Burbank Leader , CA
LATimes.com
Jan 5 2005

Kids assume giving role

By Rosette Gonzales, The Leader

Cancer patients at City of Hope will celebrate Armenian Christmas in
a matter of speaking this Thursday thanks to the domestic talents of
members of St. Peter Armenian Church Youth Ministries Center.

Congregation members knitted, sewed and crocheted more than 30
blankets to give to cancer patients as a gesture of love, said Father
Vazken Movsesian of St. Peter Armenian Church Youth Ministries
Center.

The blanket project is part of the church’s youth ministry, “In His
Shoes,” and is unique to the parish because the congregation is
extending holiday charity beyond the Armenian community, Movsesian
said.

“God asks us to give to others,” Movsesian said. “That’s why we at
St. Peter’s have decided to make this Christmas a little different to
really reach out to the local community”

Although the new year means the end of the holidays for many,
Christmas is still a day away for most Armenians.

The Armenian Christmas, as it is conventionally referred, is observed
Jan. 6.

But before Constantine moved the date to Dec. 25 in the 4th century,
all Christians commemorated the birth of Christ, the visit of the
Magi and Christ’s baptism at the River Jordan on Jan. 6, Movsesian
said. Local Armenian churches will have services starting today.

St. Mary’s Armenian Apostolic Church will have mass at 4 p.m. today
and at 9:30 and 10:30 a.m. Thursday, led by Archbishop Moushegh
Mardirossian, Prelate of the Western United States.

The Primate’s Annual Christmas Reception will take place from 4 to 8
p.m. at the Armenian Church of the Western Diocese in Burbank.
Archbishop Hovnan Derderian, Primate of the Western Diocese of the
Armenian Church, will lead the year’s 90th anniversary commemoration
of the Armenian Genocide.