MOSCOW. Aug 21 (Interfax) – The Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church instituted a holiday to honor Christians who lived on the islands of Great Britain and Ireland and were canonized before the 1054 schism that divided Christendom into the Western Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches.The holiday will be an annual event observed on the third Sunday after Pentecost in the Julian Calendar.
The Synod, which met on Tuesday, also ordered that these saints’ names be included in the Menology after their Christian exploits have been studied.
The Synod’s decision follows an appeal of March 3, 2007, in which the diocese of Sourozh, a Russian Orthodox Church diocese having the islands of Great Britain and Ireland for its territory, asked the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Alexy II, and its Holy Synod to institute a holiday for pre-1054 British and Irish saints.
A tip of my Skoufia to Fr. Joseph for this informaiton.
I love the “Julian Calendar” stipulation – as if Orthodox Churches would pay attention to any other Pentecost (outside of Finland and Estonia, anyway).