Let us rejoice and be glad in it!
Today our Ottawa Parish of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, our Barrhaven Parish of the Holy Nativity and our Spencerville Parish of St. Barnabas, Apostle and Martyr, will be received into the Catholic Church.
It is Orthodox Easter today and it is fitting that I am received into the Catholic Church on Easter Sunday given that I am baptized Russian Orthodox (now Orthodox Church in America).
On my father’s side, however, his grandparents were originally Byzantine Catholics, Ruthenian Orthodox, until they came to New Jersey and were part of a wave of conversions to Orthodoxy in the early 1900s.
I will be wearing two baptismal crosses today—my mother’s and her father’s. Alas, my little gold Byzantine baptismal cross was either lost or stolen back in the years when I did not realize the significance of my three-fold initiation into the Orthodox Church.
Today I am so grateful for it.
Congratulations! Just this past week I was sponsor to an Anglican entering the Ordinariate here in LA, and next week I’ll be in Oshawa for their reception! WELCOME to you all!
Charles A. Coulombe