturgy 9:30 AM
REFLECTION
The Well-spring of the principle of life, Jesus, our Savior, came to the well of the Patriarch Jacob, and sought water from a Samaritan woman that He might drink. And when she addressed Him and said that the Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans, the wise Creator diverted her by the sweetness of His words rather to seek of Him the everlasting water, the Knower of things hidden, God Who is come in the flesh to save man.
- Doxasticon (Glory of the Stichera) of Vespers of Friday of the Samaritan Woman
For God has created us for that purpose, he says, to make us partake in His own divinity [2 Peter 1:4] and for that purpose he came on earth. And as the divine Gregory of Nyssa says to Harmonius, Christ put on our nature for the reason that “He received the rejected into sonship and the enemies of God into partnership with His divinity.” [On Perfection 280B] And again, “the purity which we see in Christ and in the person who has part in Him is by nature one. But Christ is the source and he who takes part draws the water.”
- St. Gregory Palamas
“All Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for training in righteousness.” [2 Timothy. 3:16] The soul therefore gains great advantage from the reading of the Bible. “Like a tree planted by streams of water,” [Psalm 1:3] the soul is irrigated by the Bible and acquires vigor, produces tasty fruit, namely, true faith, and is beautiful with a thousand green leaves, namely, actions that please God. The Bible, in fact, leads us towards pure holiness and holy actions. In it we find encouragement to all the virtues and the warning to flee from evil.
The Bible is a scented garden, delightful, beautiful. It enchants our ears with birdsong in a sweet, divine and spiritual harmony, it touches our heart, comforts us in sorrow, soothes us in a moment of anger, and fills us with eternal joy. Let us knock at its gate with diligence and with perseverance. Let us not be discouraged from knocking. The latch will be opened. If we read a page of the Bible two or three times and have not understood it, let us not be tired of re-reading it and meditating on it. Let us seek in the fountain of this garden “a spring of water welling up to eternal life” [John 4:14]. We shall taste a joy that will never dry up, because the grace of the Bible garden is inexhaustible.
- St John of Damascus
Imitate the Publican and you will not be condemned with the Pharisee. Choose the meekness of Moses and you will find your heart which is a rock changed into a spring of water.
- Amma Syncletica