The origins of our church lie in two local parishes. One is Holy Trinity Bukowinian Orthodox Cathedral, Ottawa’s first Orthodox church, which was founded at the beginning of World War I by Ukrainian immigrants from the Bukovyna region of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Initially located on Gladstone Avenue, Holy Trinity moved in 1968 to what is now the heart of Ottawa’s Chinatown. The other parish, Christ the Saviour Orthodox Church, was founded in the early 1980s by our present pastor. This church, which formerly worshipped in rented space in the Westboro area, grew from a mere handful of faithful into a flourishing parish over some twenty years. When the two communities merged in 2003, Christ the Saviour moved to the Holy Trinity building and lent its name to the combined parish. Our church now continues the legacy of Ottawa’s oldest Orthodox parish while maintaining the vibrant missionary spirit of the younger one.

Christ the Saviour Church is under the spiritual protection of His Eminence, Metropolitan GREGORY of Nyssa (Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople). The parish worships primarily in English, using some modern Ukrainian, Old Church Slavonic, French, and Romanian as well. Christ the Saviour has members of many cultural backgrounds; some grew up Orthodox, while others chose to become Orthodox Christians as adults.