Thursday 1 May 2014

Services in May 2014

at Audley and Dresden

Sat 3rd  6pm Great Vespers

Sun 4th  10am Matins; 11am Divine Liturgy
Wed 7th 11am Divine Liturgy

Sat 10th 6pm Great Vespers (Reader Service – Fr Samuel away)
Sun 11th 10am Reader Matins & Typica (Fr Samuel away)

Sat 17th 6pm Great Vespers (Reader Service – Fr Samuel away)
Sun 18th 10am Reader Matins & Typica (Fr Samuel away)

Sat 24th 6pm Great Vespers
Sun 25th 10am Matins; 11am Divine Liturgy

Mon 26th – Weds 28th Archdiocesan Conference in Swanwick

Thu 29th 11am Divine Liturgy of the Ascension of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ

Sat 31st 6pm Great Vespers – in Dresden!

Sun 1st  June 10am Matins; 11am Divine Liturgy – in Dresden!

Name Days
6th Fr George Robinson (OS)
8th His Beatitude Patriarch John; Hugh Maxfield
9th Stephan Robinson (OS)
10th Simon Harvey
21st The Very Revd Archpriest Constantin Popescu; Adelina Ileana Badin; Elena Bendo;
Helena Carson; Ileana Grigoriou; Helena Batkin
23rd Lucas Joy
30th Isaac Norman Davies

Reposed
20th Jean Grace (2008)
Parish Feasts
12th Saint Æthelheard, Louth
19th Saint Dunstan, Poole
21st Saint Helen, Colchester; Saint Constantine, York

NOTE: All services in May (except the last Saturday of the month) will be at  our church in Audley while the South aisle at Dresden is being renovated and  decorated.
Volunteers for cleaning towards the end of the month will be sought!


Where are the Children?

Reproduced here is an excellent article taken (with permission) from the “Orthodox Women” 
website: http://orthodoxwoman.wordpress.com/ 


This Holy week I attended Holy Protection Russian Orthodox church for the rite
of the washing of the feet.
In the church were many, many children aged.from 0-12 attending the service. 
A twelve year old solemnly and perfectly read the prayers after communion. 
A three year old danced and spun in the beam of sunlight coming through the 
dome windows as she tried to embrace it. 
A younger child stared in awe at the icons and demanded to be brought to each 
one on the walls to reverence. 
The church was without talkativeness, cell phones or plastic wrappers. 
Everyone solemnly paid attention and stood through the service which was nearly 
five hours long. 
Where are our children you say? 
Why do you ask now that they are grown? 
Where were your children when they were young? 
Did you take them out of school to come to the services? 
Did you bring them to everything, or did you say, “This service is not for children”. 
Did you insist that Sunday was the Lord’s Day, or was it ok to be in soccer or little 
league – because it’s only a few weeks? 
Did you pry them from bed as you would for School or a camping trip on Sunday 
mornings or did you say, “That’s ok, it’s been a tough week”. 
“Where are our children?” 
“Why do they not understand the importance of the church?” 
The children have a natural desire to know God, their Father and their creator. 
But like most things which are natural in a child, unless this love and desire is 
fostered and nurtured it will become silenced in the face of our world. 
Bring the children to church from the day they are baptized. 
Bring the church into your home. 
Be the example of the faithful Christian you desire your children to become. 
Encourage each of the youth in your parish. 
Encourage and support the young mothers. 
Be the example of the faithful Christian you desire the children of your parish to 
become.
***
Within the church one thing that will set me off against anyone is the complaint 
about the young adults. 
“They are not interested” 
“They do not like depth” 
“They don’t care” 
“They don’t understand” 
Primarily because I personally hate sitting in a room with the older generation 
speaking in generalities about my generation with the all-encompassing “they”. 
If I speak up I am promptly put in my place that I am simply an anomaly. 
Shouldn’t we be looking to the anomalies and fostering their leadership in the 
church? Shouldn’t we be looking at the parents of the anomalies and asking, 
“What did they do RIGHT?” 
Personally, I feel blessed. I have mentioned it before and will mention it again. 
Every single one of my childhood friends is still actively involved in the church and 
many are current priest-wives or soon to be priest-wives. My closest friends from 
college all have a very active life in the church. We do “weird” things like have 
random akathist services and chanting parties. I have a friend who has become a monk recently. My husband has a similar story. His closest friends have all found 
their way to the seminary eventually. 
Last I checked, these are the kinds of things we WANT our young adults doing, 
but the older generation continues to label us as the strange anomaly. The 
minority. 
Here is a crazy thought: 
The young adults who have left the church? No special activity or program is going 
to bring them back. Like anything else, getting someone “hooked” is about 
relationships. So stop putting down any young adult who has interest in the 
church and getting involved and stop complaining about all of the young adults 
who have left. I wouldn’t want to be around you either, and I WILL find 
somewhere else to go. Where are the young adults? Not at your parish where 
you complain all the time, that’s for sure. 
The current youth of the parish who have no say in where they go… their parents 
need to make church a priority, not a “if there’s time thing” and “if the week 
wasn’t too busy”. It is the responsibility of the people in the church to educate 
those parents so they can educate their children. It is also the responsibility of 
the parishioners to make the church a place a parent wants to be! Would YOU 
come back if people kept staring funny at your rowdy 3-year-old? Me either. I 
WILL find somewhere else to go. Where are the mothers with the young children? 
Not at your parish where you look angrily at them for bringing their children, 
that’s for sure. 
And for anyone and everyone who steps into the church: It needs to be a place of 
love, compassion and hospitality. Not come cold, clannish, clique-filled 
establishment. You don’t need to like everyone, but it’s seriously not a big deal 
to say, “hi how are you, let me get you a coffee.” 
And lastly…. BIG does NOT equal successful. Especially in the church. One of the 
church things I participated in had huge numbers, but very little depth; 
theologically and relationship-wise. When the leadership changed, the numbers 
initially dropped drastically… but the depth became deeper than anything I had 
previously experienced. Slowly and steadily the numbers increased again. The 
truth was that the big numbers from earlier were people drawn to a personality, 
not the church. 
There is so much media and discussion flying around about the doom and gloom 
of Christianity, but no one seems to discuss the positive changes that need to be 
made to do anything about it. The Apostles certainly weren’t fearful of those who 
had no faith… they just kept evangelizing and showing love and hospitality. We 
need to do the same.