Moscow, October 6, 2014
Over the two month since it was opened, more than 7,000 people attended the exhibition in memory of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia, organized by St. Tikhon’s University in the winter of 2012/2013 at the Museum of the Contemporary Russian History. The unique exhibits were collected in various corners of the former Soviet Union, and included the saints’ personal things; various documents reflecting the government’s theomachic policy and the Church’s reaction to it; and items used in the underground liturgical life the existed in labor camps.
The exhibition’s interactive design has shown its visitors the results of 20 years of serious research conducted by St. Tikhon’s University researchers in the field of modern Church history, but, most importantly, it has made it possible for contemporary Christians to understand the significance of the new martyrs’ suffering.
The virtual tour’s launch is timed to coincide with the approaching completion of restoration work in the Moscow diocesan house on Likhov Lane, a symbolic place for the history of the Russian Orthodox Church in the 20th-century. It was here where Patriarchy was restored on October 28 (November 10), 1917, at the All-Russian Local Council. Hundreds of the Council’s delegates afterwards suffered for Christ, about 50 of them later canonized and included in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia.
The Moscow diocesan house, returned to the Church and handed over to the St. Tikhon’s University in ruins, with the blessing and support of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia will after its renovation next year become the main building of the St. Tikhon’s University, and, in accordance with its mission, will continue to contribute to public education.
