St. Sophia Orthodox Church, Victoria, BC, Canada

Our mosaicked St. Sophia (Holy Wisdom) Icon-Not-Made-by-Hands Name-Sake, as seen at the front of the church’s roof apex.
In the late 1970’s, as there was no permanent Orthodox Church yet in Victoria BC, people would occasionally travel by ferry to attend an Orthodox Church in Vancouver, BC.
During these travels, many met and became acquainted with Prince Nikita Galitzine ☦️ and his English wife, Princess Eve ☦️, who also journeyed from Victoria to Vancouver, to attend Holy Trinity Russian Orthodox Church Abroad. The church’s priest was the Very Reverend Archpriest Father Vladimir Chekanovsky ☦️ , who warmly welcomed the growing Victoria contingent to their new “home parish”. As the church services were in Church Slavonic, Canadian non-Orthodox visitors naturally gravitated to Prince Nikita, or Princess Eve (herself a British convert), to ask questions regarding the services and about the Orthodox Faith, as there was very limited material to read in English then.
The faithful would travel when they could to Vancouver on Sundays and Feast Days, and Father Vladimir eventually blessed us to have Reader’s Services at certain homes when people were unable to go to Vancouver. During the next four years, many Victorians were eventually baptized and/or married in the Church at Holy Trinity in Vancouver.
In 1985, during a visit to Holy Trinity in Vancouver, Archbishop Vitaly of Canada (who later became the Metropolitan and First Hierarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad), personally chose a parishioner from the Victoria congregation to begin the training of becoming our priest (now the reposed Archpriest John Adams Mon. Aug. 12, 2024 ☦️).
Metropolitan Vitaly ☦️ and Princess Eve Galitzine ☦️ , Vancouver BC, Canada
Princess Eve, a gifted and experienced church iconographer herself, began teaching a few Victoria parishioners the Byzantine art of painting icons. This in time, flourished into adorning the present day building church you see now, with icons and mosaics, another ancient tradition.
St. Sophia was officially incorporated as a parish in 1986. While parishioners continued to visit Vancouver for services, the elderly Archpriest Vladimir also occasionally travelled to Victoria, to celebrate Divine Liturgy at various homes. While his health permitted, Father Vladimir would come to baptize babies and elderly converts who were unable to travel to Vancouver.
After many years of training and serving in Vancouver BC, on September 1st, 1991, the Reverend Father John Adams ☦️ was ordained to the priesthood and rector of St. Sophia’s.
During the next ten years, Father John and his wife, matushka Alexandra, opened their own home as a mission church, for services and all the Feast days.
Metropolitan Vitaly and Archpriest Vladimir insisted all our services to be in the native English language of our land… and upon hearing the Divine Liturgy for the first time in English, Russian Prince Nikita Galitzine joyfully commented on how amazed he was to be able to literally follow and understand the whole Liturgy exactly, word for word!
In 1999, and God’s time, our parish’s founders, Prince and Princess Galitzine (both now of Eternal Memory ☦️ ), secured the purchase of this church building for the parish, which by God’s Grace, we have today.
For nearly seven more years (and numerous parishioner fundraisers), during the upstairs renovations to bring the church up to the strict city building codes, the weekly and festal services were held in the basement chapel of the church building.
Archpriest John blessing the church and parishioners during procession May 22, 2019
In late 2006, it was with great joy that the parish officially moved upstairs into the church-proper and are continuing to adorn the church in a manner befitting the glory of God.
The little basement chapel became the parish mosaics studio.
Our priest Father Philosoph delivering a beautiful homily at Archpriest John’s funeral. (Fri. Aug. 16, 2024)
St. Sophia Dome: “Behold our God in Whom we hope and rejoice in our salvation, that He may grant rest to this House.” – Isaiah 25