History & Parish Life

Our Parish

Protection of the Holy Virgin Church (Покров Пресвятой Богородицы) is an Orthodox Christian parish in Palo Alto, California, belonging to the Western American Diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia (ROCOR). We are under the omophorion of Archbishop Kyrill of San Francisco and Western America, within the San Francisco Deanery.

Our services are celebrated in both Church Slavonic and English, welcoming parishioners of all backgrounds who seek the fullness of Orthodox worship in the ancient tradition.

The Consecration: St. John of Shanghai and San Francisco

In 1965, just one year before his blessed repose, St. John (Maximovitch), Archbishop of Shanghai and San Francisco, came to Palo Alto to consecrate our church — personally laying the foundation stone and consecrating the Holy Table. The construction of our parish was blessed by this great wonder-worker of God.

This moment was captured on video. A 1965 recording preserves St. John during the laying of the foundation stone and the consecration of the Holy Table of our temple. It is a remarkable primary source — footage of a now-glorified saint consecrating our church, just one year before his repose. The recording is available via the «Homilies of Fr. Seraphim Rose» podcast on Spotify.

Among the greatest miracles of St. John was the building of Orthodox cathedrals among the Russian émigré community — a people who had fled persecution with little material means, yet who raised houses of worship that became the pride of their cities. The Palo Alto church fits squarely in that story: a building raised by exiles, blessed by a saint, and still serving the faithful today.

St. John was glorified by the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia in 1994. He is venerated as a wonderworker and protector of the Russian diaspora. That our church bears the direct blessing of his consecration is a treasure beyond measure.

Clergy

Current Clergy

Previous Clergy

A Silicon Valley Story: The AMPEX Connection

Our parish has a remarkable and little-known connection to the birth of Silicon Valley technology. The church was built with significant support from employees of AMPEX Corporation, the pioneering electronics firm headquartered in nearby Redwood City.

AMPEX was founded by Alexander Matveyevich Poniatoff (Александр Матвеевич Понятов), a Russian émigré engineer who fled the Bolshevik revolution and eventually made his way to California. The company's name — AMPEX — derives from his own initials (A.M.P.) combined with "EX" for excellence. Under his leadership, AMPEX achieved one of the most consequential technological breakthroughs of the twentieth century: the invention of the helical-scan (oblique-track) magnetic recording principle, and the creation of the world's first practical video recorder.

Poniatoff, like many Russian émigrés of his generation, maintained ties to the Orthodox Church throughout his life. When he died in 1980, his funeral service was performed at this very church by Fr. Vladimir Derugin — a final act of communion between a man who helped shape American technology and the parish community he had helped sustain.

This connection between our small parish and one of the most transformative companies in the history of electronics is a quiet but moving thread in the larger story of Russian-American history — and of faith persisting through displacement, ingenuity, and devotion.