Metropolitan Valentine of Suzdal reposed

[Priest Siluan]

Pictures from Funeral and Burial of Met. Valentine in Suzdal.

http://www.portal-credo.ru/site/?act=ne ... &topic=779

[Despotovac]

Вечная память Владыке митрополиту Валентину!
Memory Eternal!

[Priest Siluan]

Burial of Metropolitan Valentine and Election of New First Hierarch

The election of a new First Hierarch for the Russian Orthodox Autonomous Church (ROAC) took place on the day after the burial of Metropolitan Valentine.

Archbishop Theodore (Gineevsky) was elected the First Hierarch of ROAC at a meeting of the Synod of Bishops on January 23, 2012, at the Synodal house in Suzdal, a correspondent of Portal-Credo.Ru reports. He will be elevated to the rank of Metropolitan on May 7. Bishop Irinarkh (Nonchin) of Tula and Bryansk was named chancellor of the Synod of Bishops (a position previously held by Archbishop Theodore). The meeting of the Synod of Bishops took place the day after the burial of the late First Hierarch, Metropolitan Valentine.

The burial of Metropolitan Valentine of Suzdal and Vladimir took place on January 22, 2012, in the crypt of the Church of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia in Suzdal that he had built. According to unofficial sources, the church may be seized and handed over to the Moscow Patriarchate.

The First Hierarch’s coffin had been kept in the house chapel of the Iveron Icon of the Mother of God in the Synodal house in Suzdal. The Gospel was continuously read over the coffin by priests, first in Moscow and then in Suzdal. Farewells to the deceased took place during the All-Night Vigil on the eve of January 21 and over the course of the night before the burial.

On January 22, Archbishop Theodore of Otradnaya and the Northern Caucasus celebrated the Divine Liturgy in the Iveron Synodal church, accompanied by Archbishop Timothy of Orenburg and Kurgan, Bishop Irinarkh of Tula and Bryansk, Bishop Yakovos of Sukhodolsk, Bishop Andrei of Pavloskoe, Bishop Trofim of Simbrisk, and Bishop Mark of Armavir, along with more than thirty priests and four deacons. Several hundred Orthodox Christians prayed both in and around the church. The seriously ill Archbishop Seraphim of Sukhumi and Abkhazia, the second in episcopal seniority by ordination, who cares for communities of Catacomb Christians, came to bid farewell to the reposed First Hierarch.

The funeral service, which lasted approximately four hours, began following the completion of the Liturgy. All serving bishops and priests were given the opportunity to take part in the reading of the canon for the reposed, modeled on the canon of Great Saturday. Following the completion of the funeral service, the coffin with the body of Metropolitan Valentine was carried onto the porch of the Synodal house, where Archbishop Theodore served a memorial litia [supplicatory service] and addressed a sermon to the many faithful assembled around the house. Archbishop Theodore said, in part, that, contrary to general practice, but following the example of Patriarch Tikhon, St. John of Kronstadt, and the confessors of the Catacomb Church, the aer would be removed from Metropolitan Valentine’s face in order that for one last time “he could see the cathedral city, to which he had given so much love and strength, and from which he received such warmth and kindness and slander and persecution in equal measure.” On the seventh day following the Metropolitan’s repose on the morning of January 16, his body was only marginally affected by corruption, and those present did not notice the smell characteristic of a dead body.

The solemn procession of bishops, clergy, and laity proceeded from the Synodal house to the place of the Metropolitan’s burial, in a new neighborhood in Suzdal where historically there had never been a church, but where the First Hierarch had one constructed, thinking of elderly parishioners who would find it difficult to travel to the city center. The St. Vladimir Foundation in the USA provided great assistance in the construction of this church. Maria Georgievna Shishkova (nee Countess Grabbe), widow of the chairman of the fund, Archpriest Vladimir Shishkov, travelled to Suzdal to bid farewell to the Metropolitan. During the procession the irmosi of the Great Canon of St. Andrew of Crete were sung, beginning with “He is my Helper and Protector…”

Three buses, in which elderly and infirm parishioners were able to reach the place of burial, followed the procession; but the great majority of those present covered the two and a half miles of the First Hierarch’s final journey by foot. A large crowd of people had also gathered at the Church of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia, to which Archbishop Theodore addressed a sermon; a memorial litia was served on the church porch and all present were able to part with the First Hierarch.

After circling the church with the Metropolitan’s coffin, the clergy carried it to the crypt below the church, where Archbishop Theodore read the prayer of absolution. Accompanied by the singing of the trisagion, the coffin was sealed and lowered into the crypt prepared in the right (south) side of the church. All present approached and cast a handful of earth onto the coffin.

All interested were taken by bus from the Church of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia to the Convent of the Deposition of the Robe on Vasilievskaya Street, where a memorial meal for the more than 300 people present was organized in three halls. All present noted the excellent organization of the burial and meal, organized by Archbishop Theodore, Bishop Irinarkh, the Suzdal clergy, and the sisters of the convent, headed by Schema-Abbess Euthymia and spiritual children and friends close to the late Metropolitan. Clergy and laity traveled to the First Hierarch’s funeral from many regions of Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and the United States.

A photo gallery of the Liturgy, funeral, and burial of Metropolitan Valentine on January 22 can be seen here. http://www.portal-credo.ru/site/?act=ne ... &topic=779

VERTOGRAD Orthodox Journal, Newsletter No. 87, Tuesday, January 24, 2012. 3:10 P.M.

[Priest Siluan]

Videos:

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