Church slava celebrated in Columbus

Saint Stefan of Dechani, Serbian Orthodox Church in Columbus, Ohio celebrated its Slava on Sunday, November 24th 2013. Divine Liturgy started at 10:00 a.m. and was followed with the blessing of the Kolac and Koljivo. 

Following the Divine Liturgy Slava luncheon was served for everyone in attendance in the social hall. We were honored to have His Grace, Bishop Sava of Slavonija (recently retired) and Deacon Ljubisa Mitrovic, with us for this very special occasion. Bishop Sava in his speech said that we are blessed to have so many young Altar Servers in our parish and added that during his entire service as a Bishop in Slavonija he did not have even a single Altar Server in His Diocese. His Grace also spoke about extremely difficult circumstances for our Serbian people living in Croatia where an anti-Serb agenda and a negative sentiment towards the Serbs is present continuously from the time of massive atrocities against Serbs in Jasenovac till this day.

Kumovi for our Slava celebration were Mile and Ljubenka Radic with their children Aleksandar and Tamara. The Radic family is originally from a well-known mountain Ozren in Republika Srpska. As it is a tradition in Ozren region, our Slava Kumovi donated the Slavski Kolac, Koljivo, lamb, beverages and traditional Serbian food. Last year the Radic family donated 14 new sticharions for our Altar Servers. Svetislav and Vera Jovanovic with their children Marija and Kristina volunteered to be our Slava Kumovi for the next year. This year for our Slava, Sveta prepared and donated his famous gibanica. 

We are grateful to our hardworking Sisters: popadija Dejana Kisin, Debbie Mamula, Katarina Sanchez, Ann Lund, Kathy Maragos, Milica Papic, Pam Chobany and Lisa Hodkinson for preparing a delicious lunch. Especially we are grateful to our youngest Sisters Juliana Sanchez and Nikolina Kisin for setting and serving the tables. We are very grateful to St. George brotherhood members Branko Vukadin, Luka Zecevic and Slobodan Regulic for preparing a delicious spit-roasted lamb. Last, but not least, we would like to thank Sam Mamula for washing all the dishes after lunch. 

We thank You all for you hard work: “For we are laborers together with God: ye are God’s husbandry, ye are God’s building.” (1 Corinthians 3:9)

Source: Eastern American Diocese