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Hello to all!

I'd like to know how extensive the use of the Old Calendar is among Ukrainian Greek Catholic parishes in North America. Aside from SS. Volodomyr and Olha in Chicago and St. Elias in Brompton, Ontario, are there other parishes that continue to use the Old Calendar for the whole liturgical year, or at least for the moveable feasts? Thanks in advance for all answers!

St. George in NYC.

Immaculate Conception, Hamtrammack/Detroit, MI
St. Michael's, Jenkintown/Philly, PA
Pokrova, Parma, OH

I believe, but could be mistaken, that Holy Cross in Astoria-Queens and St. John the Baptist in Pittsburgh are OC as well.

St. John the Baptist in Ottawa has one New Calendar Liturgy and one Old Calendar Liturgy on Sundays, or at least they did when I visited.

This may well be wrong, but I thought I heard that St. Mary, Protrectress in Apopka, Florida, which has English DL on Saturdays and Ukrainian DL on Sundays, uses the Old Calender for Ukrainian and New Calender for English.

Ryan

I do believe that Holy Trinity UGC Church in Silver Spring, MD is totally on the Julian Calendar. The church building itself is built like the wooden churches of the old country.

Most parishes of the Eparchy of Toronto retain the Julian Calendar; one can also find some parishes in the other Canadian eparchies which do the same. The shortage of clergy - particularly acute in western Canada - often makes the calendar question even more difficult.

I don't know of any actual list of Julian Calendar parishes in the USA. But there are quite a few. Some, such as Saint George's, New York, simply never changed the calendar and are not about to do so. I believe that this is still the case with one parish in the Philadelphia Archeparchy - in, of all places, Moscow, Pennsylvania! Other parishes were founded from an exaisting parish when the existing parish adopted the Gregorian Calendar - thus there are two parishes in Rochester, New York (the Julian Calendar parish was founded in 1958 and was not one of the parishes involved with the Old-Calendar movement after Vatican II). Still other parishes were organized with the support of Patriarch Joseph after Vatican II; the Patriarch never made any secret of his support for the Julian Calendar.

In Western Europe, the Julian Calendar usually remains in place, though one occasionally finds the New Calendar - most likely in a locale where there are two parishes (such as Rome, where the Catholicon of Saint Sophia retains the Julian Calendar, while the metochion of Ss. Sergius and Bacchus follows the Gregorian Calendar). In some places, where there is only one priest who must serve two locations at some distance from each other, this involves one location accepting the Gregorian Calendar.

In Poland there is some use of the Gregorian Calendar. In Ukraine, the Julian Calendar reigns supreme!

Fr. Serge

There are several others in the Eparchy of Chicago as well - St. Michael and St. Andrew's come to mind. I don't know about most but certainly many in the Eparchy of Toronto. A new mission would likely have its choice of calendars in any Ukrainian Greco-Catholic Eparchy.

Besides the Ukrainians some Romanian parishes do as well; Holy Resurrection Monastery (Romanian Catholic) keeps the Julian Paschalion but the Gregorian fixed feast-days.

Fr. Serge is correct. I live in Toronto.

Fr. John Tataryn is infamous for adopting the new calendar at "his" church St. Demetrius. Although even that parish has liturgies for Christmas and Easter on the Julian calendar, in addition to the parish's regular new calendar services. Fr. Tataryn thought he would start a new trend but people want to retain their heritage and traditions.

Fr. Terry Lozynsky's mission is also New Calendar, and I could probably think of a few more in time. But yes, certainly the majority are either Julian Calendar or still cover Old Calendar Christmas and Pascha with services in the Eparchy of Toronto. I applaud those parishes that have maintained the Old Calendar intact.

How does the priest keep the proper fasting cycles in this type of setup?

It's ashame that most Greek Catholics in North America have deviated from the vast majority of Greek Catholics worldwide who are on the Julian Calendar.


Monomakh

Some of the rural Ukrainian Catholic parishes in Manitoba also continue the tradition of the Old Calendar.

St. Volodymyr's Ukrainian Catholic Church in Utica, NY is still old calendar - year round. English on Saturday and Ukrainian on Sunday.


Deweydecimal

It would be unkind of me to indicate where this happened, but a bishop of my acquaintance was seriously distressed by the following experience:

He accepted an invitation from the pastor of a "New Calendar" parish to serve Paschal Orthros and Divine Liturgy at this establishment. Just as His Grace thought that the entire service was finished, he was shocked to hear the pastor announce to the congregation that "and now the Bishop will bless the pussy willows for those of us who still follow the Julian Calendar".

Yes, it really happened. And to think that people accuse us who adhere to the Julian Calendar of madness!

Fr. Serge

Sts. Volodomyr and Olha in Garner NC--outside Raleigh. Old calendar and all Ukrainian language.

That would make at least a dozen parishes and missions just in the US alone. The position of the hierarchs in the US has been to allow each community to decide since the establishment of Sts. V&O in Chicago.

Oh, I also forgot - St. Michael's UGCC in Yonkers is also full-time Julian Calendar.