It was truly a blessing ....

to be at All Saints Antiochian Orthodox Church in Raleigh this weekend!

Without prior planning, we arrived during Orthros, to learn that Bishop ANTOUN would be present for the Heirarchical Divine Liturgy, as well as for the groundbreaking for their new temple! The place was packed, and in addition to all that was happening, His Grace tonsured a new reader for All Saints!

Last year, we attended this parish primarily because its Liturgy is all in English, and we have been taking our daughter and her family with us. At that time, after meeting some of the folk and telling them a bit of our story, we found that Father Nicholas had also been a Lutheran pastor in the LCMS ... having left a decade and a half or more ago. Neat connections, and I found also that he has close ties to Father Gordon Walker. We were present about a year ago, when Father Philip, assigned to the parish but also a military chaplain was about to be deployed to Afghanistan ... and we were there this past spring when he actually was finally deployed, there for his last Sunday at All Saints for a time. He is presently a Command Chaplain over there ... and was recently on leave (we missed him, though).

In any case, we had a great Sunday with our family away from home, and look forward to hearing reports of the construction of their new temple. We look forward to seeing it next spring, and to being in it next fall.

Glory to God for all things!