Patriarch Kirill Celebrated Divine Liturgy at Holy Transfiguration Cathedral

DNIPROPETROVSK. His Holiness Patriarch Kirill Celebrated Divine Liturgy at Holy Transfiguration Cathedral

According to the schedule of stay of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill in Dnipropetrovsk, on July 25 the Primate of the ROC celebrates the Divine Liturgy at Holy Transfiguration Cathedral of Dnipropetrovsk. The divine service is broadcast online by the First National TV-channel.

Video about the unique church ― the Holy Transfiguration Cathedral ― contemporary o fthe ancient Katerynoslav (modern Dnipropetrovsk) is available at the website of the First National TV.

Holy Transfiguration Cathedral is a main church of Dnipropetrovsk and is in fact it is of the same age. It became the first building, founded by Empress Catherine II in the territory of the new city. According to the plans of Gregory Potemkin, the church’s size ought to correspond global reforms of transformation of New Russia, so he came to look for the original of the church in Rome itself. By its proportions the building should be one arshin higher than St Paul’s Cathedral, and by its draft it should recall the ancient Papal Basilica of St Paul Outside the Walls.

The first project of the cathedral was made by famous French architect Claude Gerois, but it was not put into life. Then Ivan Starov got down to business, who was entrusted to execute the general plan of Katerynoslav’s building up. He suggested building the cathedral according to a different draft. However, the cathedral in Katerynoslav was not completed in Catherine’s age – only the foundation was laid. Only in half a century in 1835 the Holy Transfiguration Cathedral was at last completed. It seems that such long pause became the beginning of many tragic pages in the cathedral’s history…

After 1917 the church was closed and was planned to be exploded, and a monument to the leader of proletariat Volodymyr Ilyich Lenin ought to be installed in its place, but at the initiative of the historical museum director Dmytro Yavornytskyy the cathedral was turned into the Museum of Atheism, and thus the shrine was saved. In the years of the Great Patriotic War with permission of the German authorities the divine services were temporarily restored in the cathedral, but it was only a moment of quietude as compared to the post-war vandalism.

Real revival began in the 90-ies of the 20th century, Now in the territory of the cathedral there is a place of burial of the diocesan bishops and priests. Not far from the central gates in the communal grave those deceased in the Great Patriotic War rest. In the church there are pieces of relics of the venerable fathers of the Kyiv Caves Monastery: one can pray here at the relics of the Venerable Elders of Optina, Holy Great Martyrs Catherine and Barbara, the Venerable Sergius of Radonezh and Seraphim of Sarov. Now at the Cathedral of Transfiguration the Divine services are performed every day. Shadow of the past retreated with confession and communion of the first parishioners.

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