Diocese: Archdiocese of Canada
Deanery: British Columbia Deanery
Address
7221 198B St
Langley, British Columbia V2Y 1R9
Canada
Website: saintherman.net
Office: 604-588-6166
Parish Contacts
Directions
General Location
The parish is located at the corner of 72 Ave and 198 B St in Langley, BC. Call for more specific directions.
From Highway 1
From Highway 1, take the 200 St. (Langley) exit south to 72nd Ave. Turn right (west) one block to the church.
Schedule of Services
Services are in English and the parish follows the New Calendar.
6:30 PM Vespers and Confession
Saturday Evening
9:30 AM Matins and Church School; 10:00 AM Divine Liturgy, meal and catechumen class following.
Sunday Morning
Feast Days as announced
Mornings of Great Feasts
For a complete list of upcoming services, please visit the parish website.
Parish Background
The present mission parish of St Herman of Alaska, Surrey, BC began in 1976, when a group of parishioners from the predominately Russian Holy Resurrection parish in Vancouver decided to start an English mission in the lower mainland.
These few faithful, led by Dr Edward and Mrs Vivian Hartley, with the bishop’s blessing, began to hold Reader’s services in their private back-yard chapel. Eventually they found a priest to serve them, Fr Stephen Slipko, then of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. So it happened that the English mission was received into the Ukrainian jurisdiction—even though none of its members were Ukrainian and all its services were in English.
The mission was served by a succession of clergy, some resident, some visiting. By 1986, they were again without a priest. After a year of holding Reader’s services in the back-yard chapel, through the arranging of (then bishop-elect) Fr Seraphim (Storheim), they learned that a seminarian of St Tikhon’s, soon to graduate, was interested in coming to Canada to do English mission work. This priest, Fr Lawrence Farley, came to do some services and to visit in May 1987. The parish decided then to “return home” to the OCA so that Fr Lawrence could be assigned by Metropolitan THEODOSIUS (then locum-tenens for the Archdiocese of Canada, until Fr Seraphim could be consecrated ruling bishop).
The parish, now newly-returned to the OCA, continued to hold services in the Hartley’s backyard chapel as Fr Lawrence served the small mission and worked at a full-time secular job to support his wife, Donna, and their two young daughters. The mission grew in size, eventually outgrowing its original cozy chapel. It found rented quarters for a time in an Anglican church in Surrey, then in a disused United Church in Langley. This facility it also rented, pulling out the pews and installing an iconostas.
At length the parish grew enough that Fr Lawrence could resign his secular job to work full-time for the parish. It now consists mostly of young people, students, and young families. Though of course open to Orthodox of all ethnic traditions, it also consists largely of converts. The parish draws from all over the Lower Mainland, many of its flock living an hour’s drive in all directions. They continue to be very zealous in their missionary activity. Four young men, converts from the parish, are pursuing a call to Holy Orders, some having left the parish to take more education in preparion for this goal. As well, a “daughter” mission has been founded in Comox, on Vancouver Island, under the heavenly protection of the Holy Apostle Barnabas, under the leadership of Fr Alexis Nikkel. St. Herman’s also rejoices in the presence of All Saints of Alaska Mission in Victoria, on Vancouver Island, pastored now by Fr. Larry Reinheimer; and St. John of Shanghai Mission in Vancouver, pastored by Fr. Justin Hewlett, also a former parishioner of St. Herman’s.
The parish continues to work very hard at making the riches of Orthdoxy accessible to the residents of the Lower Mainland. It has produced its own Prayer Book, as well as liturgical booklets consisting of their church’s services of Vespers, Matins, Liturgy and Presanctified Liturgy. The Sunday morning sermon is available on podcast.
Fr. Lawrence has written a number of books and commentaries, available from Conciliar Press and SVS Press.
The parish has purchased a new building of its own in Langley and is hoping to expand.
