RUSSIAN ECCLESIASTICAL MISSION IN JERUSALEM: August 21, 2006
His Eminence Metropolitan Laurus Conducts a Pannikhida over the Gravesite of Archimandrite Dimitry; a Monastic Tonsuring on the Mount of Olives

On Monday, August 21, His Eminence Metropolitan Laurus prayed at Divine Liturgy, performed by Hieromonk John in the Cathedral of the Ascension on the Mount of Olives. His Eminence Vladyka then performed a pannikhida over the gravesite of the reposed Chief of the Russian Ecclesiastical Mission in Jerusalem, Archimandrite Dimitry, who before the tragic year of 1917 led his monastic life at the Kiev Monastery of the Caves. After the pannikhida, His Eminence addressed the clergymen and nuns with an archpastoral sermon in which he outlined the life of Fr Dimitry and of Protodeacon Nikita Chakirov, who was also commemorated during the pannikhida.

After the trapeza, His Eminence received visitors at his residence at the Convent, while the other delegation members visited the Tombs of the Mother of God; of Holy Joakim and Anna, Righteous Ancestors of God; and of St Joseph of Arimathea; also the birthplace of the Most-Holy Mother of God; St Alexander Nevsky Church at the "Russian Excavations"; and other holy sites along the Via Dolorosa, ending at the Church of the Resurrection of Christ. There the pilgrims not only venerated the Life-Bearing Sepulchre and Golgotha, but also a large segment of the Life-Giving Cross of Christ and the relics of saints. That evening, His Eminence performed that tonsure of Nun Vera, a resident of Ascension of Christ Convent on the Mount of Olives, giving her the name Joanna in honor of St John of Shanghai and San Francisco.