Sundays:
9 am - Orthros
10 am - Divine Liturgy
Weekday Services:
Please check the Sacred Services schedule in the bulletin or call the Church office.
Reading is under copyright and is used with permission, all rights reserved by: Fr. Seraphim Dedes
Reading is under copyright and is used with permission, all rights reserved by: Fr. Seraphim Dedes
Reading is under copyright and is used with permission, all rights reserved by: Fr. Seraphim Dedes
Reading is under copyright and is used with permission, all rights reserved by: Fr. Seraphim Dedes
On the Sunday that occurs on or immediately after the eighteenth of this month, we celebrate all those who from ages past have been well-pleasing to God, beginning from Adam even unto Joseph the Betrothed of the Most Holy Theotokos, according to genealogy, as the Evangelist Luke hath recorded historically (Luke 3:23-38); we also commemorate the Prophets and Prophetesses, and especially the Prophet Daniel and the Holy Three Children.
This Martyr was the daughter of most distinguished and noble parents named Philip and Claudia. Philip, a Prefect of Rome, moved to Alexandria with his family. In Alexandria, Eugenia had the occasion to learn the Christian Faith, in particular when she encountered the Epistles of Saint Paul, the reading of which filled her with compunction and showed her clearly the vanity of the world. Secretly taking two of her servants, Protas and Hyacinth, she departed from Alexandria by night. Disguised as a man, she called herself Eugene while pretending to be a eunuch, and departed with her servants and took up the monastic life in a monastery of men. Her parents mourned for her, but could not find her. After Saint Eugenia had laboured for some time in the monastic life, a certain woman named Melanthia, thinking Eugenia to be a monk, conceived lust and constrained Eugenia to comply with her desire; when Eugenia refused, Melanthia slandered Eugenia to the Prefect as having done insult to her honour. Eugenia was brought before the Prefect, her own father Philip, and revealed to him both that she was innocent of the accusations, and that she was his own daughter. Through this, Philip became a Christian; he was afterwards beheaded at Alexandria. Eugenia was taken back to Rome with Protas and Hyacinth. All three of them ended their life in martyrdom in the years of Commodus, who reigned from 180 to 192.
The incomprehensible and inexplicable Nativity of Christ came to pass when Herod the Great was reigning in Judea; the latter was an Ascalonite on his fathers's side and an Idumean on his mother's. He was in every way foreign to the royal line of David; rather, he had received his authority from the Roman emperors, and had ruled tyrannically over the Jewish people for some thirty-three years. The tribe of Judah, which had reigned of old, was deprived of its rights and stripped of all rule and authority. Such was the condition of the Jews when the awaited Messiah was born, and truly thus was fulfilled the prophecy which the Patriarch Jacob had spoken 1,807 years before: "A ruler shall not fail from Judah, nor a prince from his loins, until there come the things stored up for him; and he is the expectation of the nations" (Gen.49:10).
Thus, our Saviour was born in Bethlehem, a city of Judea, whither Joseph had come from Nazareth of Galilee, taking Mary his betrothed, who was great with child, that, according to the decree issued in those days by the Emperor Augustus, they might be registered in the census of those subject to Rome. Therefore, when the time came for the Virgin to give birth, and since because of the great multitude there was no place in the inn, the Virgin's circumstance constrained them to enter a cave which was near Bethlehem. Having as shelter a stable of irrational beasts, she gave birth there, and swaddled the Infant and laid Him in the manger (Luke 2:1-7). From this, the tradition has come down to us that when Christ was born He lay between two animals, an ox and an ass, that the words of the Prophets might be fulfilled: "Between two living creatures shalt Thou be known" (Abbacum 3:2), and "The ox knoweth his owner and the ass his master's crib" (Esaias 1: 3).
But while the earth gave the new-born Saviour such a humble reception, Heaven on high celebrated majestically His world-saving coming. A wondrous star, shining with uncommon brightness and following a strange course, led Magi from the East to Bethlehem to worship the new-born King. Certain shepherds who were in the area of Bethlehem, who kept watch while tending their sheep, were suddenly surrounded by an extraordinary light, and they saw before them an Angel who proclaimed to them the good tidings of the Lord's joyous Nativity. And straightway, together with this Angel, they beheld and heard a whole host of the Heavenly Powers praising God and saying: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will towards men" (Luke 2:8-14).
This Synaxis - which is to say, our coming together to glorify the Theotokos - is celebrated especially in her honour because she gave birth supernaturally to the Son and Word Of God, and thus became the instrument of the salvation of mankind.
Saint Stephen was a Jew, by race, and, as some say, a disciple of Gamaliel, the teacher of the Law mentioned in Acts 5:34 and 22:3. He was the first of the seven deacons whom the Apostles established in Jerusalem to care for the poor, and to distribute alms to them. Being a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit, he performed great signs and wonders among the people. While disputing with the Jews concerning Jesus, and wisely refuting their every contradiction, so that no one was able to withstand the wisdom and the spirit whereby he spake, he was slandered as a blasphemer and was dragged off to the Sanhedrin of the elders. There with boldness he proved from the divine Scriptures the coming of the Just One (Jesus), of Whom they had become the betrayers and murderers, and he reproved their faithless and hardheartedness. And finally, gazing into Heaven and beholding the divine glory, he said: "Lo, I see the Heavens opened and the Son of man standing at the right hand of God." But when they heard this, they stopped up their ears, and with anger cast him out of the city and stoned him, while he was calling out and saying, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." Then, imitating the long-suffering of the Master, he bent his knees and prayed in a loud voice for them that were stoning him, and he said, "Lord, lay not this sin to their charge," And saying this, he fell asleep (Acts 6, 7), thus becoming the first among the Martyrs of the Church of Christ.
Of the Sunday before the Nativity of Christ, in which we make commemoration of all those who were well-pleasing to God from the entire period, from Adam until Joseph the Betrothed of the All-Holy Theotokos, according to the genealogy which the Evangelist Luke set forth historically, and especially the Prophet Daniel, and the Three Holy Youths.
Of our Righteous Father Paul, Archbishop of Neocaesarea, one of the 318 Holy Fathers of the Council in Nicaea.
Monday, December 24
9:00 am - Royal Hours of Christmas
6:00 pm - Hierarchical Vesperal Liturgy of St Basil the Great
Tuesday, December 25
Merry Christmas!
8:50 & 10 am - Orthros/Liturgy
Saturday, December 29
NO Great Vespers
Monday, December 31
5-7 pm - Vesperal Liturgy for January 1
Friday, January 4
10:00 am - 12:00 pm - Royal Hours of Theophany
Saturday, January 5
8:50 & 10 am - Orthros/Liturgy
Eighth Orthros Gospel
The Reading is from John 20:11-18
At that time, Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. They said to her, "Woman, why are you weeping?" She said to them, "Because they have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid Him." Saying this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, "Woman, why are you weeping? Whom do you seek?" Supposing Him to be the gardener, she said to Him, "Sir, if you have carried Him away, tell me where you have laid Him, and I will take Him away." Jesus said to her, "Mary." She turned and said to him in Hebrew, "Rabboni!" (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, "Do not hold me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brethren and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God." Mary Magdalene went and said to the disciples, "I have seen the Lord"; and she told them that He had said these things to her.
Prokeimenon. Fourth Mode. Daniel 3.26,27.
Blessed are you, O Lord, the God of our fathers.
Verse: For you are just in all you have done.
The reading is from St. Paul's Letter to the Hebrews 11:9-10; 32-40.
BRETHREN, by faith Abraham sojourned in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked forward to the city which has foundation, whose builder and maker is God.
And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets - who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, received promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched raging fire, escaped the edge of the sword, won strength out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. Women received their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, that they might rise again to a better life. Others suffered mocking and scourging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were tempted, they were killed with the sword; they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, ill-treated - of whom the world was not worthy - wandering over deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.
And all these, though well attested by their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had foreseen something better for us,that apart from us they should not be made perfect.
Sunday before Nativity
The Reading is from Matthew 1:1-25
The book of the Genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.
Abraham was the father of Isaac, and Isaac the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, and Judah the father of Perez and Zerah by Tamar, and Perez the father of Hezron, and Hezron the father of Aram, and Aram the father of Amminadab, and Amminadab the father of Nahshon, and Nahshon the father of Salmon, and Salmon the father of Boaz by Rahab, and Boaz the father of Obed by Ruth, and Obed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of David the king.
And David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah, and Solomon the father of Rehoboam, and Rehoboam the father of Abijah, and Abijah the father of Asa, and Asa the father of Jehoshaphat, and Jehoshaphat the father of Joram, and Joram the father of Uzziah, and Uzziah the father of Jotham, and Jotham the father of Ahaz, and Ahaz the father of Hezekiah, and Hezekiah the father of Manasseh, and Manasseh the father of Amon, and Amon the father of Josiah, and Josiah the father of Jechoniah and his brothers, at the time of the deportation to Babylon.
And after the deportation to Babylon: Jechoniah was the father of Salathiel, and Salathiel the father of Zerubbabel, and Zerubbabel the father of Abiud, and Abiud the father of Eliakim, and Eliakim the father of Azor, and Azor the father of Zadok, and Zadok the father of Achim, and Achim the father of Eliud, and Eliud the father of Eleazar, and Eleazar the father of Matthan, and Matthan the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called Christ.
So all the generations from Abraham to David were fourteen generations, and from David to the deportation to Babylon fourteen generations, and from the deportation to Babylon to the Christ fourteen generations.
Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child of the Holy Spirit; and her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit; she will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: "Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel" (which means, God with us). When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took his wife, but knew her not until she had borne a son; and he called his name Jesus.
No Update this Week.
From Fr. Anthony - Office Hours
The Church's office hours are 9-5 Monday-Friday, and you can stop by to speak with the office staff any time during those hours. If you have a specifically Church-related question, you should speak with Susan Solo, who is in the office Tuesday, Wednesday, & Friday. If you need to meet with me, however, it's best to call first, as I may already be with another appointment, and am frequently called away to other visitations and appointments. If you prefer, I am happy to arrange a time in advance if you prefer. Please note that I am available for hospital visitations, but hospitals no longer give patient information to clergy. Please call me, or have someone in your family call me, so that I can come to visit you.
Church Etiquette
We ask that the doors of the Narthex be closed and no one enters the Church during the following portions of the service:
Epistle, Gospel, Sermon, Great Entrance, Creed, Consecration, and Lord's Prayer.
Please be respectful of the prayer and attention of those who are in the Church as you enter.
When it is time for Holy Communion, please remain in your pews until the young people of the Sunday school have finished receiving Communion. When they are finished, the Parish Council will usher you forward by row.
Epistle Reader Today: Altar Boy
Children's Christmas Play & Luncheon
Our children's Christmas play, "A Gift of Love," is today after the Divine Liturgy. There will be a spaghetti luncheon offered. Cost: Adults $10; Sunday and Greek school children are free.
Monastery Bake Sale
Today, after Divine Liturgy, we will have our Bake Sale to benefit Holy Trinity Monastery.
Dinner for High School Seniors & College Students
On Sunday, December 30, at 5:00 p.m., there will be a "get together at Christmastime" dinner offered to the college students and high school seniors of our Parish in the Parthenon Hall at the Grecian Center. All college students and high school seniors are invited. Please RSVP if you will or will not attending to the Church office (734/283-8820), or by e-mail: stgeorgesouthgate@gmail.com no later than THIS Wednesday, December 26.
New Year's Eve Reservations
You can make your reservations for our New Year's Eve Dinner Dance through the Church office, at the reservation table, or on our website at (stgeorgesouthgate.org), no later than THIS Wednesday, Dec. 26.
Orthodox Life
There will be no Orthodox Life Bible Study on Dec. 25 or Jan. 1. It will resume on Jan. 8.
Shoeboxes of Love
We are pleased to announce that the 2nd tray last week raised $692.50 for the expenses of the Shoeboxes of Love drive. Deepest thanks to all of you for your generosity and a special thank you to the Ladies of the Philoptochos who passed the tray on behalf of the Sunday School and all of us here at St. George. There were 151 shoeboxes packed and delivered.
Offering Envelopes
If you currently do not use offering envelopes, but would like to start in 2019, please contact Susan in the office.
For those of you who use personal offering envelopes, you can pick up your 2019 box in the hallway of the school. Please check your information and make sure you are picking up the correct box.
Coffee Servers Needed - 2019
Please sign-up outside the Church office next to the bulletin board to help serve Coffee on Sunday mornings during Coffee Hour.
Address Changes
If you have a new address, landline/cell number, and/or email address, please submit this information to the Church office so its records are up to date. Thank you!
Our Website: stgeorgesouthgate.org
We have a live calendar, video and audio recordings of sermons, services, and other events, and an archive of the last two months' Sunday bulletin. You can also reserve and pay for your seat to any upcoming lunch or dinner.
Email Info: stgeorgesouthgate@gmail.com
If you would like our weekly bulletin emailed to you, or to receive any other pertinent information from the Church, please call or e-mail us your information.
FOCUS Detroit Bags of Food for Needy Schoolchildren - Volunteers and Donations Needed!
Please note the new day and time - the third Thursday of each month!
Please use the link below to get to the sign-up sheet for this monthly event. You will notice that you can now sign-up all the way through May if you'd like. Please remember to list how many from your family will be coming to help out. Our goal is to provide enough supplies for all the bags ourselves!
Please consider donating any of the following: Boxes of individual oatmeal packets - Cereal bowls or small individual cereal boxes - Fruit cups - Individual Cheez-Its or Goldfish bags - Mac & Cheese Cups - Chef Boyardee/Spaghettios pop top cans or cups - Ramen Noodles - Fruit snacks (the kind with real fruit juice and added Vitamin C 100%) - Cereal bars or ganola bars.
Please call Eleni Gikas at 313.300.4903 to let her know what you plan to donate, or if you prefer to make a cash donation. All donated items can be dropped off in the Activity Room. Our next meeting date will be on THURSDAY, January 17, at 6:00 pm. Please note that there will be no Bags of Food filling in December, due to our other efforts with the Shoeboxes of Love.
http://www.signupgenius.com/go/409044facaa23a0f94-food1
Today
Children's Christmas Play & Luncheon
Benefit Bake Sale
Saturday, December 29
NO Byzantine Chant for Kids
Sunday, December 30
5:00 pm - H.S. Seniors & College Dinner
Monday, December 31
7:30 pm (doors open) New Year's Eve Dinner Dance
Tuesday, January 1
Office Closed
Saturday, January 5
NO Byzantine Chant for Kids
TODAY: NO COFFEE
Volunteers are needed for 2019!
Please sign-up outside the Church office next to the bulletin board.
We need coffee servers during the coffee hour on Sundays. Please consider serving our Lord in this capacity. Thank you!
No Memorials.