Ekaterinburg, November 25, 2016
“One of Us”
The Ekaterinburg Diocese is arranging the unique flash mob “One of Us” on Friday evening, directed against abortion. From 6:00 to 8:00 Orthodox faithful will lay out on the Plotinka embankment a ten-meter image of an eight-week-old embryo inside its mother’s womb from 600 lit lampadas, reports the diocesean website.
The embryo will be comparable in size to the height of a three-story building, and the installation, believes the diocese, will be easily seen from the bridge on Lenin Avenue. The art demonstration “One of Us” was thought up by the diocesan Center for the Protection of Motherhood “Cradle” and first held in Ekaterinburg in the spring of 2014.
“We choose life! We kindle the light!—with such a call and spirit, everyone of all ages who wants to, with the help of colored lampadas and an outline of the image on the ground, will create the image of an eight-week-old embryo with the inscription “One of Us” underneath.
"Light a lampada in his memory"
“Each of us, just like all of mankind in the past, present, and future, was the same eight-week-old baby in our mother’s womb,” said the employee of the “Cradle” Center for the Protection of Motherhood of the Social Services Department of the Ekaterinburg Diocese Elena Rusakova. “And we are very lucky that we were born into this world, that we have the possibility to plan our futures, to start our families—just to live! The demonstration ‘One of Us’ is designed to remind us that every child, while still in its mother’s womb really wants to live, and each wants to be born into this world. Unfortunately, our world is very cruel, and how cruel parents are when they rashly decide to deprive themselves of that which is most dear on earth—the happiness of being a mother and father and the smile and laugh of their own child, which cannot be quantified by any money or square meters.”
