Fr. Joseph Ponti has passed away

Our kind benefactor, Fr. Joseph Ponti, the rector of St. Francis of Assisi parish who so generously gave us access to our current building, passed away last Sunday. I did not know him well, but in our brief relationship I came to know him as a wise, good-humoured pastor with a heart for God, much concerned for the spiritual well-being of those under his care and for the cause of the Gospel.

In lieu of Little Compline tonight, I will be attending the prayer service for Fr. Joseph which is being held at St. Francis of Assisi at 7:00pm, and I would encourage as many of you who are able to do so to do the same.

The full obituary for Fr. Ponti is available online here.

I'm under the weather today...

Actually, the weather is reasonably good, but, whatever it is, I'm feeling "under" it! As a result, I will not be at Little Compline tonight, but it will be going ahead at the usual time and place with our faithful monk, Br. Cyprian.

Love in Christ,

Fr. Justin.

HELP STAMP OUT DUCT TAPE!

Come and help us stamp out the duct tape plague at St. John's! Not that we have anything against duct tape... We love it, really - the handyman's secret weapon and all that... It's just that we would prefer not to have it adorning the carpet under our feet at Sunday morning liturgy!

And now, thanks to a generous donor and to Fr. Ponti, who has given us the go-ahead to go ahead and improve the floor, we are finally blessed with the ability to replace the carpet with some beautiful laminate oak flooring. And here it is, sitting in the entrance area of St. John's house, adorned with a coffee press that we bought at the same time, right in front of the sign-boards for the soon-to-be-designed signs that will reveal the presence of St. John of Shanghai Orthodox Mission to the surrounding neighbourhood (more about that in a future post...)!


Obviously, there's just one minor problem with this picture... The flooring would look a whole lot better if it were actually installed as a floor! That's where you come in. If you are handy with this sort of thing and have some time to spare this Monday (which you just might, given that it's the Victoria Day long weekend), please feel free to come out to St. John's and help us celebrate Queen Victoria's birthday by helping us install the new floor! (We'll probably also be doing some preparatory work ripping up old duct-taped carpets on Sunday afternoon, if for some reason you're not available Monday during the day.)

Many thanks in advance if you are actually able to come out and help us on such short notice. If you're not able to, may God bless you with a wonderfully restful Victoria Day long weekend!