Newsletter January 25, 2025

On Salvation: My Salvation and the Salvation of Others

From this conversation, I reflect on the nature of salvation—both in general and specifically concerning the salvation of non-believers. This question often arises in pastoral visits: What about the salvation of non-believers or non-Orthodox?

A short article cannot comprehensively address this complex topic, but I will offer a few essential points concerning our Orthodox faith on the matter.

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Salvation belongs to God. Our role as believers is to hope for the salvation of all and to pray for it. For ourselves, we must work toward our salvation by following the path God has granted us in the Church. In humility, we become true witnesses to Christ, revealing Him to others through our example. At the same time, we fervently pray for the salvation of all people – even all creation.

Read the entire article: https://www.antiochian.org/regulararticle/2316

In this time after the Feast of Theophany and before Great Lent (1/6 – 3/2) we bring the Holy Water newly blessed during Theophany services to each of our homes and celebrate the service of the Theophany Home Blessing. I would love to celebrate it at everyone’s home (catechumens included!) this year.

As I am still working a secular job, weekday evenings are the prefered time. Please contact me via phone or email to schedule a time. Also, while I appreciate everyone’s hospitality, I would ask that there be no food. We can celebrate the service and then have a visit over a cup of tea (or other refreshment).

For the celebration of the service, I simply need a small space near your icons. I will bring everything required with me. If you would like to light a candle and carry it around during the blessing that would be great. The service is simple: we will say the few prayers and a litany, and then we will walk through the home and bless each room with the Holy Water.

Andrew and Alli Lindquist have asked a blessing to fulfill their practicum project for their college courses here at St. James. Below is their announcement. It will be a beautiful project for us and helpful for them. Please assist them!

Help Us Celebrate the Patron Saints of Our Children!

Andrew and Alli Lindquist are working on a parish project as part of their Orthodox education programs. They are creating a booklet for St. James highlighting the patron saints of the children in our parish. This booklet will include a short story and an illustration for each saint, sharing their unique significance to our families. Once completed, the booklet will be distributed to families and added to our church library for everyone to enjoy and learn from.

To make this project truly meaningful, they need your help! If you’d like your child(ren) to be included in the booklet, please share the following details with Andrew and Alli:
Name of your child
Age
Patron saint (specifically!)
Why this saint was chosen or any other meaningful details
You can connect with them during coffee hour in the coming weeks or send them an email at andrew@teamlindquist.net
Thank you!

Please remember that our full calendar continues to be available at our parish web site. Here is a link:
https://stjfc.org/Pages/Calendar/calendar.php

Full schedule:
https://stjfc.org/Pages/Ministries/Prosphora/Docs/prosphora sched 2025 web.pdf

Full schedule:
https://stjfc.org/Pages/Ministries/Altar/Docs/epistle readers for 2025.pdf

Epistle: ST. PAUL’S FIRST LETTER TO TIMOTHY 4:9-15

Timothy, my son, the saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance. For to this end we toil and suffer reproach, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of those who believe. Command and teach these things. Let no one despise your youth, but set the believers an example in speech and conduct, in love, in faith, in purity. Till I come, attend to the public reading of scripture, to preaching, to teaching. Do not neglect the gift you have, which was given you by prophetic utterance when the council of elders laid their hands upon you. Practice these duties, devote yourself to them, so that all may see your progress.

Gospel: LUKE 19:1-10

At that time, Jesus was passing through Jericho. And there was a man named Zacchaios; he was a chief collector, and rich. And he sought to see who Jesus was, but could not, on account of the crowd, because he was small of stature. So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him, for he was to pass that way. And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaios, make haste and come down; for I must stay at your house today.” So he made haste and came down, and received him joyfully. And when they saw it they all murmured, “He has gone in to be the guest of a man who is a sinner.” And Zacchaios stood and said to the Lord, “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have defrauded any one of anything, I restore it fourfold.” And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of man came to seek and to save the lost.”

Children of Light

Igumen Gabriel

Today is one of the most glorious and awesome days of the entire Church year: the Theophany of our Lord, God, and Savior Jesus Christ. Today Christ — “born secretly in a cave” on the Nativity — now reveals Himself openly on the banks of the River Jordan. Not only does He reveal Himself, but for the first time in history the Holy Trinity itself “was made manifest,” as the troparion of today’s feast proclaims: “for the voice of the Father bore witness… and the Spirit in the form of a dove confirmed the certainty of the word.” In short, “the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations is made manifest” (Col. 1:26) on this great and luminous day.

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God calls out to all of us without exception, and offers freely to everyone the cleansing and illuminating waters of Holy Baptism which He Himself sanctified this day. But He forces no-one. He compels no-one. He gives to each and every one of us a choice: do we wish to behold Him, in all the fullness His divine glory… or do we wish instead to look away? Quite simply: are we willing to repent? Are we willing to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven which is now at hand (cf. Matt. 3:2)?

As Orthodox Christians, we know (though we often forget) that the true meaning of repentance (metanoia) is not simply to feel guilty, nor even to become virtuous. It means, rather, to turn our hearts toward God. Without this divine vision (theoria) of Christ, absolutely nothing else in our religious life has any meaning or worth whatsoever.

Read the entire article: https://www.rememberingsion.com/p/children-of-light-sermon-theophany-2025