Bolivar, Pennsylvania, July 19, 2024
Photo: Fr. John Rassem El Massih
The relics of the great saint of America, Holy Hierarch Raphael (Hawaweeny) of Brooklyn, have been exhumed for the veneration of the faithful.
St. Raphael (†1915) was the first Orthodox bishop consecrated in America, where he faithfully served the mission of the Russian Orthodox Church under St. Tikhon, the future Patriarch of Moscow, together with a number of other saints.
Photo: Fr. John Rassem El Massih
Since 1988, his remains have been interred at the Antiochian Village in Bolivar, Pennsylvania. He was glorified by the Orthodox Church in America in 2000.
And yesterday, July 18, his relics were exhumed at the Antiochian Village, and it was announced that the date would henceforth serve as the feast of the translation of his relics, reports Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick.
Photo: Fr. John Rassem El Massih
“There are hundreds of people here (mostly kids from the camp!), gathered around with love and respect, as many clergy are working slowly in the grave, carefully bringing out each part of the relics. It’s an amazing, historic, blessed, mystical moment,” Fr. Andrew writes.
Byzantine chant instructor George Zain posted a short video from the historic day:
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St. Raphael was born in Beirut in 1860. He was educated at the Damascus Patriarchal School, the leading Orthodox institution in the Levant, at the Patriarchal Halki Seminary in Constantinople, and at the Theological Academy in Kiev. He later served as rector of the Antiochian representation church in Moscow and taught at the Theological Academy of Kazan.
He was sent to New York City in by Tsar Nicholas II in 1895 and in 1904 became the first Orthodox bishop to be consecrated in North America. His consecration was celebrated by St. Tikhon, the head of the Church in America at that time.
During the course of his ministry as a bishop of the Russian Church in America, St. Raphael founded the St. Nicholas Cathedral in New York and 29 other parishes, and assisted in the founding of St. Tikhon’s Monastery in Pennsylvania, where his glorification was celebrated in 2000, with the participation of hierarchs of the Antiochian Archdiocese, the Greek Archdiocese of America, and the Church of Poland.
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