Services and Location

OUR PREMISES

We are located at the Moravian Church, 1 University Road, Belfast, BT7 1NA.

Our services are held in the ground floor hall of the main church building – when approaching the main entrance of the church from University Road, just follow around to the right hand side, past the steps, to find the door to the hall.

Please note – we are not present at these premises outside of our listed service times.

WARM WELCOME 

St John

You and your friends and family are warmly invited to all our (mainly) English-language Divine Liturgy and other services. We are a small group of faithful and new faces are always very welcome. Our parish priest Fr Justin Venn typically visits us once a month (typically the second weekend of each month – see below for upcoming dates) to hear confessions and celebrate the Divine Liturgy as well as carrying out other priestly duties as and when required such as baptisms, house blessings and visiting the sick.

Unless otherwise stated, all our services are in English. There may very occasionally be Slavonic, Greek, Romanian, Irish, Latin, German, Arabic, Spanish or other languages used – for example for the “Lord have Mercy” prayer. This does not interfere with the understanding of the prayers for English speakers but may help people of those language backgrounds to feel more at home.

NEXT DIVINE LITURGY

SATURDAY 17th January 2026

This unfortunately means that there will be no Christmas – Nativity – Divine Liturgy Celebrated in our parish this year.

Fr Justin will be back with us on Saturday 17th of January to hear confessions and celebrate the Divine Liturgy followed by food together.

Confession from 8.30am
Divine Liturgy from 10.00am

CORRECTION of a previous notice: There will be “The Blessing of the Water” after the Divine Liturgy and all who want to take Holy Water home after the Service, are asked to bring EMPTY bottles with them, as Fr Justin will be blessing water in a big tub, from which we can fill our own bottle/s. Thank you.

You are warmly invited to our services and to join us for food and fellowship afterwards!

FURTHER UPCOMING DIVINE LITURGIES

February dates yet to be confirmed

OTHER SERVICES

READER’S SERVICE – SATURDAYS

Readers’ Services on Saturdays (when there is no Divine Liturgy) at 10:30 am. All welcome. This is our main service when we do not have a priest, sung by our choir and followed by teas/coffees and parish fellowship. 

 
AKATHISTS – RECORDED AT OUR FORMER PREMISES
Akathist to St John the Forerunner and Baptist
You can find the text here: Akathist to Saint John the Baptist    and you can find a live-stream recorded version from our old premises below.

https://fb.watch/hoKbflD9_l/

Akathist to St John of Shanghai
The text to the Akathist can be found here: Akathist in Honour of St John of Shanghai

and you can find a live streamed version from our old premises (starting after a short delay) of it below: 

https://fb.watch/hoKjFSgxyb/

Akathist for the Departed
You can find the text here:  Akathist for Departed

and you can find a live-streamed version of it from our old premises here:

https://fb.watch/hoKecCGTv0/

 
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A photo from our previous premises in our little wooden church building
 
 
USUAL PREPARATION FOR COMMUNION FOR ORTHODOX CHRISTIANS:
All who would partake of Divine Liturgy Communion are reminded to be sure at least:
  • to fast from midnight (people requiring medication are allowed to make necessary adjustments to this)
  • to be present from the very beginning of the Liturgy
  • to confess is recommended as preparation for Communion, but can be done to a different confessor
  • to read Pre-Communion prayers before attending

Below are some useful links with further pastoral guidance on preparation for Confession, from our fellow ROCOR parish in Cardiff and from the offical website of the ROCOR:

PREPARING FOR CONFESSION

https://www.synod.com/synod/engdocuments/enart_elchaninoffdiscussionconfession.html

AFTER COMMUNION:

At the Divine Liturgy, there will be a table with antidoron (the remaining bread from the preparation for the Eucharist, which has been blessed, but not consecrated) and warm wine diluted with water to one side for taking immediately after Communion. This is a practice within the Russian Tradition to ensure that the Eucharist is being swallowed properly and so surely taken into us. Please partake of the wine and antidoron served at this table after partaking of Communion. It is further good practice to listen attentively to the After Communion Prayers which are chanted in the church at the end of the service. Thank you.

 
SISTER PARISHES:
For those of us who are also interested in attending Services in Stradbally, County Laois in the Republic of Ireland, here is a link (which you may need to translate to English) to the Service page of their website… https://www.st-colman-church.org/
 
We also have another sister parish, The Parish of St Elisabeth the New-Martyr, and it has a wonderful extensive website http://www.newmartyr.info/ and also a warm relationship with our parish thanks to Fr Paul Elliott who has been continually supportive of us in many different ways and was formerly our parish priest.
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Additional online resources:

PARISH OF ST. ELISABETH THE NEW-MARTYR – STREAMED SERVICES via the Church’s fb account

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TALKS FROM ST MICHAEL THE ARCHANGEL’S MONASTERY:

For all with a thirst for entering further into the heart of the Orthodox faith and life there is another ROCOR online  resource offering a wealth of in-depth coverage of numerous aspects of this by means of talks which were previously for sale but have recently become free to listen to and are worth dedicating some time to… https://www.orthodoxtalks.com/about-us/