Diocesan Office

His Grace's Schedule

Clergy Assignments

Upcoming Ordinations and Elevations

Deacon Paul Olson to the Holy Priesthood on Sunday, December 7, 2008, at St. Nicholas Cathedral, Los Angeles, California.

Deacon Justin Havens to the Holy Priesthood on Sunday, December 14, 2008, at Ss. Peter and Paul Church in Salt Lake City, Utah.

September 27-28)

Update from President Kyra Pelachik

“Two little words that can make all the difference: START NOW!”  This little quote by Mary C. Crowley has become the motivation among the Officers for the Fellowship of St. John the Divine in the Diocese of Los Angeles and the West.  Four new officers with great enthusiasm to rejuvenate the Young Adults of our Fellowship were elected at the Diocesan Parish Life Conference in July of 2005, and that enthusiasm continues today.   

The Fellowship has focused their attention to the Young Adults (ages 19 -35) creating a more recognizable and identifiable place of belonging within the Fellowship.  This has been the goal for several years, but only recently has this vision begun to bear fruit.  One of the first things to happen to make this transition more visible was at our 2005 Parish Life Conference in San Francisco.  More than 40 young adults attended a discussion on a Thursday night in one of the hotel suites. With Fr. Kevin Scherer leading our discussion, many people were motivated to come, knowing we were blessed to have such a great speaker.  The weekend continued to have a large amount of young adults active and present in activities that were geared towards them.

Twenty–two parishes sent their young adult representatives to our Diocesan Delegates Meeting in October 15, 2005, the highest turnout in recent memory.  His Grace, Bishop JOSEPH especially thanked those who scarified to travel the long distances to gather that day in San Dimas, California.  The Diocese of Los Angeles and the West is, by far, the largest geographically, stretching from San Diego to Alaska and the Pacific Ocean to Salt Lake City.  The Fellowship Meeting was very successful, and the attendees were delighted by the mention of upcoming deanery events, weekend retreats, and talks about a future Young Adult Conference for our Diocese.  The Fellowship also participated in a community service project helping with the IOCC’s “Gift of the Heart” in which we made more than 50 school kits for those affected by the recent hurricanes.  The day concluded with a BBQ at a local park for the Young Adults and had an opportunity to gather, meet and talk with each other.

We have also started Deanery Young Adult Discussions and Dinners in which we were grateful for His Grace, Bishop JOSEPH to be presiding over the first two discussions in Southern California (October 29, 2005) and Northern California (November 12, 2005).  We had 30 in attendance at the Southern California discussion and 20 in attendance for Northern California.  Following the discussion we celebrated Great Vespers with His Grace, Bishop JOSEPH presiding, and then the Young Adults proceeded to dinner together at a local restaurant.  The discussion was more of an open forum and asking the opinions of the young adults; such as, what obstacles they are facing that would prevent them from participating in any diocese events.  Most replies from both discussions were the costs of events and securing dates with little conflicts.  We also asked for suggestions of specific events they would like to see happen in our diocese and the responses included community service projects in the deaneries allowing several young adults in the local area to help with the project together.  Another suggestion was Saturday workshops with speakers, followed by vespers and a dinner.  Recommendations of spiritual books and suggested group topic questions from the books were asked for and will soon be placed on our website so that all young adults from across the diocese can have access to the material.  These Deanery Discussions and Dinners will continue and allow the young adults to gather, meet and have fellowship with one another.  The job isn’t done yet though, we still are in planning for the Desert, Prairie, and the Pacific Northwest Deaneries.

Spiritual Weekend Retreats continue to be events to look forward to, as we have them in Western Canada in the Fall, and Northern California in the Spring.  The Canadian Retreat that happened November 10-13, 2005 had 60 young adults in attendance with many participants from various local churches’ creating a Pan-Orthodox environment.  With Fr. John Hainsworth speaking, many came from long distances to hear him speak.  We continue to plan for more spiritual weekend retreats in the future in each of the deaneries. 

We also look forward to our 2006 Parish Life Conference in San Diego as we’ll be having a “Fellowship Young Adult Track” outlining specific events for the young adults to participate in.  Our plan is to also have in the Fall of 2006 a Young Adult Conference complete with workshops, speakers, liturgical services celebrated at a local parish, and social activities for the young adults.  More information about the Parish Life Conference and Young Adult Conference will be available soon.

There has been much talk about what we’d like to do within our Diocesan Fellowship, but it is finally now that we are actually doing what we have been talking about for so long.  We have a great need to keep our youth unified and participating in the life of the Church; our Young Adults have grown up with each other through Teen SOYO, retreats, summer camps, and the Parish Life Conferences; to lose them would be painful loss.  Though we are spread far and wide across the western United States, we still have the need to be with one another.  By the growing attendance at each of our events, it appears that we are on the right path of connecting everyone together both spiritually and socially.  Keep the Diocese of Los Angeles and the West Fellowship of St. John the Divine in your prayers as we are continuing to build what we know can be great!  All information regarding our diocese events can be found on our webpage, or you can join our list serve below.

October 10-12, 2008

November 14-16, 2008

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