At midnight on January 19, the feast of the Holy Theophany of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the Great Blessing of Waters was served on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean by the spiritual father of the St. John of Kronstadt Mercy House in Brooklyn, NY, Priest Maksim Pliskov.
At the conclusion of the service, many braved the cold temperatures as well as the freezing ocean water and took part in the long-standing tradition of plunging into the sanctified waters.