Академический Документы
Профессиональный Документы
Культура Документы
CHRIST IS BORN!
GLORIFY HIM!
Christmas greetings of His Beatitude Lubomyr
to the faithful of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church
Beloved in Christ!
Today, Sunday of the Holy Fathers, the Gospel told us about the
genealogy of Jesus Christ, from Abraham until the birth of our Savior.
Listening to this detailed enumeration of generations, one realizes
that the coming of Christ to us humans was prepared in advance, and
that His appearance on earth occurred according to a precise plan of our
Heavenly Father. What’s more, not only the birth, but also the entire life of Jesus Christ was foreseen by
the prophets centuries earlier. We find an example of this again in the holy Gospel: when the three wise
men from the East stopped by Herod, to learn where the new King was born, he summoned the scribes,
who without any hesitation said that the Messiah was to come into the world in Bethlehem of Judah,
“because thus it is written by the prophet” (Matthew, 2,5).
Beloved in Christ, I turn your attention to this because, when contemplating the events of our daily
life, we are prone to think that they occur due to chance. We often consider that everything could be
different. Sometimes we get the impression that everything around us occurs uncontrolled, that our Lord
God has forgotten about the world. However our faith, built upon God’s revelation, gives us the opposite
reply: everything that occurs in our personal and social life, except sin, occurs according to God’s plan.
We find proof of this in the very biography of Jesus Christ, from the promise of the Messiah to our
ancestors in the Garden of Eden, until His glorious Resurrection. Therefore the following question arises:
why does the Lord God permit circumstances which are for us unpleasant or even cause us great
suffering?
This time Jesus Christ Himself gives us the answer, in the Gospel according to Luke, when He
speaks of the further development of history and of various tragic events that are to occur in the future.
These are His words: “This will give you the chance to bear witness” (Luke 21, 13). If there were no
hungry, there would be no one to feed, if there were no thirsty,
there would be no one to whom to give drink, if there were no
strangers, there would be no one to shelter, if there were no ill
or imprisoned, there would be no one to visit. If there were no
Christmas, there would be no Good Friday and no
Resurrection.
Therefore all that occurs around us, even the most tragic,
is part of God’s plan for us, which gives us the opportunity to
bear witness to Christ, by seeking truth, justice, and goodness.
It would seem that these ideas have nothing to do with
the joyful Christmas season, when people gather together at
table, exchange gifts, carol, and visit one another. Actually
PARISH LIFE
Continuation. Beginning on the previous page.
the essence of the great feast of Christ’s Birth is not in external and fleeting things; the essence of this
feast is that the Only Begotten Son of God came among us, to fulfill fully the plan of the Heavenly Father
for our salvation. Therefore my greatest wish for all of us is that the truth, that God is with us, would
occupy the main place in our Christmas festivities, that we would keep it in our thoughts and hearts
during the whole year, and that it would make our life understandable, giving every moment of our
earthly existence a saving value.
Beloved in Christ! At the end of this message I wish to make one request of you, which to a certain
extent is related to the Christmas celebration, since it concerns the land where our Savior was born.
Today in the Holy Land, especially in Bethlehem, Christians, who are already a minority, find themselves
in a difficult situation. These people await our support.
The faithful of our Church in Ukraine still remember well what it means to be oppressed and
persecuted, because they suffered this only a few decades ago. At the same time they understand the
value of support by prayer, for which they asked their brothers and sisters who at that time lived abroad.
Of course the fate of Christians in the Holy Land differs from ours in past years, however it is nevertheless
very hard and we should help them. Let us entrust to the Merciful Lord the inhabitants of that land where
His Only Begotten Son was born, and the Christians, His faithful followers. Let this be for them our
Christmas gift.
My most sincere wishes to you for a blissful and joyful Christmas!
The Lord’s blessings upon you! Christ is Born!
+ LUBOMYR
We invite you to an
ECUMENICAL BLESSING OF THE WATER
which will be celebrated in our church
on Tuesday January 18, 2011 at 6:00 P.M.
The Catholic TV channel EWTN will show a documentary film entitled “Parish
Priest of Maidanek”, about the Rev. Omelyan Kovch, a Ukrainian Catholic
priest who died in Maidanek, a Nazi concentration camp on the outskirts of
Lublin, in Poland.
Like St. Maximilian Kolbe, Rev. Omelian prepared many fellow prisoners for
an inevitable death. Pope John Paul II declared him beatified in 2001.
The program will be shown on January 30 at 10 PM; February 1 at 1 PM; or
on February 3 at 5 AM.
DIVINE LITURGY SCHEDULE
A general meeting
of the Sisterhood of Our Lady of Pochaiv
was held on December 5, 2010. A special guest that day was Father Ihor
Shved, the Caritas representative in the Sambirsk-Drohobych Eparchy.
The governing board was re-elected: Iryna Yasinska Graves, president;
Mary Bergman, vice-president; Larissa Fontana, secretary; Ann
Woroniak, treasurer.
May God strengthen and bless the new Board!
A sincere thank you to the following persons, who made varenyky in preparation for Shchedriy
Vechir on January 3: T. Ben, L. Bodnar Campion, N. and M. Hnatyshyn, I. and N. Gawdiak, B.
Geleta, N. Krawchuk-Wells, S. Krul, L. Fontana, and K. Styn.
MEETING OF THE PARISH COUNCIL is called for Sunday, February 13, 2011, at 1:15 P.M. in the church hall.
SUNDAY SCHOOL (includes all children) meets on the first and third Sundays of the month. The meetings will
be: Sundays Jan. 2 and 16, at 10:30 A.M.
THE FILM “A KINGDOM REBORN: TREASURES FROM UKRAINIAN GALICIA”, will be shown in the church
hall on Sunday January 16, 2011 at 1:15 P.M. Present will be Danielle Stodilka, the producer to the film from
Toronto, Canada, who will answer questions about the film. The event is sponsored by the Sts. Cyril & Methodius
Brotherhood.
ECUMENICAL BLESSING OF THE WATER will be celebrated in our church on Tuesday, January 18, 2011, at
6:00 P.M. This will be followed by a joint “Shchedriy Vechir” in our hall. Adults $10.00; children free.
PREPARATION OF CHILDREN FOR FIRST CONFESSION under direction of Father Taras, will begin on Sunday,
January 30, 2011, following the Liturgy.
CELEBRATION OF THE 60th BIRTHDAY of Father Taras Lonchyna will take place on Sunday, February 6. We
expect the presence at the Liturgy of Bishop Hlib Lonchyna from London. Afterwards there will be a reception in
the hall, prepared by Sisterhood.
THE NEW COORDINATOR of Sunday brunches is Luba Zavaliy (tel. 301-789-2355 – call evenings). We ask
women or men to contact Mrs. Luba about preparing Sunday brunches. A hearty thank you to Andrea Bilaniuk for
coordinating the brunches in 2010!
BORN Olexa HARMATIY, on January 3, 2011, son of Andriy and Renata Harmatiy. We greet the newborn as a
special Christmas gift!
We encourage the forming of groups of carolers for the church. Envelopes with addresses
can be picked up from the table in the hall. We ask group leaders to sign the list, indicating
in which area the group will carol. All contributions are intended for the Building Fund.
We have various building projects in mind to achieve this year.
© Holy Trinity Particular Ukrainian Catholic Church; Editor – rev. Taras Lonchyna; Translated by - Wolodar Lysko;
Design: Andriy Harmatiy, Photo - o. Taras Lonchyna
Parish address: 16631 New Hampshire Ave, Silver Spring, MD 20905-3919; Tel.: 301-421-1739