DC’s St. Nicholas Cathedral Keeps Memory of Veterans Alive
Saint Nicholas Cathedral here invites all Orthodox parishes in the US to add the names, ranks, and photographs of their US military veterans to the newly established Orthodox Veterans Memorial Webpage, an expression of the cathedral’s ongoing commitment to pray for departed Orthodox Christians.
“Our chaplains serve Orthodox of all jurisdictions and as such our War Memorial will honor all Orthodox whose names have been submitted to be honored,” wrote his Beatitude, Metropolitan Jonah, in a letter to the faithful and friends of the cathedral. “We must never forget their sacrifice and those who came before who have, as Abraham Lincoln so eloquently stated in his Gettysburg Address, ‘given their last full measure of devotion.’”
The Orthodox Church has a longstanding tradition of dedicating churches to the memory of Orthodox Christians who have fought and died in defense of Church and country. The Church of Saint Hilaire-le-Grand near Mourmelon, France, commemorates Orthodox veterans of World War I; the Churches of Saint Nicholas in Shanghai and Saint Job in Brussels commemorate Tsar Nicholas II, his family, and all victims of the Bolsheviks; and the Churches of Saint Nicholas, Saint Ioannis, and Saint Spyridon in Australia were built to commemorate the Orthodox fallen of World Wars I and II.
Saint Nicholas Cathedral was built in the early 1960s as the National War Memorial Shrine of what is now the Orthodox Church in America, after a decade-long fundraising effort blessed by the Synod of Bishops in 1949. The cathedral was dedicated in 1963 to the memory of Orthodox Christians who died fighting for freedom in the Russian Revolution, World Wars I and II, and the Korean War.
Based on the 12th-century Church of Saint Dmitri in Vladimir, Russia, the cathedral is topped by a helmet-shaped dome symbolic of military service. A bronze dedicatory tablet hangs at the cathedral’s entrance, while a book containing the names of the fallen, collected from parishes across the nation, is kept in the altar. Each year, on the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend, these names are read aloud during the Divine Liturgy.
To its mission of remembering the Orthodox fallen, the cathedral recently added a commitment to remembering the sacrifices of all Orthodox veterans who have served this country to this day. As a first step, the cathedral’s new Veterans Memorial webpage has initiated a list of Orthodox veterans by jurisdiction and parish. On-line visitors can find the web page by clicking the tab labeled “Veterans” on the navigation section of the cathedral’s web site at www.stnicholasdc.org.
New names and photographs will be added as they are received. Additions to the webpage should be submitted by e-mail to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Please include the word “VETERANS” in the subject line of all e-mails. Names should be submitted in the following format:
Jurisdiction, Name of Home Parish, Location of Home Parish
(e.g., GOARCH, Hagia Sophia Cathedral, Washington, DC)
Full Name of Veteran, Rank, Branch of Service, Years of Service, Wartime Service, Awards for Valor, Active/Retired/Deceased/KIA/MIA.
(e.g., Pappas, George J., COL, US Army, 1948-1978, Korea, Vietnam, Silver Star, Retired.)
Please address all hardcopy correspondence concerning the Veterans Memorial to the Veterans Memorial Coordinator, Saint Nicholas Cathedral, 3500 Massachusetts Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20007