Newsletter of St. John’s Greek Orthodox Church
1000 Spruce, Pueblo, CO 81004 PO Box 3011, Pueblo, CO 81005
May God keep everyone well and keep St. John the Baptist Church alive and vibrant for future generations to embrace and enjoy.
July/August 2026
All Sundays: 8:20 Orthros, 9:30 Divine Liturgy
**With the blessing of His Eminence, Metropolitan Constantine, Fr. Stephen will be on vacation July 1 – 17. Fr. Stephan Close will be serving on those 2 Sundays.
7/5 –5th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
7/12 – 6th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
7/19 –Sunday of the Holy Fathers
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
**Fr. Stephen will be filming prison ministry training videos in Louisville, KY, July 29-31.
7/30 – 8th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
August 2026 Tentative Service Schedule
Dormition Fast - August 1-14
Holy Transfiguration on August 6th
Feast of the Dormition on August 15th
8/2 – 9th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
1 Corinthians 3:9-17Matthew 14:22-34
8/6 – (Thursday) Holy Transfiguration
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
8/9 – 10th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
8/15 – (Saturday) Dormition of the Theotokos
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
8/16 – 11th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
8/23 – The 12th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
**With the blessing of His Eminence, Metropolitan Constantine, Fr. Stephen will be in at St. Tikhon’s Seminary for the Orthodox Christian Prison Ministry Board Meeting August 26-29.
8/30 – The 13th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
**With the blessing of His Eminence, Metropolitan Constantine, Fr. Stephen will be on vacation July 1 – 17. Fr. Stephan Close will be serving on those 2 Sundays.
7/5 –5th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
- Galatians 5:22-26; 6:1-2
- Matthew 8:28-34; 9:1
7/12 – 6th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
- Romans 12:6-14
- Matthew 9:1-8
7/19 –Sunday of the Holy Fathers
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
- Titus 3:8-15
- Matthew 5:14-19
**Fr. Stephen will be filming prison ministry training videos in Louisville, KY, July 29-31.
7/30 – 8th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
- Galatians 3:23-29; 4:1-5
- Matthew 14:14-22
August 2026 Tentative Service Schedule
Dormition Fast - August 1-14
Holy Transfiguration on August 6th
Feast of the Dormition on August 15th
8/2 – 9th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
1 Corinthians 3:9-17Matthew 14:22-34
8/6 – (Thursday) Holy Transfiguration
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
- 2 Peter 1:10-19
- Matthew 17:1-9
8/9 – 10th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
- 1 Corinthians 4:9-16
- Matthew 17:14-23
8/15 – (Saturday) Dormition of the Theotokos
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
- Philippians 2:5-11
- Luke 10:38-42; 11:27-28
8/16 – 11th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
- 1 Corinthians 9:2-12
- Matthew 18:23-35
8/23 – The 12th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
- 1 Corinthians 15:1-11
- Matthew 19:16-26
**With the blessing of His Eminence, Metropolitan Constantine, Fr. Stephen will be in at St. Tikhon’s Seminary for the Orthodox Christian Prison Ministry Board Meeting August 26-29.
8/30 – The 13th Sunday of Matthew
Orthros at 8:20 a.m. Divine Liturgy 9:30 a.m.
- 1 Corinthians 16:13-24
- Matthew 21:33-42
Prosforo
July 5 Lynnette, Pam August 3 Chad, Naomi
July 12 Brian, Brian August 6 Pres. Ashley
July 19 Lynnette, Elizabeth August 9 Fran, Rhonda
July 26 Fran, Thalia August 15 Pres. Ashley
August 16 Lynnette, Elizabeth
August 23 Ryan, Chad
August 30 Thalia, Fran
July 5 Lynnette, Pam August 3 Chad, Naomi
July 12 Brian, Brian August 6 Pres. Ashley
July 19 Lynnette, Elizabeth August 9 Fran, Rhonda
July 26 Fran, Thalia August 15 Pres. Ashley
August 16 Lynnette, Elizabeth
August 23 Ryan, Chad
August 30 Thalia, Fran
Our General Assembly meeting will be held on Sunday the 19th of July after coffee hour. We will present the update of all our activities associated with our “expansion plan,” and provide the roadmap of plans going forward. Please plan on attending. The church will cater our lunch that day.
What a time in our lives! I’m sure even the people who do not reside in Pueblo and our immediate area are aware of the fires and all that brings.
Many people are overcome with loss and change. Right now we don’t know what’s gone and what may still be here. It’s time for extra prayer and
consideration for those round us.
Cybercrime has become a part of our lives for some time. Requesting money through the internet has become a very common scam and the church is not immune from this. Metropolitan Constantine has directed that the church remind the faithful that this scam exists, is ongoing, and they will never be asked to donate or transfer any monetary assets by email or text. I have been directed to make this warning a permanent fixture of the Messenger to inform and protect the faithful.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
The following pictures are from the baptism of Thomas Rougas. I couldn’t resist including them. L:Alexander Rougas-Hawkins, Thomas Rougas, Nonie Rougas-Redding. R:Stacie Rougas-Redding, Sam /Alexandra Rougas, Thomas Rougas, Nonie Rougas-Hawkins
What a time in our lives! I’m sure even the people who do not reside in Pueblo and our immediate area are aware of the fires and all that brings.
Many people are overcome with loss and change. Right now we don’t know what’s gone and what may still be here. It’s time for extra prayer and
consideration for those round us.
Cybercrime has become a part of our lives for some time. Requesting money through the internet has become a very common scam and the church is not immune from this. Metropolitan Constantine has directed that the church remind the faithful that this scam exists, is ongoing, and they will never be asked to donate or transfer any monetary assets by email or text. I have been directed to make this warning a permanent fixture of the Messenger to inform and protect the faithful.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
The following pictures are from the baptism of Thomas Rougas. I couldn’t resist including them. L:Alexander Rougas-Hawkins, Thomas Rougas, Nonie Rougas-Redding. R:Stacie Rougas-Redding, Sam /Alexandra Rougas, Thomas Rougas, Nonie Rougas-Hawkins
“‘Erased from history’: A century on from Canada’s anti-Greek riots
Toronto, Canada – The mobs marched down Yonge Street in the heart of what is now Canada’s largest city in August 1918.
Tens of thousands of people, angry over perceived Now, more than a century after “the single largest anti-Greek riot anywhere in the world in history” shook Toronto, experts such as Gallant say the events of that summer should serve as a cautionary tale.
Amid the ongoing, intensified rise in anti-immigrant views and policies around the world, including in Canada, they argue the riot demonstrates just how dangerous unchecked xenophobia can be.
‘Conditions ripe for an explosion’
Toronto was in the throes of a heatwave in early August 1918 as it prepared to host a national congress of the Great War Veterans Association, a group advocating for the needs of soldiers returning to Canada after World War I.
The country paid a heavy price on the battlefields of Europe: Tens of thousands of Canadian soldiers were killed during the war, which ended in November 1918, while more than 172,000 arrived home injured.
Those veterans returned to a lack of support from the Canadian government, which offered inadequate health care and no disability pensions. “They came back to a country that really wasn’t all that welcoming,” says Gallant.
Most Greek immigrants in Canada did not serve in WWI, in part due to fears in government that some might harbor the pro-German views of Greece’s King Constantine I. While it was not official policy to refuse to accept naturalised Greeks into the army, says Gallant, it only happened “very rarely”.
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“I found the enlistment papers of only about 10 who were accepted, because you didn’t know who you were getting.”
At the same time, in Toronto, many returning Canadian veterans lived near a military hospital that was in the same neighborhood that the city’s small-yet-visible Greek community was establishing itself.
In 1918, Greek immigrants made up less than one percent of the population in Toronto, but they owned more than one-third of the city’s cheap eateries and diners.
The perception among members of the city’s veteran community was that Greeks had grown rich while they, the ones who had sacrificed so much in the war, had been left destitute. And the visibility of the Greek community was key, says Gallant.
“Every day, these veterans who ate at those diners … saw these Greeks – young men, very healthy, robust – who managed not to serve. And the Greeks came to epitomize what was called ‘the slacker’,” or the draft dodger, he explains. “The conditions were ripe then for an explosion.”
White City Cafe
That explosion was set off at a Greek-owned restaurant known as the White City Cafe, where a drunk Canadian military veteran had become belligerent and abusive towards staff.
Police were called and Claude Cludernay – the veteran in question – was held overnight in jail. But by the next day, rumors had begun to spread among the veterans in Toronto that Cludernay had been beaten – or even killed – by Greek immigrants.
Hundreds of people massed outside the restaurant and, despite the pleas of owner Paul Letros, who tried to calm the angry crowd, the cafe was attacked. “They yelled, ‘Tonight we get justice,’ and they started throwing bricks through the windows and ransacked the whole place,” said Sandra Gionas, chair of the history committee at the Hellenic Heritage Foundation. “The mob grew throughout the night and, eventually, other Greek restaurants were going to be targeted,” she told Al Jazeera outside the two-story brick building at 433 Yonge Street which previously housed the cafe.
Over the course of the weekend, more than a dozen Greek-owned businesses would be destroyed across Toronto, resulting in tens of thousands of dollars in damages – the equivalent of millions of dollars today. No deaths or serious injuries were reported.
“That is a map with the red dots of all the Greek businesses that were destroyed,” Gionas says, opening a pamphlet that her organization gives out during a walking tour of important sites linked to the riots.
Episode ‘erased from history’
The riots made headlines in Canada, Greece and other countries around the world. “Angry Mob Wrecks Dozen Restaurants,” read one in the Toronto Daily Star on August 3, 1918. “Returned Soldiers Raid Many Greek Restaurants,” the Globe and Mail proclaimed that same day.
A crowd of a thousand returned soldiers and sympathisers broke loose last night,” the Globe’s report reads.
“From six o’clock in the evening until after two o’clock this morning they were absolute masters of all authority, defied the police and the military, and utterly tore to pieces the interiors of a dozen restaurants and stores, leaving wreckage in their path like unto the devastation they saw themselves after their advance in France following a great artillery battle.” But the overriding narrative in 1918 was, by and large, that the Greek community was itself to blame for the violent incident, said Gallant, who has studied local newspaper clippings in the aftermath of the riots.
“Even the mayor [of Toronto] said, ‘Yes, all of the grievances of the soldiers need to be looked at. Yes, the Greeks have not done their fair share for the war’,” he says. “It became blame the victim, the immigrant.”
Public attention also quickly turned to other issues, such as the rise of left-wing labor movements in Canada after the end of WWI, which led to the Winnipeg General Strike of 1919 – the largest in Canadian history.
Meanwhile, a “cone of silence” had fallen over the Greek community in Toronto as families tried to turn the page and rebuild, Gallant says. The goal was assimilation, and gradually, the anti-Greek riots were “erased from history”.
It was not until the early 2000s that more people became aware of what had happened, thanks in part to a book Gallant co-wrote, titled “The 1918 anti-Greek Riot in Toronto”.
In 2009, a documentary about the violent chapter in Canadian history also came out, reaching a wider audience. Gionas says she had never heard about the riots until she saw the documentary on TV.
“I was shocked to find out about them,” she says, describing the story as “largely forgotten” for decades. “I was like, ‘I thought I was a student of Canadian history, how can I not know this’?” she recalls.
By Jillian Kestler-D'Amours
Published On 29 Jun 202629 Jun 2026
Tens of thousands of people, angry over perceived Now, more than a century after “the single largest anti-Greek riot anywhere in the world in history” shook Toronto, experts such as Gallant say the events of that summer should serve as a cautionary tale.
Amid the ongoing, intensified rise in anti-immigrant views and policies around the world, including in Canada, they argue the riot demonstrates just how dangerous unchecked xenophobia can be.
‘Conditions ripe for an explosion’
Toronto was in the throes of a heatwave in early August 1918 as it prepared to host a national congress of the Great War Veterans Association, a group advocating for the needs of soldiers returning to Canada after World War I.
The country paid a heavy price on the battlefields of Europe: Tens of thousands of Canadian soldiers were killed during the war, which ended in November 1918, while more than 172,000 arrived home injured.
Those veterans returned to a lack of support from the Canadian government, which offered inadequate health care and no disability pensions. “They came back to a country that really wasn’t all that welcoming,” says Gallant.
Most Greek immigrants in Canada did not serve in WWI, in part due to fears in government that some might harbor the pro-German views of Greece’s King Constantine I. While it was not official policy to refuse to accept naturalised Greeks into the army, says Gallant, it only happened “very rarely”.
Get instant alerts and updates based on your interests. Be the first to know when big stories happen.
“I found the enlistment papers of only about 10 who were accepted, because you didn’t know who you were getting.”
At the same time, in Toronto, many returning Canadian veterans lived near a military hospital that was in the same neighborhood that the city’s small-yet-visible Greek community was establishing itself.
In 1918, Greek immigrants made up less than one percent of the population in Toronto, but they owned more than one-third of the city’s cheap eateries and diners.
The perception among members of the city’s veteran community was that Greeks had grown rich while they, the ones who had sacrificed so much in the war, had been left destitute. And the visibility of the Greek community was key, says Gallant.
“Every day, these veterans who ate at those diners … saw these Greeks – young men, very healthy, robust – who managed not to serve. And the Greeks came to epitomize what was called ‘the slacker’,” or the draft dodger, he explains. “The conditions were ripe then for an explosion.”
White City Cafe
That explosion was set off at a Greek-owned restaurant known as the White City Cafe, where a drunk Canadian military veteran had become belligerent and abusive towards staff.
Police were called and Claude Cludernay – the veteran in question – was held overnight in jail. But by the next day, rumors had begun to spread among the veterans in Toronto that Cludernay had been beaten – or even killed – by Greek immigrants.
Hundreds of people massed outside the restaurant and, despite the pleas of owner Paul Letros, who tried to calm the angry crowd, the cafe was attacked. “They yelled, ‘Tonight we get justice,’ and they started throwing bricks through the windows and ransacked the whole place,” said Sandra Gionas, chair of the history committee at the Hellenic Heritage Foundation. “The mob grew throughout the night and, eventually, other Greek restaurants were going to be targeted,” she told Al Jazeera outside the two-story brick building at 433 Yonge Street which previously housed the cafe.
Over the course of the weekend, more than a dozen Greek-owned businesses would be destroyed across Toronto, resulting in tens of thousands of dollars in damages – the equivalent of millions of dollars today. No deaths or serious injuries were reported.
“That is a map with the red dots of all the Greek businesses that were destroyed,” Gionas says, opening a pamphlet that her organization gives out during a walking tour of important sites linked to the riots.
Episode ‘erased from history’
The riots made headlines in Canada, Greece and other countries around the world. “Angry Mob Wrecks Dozen Restaurants,” read one in the Toronto Daily Star on August 3, 1918. “Returned Soldiers Raid Many Greek Restaurants,” the Globe and Mail proclaimed that same day.
A crowd of a thousand returned soldiers and sympathisers broke loose last night,” the Globe’s report reads.
“From six o’clock in the evening until after two o’clock this morning they were absolute masters of all authority, defied the police and the military, and utterly tore to pieces the interiors of a dozen restaurants and stores, leaving wreckage in their path like unto the devastation they saw themselves after their advance in France following a great artillery battle.” But the overriding narrative in 1918 was, by and large, that the Greek community was itself to blame for the violent incident, said Gallant, who has studied local newspaper clippings in the aftermath of the riots.
“Even the mayor [of Toronto] said, ‘Yes, all of the grievances of the soldiers need to be looked at. Yes, the Greeks have not done their fair share for the war’,” he says. “It became blame the victim, the immigrant.”
Public attention also quickly turned to other issues, such as the rise of left-wing labor movements in Canada after the end of WWI, which led to the Winnipeg General Strike of 1919 – the largest in Canadian history.
Meanwhile, a “cone of silence” had fallen over the Greek community in Toronto as families tried to turn the page and rebuild, Gallant says. The goal was assimilation, and gradually, the anti-Greek riots were “erased from history”.
It was not until the early 2000s that more people became aware of what had happened, thanks in part to a book Gallant co-wrote, titled “The 1918 anti-Greek Riot in Toronto”.
In 2009, a documentary about the violent chapter in Canadian history also came out, reaching a wider audience. Gionas says she had never heard about the riots until she saw the documentary on TV.
“I was shocked to find out about them,” she says, describing the story as “largely forgotten” for decades. “I was like, ‘I thought I was a student of Canadian history, how can I not know this’?” she recalls.
By Jillian Kestler-D'Amours
Published On 29 Jun 202629 Jun 2026
