What are you doing for St. Nicholas' feast on Dec 6th?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Woodstock
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Hanging my Sv. Nikola ikon, which he so GRACIOUSLY gave me the money to purchase and restore.

Stopping at the florist on my way home from work and buying a nice bunch of red & white carnations to put before his ikon at Divine Liturgy and putting my shoes outside my door…
 
Old Calender St. Nicholas day. I’m not sure, probably chanting vespers and then going back in the morning going to be the acolyte for the Liturgy.
 
Ulp! This is not going to sound very good compared to what the Eastern Catholics do. It is our custom (St. Nicholas’ really) to put little treats in the childrens’ (grandchildren now) shoes overnight. I think that’s a German thing to do, because my wife, who is from a pretty ethnic German family, came up with it. Her family had always done that.

Also, since December 6 is my birthday and my wife’s as well, that kind of clouds the whole thing. It was funny. We had been going together for awhile, and I guess she was considering getting me something, so she asked me when my birthday is. I told her, and she became irate! Really angry! She thought I had gotten into her purse somehow, looked at her driver’s license and was mocking her! After I produced my own driver’s license, she did calm down.
 
Well, I got a final for Theology 101. I’ll probably go to Mass like usual. I might go to Vespers and chill with the monks later though…
Seeing as how I live in the dorms, I don’t think I should leave my shoes out, that is, if I ever want to see them again. Ha.
 
Lots of parishes have St. Nicholas feast day activities after Liturgy.
 
mgy100 said:
Lots of parishes have St. Nicholas feast day activities after Liturgy.
Click to expand...
We’re doing ours this Sunday with a Pot-luck luncheon after Divine Liturgy, a off-off Broadway production by the Sunday school kids, a visit from Sv. Nikola for all the kids reguardless of age.

Our Sunday school children have been asked to bring school supplies to give to Sv. Nikola so that he can take them to an inner city Catholic school for the children there. Last year, they brought mittens and winter hats for Sv. Nikola to give to this children.

We’re an urban parish with families traveling over an hour each way to attend Divine Liturgy…
 
I picked up some dairy-free chocolate, an apple and a couple clementines, and a handful of mixed nuts today.

What do you put in stockings or shoes left out for St. Nick?
 
I just got back from Vespers.
As for Dec. 6 itself, I’ll be at work then going to a wake for a high school classmate who was killed by a drunken driver on Nov. 30.

Also, I believe the Philip’s Fast is negated on Dec. 6, but will still watch my intake.
 
Patchunky said:
It depends… in Slovakia, they would give walnuts, apples, sometimes an orange, some candies or even small toys…
Click to expand...
That *IS *what I got as a kid. We didn’t understand why we got those treats. What baffles me is that my mother always told me and my brothers that we were Byzantine and that was the end of the that. Happily now I know what she meant to be Byzantine!:extrahappy:
 
Patchunky said:
It depends… in Slovakia, they would give walnuts, apples, sometimes an orange, some candies or even small toys…
Click to expand...
Sounds just like my list. Except I didn’t pick up any small toys. 😉

Apple, oranges (tangerines, mandarin oranges or clementines were fairly interchangeable growing up), unhusked nuts, and gold coins. We were always told it was because St. Nicholas brought those foods to the hungry and the coins were because he brought money to the poor.
 
Patchunky said:
It depends… in Slovakia, they would give walnuts, apples, sometimes an orange, some candies or even small toys…
Click to expand...
I sure hope St Nick passes by Russia, don’t wanna see him drinking and flying his sleigh after all that great vodka. 👍
 
On December 19, 2007, St. Nicholas Orthodox Church in Jacob’s Creek, PA will celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Miracle of St. Nicholas.

On December 19th, 1907, the Carpatho-Rusyn miners of Jacob’s Creek decided to forgo working, loose a day’s wages and celebrate the Feast of their patron, St. Nicholas.

As the Divine Liturgy was taking place, the church shook.

There had been an explosion in the mine and over 250 men who had gone to work had been killed. The Rusyn miners who had gone to honor their patron saint had survived.

Strangely enough, on December 6, 1907, in Mononagh, WV, the Hungarian and Slovak miners had decided to celebrate the Feast of St. Nicholas on the Western Calendar and did not work. There was an explosion at the mine as well and over 350 miners were killed. This mining disaster is considered to be the worst in US history.

There will be a couple of events to mark the anniversary of the “Miracle of St. NIcholas” including Divine Services at St. NIcholas Orthodox church in Jacob’s Creek.
 
Patchunky said:
On December 19, 2007, St. Nicholas Orthodox Church in Jacob’s Creek, PA will celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Miracle of St. Nicholas.
Click to expand...
The Darr Mine explosion in Jacob’s Creek killed 240 miners and, as Patchunky notes, that at Monongah killed over 350.

The faithful of Saint Nicholas Byzantine (Ruthenian) parish in Perryopolis, the other church built to honor S Nikolai as a consequence of the Darr Mine event, will join with their Orthodox brethren in Jacob’s Creek to jointly celebrate the Miracle.

December 6 was proclaimed a day of memory for those in WV who lost their lives and a statewide moment of silence was requested by the state’s governor at the time recorded as that of the explosion. Churches of several faiths conducted memorial services in WV on Thursday, including a pontifical Mass served by the Bishop of Wheeling-Charleston.

Memory eternal for all who perished in those two disasters.

Neil
 
A memorial statue erected this year to the memory of the women left widowed by the WV disaster, who went on to raise their fatherless children single-handedly.

Interestingly, a bell is also being mounted at the memorial site. It was cast in and is the gift of a small town in Italy in which there is a memorial to the WV disaster, as there was also a contingent of Italian immigrants from that town among those killed.

A recent book on the disaster, written by a former official of the US Mine Safety Administration, apparently makes a convincing case for the death toll (already the worst in US mining history) to have been understated by 200 miners. These were the “unknown”, who were without family locally.

Memory eternal.
 
Patchunky said:
On December 19, 2007, St. Nicholas Orthodox Church in Jacob’s Creek, PA will celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Miracle of St. Nicholas.

On December 19th, 1907, the Carpatho-Rusyn miners of Jacob’s Creek decided to forgo working, loose a day’s wages and celebrate the Feast of their patron, St. Nicholas.

As the Divine Liturgy was taking place, the church shook.

There had been an explosion in the mine and over 250 men who had gone to work had been killed. The Rusyn miners who had gone to honor their patron saint had survived.

Strangely enough, on December 6, 1907, in Mononagh, WV, the Hungarian and Slovak miners had decided to celebrate the Feast of St. Nicholas on the Western Calendar and did not work. There was an explosion at the mine as well and over 350 miners were killed. This mining disaster is considered to be the worst in US history.

There will be a couple of events to mark the anniversary of the “Miracle of St. NIcholas” including Divine Services at St. NIcholas Orthodox church in Jacob’s Creek.
Click to expand...
With all respect, and prayers for the souls those who lost their lives and prayers of gratitude for those who didn’t, I don’t like the idea of attributing such events as miracles.

You see there’s plenty on the minus side of this sort of ledger too. The most noteworthy probably is the 1755 Lisbon Earthquake - not only did it hit the city on All Saints’ Day of that year, it did particular damage to the churches in which people were celebrating the feast. And doubtless to the people attending too - in all anywhere between 60,000 and 100,000 died. Go figure. 🤷
 
LilyM said:
With all respect, and prayers for the souls those who lost their lives and prayers of gratitude for those who didn’t, I don’t like the idea of attributing such events as miracles.
Click to expand...
That, Lily, is one of the differences between East and West. While the vast majority of us are unimpressed by apparitions seen by the few and embraced by the many, we are spiritually enriched by the love that God showed the few to whom He granted the opportunity to live for another day, in the face of overwhelming odds not to have survived.

That those who did were engaged in a holy act at the time, observing the feast of S Nikolai, perfectly meshes with our mindset of why God would see fit to have them be spared. As it was the feast of our beloved Saint, and it was through honor of him that they survived, it stands to all reason that Holy Nikolai looked with love on his sons and interceded for them.

Nor would we ever consider that those who reposed on that day were not honored by God or were victimized by Him for not making the same choice - to worship rather than work. They received from Him the reward of being taken to a place of light and love and verdancy, where there is neither sighing, nor suffering, but only life everlasting.

It’s just such reasoning as this that makes us Eastern - or “byzantine”, if you wish 😃

Many years,

Neil
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top