The venue of the annual Otpust is the Motherhouse of the Byzantine Sisters of St. Basil the Great, which is the former estate of coal-baron Josiah Van Kirk Thompson. The estate was renamed “Mt. St. Macrina” in honor of the sister of St. Basil the Great, the father of cenobitic monasticism in the Eastern Church and patron of the Basilian Order.
On March 25, 1935, Pope Pius XI issued a decree giving official papal approbation for the Sisters to conduct an annual pilgrimage during the festal period of the Feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God (August 28th according to the Julian Calendar). The Sisters were presented on that date with a special pilgrimage icon – a painted copy of the venerated icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help. Exhorted to spread devotion to the Mother of God under this title, the religious community established the annual tradition of Otpust, honoring Mary as Our Lady of Perpetual Help.
Over the decades, the crowds reached their peek in the mid-1950s. The Venerable Archbishop Fulton Sheen often visited Mt. St. Macrina Byzantine Catholic Monastery in Uniontown, where in 1955 he became the first Latin-rite bishop to offer an English-language Byzantine Liturgy before more than 150,000 pilgrims.
Since the beginning, every Otpust opens with a procession from the Motherhouse to the Shrine Altar. The sisters carry the original icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help, accompanied by crucifers carrying processional crosses adorned with a traditional wreath of flowers and attached ribbons identifying the name and location of each represented parish. The celebration of the Divine Liturgy and the Blessing of Water at the Lourdes Grotto follows the opening procession, invoking God’s blessing on each and every pilgrim that sojourns to the Mount.
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