The Orthodox Christian Mission center located in St. Augustine, FL is seeking volunteers who are able to help with mailings, i.e., stuffing, labeling and sealing envelopes, folding letters, and possible bulk mail sorting all within the St. Augustine office. There is typically a 3-5 day advanced notice for requested volunteers. If you are interested in any of the above tasks and are local or able to get to the St. Augustine office, please contact Phyllis Skinner at 904-829-5132 x164 or by email at Phyllis@ocmc.org.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Friday, August 26, 2011
Gezuar Pashket! An Update from Missionary Anastasia Pamela Barksdale
Dear Friends and Prayer Partners,
Pascha this year will mark my three year anniversary in Albania. As I reflected on this fact, I thought, how quickly time is passing as I am involved in the various ministries, ministries rich with the blessings of God’s grace and friends. My Christian Education and Field Work program with the students at the Seminary has grown considerably. For the first two years, my students’ work has included a teaching assignment at of one of the Kids’ Clubs or the Church in Tirana, under the direction of fellow missionaries, Nathan and Gabriela Hoppe. This year His Grace Bishop Nikola, Dean of the Resurrection of Christ Theological Academy, began to also send the students to local villages and churches in Durres and Kavaja. This has been an exciting challenge for me in many new ways. Saturday there are catechism programs at Shen Vlash for the village children and in Tirana at the Roma Community. Sunday there are catechism programs in Tirana, in Durres, in Kavajes and at a local village church, in Rushku, and Sunday evening in a home in a suburb of Durres, Shkozet. Just getting to the various locations is a bit of an adventure and has prompted me to seriously consider acquiring a car.
What has been really fulfilling has been identifying the needs of the six very different catechetical settings outside Tirana and trying to implement new strategies and methods for improving their programs. In conjunction with this effort, OCMC has approved funding for ministry relating to a new Catechetical Resource Center at the Seminary through my missionary support account. The catechism programs are funded partially by the Orthodox Church of Albania and partially from my support account, made up of donations from you, my prayer partners. Therefore, I want to account to you for the work we are doing and to keep you posted on our progress so that you can keep us in your prayers. Also, if you are a Facebook fan, I have been posting pictures from the various events on my Profile page and in my Cause: Pray with Missionary Anastasia Pamela Barksdale for the Orthodox Church in Albania. Thank you for your continued support of this vital and important ministry.
Recent Events:
This Spring, the Children’s Office offered to conduct an “Outreach” program in Durres for our catechism classes at the Saints Paul and Asti Church, located near the local boardwalk. My students joined with the Children’s Office staff and the Durres youth group to conduct a series of youth oriented activities to bring the “good news” about our catechism program to the general public, as well as the local Orthodox community. The number of new children actually joining our catechism classes, to-date, has been small, but the activity did enable my students to encounter the unchurched children of Durres, reorganize our program, establishing two classrooms and begin developing interactive activities with the Church’s youth group.
Last week, the first step of the Resource Center at Shen Vlash Monastery became a reality as 22 children gathered at 8:00 am on a Saturday morning in our new classroom space. Tomorrow my students and a group of volunteers will meet once again to paint a second room which will be for younger children. My goal is to establish “age appropriate” classrooms for children 5 to 9 years and 10 – 13 years.
One of the major complaints my students have about their teaching assignments is the “conditions” under which they must teach. So often there is no real classroom, maybe they teach in a living room, a field, a beach, or the narthex of the Church. Thus, I am trying to create a teaching lab; one which I hope will set a standard, and then we can talk about the things we can and cannot control in a learning environment. Often in Albania, new ideas or concepts are difficult to explain because of the lack of experience, which provides a reference for the students. Our first “new” classroom has been painted and shelves assembled and I have begun to equip it with visual aid tools like bulletin boards, white boards, and flannel boards; cd players to use in teaching songs and hymns and playing games. Several students have artistic abilities and are painting thematic pictures of Jesus with children. Learning to use visual aids and interactive materials is still a very new idea in Albania.
Our final stage will be to set up a room that will be our workshop space for conducting training, developing curriculum and lesson plans. Besides computer equipment and a data projector, we also plan to collect materials from all the various diocese ministries in Albania and have them available for reference. We would also like to develop a good collection of craft ideas, games, songs, etc. Having resource materials readily available comes slowly here, but it is something we are working at all the time.
In the hopes that some of my prayer partners in the States would want to help, I have set up a Wish List on Amazon.Com. You can access this list at the following link:
Pamela's Wish List
Permalink: http://amzn.com/w/3CO8T0CCGDK56
Please share the list with others. If just a few people send one or two items, we could improve our program very quickly. Fr. Luke Veronis is coming to Albania the end of May and promised to try to bring things with his Mission Institute team, but packages must arrive by May 25th. Father Luke's shipping address is 41 Noble St, Dudley, MA 01571. Otherwise, mail by slow boat to Albania to: Anastasia Pamela Barksdale, c/o Kisha Orthodhoskia, Rruge e Kavajes, 151 Mitropolia, Tirana, Albania. Please help if you are able.
Pascha this year will mark my three year anniversary in Albania. As I reflected on this fact, I thought, how quickly time is passing as I am involved in the various ministries, ministries rich with the blessings of God’s grace and friends. My Christian Education and Field Work program with the students at the Seminary has grown considerably. For the first two years, my students’ work has included a teaching assignment at of one of the Kids’ Clubs or the Church in Tirana, under the direction of fellow missionaries, Nathan and Gabriela Hoppe. This year His Grace Bishop Nikola, Dean of the Resurrection of Christ Theological Academy, began to also send the students to local villages and churches in Durres and Kavaja. This has been an exciting challenge for me in many new ways. Saturday there are catechism programs at Shen Vlash for the village children and in Tirana at the Roma Community. Sunday there are catechism programs in Tirana, in Durres, in Kavajes and at a local village church, in Rushku, and Sunday evening in a home in a suburb of Durres, Shkozet. Just getting to the various locations is a bit of an adventure and has prompted me to seriously consider acquiring a car.
What has been really fulfilling has been identifying the needs of the six very different catechetical settings outside Tirana and trying to implement new strategies and methods for improving their programs. In conjunction with this effort, OCMC has approved funding for ministry relating to a new Catechetical Resource Center at the Seminary through my missionary support account. The catechism programs are funded partially by the Orthodox Church of Albania and partially from my support account, made up of donations from you, my prayer partners. Therefore, I want to account to you for the work we are doing and to keep you posted on our progress so that you can keep us in your prayers. Also, if you are a Facebook fan, I have been posting pictures from the various events on my Profile page and in my Cause: Pray with Missionary Anastasia Pamela Barksdale for the Orthodox Church in Albania. Thank you for your continued support of this vital and important ministry.
Recent Events:
This Spring, the Children’s Office offered to conduct an “Outreach” program in Durres for our catechism classes at the Saints Paul and Asti Church, located near the local boardwalk. My students joined with the Children’s Office staff and the Durres youth group to conduct a series of youth oriented activities to bring the “good news” about our catechism program to the general public, as well as the local Orthodox community. The number of new children actually joining our catechism classes, to-date, has been small, but the activity did enable my students to encounter the unchurched children of Durres, reorganize our program, establishing two classrooms and begin developing interactive activities with the Church’s youth group.
Last week, the first step of the Resource Center at Shen Vlash Monastery became a reality as 22 children gathered at 8:00 am on a Saturday morning in our new classroom space. Tomorrow my students and a group of volunteers will meet once again to paint a second room which will be for younger children. My goal is to establish “age appropriate” classrooms for children 5 to 9 years and 10 – 13 years.
One of the major complaints my students have about their teaching assignments is the “conditions” under which they must teach. So often there is no real classroom, maybe they teach in a living room, a field, a beach, or the narthex of the Church. Thus, I am trying to create a teaching lab; one which I hope will set a standard, and then we can talk about the things we can and cannot control in a learning environment. Often in Albania, new ideas or concepts are difficult to explain because of the lack of experience, which provides a reference for the students. Our first “new” classroom has been painted and shelves assembled and I have begun to equip it with visual aid tools like bulletin boards, white boards, and flannel boards; cd players to use in teaching songs and hymns and playing games. Several students have artistic abilities and are painting thematic pictures of Jesus with children. Learning to use visual aids and interactive materials is still a very new idea in Albania.
Our final stage will be to set up a room that will be our workshop space for conducting training, developing curriculum and lesson plans. Besides computer equipment and a data projector, we also plan to collect materials from all the various diocese ministries in Albania and have them available for reference. We would also like to develop a good collection of craft ideas, games, songs, etc. Having resource materials readily available comes slowly here, but it is something we are working at all the time.
In the hopes that some of my prayer partners in the States would want to help, I have set up a Wish List on Amazon.Com. You can access this list at the following link:
Pamela's Wish List
Permalink: http://amzn.com/w/3CO8T0CCGDK56
Please share the list with others. If just a few people send one or two items, we could improve our program very quickly. Fr. Luke Veronis is coming to Albania the end of May and promised to try to bring things with his Mission Institute team, but packages must arrive by May 25th. Father Luke's shipping address is 41 Noble St, Dudley, MA 01571. Otherwise, mail by slow boat to Albania to: Anastasia Pamela Barksdale, c/o Kisha Orthodhoskia, Rruge e Kavajes, 151 Mitropolia, Tirana, Albania. Please help if you are able.
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Tanzania and James: St Jacob of Alaska 2011 Update
Dear friends,
Furaha na amani! Joy and peace!
And greetings from Tanzanian winter. It's hovering around 18 degrees- 65 Fahrenheit- and although it's the dry season we have had some small rainshowers. I've been reading about the extreme heat waves in North America. If you're pitying me for having to endure Africa's supposedly harsh and unforgiving climate, don't!
Here in Mwanza we are making final preparations for receiving volunteers from the Finnish Orthodox Mission and OCMC who will participate in a rural youth seminar in Muleba District of Kagera Region. This is an annual event, taking place in a different deanery each year, and currently our major ministry with youth at an Archdiocesan level. Event planning in rural Tanzania is a little different from event planning in North America. It's been fun.
In June, I was pleased to welcome two newcomers to the Archdiocese of Mwanza. OCMC Missionary Maria Roeber, a maternity nurse from Georgetown, arrived last month after more than two years of preparation. Maria hopes to help the Archdiocese of Mwanza develop its health care ministry, possibly by working at Resurrection Hospital in Bukoba or through other means. She is also helping OCMC to develop regional long-term health-care strategy elsewhere in East Africa. Maria is currently stationed in Bukoba town for her time of language and culture acquisition, and I have thoroughly enjoyed catching up with her in the past two weeks.
Meg Engelbach, an Intercultural Studies/ Linguistics student at Biola University in Southern California, is serving a summer internship here in the Archdiocese of Mwanza. She is living with a local family in Mwanza city, sharing in their life and learning from them. Meg is also learning Kiswahili and using her experience to help improve language-learning materials to better address East African linguaculture. God willing, Meg's notes and suggestions will be of benefit to future OCMC missionaries as they learn language in this part of the world. I've enjoyed having Meg around, and am very impressed with her dedication and adaptability. It is my hope to continue to play a role in welcoming students and interns to share life with us here in Western Tanzania as they broaden their own experiences and make decisions about possible long-term missionary service in the future.
It's been a good winter, and I'm looking forward to what lies ahead. I am grateful to each of you for your prayers, encouragement, and long-term commitment to financial support. I am here because of you. Stay in touch!
By your prayers in Christ,
James Hargrave
Furaha na amani! Joy and peace!
And greetings from Tanzanian winter. It's hovering around 18 degrees- 65 Fahrenheit- and although it's the dry season we have had some small rainshowers. I've been reading about the extreme heat waves in North America. If you're pitying me for having to endure Africa's supposedly harsh and unforgiving climate, don't!
Here in Mwanza we are making final preparations for receiving volunteers from the Finnish Orthodox Mission and OCMC who will participate in a rural youth seminar in Muleba District of Kagera Region. This is an annual event, taking place in a different deanery each year, and currently our major ministry with youth at an Archdiocesan level. Event planning in rural Tanzania is a little different from event planning in North America. It's been fun.
In June, I was pleased to welcome two newcomers to the Archdiocese of Mwanza. OCMC Missionary Maria Roeber, a maternity nurse from Georgetown, arrived last month after more than two years of preparation. Maria hopes to help the Archdiocese of Mwanza develop its health care ministry, possibly by working at Resurrection Hospital in Bukoba or through other means. She is also helping OCMC to develop regional long-term health-care strategy elsewhere in East Africa. Maria is currently stationed in Bukoba town for her time of language and culture acquisition, and I have thoroughly enjoyed catching up with her in the past two weeks.
Meg Engelbach, an Intercultural Studies/ Linguistics student at Biola University in Southern California, is serving a summer internship here in the Archdiocese of Mwanza. She is living with a local family in Mwanza city, sharing in their life and learning from them. Meg is also learning Kiswahili and using her experience to help improve language-learning materials to better address East African linguaculture. God willing, Meg's notes and suggestions will be of benefit to future OCMC missionaries as they learn language in this part of the world. I've enjoyed having Meg around, and am very impressed with her dedication and adaptability. It is my hope to continue to play a role in welcoming students and interns to share life with us here in Western Tanzania as they broaden their own experiences and make decisions about possible long-term missionary service in the future.
It's been a good winter, and I'm looking forward to what lies ahead. I am grateful to each of you for your prayers, encouragement, and long-term commitment to financial support. I am here because of you. Stay in touch!
By your prayers in Christ,
James Hargrave
Thursday, August 18, 2011
My First Journey to Albania: An Update from Missionary Candidate Jeffrey Macdonald
In 2010, I visited Albania in order to meet with Archbishop Anastasios in the capital of Tirana, and to visit the Holy Resurrection Seminary in Durres. I had the privilege to travel in conjunction with a Missions class from Holy Cross and St. Vladimir's Seminaries taught by Fr. Luke Veronis, a former OCMC Missionary in Albania and author of the recent book, Go Forth: Stories of Mission and Resurrection in Albania.
Albania is along the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea, north of Greece. Albania became an independent country in 1912, following the breakup of the Ottoman Empire. After World War II, Albania fell under communist rule until 1992. In 1967, the communist government outlawed religion, destroying or confiscating all religious buildings, and attempting to eliminate the Christian faith.
Prior to its conquest by the Turks, Albania was part of the Roman Empire. During this period, Albania’s port of Durres was an important link between Italy and the Roman road to Thessalonica and Constantinople. Christianity is thought to have come to Albania with the visit of St. Paul to Durres in the first century. By the end of the first century the Church in Durres had grown and had its own bishop, Asti, who was martyred under the Emperor Trajan.
Durres today contains extensive Roman ruins including a large amphitheater. I had the opportunity to visit this amphitheater with Nathan Hoppe, an OCMC Missionary in Albania, and to see the remains of two early Christian chapels built in its passageways to commemorate Christians who were martyred there.
I was also able to visit a site associated with another early Christian martyrdom when I visited Holy Resurrection Seminary built on a hill, overlooking Durres. The hill was the site of the Monastery of St. Vlash (Blaise). Tradition ascribes his martyrdom to this spot in the fourth century, which suggests that he is a different person than the well known St. Blaise of Sebaste, martyred in Armenia. The Church was an important pilgrimage site known for miraculous healings, and perhaps for this reason was the first church destroyed at the beginning of the anti-religious campaign of 1967. The church was rebuilt following the fall of communism in 1992, and the hill is now also the location of the Holy Resurrection Seminary and the Home of Hope for children. During my visit to the Seminary, I was able to meet with Bishop Nikola and some of the seminarians, and also to attend a large youth retreat held at the Seminary.
The Christian faith spread in Albania, as in the rest of the Roman world, following the end of the Roman persecutions in the fourth century. Unfortunately, much of the material heritage of Christianity in Albania was damaged or destroyed during the communist period, when approximately sixteen hundred Orthodox churches were destroyed. However, since the end of communism, the Orthodox Church in Albania, with the help of others, has rebuilt and repaired many of these damaged and destroyed buildings.
In contrast to historic Durres on the coastal plain, Tirana, the capital, is a more recent and much larger city surrounded by mountains. Here, I was able to visit an important exhibit of Albanian Christian manuscripts. These manuscripts had been confiscated by the communist government and were now being displayed to the Albanian public for the first time. Two of the manuscripts were Gospels from the sixth century. Their existence testifies to the tenacity of the Christian witness in Albania despite the many invasions that disrupted life in the Balkans through the Middle Ages and the Turkish conquest of the fifteenth century.
Unfortunately, many Christians abandoned their faith during the approximately four hundred years of Turkish rule. As a result, by the time of the communist takeover, only twenty percent of Albanians were still members of the Orthodox Church. Following this, the years of communist persecution largely reduced Albania to a secular country. However, following the end of communism in 1992, church life has been revived under the leadership of Archbishop Anastasios. He is a leading proponent of Orthodox missions, who, after serving in East Africa, has overseen the enormous work of rebuilding the Church in Albania after the fall of communism.
While in Tirana, I also met a number of the clergy and church workers, and had a chance to speak briefly about St. Herman of Alaska to the Orthodox Sisterhood. The two functioning Orthodox churches in Tirana were restored to the Church by the government. A new, larger, cathedral is now being built to replace the one that was destroyed.
Albania has a long heritage of Christian faith, but due to historical circumstances the majority of the country has been deprived of the knowledge of Christ for many years. However, now, by God’s mercy, the end of communism and the rebuilding of the Church in Albania have created an opportunity for the spread of the gospel. It was good to see how energetically this work has been begun, and we look forward to the possibility of being able to assist the Church there in its further growth.
Albania is along the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea, north of Greece. Albania became an independent country in 1912, following the breakup of the Ottoman Empire. After World War II, Albania fell under communist rule until 1992. In 1967, the communist government outlawed religion, destroying or confiscating all religious buildings, and attempting to eliminate the Christian faith.
Prior to its conquest by the Turks, Albania was part of the Roman Empire. During this period, Albania’s port of Durres was an important link between Italy and the Roman road to Thessalonica and Constantinople. Christianity is thought to have come to Albania with the visit of St. Paul to Durres in the first century. By the end of the first century the Church in Durres had grown and had its own bishop, Asti, who was martyred under the Emperor Trajan.
Durres today contains extensive Roman ruins including a large amphitheater. I had the opportunity to visit this amphitheater with Nathan Hoppe, an OCMC Missionary in Albania, and to see the remains of two early Christian chapels built in its passageways to commemorate Christians who were martyred there.
I was also able to visit a site associated with another early Christian martyrdom when I visited Holy Resurrection Seminary built on a hill, overlooking Durres. The hill was the site of the Monastery of St. Vlash (Blaise). Tradition ascribes his martyrdom to this spot in the fourth century, which suggests that he is a different person than the well known St. Blaise of Sebaste, martyred in Armenia. The Church was an important pilgrimage site known for miraculous healings, and perhaps for this reason was the first church destroyed at the beginning of the anti-religious campaign of 1967. The church was rebuilt following the fall of communism in 1992, and the hill is now also the location of the Holy Resurrection Seminary and the Home of Hope for children. During my visit to the Seminary, I was able to meet with Bishop Nikola and some of the seminarians, and also to attend a large youth retreat held at the Seminary.
The Christian faith spread in Albania, as in the rest of the Roman world, following the end of the Roman persecutions in the fourth century. Unfortunately, much of the material heritage of Christianity in Albania was damaged or destroyed during the communist period, when approximately sixteen hundred Orthodox churches were destroyed. However, since the end of communism, the Orthodox Church in Albania, with the help of others, has rebuilt and repaired many of these damaged and destroyed buildings.
In contrast to historic Durres on the coastal plain, Tirana, the capital, is a more recent and much larger city surrounded by mountains. Here, I was able to visit an important exhibit of Albanian Christian manuscripts. These manuscripts had been confiscated by the communist government and were now being displayed to the Albanian public for the first time. Two of the manuscripts were Gospels from the sixth century. Their existence testifies to the tenacity of the Christian witness in Albania despite the many invasions that disrupted life in the Balkans through the Middle Ages and the Turkish conquest of the fifteenth century.
Unfortunately, many Christians abandoned their faith during the approximately four hundred years of Turkish rule. As a result, by the time of the communist takeover, only twenty percent of Albanians were still members of the Orthodox Church. Following this, the years of communist persecution largely reduced Albania to a secular country. However, following the end of communism in 1992, church life has been revived under the leadership of Archbishop Anastasios. He is a leading proponent of Orthodox missions, who, after serving in East Africa, has overseen the enormous work of rebuilding the Church in Albania after the fall of communism.
While in Tirana, I also met a number of the clergy and church workers, and had a chance to speak briefly about St. Herman of Alaska to the Orthodox Sisterhood. The two functioning Orthodox churches in Tirana were restored to the Church by the government. A new, larger, cathedral is now being built to replace the one that was destroyed.
Albania has a long heritage of Christian faith, but due to historical circumstances the majority of the country has been deprived of the knowledge of Christ for many years. However, now, by God’s mercy, the end of communism and the rebuilding of the Church in Albania have created an opportunity for the spread of the gospel. It was good to see how energetically this work has been begun, and we look forward to the possibility of being able to assist the Church there in its further growth.
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