Parish News and Announcements

Parish News

Our parish library has been completely reorganized, refurbished, restocked, and greatly expanded! Katherine Alderson, with Nick Maas and many others, have turned what once was a "library" mostly in name into a true library, with a large collection of books on Orthodox Christianity, the liturgy, prayer, iconography, classic literature, and many other topics. All books are are indexed according to standard Information Science protocol. There is a modern multimedia computer with Internet access. There are ongoing education exhibits. A great debt of gratitude is owed to all who contributed to this wonderful resource available to all! We have a few photographs, and the Library has plans for an independent web site with more photographs, information, and extensive resources for other parishes who may wish to establish their own libraries.
The parish of All Saints of North America joyfully celebrated its 12th annual parish feast on June 15/2, 2008. The services commemorating the Saints who have shown forth in the land of North America were beautiful and very moving. The parish church continues to shine more and more brightly with ongoing enhancements on the iconostas and elsewhere, and there are many new icons by local iconographer and parish member Sean Flaherty, including a newly-completed mural icon of the Annunciation. Katherine Alderson and Nick Maas researched and completed in time for the festival a wonderful educational presentation on the lives and work of the Saints of North America in conjunction with the the parish library that they have tremendously expanded and enhanced with some additional contributions by other parishioners. We have photographs and a video from the festival weekend, and plan more photographs of the library and the educational material on the Saints of North America.
There are many new icons painted/written by local iconographer and parishioner Sean Flaherty, including major icons on the iconostas and an icon mural of the Annunciation covering most of the North wall.
All Saints of North America proudly sponsored the First Annual Greek and Slavic Festival at Gypsy Hill Park in Staunton on October 27th 10:30 a.m. - 5:30 p.m., and it was a grand success! Despite threatening weather forecasts, the day turned out to be beautiful, and great crowds enjoyed wonderful Greek food, Greek coffee, Greek dancing, Serbian sausages, a Russian Tea Room, and much more. An excited correspondent said, "It was like ... Woodstock again!" We will hope to offer more descriptions and photographs when they become available.
On June 9-10, 2007, we celebrated our 11th parish Feast of All Saints of North America. Bishop Gabriel presided at the vigil and liturgy, and we were joined by Hieromonk Father Seraphim Voepel of the Hermitage of the Holy Cross Monastery, accompanied by his deacon, Father Sergius, and his sub-deacon Gregory. Also in attendance was Father Seraphim Stevens from the St. Joseph of Optina Church, in Chesapeake, Va, and Father Gregory Williams of the Annunciation Church, in Liberty, TN. Bishop Gabriel ordained our brother, Gabriel Weller, to the Diaconate to joyful shouts of “Axios,” and he awarded Father John the gold Cross. After the Liturgy, the Bishop led us in a procession around our church and blessed our sanctuary with holy water to the singing of the choir. The Sisterhood prepared two wonderful meals and beautifully decorated the Church and parish hall. Everyone enjoyed a wonderful celebration. We have some photographs of the festal weekend, and we invite you to check back soon for more!

A number of our parishioners went to the Hermitage of the Holy Cross for their annual Pilgrimage weekend in 2006. Metropolitan Laurus was present, as were the Kursk Root Icon and the myrrh-streaming icon of St. Anna. Photos are available.
We celebrated the 10th Anniversary of our Parish in 2006. The entire parish worked together preparing for the Festal Services and the celebration. Many friends old and new joined us to give thanks to God and commemorate All of the Saints of North America, and helped to make it an uplifting and joyous occasion for all. Some photos are available (see below).
The St. Macrina Sisterhood now is offering for sale a revised edition of their Orthodox cookbook! Details, including sample pages, pricing, and volume discounts are available here: Give Us Your Five Best.
Many hard-working members of our parish organized, prepared, cooked, served, cleaned-up, and made a wonderful success of a Russian Orthodox Foods booth at the Harrisonburg International Festival this year. Leonidas shared some photographs. One parish member said,

To all the parishioners who worked so very hard and pulled off a very successful booth at the International Festival. My hat off to each and all. You did such a nice job. The booth set up looked so good. The very attractive signs, and colorful table cover, and the excellent food was right on. You get a 10 for presentation. and 5 stars for the food .... excellent menu ... I think you were a big hit. From what I saw All Saints was the only representative of eastern Europe and western Asia. Well Done.

Web Site - What's New

Father John's blog now is available on this site! We invite you to peruse what he calls, "Ramblings of a Redneck Priest."
Leonidas shared some photographs of our 11th annual Parish Feast!
Leonidas shared some snapshots of Pascha this year.
Our iconographer Sean Flaherty completed a new icon of the Forerunner for our iconostas!
Photographs of our church taken by Father Anthony, a monk of the Hermitage of the Holy Cross.
Father John's article, "Revitalizing Our Parish Life" is online, as is the article from Orthodox Life to which he referred us, "On Methods of Revitalizing Parish Life and Piety—A Report by Archbishop Antony of Los Angeles To the Council of Bishops, 1985"
Photographs of the 2006 Pilgrimage to the Hermitage of the Holy Cross, sent to us by Gabriel.
Photographs from the Feast of the Dormition of the Theotokos, 2006, with grateful thanks to Nick Maas, who took them and shared them with us (and to Katherine for her work on the lovely arrangement).
Photographs of our church's new icons painted/written by our local iconographer Sean Flaherty.
Photos of our Tenth Anniversary Parish Feast, thanks to Father Serge Lukianov and Gabriel.
Photos of work on the church. There is SO much wonderful work that has been accomplished by many hard workers with Gabriel's leadership!
Photos of Father John and Gabriel at the Monastery!
Leonidas shared some photos he took at our Pascha Break-fast Trapeza .
12/6/2005 -The St. Macrina Sisterhood now is offering for sale a revised edition of their Orthodox cookbook! Details, including sample pages, pricing, and volume discounts are available here: Give Us Your Five Best.