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About 80 years ago, a devout woman took her son by the hand and set out before daybreak on a 15-mile pilgrimage from their home in Jermyn to St. Tikhon’s Monastery in South Canaan.
“I was a very young boy, 8 or 9 years old, and we walked through the woods and on the highway,” said Archpriest Vladimir Petorak, 89, recalling the journey from Lackawanna into Wayne County for a Memorial Day service. “We started out at 4 in the morning.”
His three older brothers and three older sisters didn’t come along; it was only Mrs. Petorak’s youngest child who accompanied her, listening to the prayers and the music, watching his mother “buy a candle for $1.”
In addition to the candle his mother left burning at the monastery, something else may have been kindled that day — in the little boy, who grew up and followed a calling to become an Orthodox priest. He would baptize the babies, counsel the doubtful and, in the early 1970s, oversee the reconstruction of Holy Resurrection Orthodox Cathedral on North Main Street in Wilkes-Barre.
The best part of his vocation, Father Vladimir said, has been “participating in the sacrament of Holy Communion,” which he still does as concelebrant during Divine Liturgy with Father Gregory White, the current church pastor.
In recognition of his 65 years in the ministry, Father Vladimir will receive a mitre, awarded by Archbishop Mark, Bishop of Philadelphia and the Diocese of Eastern Pennsylvania, Orthodox Church in America, during the 9 a.m. Sept. 1 Divine Liturgy at Holy Resurrection Orthodox Cathedral, where Father Vladimir served 22 years before his retirement.
“It’s a very high honor,” said Father Gregory, explaining that the mitre is a kind of turban, made of fabric, and similar to the clothing the Bible describes as being worn by Moses’ brother Aaron and his sons to show that they were priests, including “a breastpiece, an ephod (sleeveless garment), a robe, a woven tunic, a turban and a sash.”
“It goes all the way back to the book of Exodus,” he said.
“In the case of Archpriest Vladimir, he will be known from this day on as Mitred Archpriest Vladimir for his many years of service to the church,” Father Gregory noted.
The traditional ceremony will include a point at which the congregation exclaims “Axios! Axios! Axios!,” which means, “He is worthy” in Greek.
Despite the accolades, Father Vladimir is a humble man who is spending some of his retirement working in a local restaurant owned by one of his daughters, as well as harvesting tomatoes, broccoli and lettuce on a farm one of his grandsons runs.
He and his wife, Matushka Elizabeth Petorak, live in the Beaumont area, in Wyoming County. The couple married in 1953 and Father Vladimir was ordained in 1954.
“If I had my life to live over, I wouldn’t change a thing,” Matushka Elizabeth said, smiling at her husband.
Two of the highlights of Father Vladimir’s life include a trip to Russia and a trip to Israel, both during the 1980s.
Russia was still under Communist rule, he remembered, and “people wouldn’t talk to us; they were so fearful.” Nevertheless, he visited Orthodox churches that he recalls as crowded.
In Israel he visited such places as the room that is said to be the scene of Jesus’ last supper with his disciples. “Words can’t describe it,” he said. “It was mystical.”
