Sitka, Alaska, March 6, 2026
OCA Diocese of Sitka and Alaska
In a video published by the OCA’s Diocese of Sitka and Alaska yesterday, His Eminence Archbishop Alexei of Alaska reflected on the theological significance of holy relics in Orthodox Christian worship.
He explains that the placement of relics in every Orthodox altar isn’t a matter of convenience but a mystery of worship. Every Orthodox altar is consecrated with holy relics placed by the bishop into the holy table, which is then anointed with Chrism and sealed with fragrant spices and wax mastic—becoming at once a tomb, a cross, and a throne.
The antimension—the sacred cloth required for the celebration of the Divine Liturgy—also contains relics and carries the same witness.
The church, he said, is built not on stone alone but on the bones and prayers of the saints, and when the faithful celebrate the Liturgy they’re never alone, surrounded by the saints who stand invisibly at their side. The bones of the martyrs, His Eminence notes, were never regarded as lifeless remains but as altars blazing silently with the resurrected life.
Abp. Alexei points to the liturgical calendar’s many feasts connected with relics as living proclamations that death has been trampled down, and observes that even in the smallest parish a single fragment of bone becomes the spiritual heart of the community.
He concludes by encouraging the faithful to pause before the holy table, remember the saint whose relics rest beneath it, venerate relics as a greeting rather than a farewell, and teach their children to regard the saints as beloved members of the family rather than distant figures.
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