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The Divine Liturgy will be served at 10 am in the Chapel of

York St John University on 12th September.

Please see the link on the Home Page to the University Campus map

In the spirit of the recent Inter-Orthodox talks at Chambesy, all Orthodox Christians of any jurisdiction are welcome.

DEANERY CONFERENCE 2011

Metropolitan John invites us all, clergy and laity alike, to join him for a Deanery Conference at The Hayes Conference Centre, Swanwick, in Derbyshire, from 22nd to 24th June 2011. A note from our Dean, Archpriest Gregory, follows, explaining the reason why    it is important to waste no time if we intend to be there.

"The Deanery Trustees at their last meeting agreed that we should encourage our parishioners to book their places for Swanwick 2011 in the autumn.  This has to do with the management of bookings and reflects a situation particular to Swanwick.  The Hayes now operates a minimum booking and payment policy.  Whatever number of places we book for the conference, those we have to pay for come what may.  For this reason we deliberately UNDERESTIMATED the potential attendance to minimise any probability of loss.  The downside to this, but one we can cope with, is the necessity of people booking early, at least by deposit, if they want to secure a place. 

Prompt booking also enables us to contact Swanwick in good time and ask for more places.  We cannot do that late in the day for understandably, Swanwick will fill its vacant rooms as soon as it can and from whomsoever it can.  Therefore, we have booked 60 rooms and I am pleased to say that in my recent exercise when I solicited a projected attendance number that minimum number has been matched.  Clearly this leaves very little wriggle room for extra people to attend unless everyone who has shown an interest books now rather than later.  I ask therefore your cooperation in explaining this to your parishioners and asking those who intend to come to send their bookings to me with the deposit of £30 per person within the next few weeks.

I have posted to you today a supply of printed forms together with a poster for your notice board.  My intention in sending you the file now is to ask you to inform all parishioner contacts with my explanation for being so quick off the starting grid! .

I think you will agree the cost of £130 (50% for 6 to 13-year-olds, under fives go free) is very reasonable especially when compared with the cost of the Fellowship of St John the Baptist conference this summer, which was £60 more expensive."

 

A copy of the conference application form which you can print, using your own printer is available here in Adobe Acrobat PDF format*.

*If you need Adobe Acrobat Reader to view the PDF document click here

 

St Theodore is the Patron Saint of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch in Great Britain and Ireland. He was appointed Archbishop of Canterbury by the Patriarch of Rome at the age of 65, which was already a very good innings in those days. He was at the time not a priest but a lay monk so it was quite a change for him. He died at the age of 88 on 19th September 690 [10 years after his Consecration of St Æthelwine]. Travelling the length and breadth of England, he delineated the boundaries of his current dioceses, and established new ones to fill the gaps. He was the first Archbishop of Canterbury to preside over a meeting of the entire church in England, as some time earlier, following the Synod of Whitby, the English church adopted the ways of the rest of the church rather than follow the local Celtic customs.

He was also sufficient a scholar to write the Canon Laws for the church in England, quite a task. The Laws are little changed today, and the Church of England’s current diocesan  boundaries are substantially the same.

A CUSTOM OF THE GREEK ORTHODOX PATRIARCHATE OF ANTIOCH

Our father, Metropolitan John, has reminded us that it is not Antiochian practice to kiss the Cup after receiving the Holy Gifts. This is because we have received Christ Himself into our mortal body and we stand united with Him. There is no need to kiss the Cup which contains Him because we have now become that very Cup.

(Some branches of the Orthodox faith do not have this custom).

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Do You Like To Sing?

We are fortunate in having the help of Mr Ralph Bateman, head of performance at York St John University. Mr Bateman is a composer, with works premiered both here and overseas. He is also an excellent singer himself, and is improving the sound of our Divine Liturgy exponentially. Please be assured of a hearty welcome if you can already sing, or if you simply enjoy singing and can read music. Our usual fortnightly Liturgies should not be too burdensome, and with full harmonies the music can be breathtaking. Things become more interesting, as Chinese philosophers might put it, around Great Festivals, such as Nativity and Pascha.