Eleventh Sunday After Pentecost
Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory Forever!
11th Sunday after Pentecost
August 24, 2025
Sat 8/23/25 4:00pm Vigil Divine Liturgy +Tim Hayes by Marian Luther
Sun 8/24/25 9:30am Divine Liturgy +Irene Simko by Peggy Figler
Wed 8/27/25 7:00pm Liturgy for Healing +Souls in Purgatory by Marian Luther
Fri 8/29/25 9:30am Beheading of John the Baptist +Paul Worst by Pocchiari Family
Fri 8/29/25 7:00pm Beheading of John the Baptist - adoration before liturgy starts at 6pm
Sat 8/30/25 4:00pm Vigil Divine Liturgy +Herbert and +Margaret Moniot by Drew Moniot
Sun 8/31/25 9:30am Divine Liturgy +Tim Hayes by Marian Luther
Variable Parts Tone 2 - Pages 130 - 132
Epistle 1 Corinthians 9:2-12
Gospel Matthew 18:23-35
Memorial Candle Request: No Candle Request
Epistle Readers 23-Aug Mary Troyan 24-Aug Eva Babick 30-Aug John Baycura/Mary Motko 31-Aug Liz/John Pocchiari
Please Pray for: Deanna Shpakof, Brian Buchkovich, Lejen Warner, Sharon King, Ole J. Bergh, Liz Moyta, Fr. Michael Huszti, Fr. Laska, Susie Curcio, Teresa Milkovich, Robert Saper, Anna Habil, Martha Sapar, Mike Dancisin, Diane Sotak, Anna Pocchiari, Larry Hamil, Beverly Jones, Maryann Russin Schyvers, Nick Russin and Ken Konchan
Attendance: 8/16 — 20; 8/17 — 70; Collection: 8/16 thru 8/17 - $1,672.00
Honoring the Theotokos: During August and September, we honor/venerate The Blessed Mother because of the Feast Days celebrated — the Dormition and her Birth. Help us honor her by sharing your favorite icon of the Theotokos. It can be of her image or a feast day. They will be displayed in the Church Windows. Stands will be provided if needed. Remember to put your name on the back so we know who it belongs to. Place your icon at any window you like. Labels are available on the readers lectern if you need one.
Church Picnic: The Church Picnic will be held TODAY at Connoquenessing Park. The address is: 228 Constitution Ave. Connoquenessing, PA 16027
Student Food Pantry: Our parish will begin collecting food for school age children. Each month will be a different food item. For August, it will be soups, and the donations can be placed in the baskets supplied. Any questions, contact Pam Gagen.
Shoe Box Kids: Attention back to school shoppers, don't forget to buy extra school supplies for the Shoe Box Kids. The kids need school supplies, clothing, underwear, hats, gloves, toiletry items, etc. No liquid or toothpaste, please. The children are ages 2-14. There will be a box in the vestibule for you to place your items in, which our Religious Education students will pack in distribution boxes in November as part of their social services project. National Collection Week is November 17-24. If someone wants to attend the local workshop - please see Fr. Radko . The workshop will be on Saturday, September 13 from 10:00 am - 12:00 pm
Polka Party 50/50 Tickets: Please pickup your 50/50 tickets in the vestibule. If you do not find your name, use a blank envelope from the back of the box and ask us to add you to the mailing list. Last year's winner received over $600.00! Envelopes of tickets which are not picked up will be mailed.
Upcoming Event Dates: 1. The Polka Ball will be held Saturday, September 6th at the Highfield Community Center, which is a new venue for this event. 2. Our church rummage sale will take place on October 10.th and 11th. Donations may be dropped off September 28th — October 5th.
The tradition from about the 4th century on has been unanimous with what gets in the way of becoming pure of heart. I will quote directly from the Philokalia: "The problem with the passions is that they divide the heart." The passions are the culprit that sucks the heart out of its capacity to see with equanimity and clarity, with luminosity and radiance, and makes it the slave of your personal drama.
Nowadays, we think of passion as a good thing, as authenticity, and joie de vivre, the energy of our being coming through. Passion is the capacity to relate to life and get some juice out of it. We keep running this map: that if you can only find what you're passionate about, you'll become authentic. I'm not going to say that meaning is wrong, but I will say that that meaning is modern. In ancient texts it has a different meaning: "Passio" is the first-person singular passive of the word which means "I suffer. I am acted upon." What passion always refers to in the ancient texts is this peculiar, compulsive nature of stuck emotion. The passions are really stuck emotions, revolving around themselves to generate drama.
There's a great teaching from the 4th-century spiritual teacher, Evagrius, the first real spiritual psychologist of the Christian West. He did an interesting analysis of how when you're in a deep field of gathered stillness something will rise up as a thought and quickly become a thought chain. At first it doesn't have any energy in it but as soon as it hooks onto a sense of myself, as soon as it becomes an "I-story," it becomes a passion. It's usually at this point, if you're not terribly self-aware, that it comes to the surface in the form of rage, anger, hurt or fear, or all of those.
Once it becomes a passion and it's stuck to your story, it can do nothing else but churn up more emotion, which then goes down into your physical body and steals your energy of being. Evagrius' advice is that you have to learn to nip the thought in the bud before it becomes a passion. It's a kind of wonderful combination of what we might call witnessing presence or practice, developing the capacity to see, combined with kenosis, the willingiiess to let go of the satisfaction you get from your drama. That is what clears the radar screen.
The core practice for cleansing and restoring the heart to its organ of spiritual seeing, becomes supremely, in Christianity, the path of kenosis, of letting go. The seeing will come, but the real heart of working with emotion is the willingness to let go, to sacrifice your personal drama, letting go at that level, so that you can begin to see with a pure heart.
The Beheading of John the Baptist - After the Baptism of Jesus, St John was locked up in prison by Herod Antipas, governor of Galilee. John openly denounced Herod for having left his lawful wife, the daughter of the Arabian king Aretas, and then instead cohabiting with Herodias, the wife of his brother Philip. On his birthday, Herod made a feast for dignitaries. Salome, the step daughter of Herod, danced before the guests and charmed Herod. In gratitude to the girl, Herod swore to give her whatever she would ask, up to half his kingdom. The girl on the advice of her mother Herodias asked that she be given the head of John the Baptist on a platter. Herod became apprehensive, for he feared the wrath of God but because of the guests and his careless oath, he gave orders to cut off the head of St John and to give it to Salome. Salome took the platter with the head and gave it to her mother. The frenzied Herodias repeatedly stabbed the tongue of the prophet with a needle and throw it away as trash. But the pious Joanna, wife of Herod's steward Chuza, buried the head of John the Baptist in an earthen vessel on the Mount of Olives. The holy body of John the Baptist was taken that night by his disciples and buried at Sebastia. The judgment of God came upon Herod, Herodias and Salome, even during their earthly life. Salome, crossing the River Sikoris in winter, fell through the ice. The ice gave way in such a way that her body was in the water, but her head was trapped above the ice. Thus she was trapped until that time when the sharp ice cut through her neck. Her corpse was not found, but they brought the head to Herod and Herodias, as once they had brought them the head of St John the Baptist. The Arab king Aretas, in revenge for the disrespect shown his daughter, made war against Herod. The defeated Herod suffered the wrath of the Roman emperor Caligua and was exiled with Herodias first to Gaul, and then to Spain. The Beheading is a strict fast day. In our tradition people do not eat food from a flat plate, or eat food that is round in shape on this day.
