It was started in 1913 by a small group of immigrants from Bukovina who, on the feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God in 1918, consecrated the first Orthodox church in Ottawa.

With the blessing of Archbishop Vitaly (Ustinov) of Montreal and Canada, the Protection of the Virgin Mary parish opened in Ottawa on October 21, 1965.

Visiting priest-monks from the St. Job of Pochaev brotherhood in Montreal served at the new church several times a month.

Gregory stayed only one year in Ottawa, he is remembered for his love of the church services and for his care in teaching the young people of the parish reading and singing on kliros.

By the end of the sixties it became clear that the recently purchased house-church was not sufficient for the needs of the community, and a search began for a building to replace it.

In the several months that followed, the interior of this building was completely rebuilt and decorated to make it suitable for Orthodox worship.

For the next eighteen years this church was to be the centre of prayer and fellowship for the Russian Orthodox community in Ottawa.

In the early eighties the parish began exploring the possibility of building a large Russian Orthodox church to house the growing community.

In the same year, a large piece of land was acquired at 89 and 99 Stonehurst Avenue for the construction of the future St. Vladimir’s Russian Seniors’ Residence and Holy Virgin Protection Church.

The newly built memorial church was consecrated on August 6, 1989, by Metropolitan Vitaly, Archbishop Laurus (Škurla) of Holy Trinity Monastery, and Archbishop Paul (Pavlov) of Australia who in the sixties, while still a priest-monk, had travelled from Montreal to serve at the newly organized Protection parish in Ottawa.

In 2013 Archbishop Gabriel (Chemodakov), the ruling bishop of the Canadian Diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia and the rector of the parish assigned Fr.

Former members of the parish include a bishop, a deacon, nuns, choir conductors, and seminarians, serving God in various parts of Canada.

Today the parish is a multi-ethnic community with Orthodox Greeks, Serbs, Bulgarians, Ukrainians, Arabs, Romanians and Canadian converts joining with Russians from all three immigrations and their descendants to worship God.