Jesus Christ taught us to love and serve all people, regardless of their ethnicity or nationality. To understand that, we need to look no further than to the Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). Every time we celebrate the Divine Liturgy, it is offered "on behalf of all, and for all." As Orthodox Christians we stand against racism and bigotry. All human beings share one common identity as children of God. "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus" (Galatian 3:28)

Members of our Parish Council are:
Joseph Barbera - Council Member at Large
Susan Davis- Council Elect
Carolyn Neiss - Vice President
Marlene Melesko - Council Member at Large
Susan Egan - Council Elect
Dn Timothy Skuby - Council Elect

Pastoral Care - General Information

Emergency Sick Calls can be made at any time. Please call Fr Steven at (860) 866-5802, when a family member is admitted to the hospital.
Anointing in Sickness: The Sacrament of Unction is available in Church, the hospital, or your home, for anyone who is sick and suffering, however severe. 
Marriages and Baptisms require early planning, scheduling and selections of sponsors (crown bearers or godparents). See Father before booking dates and reception halls!
Funerals are celebrated for practicing Orthodox Christians. Please see Father for details. The Church opposes cremation; we cannot celebrate funerals for cremations.

Please remember to turn in the "pledge" portion of your stewardship form.

OUTREACH REQUEST:  The Outreach Committee is once again asking for new toys for Christmas which will be donated to Safe Futures in New London, a safe-house for abused men, women and families.  Please bring your new, unwrapped gifts to church no later than December 5th.  Any questions, please contact Marlene Melesko at 860-739-4360.  Thank you.

Reflections on the Nativity Fast: On the parish's Facebook page, I have been placing a daily reflection and readings. I encourage you to make these part of your meditations in preparation for the celebration of the Nativity of the Lord and Savior. If you don't have access to Facebook (Meta), I have also placed these readings under a new link on our parish web page, called "Reflections and News". Simply follow the link on the main menu, or use this direct link: https://stalexischurch.org/reflections

OCA Guidelines for Confession
The following directions, from the Guidelines for Clergy (Orthodox Church in America, 1998), address various issues surrounding Confession (the Mystery of Penance) and are considered normative for our practice at Christ the Savior Orthodox Church.

Confession, the mystery of reconcilliation with the Church, must be regular and frequent. It must be an abiding element in the lives oif the faithful, deformalized and revitalized as the most common and normal actions of a people continually united and reunited with each other and with God. See: On Spiritual Life in the Church, Encyclical.

The priest, as spiritual father and confessor of the flock entrusted to his care, must determine the frequency with which the spiritual child confesses his/her sins.

For those who seldom receive Holy Communion, the priest must keep in all its strictness the obligation for confession before communion. However, if someone wants to confess more often than he/she communes, the Spiritual Father should be prepared to hear that person’s confession at all times.

For reception of Holy Communion more than once a month, Confession must be on a regular basis, and heard not less than once a month.

If General Confession is practiced, then the Order of Prayers before Confession must be read. The General Service of Prayers Before Confession is not meant to replace or be a substitute for personal confession.

The clergy are reminded that they must also avail themselves of the Mystery of Penance regularly and faithfully. The priest who does not have a Spiritual Father upon beginning his priestly ministry must seek one. If he cannot find one, then he must turn to his hierarch to appoint one for him. In some instances, there is a senior priest who has been appointed by the hierarch as diocesan confessor to whom the priest can turn.

See Confidentiality of Confession, Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church in America, 1988. See: Confession and Communion, Report to the Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church in America by Protopresbyter Alexander Schmemann, 1972.

Archpriest Dennis, Archpriest Michael, Deacon Timothy, Evelyn, Katheryn, Anne, Aaron, Veronica, Richard, Nancy, Susanne, Carol, Alexander, Gail, Kelley, Nina, Ellen, Maureen, Elizabeth, Christopher, Joshua, Jennifer, Petra, Olivia, Jessica, Sean, Sarah, Justin, Dayna and Maria.

Please pray for our catecumens: Daniel, Gregory and David.

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• Pray for: All those confined to hospitals, nursing homes, and their own homes due to illness; for all those who serve in the armed forces; widows, orphans, prisoners, victims of violence, and refugees;
• All those suffering chronic illness, financial hardship, loneliness, addictions, abuse, abandonment and despair; those who are homeless, those who are institutionalize, those who have no one to pray for them;
• All Orthodox seminarians & families; all Orthodox monks and nuns, and all those considering monastic life; all Orthodox missionaries and their families.
• All those who have perished due to hatred, intolerance and pestilence; all those departed this life in the hope of the Resurrection.

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Monastic Martyr and Confessor Stephen the New of Mt. St. Auxentius, Martyrs Basil, Stephen, two Gregories, John, Andrew, Peter, Anna, and many others (767). Martyr Irenarchus and Seven Women Martyrs at Sebaste (303). St. Theodore, Archbishop of Rostov (1394). Martyrs Timothy and Theodore—Bishops; Peter, John, Sergius, Theodore, and Nikēphóros—Presbyters; Basil and Thomas—Deacons; Hierotheus, David, Chariton, Socrates, Comasius, and Eusebius—Monks; and Etymasius, at Tiberiopolis (8th c.).

Tone 6 Troparion (Resurrection)

The Angelic Powers were at Your tomb;
the guards became as dead men.
Mary stood by Your grave,
seeking Your most pure body.
You captured hell, not being tempted by it.
You came to the Virgin, granting life.
O Lord, Who rose from the dead,//
glory to You.

Tone 4 Troparion (St. Stephen the New)

Trained in asceticism on the mountain,
with the weapon of the Cross you destroyed the spiritual assaults of the hostile powers, O all-blessed one.
Again you bravely prepared for combat
and slew Coprónymus with the sword of faith;//
for both struggles you have been crowned by God, monk-martyr Stephen of eternal memory.

Tone 6 Kontakion (Resurrection)

When Christ God, the Giver of Life,
raised all of the dead from the valleys of misery with His mighty hand,
He bestowed resurrection on the human race.//
He is the Savior of all, the Resurrection, the Life, and the God of all.

Tone 8 Kontakion (St. Stephen the New)

Lovers of the feasts, from the heart with hymns let us praise in faith
God-like Stephen, the lover of the Trinity,
for he honored the fair icon of the Master and of His Mother.
Now let us rejoice together and cry out to him with love://
“Rejoice, ever-glorious Father!”

Communion Hymn

Praise the Lord from the heavens, praise Him in the highest! (Ps. 148:1)
Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia!

Mercy
“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (Mt 5.7). To be merciful is to be like God, for “The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love” (Ps 103.8).

The Lord passed before Moses and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin . . .” (Ex 34.6–7). This also is the teaching of Christ in His Sermon on the Mount:

. . . love your enemies and do good and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for He is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful (Lk 6.35–36). (Exodus 34:6-7)

To be merciful does not mean to justify falsehood and sin. It does not mean to be tolerant of foolishness and evil. It does not mean to overlook injustice and iniquity. God is not this way, and does not do this.

To be merciful means to have compassion on evil-doers and to sympathize with those who are caught in the bonds of sin. It means to forego every self-righteousness and every self-justification in comparison with others. It means to refuse to condemn whose who do wrong, but to forgive those who harm and destroy, both themselves and others. It is to say with utter seriousness, “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us” (Mt 6.12).

According to Jesus, the spiritual person will be merciful because he himself is in need of mercy. The spiritual person will be merciful because he knows that he himself is a sinful man in need of God’s mercy and help. There is no one without sin, no one who can claim righteousness before God. If one claims to have no sin, says Saint John, he is a liar, and makes God a liar as well (1 Jn 1.10,2.4). The spiritual person, because he is in union with God, acknowledges his sin and his need for forgiveness from God and from men. He cannot condemn others for he knows, but for the grace of Christ, that he himself stands unworthy and condemned.

If Thou O Lord, shouldst mark iniquities, who could stand? But there is forgiveness with Thee that Thou mayst be feared (Ps 130.3–4).

The merciful person is merciful toward himself as well as others. This does not mean that he makes light of his sins and takes God’s forgiveness for granted. It means rather that he does not plague himself with neurotic guilt and remorse, surrendering to sinful scruples which are the death of the soul. It means that he trusts in the loving-kindness of God and knows, as Saint Paul has said, that no works of his own will ever deliver him from the need of God’s mercy and love.

For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this not your own doing, it is the gift of God—not because of works, lest any man boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them (Eph 2.8–10).

Thus it is the continual reception of the mercy of God and nothing else which empowers the soul to good works. And it is only the merciful who attain mercy from God. For all eternity man will be at the disposal of God’s mercy. At whatever stage of development he will reach, man’s prayer will always remain the central prayer of the Church: Lord have mercy on me a sinner! The holier the person, the greater is his sense of sinful unworthiness, the stronger is his dependence on the mercy of God, and the more he is merciful to the weaknesses of others.

https://www.oca.org/orthodoxy/the-orthodox-faith/spirituality/the-beatitudes/mercy