Tuesday, January 19, 2010

The Baptism of the Lord

Today is a big church holiday here. I did kind of think it was funny when one of the men in church this morning said that the whole world was celebrating with us. This is the day we celebrate when Jesus was baptized by John.

It was a beautiful day here! Cold and clear....

After the service at our church, Jaan and Raia and I went down to see the Orthodox blessing of the water. However, the priest never showed up. Rumor has it that he took a group to visit a monastery today. There weren't many people swimming either. Apparently the water was "bad." I think they meant that it wasn't the ideal conditions like last year. There was just ice along the shore (and floating slush beyond that), so the people who were going in had to wade out, not just jump through a hole in the ice.


We had a nice walk, though. And we certainly enjoyed the sunshine!

3 comments:

Baba Julie said...

Great pictures! Still looks cold! I wouldn't want to be in that water!! Love y'all!

Stephanie in AR said...

I love reading about all the different church holidays your family & church celebrate, it seems to keep the focus around Jesus, his life & teachings. As part of chuch history (AO) I thought it would be interesting to learn more about the holidays - is there a calendar that were I could go to learn what they are?

Phyllis said...

The calendar that I really like is in Russian (calend.ru). I'm sure there's something similar in English, but I don't know where. It would be very similar to a Catholic or Orthodox calendar; we're usually just about two weeks behind. And we focus on the holidays that celebrate events in Jesus' life, not the various saint days. Oh, and Zhatva: the harvest holiday in September or October. I don't think that you would find that on a Catholic calendar. :-)