Appeal of the Parish Council

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Dear brothers and sisters!

As you know, last year our parish was presented with the opportunity to invite a priest from Russia, Fr. Alexander Davydov, to be our rector. The past half year has been spent obtaining the necessary letters of canonical release allowing Fr. Alexander to relocate to our diocese. The documents were finally obtained and in June we filed paperwork with the US CIS for a religious worker visa for Fr. Alexander. The processing of our case should take around 6 months.

The arrival of a rector from Russia is a joyful event for our parish. After many years of readers' services we now have the opportunity to establish normal parish life, with regular Sunday and festal services, with special needs services (treby) and, most importantly, with normal pastoral oversight and care. We will now have a spiritual father, someone to whom we can turn for advice, or to whom we can go for Confession. We also have an opportunity to develop the educational and cultural aspects of parish life -- to start a Sunday school, youth ministry, catechesis, and much more.

However, we also have new responsibilities. Fr. Alexander is arriving with his matushka and daughter and the parish is responisble for their financial support. Bear in mind that we receive no money from without -- we have no sponsors and receive no aid from the Synod or the diocese. Given our present financial position, we believe that supporting a full time priest is a realistic goal for our parish, but realistic only with your support. This is why we are turning to everyone interested in an established, functioning parish of the Russian Orthodox Church in North Carolina and asking to now take an active role in making this happen.

The most direct way of helping the parish at this juncture is to make a monthly pledge of financial support. This way, we can put together a certain monthly budget and can ensure that in addition to the priest's compensation we can pay for the mortgage on the property and the upkeep of the building. Of course, one-time contributions are always welcome as is non-pecuniary support -- Father Alexander, for example, will need a car, furniture, and household appliances upon his arrival. Keep in mind that all donations to the parish are tax deductible.

We hope that you can become actively involved in building the future of Holy Trinity. The easiest way to start is by filling out the pledge form. Donations can be made online using our PayPal account or you can  send checks made payable to Holy Trinity Orthodox Church to:

Holy Trinity Orthodox Church
c/o Treasurer
209 Chesapeake Way
Chapel Hill, NC 27516

May the Lord bless all who labor with zeal for the well-being of His Church!

With love in Christ,

Dmitry Efremov
Ljudmila Trofimova
Aleksandr Andreev

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Biographical Note

Fr. Alexander Davydov was born on June 15, 1963, in Puzhichi village of Obukhovo district of Grodno region of Belarus in a clerical family. In 1980, he completed his secondary education in Kursk and then worked as watch repairman. In 1981-1983 he did his military service in Nikolaev. In December of 1984, he was ordained to the deaconate and then the priesthood by His Eminence Chrysostom, Archbishop of Kursk and Belgorod and served, until 1997, as a priest in the St Michael Church in Verkhneye Kosinovo village of Kursk region. In 1996 he completed Kursk Theological Seminary. Since 2005, he has been assigned to the St Nicholas Church in Kursk.

Matushka Elena was born in 1963. They have two children: Vladimir, 25 years old, choir director at the St Alexander Nevsky Church in Lakewood, New Jersey; and Olga, 20 years old, student at Kursk State University.