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Patriarch Kirill Gundyaev of Moscow and all the Russias took a reliquary with a relic of St Lazarus the Four-Days-Dead from the Church of St Lazarus in Larnaka to Russia so that believers could venerate it. The solemn transfer of the reliquary marked the end of Patriarch Kirill’s official visit to the Republic of Cyprus, which lasted from 8 to 11 June. Orthodox Tradition relates that the Righteous Lazarus, whom Jesus Christ himself called his friend, was resurrected by the God-man on the fourth day after his death. Sometime after the resurrection of Christ, St Lazarus had to flee from Judea because his resurrection scandalised many Jews. He left in a sailboat, and, after a few days, the wind drove the fugitive to the shores of Cyprus. Whilst on Cyprus, St Lazarus met the Apostles Ss Paul and Barnabas, they ordained him Bishop of Kition, an office he held for the rest of his life. For his true faith and holiness, the Cypriots loved the saint very much. After his death, his followers buried the Righteous Lazarus near the ancient city of Kition, which later became Larnaks, which means “a grave or sarcophagus”, which subsequently became Larnaka in modern times.
His Holiness, when he took the reliquary from the hands of the rector of the Church of St Lazarus in Larnaka, spoke of the value that the relic had for believers, saying, “You can give us no greater gift than this. We’ll take these relics of your heavenly patron to the city of Moscow and put them in a place where many people will be able to bow before them. All those who bow before the saint’s relics will know your generosity. The veneration of this holy object will strengthen the love for Cyprus and the Church of Cyprus in the hearts of our people”.
In 898, Roman Emperor Leo VI the Wise transferred the recently-discovered relics of Righteous Lazarus to Constantinople (now Istanbul), where he placed them in a silver reliquary. Relics have miraculous powers; therefore, the Church of St Lazarus attracts thousands of pilgrims come from all over the world. Archbishop Chrysostomos Dimitriou of Nova Justiniana and All Cyprus emphasised, “The fact that we loaned these relics to Patriarch Kirill signifies the special respect that the Local Church of Cyprus has for the Local Church of Russia and its First Hierarch. Today, our hearts overflow with a sense of the sacred and with sincere joy, because your presence here provides an opportunity for our pious and suffering people to receive a blessing from the distinguished First Hierarch of the Church of Russia, an exemplary man adorned with humility, sobriety, and love. With admiration, we watch your many-fold activities. Your deeds embellish the majesty of Orthodoxy, and they reinforce the hope for a better society in the world, relying on the principles of love and equality, based in the acceptance and recognition of the basic human rights inherent in all mankind”.
The history of warm relations between these two Local Churches spans the centuries. Russian pilgrims, travellers, sailors, diplomats, and merchants, en route to the Holy Land and the Levant always made a detour to the island to pay homage to its holy sites, to rest, and to replenish their supplies. Many left behind writings noting their fond memories of this blessed land. More than once, Russian icon-painters came to Cyprus to help decorate local churches. One could see an example of this at the world-famous Holy, Royal, and Stavropegic Monastery of the Mother of God of Kykkos that the Patriarch visited during his visit. At the monastery, His Holiness said, “When I was Metropolitan of Smolensk, I helped with the decoration of the Monastery of Kykkos. In the economically-hard times of the 1990s, I blessed a talented team of Russian painters and gilders from the Diocese of Smolensk to go to Cyprus in order to contribute to the beautification and restoration of this monastery. I haven’t been here until today, but it seems to me that they made the grade, as I see how well they restored the art here, including the iconostas in the church”.
In 1988, the then-First Hierarch of the Local Church of Cyprus, Archbishop Chrysostomos Arsitodemou, took part in the celebration of the Millennium of the Baptism of Russia. Since the early 1990s, many thousands of our compatriots have moved to Cyprus. In 1997, in Limassol, the Russian-speaking community of the city received a small church, where the clergy serve regularly in Church Slavonic. This helped to alleviate the problems in caring for the spiritual needs of Orthodox Russians living in Cyprus. During his current visit, Patriarch Kirill blessed the hillside site of another Russian church and laid its foundation stone. There are four Russian-language schools on the island and many colleges and secondary schools throughout the country offer courses in Russian as a second language.
The reliquary with the relics of St Lazarus will reside at the Stavropegial Convent of the Conception in Moscow {the convent is accessible by Metro: editor}. For its part, the Church of Russia gave a reliquary with the relics of Russian saints, as well as 19 icons painted recently by Russian icon-painters, as a gift to Cypriot churches and monasteries.
12 June 2012
Milena Faustova
Voice of Russia World Service
http://rus.ruvr.ru/2012_06_12/77866426/
Voices from Russia 
Thousands Queue In Russia to See Religious Relic
Tags: Belarus, Belt of the Holy Mother of God, Brest, Byelorussia, Christian, Christian relics, Christianity, Cross of St Andrew, Eastern Orthodox Church, Foundation of St Andrew the First-Called, Greece, holy relics, Kazan Cathedral (St Petersburg), Kazan Icon, Kiev, Kievan Rus, Kirill I of Moscow, Moscow, Moscow Patriarchate, Orthodox, Orthodoxy, Our Lady of Kazan, Patriarch Kirill I, political commentary, politics, Pussy Riot, Relic, Relics, Religion, Religion and Spirituality, Russia, Russian, Russian culture, Russian history, Russian Orthodox Church, Soviet Union, St Andrew, St Petersburg, Ukraine, USSR
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On Saturday, officials said that around 65,000 people queued for hours in St Petersburg to see a religious relic brought from Greece, in the latest sign of the Orthodox Church’s influence in post-Soviet Russia. The Cross of St Andrew… said to be a relic of the X-shaped cross on which Apostle St Andrew the First-Called was crucified… was placed in St Petersburg’s Kazan Cathedral (Cathedral of the Kazan Icon of the Mother of God) on Thursday after arriving from its historic home in Patras in Greece. A representative of the Foundation of St Andrew the First-Called, which helped bring the cross to Russia, told RIA-Novosti that there were some 65,000 visitors in just the first days of its display, and that the numbers are increasing all the time.
The cross came from Greece as part of commemorations of the 1,025th anniversary of the Baptism of the mediaeval Slavic state of Rus. The queue to see the relic snaked all around the cathedral with the faithful having to wait for several hours to venerate the relic. Local officials said that the atmosphere in the queue was cheerful. Tatiana Koroliova, 60, told AFP, “It’s a great event for all Orthodox. I came especially to St Petersburg from my house in the country which is 200 kilometres (125 miles) away”. The excitement recalls the frenzy that surrounded the appearance of the Belt of the Virgin Mary in Russia in 2011… also on loan from Greece… which attracted gigantic queues when it arrived in Moscow.
The communists suppressed the Orthodox Church, but it’s staged an astonishing recovery in post-Soviet Russia to become one of the country’s most powerful institutions. Symbolically, the Cross of St Andrew cross is being shown in the Kazan Cathedral in St Petersburg, which under Communism was a museum of atheism. However, the anti-Kremlin opposition accused the Orthodox Church under its powerful Patriarch Kirill of meddling in politics and instigating the harsh treatment of the Pussy Riot punk group. Two members of the punk collective are serving two-year prison colony terms for performing an anti-Kremlin song inside a Moscow church, in a case that divided Russian society. The relic is due to stay in St Petersburg until Monday, and then be taken to Kiev in the Ukraine, Minsk in Belarus, and to the Russian capital of Moscow before returning to Greece on 2 August.
13 July 2013
AFP
http://www.afpbb.co.kr/html/view.html?ano=21492
Editor’s Note:
The journey of the Cross of St Andrew is so “newsy” that even the Western press agencies are covering it. Take all Western reportage on the Rodina with a block of salt… much of it is nothing but meretricious and lying pro-crapitalist propaganda (especially, mistrust “Orthodox” lickspittles such as Sophia Kishkovsky and Serge Schmemann… they’ve sold out for the proverbial “mess of pottage“). Look at the inclusion of a blurb on Pussy Riot… most Russians don’t give a shit about these zapadniki poseurs… only a small English-speaking minority in Piter and the Centre do… and the clueless Westerners just eat it all up. However, don’t argue with Amerikantsy idiots about it… it’ll do you no good, it’ll just frustrate you to no good end, and it’ll just drive the Fox News propaganda deeper into your interlocutor’s (shallow) mind. Do mind this, though… the worst, most fanatic, and most closed-minded Amerikantsy are found amongst the “Orthodox” konvertsy… fancy that. Have a care…
BMD