On June 24, 2012, the feast day of the Two Hundred Twenty-Two Chinese Martyrs, who were martyred for Christ in 1900, His Eminence Metropolitan Ilarion of Volokolamsk, President of the Moscow Patriarchate’s Department of External Church Relations, celebrated Divine Liturgy in Protection Church in Harbin, China.
Vladimir Kuzmin, Archpriest Nicholas Karipoff
Rating: 9.8|Votes: 4
—We tried our best to use contemporary materials and technology but to build the church in the Yaroslav style of the 16th-17th centuries. The philosophical basis of this was provided by Fr Dimitry, who later became Bishop Daniel (Alexandrov). He was a sort of Leonardo da Vinci: he knew 15 languages, was a wonderful icon-painter, built several churches in America, and was just a remarkable person in general. He clearly, and strictly, advised us to build in the Yaroslav style, because that was the last genuinely-Russian church style.
Rating: 5.5|Votes: 8
‘Why don’t you settle down somewhere in one place on a permanent basis?’ ‘If I do, who will guide the Orthodox faithful on all these islands?’ he replied forcefully and with great bitterness. ‘Just think, how much suffering there is there! Five islands and the southern American republics, and there is not a single Orthodox priest!
Vasily Tomachinsky , Fr. John Schroedel
Rating: 6|Votes: 4
On the feast of Theophany we bless the ocean. Normally the Great Blessing of the Waters is done in fresh water, but we have no fresh water, no streams, or lakes—so we bless the ocean. One might say that it is rather ambitious of us to bless the Pacific Ocean, but our God is Great God, and He can do it! Once when we were saying the prayers before blessing, there was a Hawaiian man nearby catching fish. He kept catching more and more fish, and finally said “Thank you!”
Rating: 10|Votes: 2
In early June, a mission team from the seminary community, led by Chancellor/CEO Archpriest Chad Hatfield, visited Guatemala to lend much-needed hands to Hogar Rafael Ayau Orphanage. The team assisted in moving the orphanage from "Zone 1," a crime-ridden and dangerous area of Guatemala City, to Hogar San Miguel, a new orphanage in the mountains outside of Guatemala City.
