St. George Ukrainian Orthodox Church
St. George is a parish of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Canada, under the spiritual jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople. Orthodox Christians confess the Nicene Creed, which they call the Symbol of Faith, read the Scriptures within Holy Tradition, and receive the Holy Mysteries, or sacraments, among them Baptism, Chrismation, Confession and Holy Communion. The parish keeps the feasts of the Church by the Julian, or 'old', calendar.
St. George’s was founded in 1943 to serve the Ukrainians of the Grimsby area, many of whom had come for the farmland of the Niagara Peninsula or for wartime factory work in Hamilton and Niagara. The founders bought a first building on Ontario Street, and in 1948 the parish acquired its present church, built by the Methodists in 1865, with a kitchen and Sunday school added in 1897; after church union it had served Trinity United Church as Trinity Hall. Its iconostas, the screen of icons before the altar, was designed by Yurij Kodak and installed in 1953, and the walls were painted in the Ukrainian style by Volodymyr Slipchenko in 1993.
The parish belongs to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Canada and keeps the Julian calendar. Its first full-time priest, from 1948, was Fr. Wasyly Fedak, later Metropolitan Wasyly and primate of the church. Patriarch Mstyslav (Skrypnyk), who as archbishop had celebrated the parish’s first hierarchical Liturgy, died while visiting family in Grimsby in 1993, and the first funeral services for him were held at St. George’s. Fr. Michał Pograniczny served the parish from 1995 until his retirement in 2023; its priest is now Father Vitaliy. A plaque at the church, one of a hundred unveiled across Canada in 2014, commemorates the Ukrainians interned as enemy aliens during the First World War.
The Divine Liturgy is celebrated two or three times a month, on Sundays at ten, in Ukrainian and English. The parish’s schedule for late 2026 lists Liturgies on 15 and 22 November and on 6 and 20 December.
What to expect
Services are conducted in both Ukrainian and English. Orthodox Christians who wish to go to confession can do so before the Divine Liturgy or by appointment with the priest, and the Liturgy is followed by a fellowship luncheon or by coffee and conversation.
About this listing
Sources: stgeorgegrimsby.org, uocc.ca.
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