Arabic original, with dozens of photos, here.
August 1-4
At the invitation of Metropolitan Melety, Archbishop of Chernovtsy and Metropolitan of Bukovina in Ukraine, Bishop Qais Sadeq, Bishop of Erzurum and patriarchal assistant, visited the Metropolis of Chernovtsy in Ukraine, where, on Monday, August 1, he joined with its metropolitan in serving the vigil for the Feast of the Prophet Elijah according to the Julian Calendar at the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit in the city center. He was welcomed there by the metropolitan with a speech focusing on the eccelsiastical ties between Antioch and Ukraine, wishing for the See of Antioch, its children everywhere and its Holy Synod, under the presidency of Patriarch John X, spiritual growth, health, peace and tranquility.
Bishop Qais responded with a speech in which he said, "I come to you bearing blessings for you from our father Patriarch John X and the prayers of your Antiochian brothers that there may be peace in your country and that the grace of God may cover your people, whom we love. I come to you from the Holy Land, specifically from the heart of Antioch, where the disciples were first called Christians; from Damascus, where Paul passed and Ananias lived; from Tyre and Sidon, where the Savior's feet trod; from Iraq, where Abraham was called to be a father; from Egypt, which welcomed the Holy Family and witnessed the life of our monastic saints; from Jordan and Palestine, where the Savior was born, lived, was crucified and rose. We Middle Eastern Arabs are the brothers of the Savior and He is a son of our lands. Our Orthodoxy is original and apostolic. We did not acquire it from outside... I do not want you to forget that it was Antioch that begat you in Christ because Orthodoxy only came to you from Antioch, since the first bishop of Kiev was Michael of Antioch."
On the morning of the following day, Tuesday, August 2, the Feast of the Prophet Elijah according to the Julian Calendar, His Grace Bishop Qais joined Metropolitan Melety in the services of consecrating the new altar and the divine liturgy at the Church of the Prophet Elijah in the village of Zrub-Komarovsky near the Ukrainian-Romanian border. During the divine liturgy, the Deacon Silouan was ordained to the priesthood. The service ended with a procession of the Holy Gospel around the outside of the church, where the four passages of the Gospel for the consecration of a new church were read at the four corners of the church and the church and the people were sprinkled with holy water. Metropolitan Melety welcomed Bishop Qais, who replied with a word of thanks and prayers that there will be peace in Syria, Palestine, Iraq and Ukraine. Metropolitan Melety presented Bishop Qais with a commemorative gift, a bilingual service-book for hierarchs in Ukrainian and Romanian, and the priest of the church gave His Grace an icon of Saint Nicholas the Wonder-worker.
Metropolitan Melety honored with grammotas, medals, and tokens of appreciation those who had contributed to building the church, first among them the church's pastor and the mayor of the town, whom he honored with the Order of Saint Vladimir. The faithful and pastors then sat at the agape table in the courtyard of the church, giving thanks to God for His gifts and divine grace.
In the evening, His Grace Bishop Qais headed to the Diocese of Ternopol, where he was the guest of Metropolitan Vladimir of Pochaev. He spent the night at the Great Lavra of the Dormition of the Theotokos in the city, where he prayed before the wonder-working icon of the Theotokos, received a blessing from the water that flows from the Spring of Our Lady (a rock inside the monastery cathedral bearing the footprint of the Theotokos) and visited the relics of the righteous Saints Job, the founder of the monastery, and Amfilokhy, the organizer of Russian monastic rules.
The history of the monastery on Mount Pochaev goes back to the thirteenth century, when Batu Khan occupied Kiev during the years 1240-1241 and Russia found herself under the Tatar-Mongol Yoke. A number of monks from the Kiev Cave Monastery headed to the region of Volyn seeking refuge, which they found on a rocky mountain covered with a thick forest. They came to this place, where they settled in a spirit of strict asceticism according to the rules of Saint Anthony and Theodosius of the Kiev Cave. They named the new place of their hermitage after the Pochaina River, one of the sources of the Dnieper, by the banks of which their monastery was located and in which the Holy Prince Vladimir baptized his people.
The next afternoon, Wednesday, August 3, His Grace visited the Theophany Monastery for women in the city of Kremenets, part of the Diocese of Ternopol, where he was met by the abbess of the monastery, Mother Marionula (Panasyuk) and the nuns, who are 80 in number, practicing a life of communion imbued with prayer and work. The nuns operate a cattle farm, grain farms, workshops for sewing, embroidery, beekeeping and mushroom production, and greenhouses for vegetables, in addition to organizations for providing religious instruction to the children of the city.
On the morning of Thursday, August 4, the Feast of Saint Mary Magdalene according to the Julian Calendar, Bishop Qais joined His Eminence Metropolitan Melety, Archbishop of Chernovtsy and Bukovina, in the services of consecrating a new altar and the divine liturgy at the Church of the Nativity of the Theotokos in the village of Kolishevka near the Ukrainian-Moldovan border. The service also included a procession of the Holy Gospel around the outside of the church, where the four passages of the Gospel for the consecration of a new church were read at the four corners of the church and the church and the people were sprinkled with holy water.
After words of welcome, Metropolitan Melety honored with rammotas, medals, and tokens of appreciation those who contributed to the rebuilding of the church and decorating its walls with icons. The agape table which included the faithful and their pastors in the church courtyard was an earnest of the unity of the parish around its pastor.
His Grace completed his visit to Ukraine and headed to Romania for a visit accompanied by Metropolitan Melety. They stopped to visit the martyr Saint John the New (patron saint of Bukovina) at his monastery in the city of Suceava an received a blessing from his relics. Bishop Qais then made the journey back to Bucharest, where he went to give thanks to the Lord for all the graces and blessings he was given, seeking a blessing from the relics of the Holy New-Martyr Dimitrie Basarabov, the patron saint of Bucharest, and the relics of Saints Constantine and Helen, patron saints of the city's cathedral, and Saint Nektarios of Pentapolis.
August 1-4
At the invitation of Metropolitan Melety, Archbishop of Chernovtsy and Metropolitan of Bukovina in Ukraine, Bishop Qais Sadeq, Bishop of Erzurum and patriarchal assistant, visited the Metropolis of Chernovtsy in Ukraine, where, on Monday, August 1, he joined with its metropolitan in serving the vigil for the Feast of the Prophet Elijah according to the Julian Calendar at the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit in the city center. He was welcomed there by the metropolitan with a speech focusing on the eccelsiastical ties between Antioch and Ukraine, wishing for the See of Antioch, its children everywhere and its Holy Synod, under the presidency of Patriarch John X, spiritual growth, health, peace and tranquility.
Bishop Qais responded with a speech in which he said, "I come to you bearing blessings for you from our father Patriarch John X and the prayers of your Antiochian brothers that there may be peace in your country and that the grace of God may cover your people, whom we love. I come to you from the Holy Land, specifically from the heart of Antioch, where the disciples were first called Christians; from Damascus, where Paul passed and Ananias lived; from Tyre and Sidon, where the Savior's feet trod; from Iraq, where Abraham was called to be a father; from Egypt, which welcomed the Holy Family and witnessed the life of our monastic saints; from Jordan and Palestine, where the Savior was born, lived, was crucified and rose. We Middle Eastern Arabs are the brothers of the Savior and He is a son of our lands. Our Orthodoxy is original and apostolic. We did not acquire it from outside... I do not want you to forget that it was Antioch that begat you in Christ because Orthodoxy only came to you from Antioch, since the first bishop of Kiev was Michael of Antioch."
On the morning of the following day, Tuesday, August 2, the Feast of the Prophet Elijah according to the Julian Calendar, His Grace Bishop Qais joined Metropolitan Melety in the services of consecrating the new altar and the divine liturgy at the Church of the Prophet Elijah in the village of Zrub-Komarovsky near the Ukrainian-Romanian border. During the divine liturgy, the Deacon Silouan was ordained to the priesthood. The service ended with a procession of the Holy Gospel around the outside of the church, where the four passages of the Gospel for the consecration of a new church were read at the four corners of the church and the church and the people were sprinkled with holy water. Metropolitan Melety welcomed Bishop Qais, who replied with a word of thanks and prayers that there will be peace in Syria, Palestine, Iraq and Ukraine. Metropolitan Melety presented Bishop Qais with a commemorative gift, a bilingual service-book for hierarchs in Ukrainian and Romanian, and the priest of the church gave His Grace an icon of Saint Nicholas the Wonder-worker.
Metropolitan Melety honored with grammotas, medals, and tokens of appreciation those who had contributed to building the church, first among them the church's pastor and the mayor of the town, whom he honored with the Order of Saint Vladimir. The faithful and pastors then sat at the agape table in the courtyard of the church, giving thanks to God for His gifts and divine grace.
In the evening, His Grace Bishop Qais headed to the Diocese of Ternopol, where he was the guest of Metropolitan Vladimir of Pochaev. He spent the night at the Great Lavra of the Dormition of the Theotokos in the city, where he prayed before the wonder-working icon of the Theotokos, received a blessing from the water that flows from the Spring of Our Lady (a rock inside the monastery cathedral bearing the footprint of the Theotokos) and visited the relics of the righteous Saints Job, the founder of the monastery, and Amfilokhy, the organizer of Russian monastic rules.
The history of the monastery on Mount Pochaev goes back to the thirteenth century, when Batu Khan occupied Kiev during the years 1240-1241 and Russia found herself under the Tatar-Mongol Yoke. A number of monks from the Kiev Cave Monastery headed to the region of Volyn seeking refuge, which they found on a rocky mountain covered with a thick forest. They came to this place, where they settled in a spirit of strict asceticism according to the rules of Saint Anthony and Theodosius of the Kiev Cave. They named the new place of their hermitage after the Pochaina River, one of the sources of the Dnieper, by the banks of which their monastery was located and in which the Holy Prince Vladimir baptized his people.
The next afternoon, Wednesday, August 3, His Grace visited the Theophany Monastery for women in the city of Kremenets, part of the Diocese of Ternopol, where he was met by the abbess of the monastery, Mother Marionula (Panasyuk) and the nuns, who are 80 in number, practicing a life of communion imbued with prayer and work. The nuns operate a cattle farm, grain farms, workshops for sewing, embroidery, beekeeping and mushroom production, and greenhouses for vegetables, in addition to organizations for providing religious instruction to the children of the city.
On the morning of Thursday, August 4, the Feast of Saint Mary Magdalene according to the Julian Calendar, Bishop Qais joined His Eminence Metropolitan Melety, Archbishop of Chernovtsy and Bukovina, in the services of consecrating a new altar and the divine liturgy at the Church of the Nativity of the Theotokos in the village of Kolishevka near the Ukrainian-Moldovan border. The service also included a procession of the Holy Gospel around the outside of the church, where the four passages of the Gospel for the consecration of a new church were read at the four corners of the church and the church and the people were sprinkled with holy water.
After words of welcome, Metropolitan Melety honored with rammotas, medals, and tokens of appreciation those who contributed to the rebuilding of the church and decorating its walls with icons. The agape table which included the faithful and their pastors in the church courtyard was an earnest of the unity of the parish around its pastor.
His Grace completed his visit to Ukraine and headed to Romania for a visit accompanied by Metropolitan Melety. They stopped to visit the martyr Saint John the New (patron saint of Bukovina) at his monastery in the city of Suceava an received a blessing from his relics. Bishop Qais then made the journey back to Bucharest, where he went to give thanks to the Lord for all the graces and blessings he was given, seeking a blessing from the relics of the Holy New-Martyr Dimitrie Basarabov, the patron saint of Bucharest, and the relics of Saints Constantine and Helen, patron saints of the city's cathedral, and Saint Nektarios of Pentapolis.
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