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 Reverend Petka, named also Paraskeva, lived in the eleventh century. Her parents were Bulgarian wealthy landowners. They lived in the town of Epivates, in Thrace, on the Sea of Marmara, between Silivria and Constantinople.   Legend says that when she was a child, Petka heard in church the Lord’s words: “Whoever wants to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.” They made her very excited, and she gave her rich clothes away to the poor. Her parents didn't support her decision to follow an ascetic and religious life, but she explained to them that that’s the only way she could live. After they passed away, Petka completely separated herself from the world. She gave away her inherited possessions to the poor and visited all of the holy places.  

Her voyages took her to Jerusalem and the Holy Land, she wished to kneel in front of God’s tomb and spend the rest of her life there and she settled in a convent in the Jordanian desert. Here Petka endured extreme heat and cold weather. She ate grass only once a day – after sunset. An evil spirit tempted her into dreams and apparitions, but she had the Lord as her refuge. That is how she spent her life till old age. One time, as she stood in prayer, an Angel appeared to her and said, "Leave the wilderness and return to your homeland. There you must leave your body on the Earth and give your soul to the Lord." She was pleased that the time to part with her body and let her soul go to Heaven was near. She went back and lived as a stranger in a constant prayer at the church of the Holy Apostles. Two years later while praying the Lord came and took her soul. She was buried as a stranger outside the village.  

Many years later not far from the place where the Reverend was buried, a sailor died. His body was dumped near the place where the drifter was living. The stench of the decaying corpse was so strong that he was forced to ask the nearby inhabitants to bury the body of the unfortunate man. Pious people began digging a tomb and found in the ground the body of the Blessed Petka, preserved and not decomposed. People were frightened, because they had never seen anything like that before and they buried the sailor’s corpse with it. The same night, one of those people named Georgi dreamed of a virgin, encircled by light, clothed in royal attire and surrounded by soldiers. One of the soldiers told Georgi, "Why have you detested the body of the reverend Paraskeva? Take the dead sailor out of her grave and lay him in a coffin. The Lord God wants to glorify her on this earth." Then the Virgin herself told the troubled Georgi: "Hurry and take out my relics. I can't stand the stench. My homeland is Epivates, where you live." The next day, the tomb was excavated. The preserved body of Saint Petka was removed and transferred to the church of “The Holy Apostles.”  Many miracles happened in front of the holy relics: blind could see, crippled could walk, incurable diseases were healed. 

In 1238 the Bulgarian tsar Ivan Asen ordered the relics to be transferred to the capital Turnovo. Solemnly greeted by the Tsar and the Bulgarian Patriarch Vasily, the relics were placed in the newly built for them church "The Reverend Petka". 

From 1393 to 1641 the relics of the Reverend Petka was transferred to three different countries to save them from the Turks. From 1641 to present day, they are resting in the city of Iash, Romania and deeply revered by the Romanian people.   The memory of Saint Petka  has been exalted not only in Bulgaria, but also in Greece, Serbia and Romania. In the twelfth century Deacon Vasily wrote a biography of the Blessed. The Deacon’s work inspired Patriarch Turnovski two hundred years later to wrote also a biography of Saint Petka.  

Life of the Reverend Petka Bulgarska

Short biography of our church father

My name is Dimitar Dimitrov and I was born in Sofia. I am married and have two girls.

I was ordained a priest by His Eminence John, current Metropolitan of Varna and Veliki Preslav in 2013. I completed a two-year course at the Sofia Theological Seminary in 1993. Then in 1998 I graduated with a master's degree in theology from the Faculty of Theology at Sofia University "St. Kliment Ohridski".

I was a priest in Radomir and took care of another 9 parishes and the "Sveti Duh" monastery.

I arrived in Florida with my family after winning a green card. With the blessing of His Eminence Joseph - Metropolitan of the USA, Canada and Australia in 2019. I started serving in Saint Petka Church in Saint Petersburg.

Here I found many believers who, with enormous voluntary work and generous donations, had turned an old Baptist prayer house into a beautiful Orthodox church!

We had to make changes in the church so that everything in it could be according to church canons. Namely, we took down the normal height altar, which was otherwise 6 steps high.

With the help of donors, we built a solid and massive King's throne in the altar, on which there are Holy relics, and this allows the Divine Holy Liturgy to be celebrated in the temple in place of the old wooden one.

The ministries here are no different from the ministries in Bulgaria. With God's help, every Sunday and on all church holidays we enjoy Divine Service and our church has never remained empty.

I do not lose hope, I believe as I believe in our God Jesus Christ, that more and more young people will come in the future so that we can preserve the Bulgarian faith and Bulgarian tradition.