ST. STEPHEN NEMANJA ORTHODOX CHURCH
216 Park Avenue, Bisbee, Arizona 85603
Mailing Address: P.O. Box 5666, Bisbee, Arizona 85603.
UPCOMING AT ST STEPHEN NEMANJA
Our next Divine Liturgy is scheduled for Sunday, May 11, at 10:00 AM. This is the 4th Sunday of Pascha, the continuation of our celebration of Christ’s resurrection. We are not just commemorating a past event. In the Church, the resurrection remains a present reality, a foretaste of God’s redemptive plan for humankind.
Most of our gospel readings during this season are taken from the John, the most “mystical” of the gospels. In them we are reminded of the sacramental life of the Church. But we should also remember another theme that runs throughout the season: the theme of mission. This is a time for deepening our resurrection faith. This also is a time of going out - going out from the emotional comfort and security of the Upper Chamber to the ends of the earth. The living water, the bread of life from heaven that we read about in the gospel is meant not just for the immediate circle of the disciples, not just for the Jews, not just for this tribe or that, not just for insiders. His blood has been shed for the life of the world.
During the paschal season we see this theme of mission in our readings from the book of Acts, which trace the expansion of the church as it grows even amid persecution. The book begins in Jerusalem, but it ends with Paul’s ministry in Rome, which was center of the world at that time. And even then, Acts is open-ended – the mission goes on and still goes on.
May it still go on in Bisbee!
HISTORY OF ST STEPHEN NEMANJA
The Serbian Orthodox presence in Bisbee goes back to the late 1880s. While some of these early immigrants went into business, most went to work in the mines. Their importance for the local economy can be seen in Bisbee’s “copper man” statue, for which a Serbian miner served as model. Many of these early immigrants became American citizens, but they retained a love for the Orthodox Christian faith of their homeland. Newspaper articles document visits by early priests for baptisms and special occasions – most notably Fr. Sebastian Dabovich, American-born son of Serbian immigrants who was canonized in 2015 as St. Sebastian of Jackson and San Francisco.