Rating: 8,3|Votes: 43
Having come to know the inconstancy of earthly happiness through the death of her beloved husband, Xenia strove toward God with all her heart, and sought protection and comfort only in Him. Earthly, transitory goods ceased to have any value for her. Xenia had a house; but gave it over to an acquaintance under the condition that it be used to shelter paupers. But Xenia herself, not having a refuge, would wander among the paupers of Petersburg. At night she would go out to a field, where she spent the time in ardent prayer.
Anton Pospelov, Abbess Moisseia (Bubnova)
Rating: 5,5|Votes: 2
I ended up in the Holy Land almost by accident. But of course nothing happens by accident in this world. In 1974, I wished to travel to Russia, but I was refused a visa. Our batiushka, Fr. Dimitry Khvostoff, was in the process of organizing a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and his daughter invited me to go, to be Fr. Dimitry’s helper. I agreed. I did not think that I would once again come to the Holy Land and stay for good, that the Holy Land was to be my home. Everything here was so sacred, so remote, so lofty! I fell in love with the Holy Land from the very first day.
Maria Degtyarova, Natalia Degtyarova
Rating: 10|Votes: 6
It is hard to imagine now how it could have been then. In the protocol of the interrogation of one witness in the case of a priest is written: “There is information that all the clergy in Perm have been arrested and there are no [church] services anywhere…” In 2012 the legal “statute of limitations” of 75 years ran out, and researchers were given access to the investigation archives from 1937, including those of the Perm state archives of recent history. There was a year of familiarization with the archives: searches, systematization and processing of materials, making contact with the fate of people swept away by the wave of the “Great Terror”.
Olga Rozhneva
It’s cold. Thorny flakes of snow strike his face amidst the swirling snowstorm. Where is the earth, where the sky? Nothing but whiteness and indifference, nothing but loneliness and anguish, just like the life of Slavka, otherwise known as “the Czech”. He has nowhere to go; no one is waiting for him, anywhere. Why is he living? Why was he born? He tries to forget, raising his head to the empty sky to forget all that is bitter and wearying, to spill out his pain.
Metropolitan Laurus (Skurla)
Rating: 10|Votes: 5
Dear brethren and sisters, today we are gathered here to glorify in prayer the great feast of Theophany. This Sunday, in the liturgical language of the Church, is called the Sunday after the Enlightenment. Some of us probably know that in antiquity, and even today in the liturgical books, the feast of the Theophany of the Lord is referred to as the Day of the Enlightenment.
