Uniontown church to celebrate heritage
The 22nd annual Carpatho-Rusyn Celebration will take place from noon to 7 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 26, at St. John the Baptist Byzantine Catholic Church Social Hall, 201 E. Main St., Uniontown. The day will feature the heritage of the Carpatho-Rusyns who come from the very heart of Europe, along the northern and southern slopes of the Carpathian Mountains. Their homeland, known as “Carpathian-Rus,” is situated at the crossroads where the borders of Slovakia, Ukraine and Poland meet.
It is immigrants from Carpathian-Rus’ who came to the United States in the early 1900s, settled in this area and started several churches, including St. John the Baptist Byzantine Catholic Church.
The Carpatho-Rusyns, though a Slavic group, have distinct differences in language, customs, music, dance, folk crafts and foods. These immigrants brought their traditions with them and maintained them, particularly those in their church life, which was of utmost importance to them.
The day will highlight various aspects of Carpatho-Rusyn culture. Mouth-watering foods such as pirohi, holubki, halushki, kolbasi and sauerkraut, nalesniki (potato pancakes), soups and much more will be offered. There will also be baked goods including kolachy (apricot, nut, poppyseed and cottage cheese rolls), pagach, breads and more.
The event will be a blending of spiritual and cultural traditions of the Rusyn people. A Divine Liturgy will take place at 5:30 p.m. Saturday. It will include a blessing for the event and festival workers. There will be a Divine Liturgy at 9 a.m. Sunday in English. The 11:15 a.m. Divine Liturgy will be sung in Church Slavonic, the responses being sung by the Singing Revilak Family from Slovakia, with the Rev. Thomas J. Wesdock as celebrant. There will be on-going entertainment, which includes music, folk dancing and singing, demonstrations, videos, displays and presentations. The Singing Revilak family will perform at 2 and 5 p.m. Slavjane Folk Ensemble dancers and musicians from Holy Ghost Byzantine Catholic Church in McKees Rocks will perform at 3:30 p.m.
Various topics such as Carpatho-Rusyn family customs – both secular and religious, genealogy and tracing cultural roots and recent trips to the Carpathian homeland will be presented. At 2:30 p.m. John Righetti, a Monesson native and Carpatho-Rusyn Society president, will explain who the Rusyns are and discuss Rusyn customs. At 4:30 p.m., Dean Polka, the society’s vice president, will speak about the life of the Rev. Alaksandr Duchnovyc, the national awakener of Rusyns.
Once again, there will be the fu- filled children’s activities room where children can experience the Rusyn culture through storytelling and making folk crafts such as pysanky, icon, bookmarks, crosses, decorated coolies, coloring sheets and more.
There will also be demonstrations of pysanky (egg decorating), folk embroidery and woodburning, which are traditional fold crafts of the Carpatho-Rusyn heritage. Also on display will be a burial shroud (Plascanitsja), which is used in a procession on the feast of Dormition. This religious work of art was made in the Ukraine by the Didyk Family and was purchased by St. John’s Church for use as part of an American tradition that is now being promoted in American Byzantine Catholic Churches. A display will also depict the span of 21 years of the Carpatho-Rusyn Celebration at St. John’s.
Tables of crafts for sale will include contemporary crafts, as well as traditional Carpatho-Rusyn folk crafts.
The folk crafts of the Rusyns include pysanky (decorated eggs), embroideries such as those used to cover Easter baskets to be blessed, woodburned icon ornaments, greeting cards and other articles. The many raffle items include a queen-size folk embroidered/appliqu?d quilt made by St. John’s Ethic Craft Club.
There is no admission charge. The administrator is the Rev. Thomas J. Wesdock. For information, call 724-438-6027 Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. or 724-438-8412 in the evenings.