Holy Trinity Cathedral, San Francisco, California August 16, 2025 In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Today, we continue to celebrate the great feast of the Dormition of the Most Holy Theotokos. As Christians, we understand that death, the last enemy, has already been defeated by Christ on the Cross. Therefore, we know that death is no longer our final end, a consignment to the darkness of Sheol. Instead, death is now a falling asleep: just as Christ fell asleep o...| www.oca.org
Holy Trinity Cathedral, San Francisco, California August 16, 2025 Our Lord Jesus Christ, whose image we honor today, has gathered us together to participate in this glorious liturgy and in the sacred office for the ordination to the holy episcopacy of His Grace Bishop Vasily. Before I address the newly-ordained, I welcome his co-consecrators and those who are now his brother bishops on the Holy Synod of Bishops of the Orthodox Church in America:His Eminence Archbishop Melchisedek of Pittsburg...| www.oca.org
The episcopal ordination of Archimandrite Vasily (Permiakov) as Bishop of San Francisco and the West took place at Holy Trinity Orthodox Cathedral in San Francisco, CA, on Saturday, August 16, 2025. His Beatitude Metropolitan Tikhon presided at the hierarchical Divine Liturgy and ordination rites. Hierarchs of the Holy Synod of Bishops of the Orthodox Church in America, representatives from other Churches, along with many clergy, faithful, and guests, gathered for the joyful event.| www.oca.org
His Grace Bishop Vasily was born to a Russian family in Riga, Latvia, and relocated to the United States in 1999 after completing his undergraduate studies. He entered Saint Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary (SVOTS) in Yonkers, NY with the blessing of late Archbishop Dmitri (Royster) of Dallas. After finishing seminary, he enrolled in a doctoral program in Liturgical Studies at the University of Notre Dame, where in 2012 he defended his dissertation on the history and origins of the ...| www.oca.org
A Real Person in the Eyes of God and Man In the wide stillness of the Alaskan tundra—where the sky stretches open like a prayer and the rivers flow between worlds—God planted a soul full of hidden beauty. On February 3, 1916 (January 21, Julian Calendar), in the village of Kwethluk, at the…| www.oca.org
Documents November 8, 2023: Proclamation of the Holy Synod of Bishops on the Glorification of the Righteous Matushka Olga November 2, 2023: Letter from His Grace Bishop Alexei of Sitka and Alaska to the Holy Synod News June 29, 2025: His…| www.oca.org
In accordance with the Statute of the Orthodox Church in America, which requires the distribution of official Council minutes within 60 days of its adjournment, the Secretariat and Holy Synod have completed their review and approval process.| www.oca.org
In the year 313 Saint Constantine the Great issued an edict granting Christians religious freedom, and officially recognizing Christianity as equal with paganism under the law. But his co-ruler Licinius was a pagan, and he decided to stamp out Christianity in his part of the Empire. As Licinius…| www.oca.org
His Beatitude Metropolitan Tikhon of All America and Canada, is the Primate of the Orthodox Church in America. Born in 1966, he is the eldest of three children born to Francois and Elizabeth Mollard. He spent his childhood living in various places including Connecticut, France, and Missouri, before settling in Reading, PA, where he graduated from Wyomissing High School in 1984. He moved to Chicago in 1988 after completing his undergraduate studies at Franklin and Marshall College, Lancaster, ...| www.oca.org
