Archpriest Dmitry Grigorieff
My cathedral was sadden by the falling asleeping of Dean Emeritus Archpriest Dmitry Grigorieff. When I first came to St. Nicholas Cathedral, Fr. Dmitry was the second priest and he served the English Liturgy. Fr. Arkady was the dean and he served the Slavonic Liturgy.
I always saw Fr. Dmitry as a kind man and often as the typical professor. He impressed me with his detailed knowledge of the services. It was he who introduced me to baptismal Liturgy which I think is the ideal way to do a baptism.
When he became dean, one of the first things that he did was to eliminate the separate English Vespers and then Slavonic Matins on Saturday evening and combined them into a modified Vigil in both languages. Things that were repeated at both services were done only once. This worked very well for the parish. Often at the Slavonic Matins there would be just Anne Kalish was faithfully sang all the parts. Now we had the English choir singing Vespers and Matins.
Shortly after I arrived at St. Nicholas, Bishop Dmitri (now Archbishop Dmitri) visited the parish and gave a talk. I happened to be one of the first persons he saw when he arrived. A year earlier I belonged to his cathedral in Dallas.
At the beginning of his talk, he mentioned me and said, "You are not a member of this parish, are you, Michael?" Before I could open my mouth, both Fr. Dmitry and parish warden (president) Henry Sawchak both said, "Yes, he is!"
It was Fr. Dmitry who instituted English language services at St. Nicholas Cathedral. This was very important for many of us. We hear the servicesd in our own language and we have the opportunity to learn the beautiful theology of the Church.
I was very fortunate to be able to serve at his funeral and also to take part in a memorial for Bishop Basil at is grave site. In addition, I had an opportunity to meet new people and to see old friends whom I have not seen for years. Unfortunately I did not have the opportunity to meet the gentleman who came from France just for the funeral.
Another honor was to be serving between the dean of my cathedral and the dean of the Russian Orthodox Cathedral of St. John the Baptist, namely Fr. Victor Potapov. Just five years ago this was unthinkable. Today it is reality. When I asked him how as my Slavonic, he said that it is pretty good and in a few years it will be second nature.
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