Храмы и святыни

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If there is a church near the houses of people, the settlement does not look as a number of cockleshells, which sail in the sea of life in unfathomable darkness where there are not any pole-stars. On the contrary, this settlement has a beautiful lamp, which lights and warms its inhabitants with spiritual light. It fills their life with divine sense and shows them the way to the quiet quay of the Kingdom of Heaven.

A church is "a complex symbol, inexhaustible in its readability." It serves as a well of life-giving water, the Gifts of the Holy Spirit. Father Paul Florensky wrote: "A church is the ladder of St. James and it leads up from the visible world to the invisible one".

Religious zeal often makes people build several churches on a small piece of land. It especially concerns monks. Orthodox cloisters have always been settlements, which do not belong to this world, with a large number of churches and relics.

In the Monastery of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist John the Theologian there are seven churches, two chapels and two bell-towers.

The main church in the cloister is the Cathedral of Saint John the Theologian built in 1689. The daily cycle of monastic divine services is usually performed in it.

Under the sanctuary of the Cathedral there is a church consecrated in honor of Saint Seraphim of Sarov, Saint Martyr Juvenaliy of Ryazan and All the Saint Martyrs and Confessors of Russia. It is a church - crypt. The relics of three archimandrites: Vitaly, Tikhon and Zosima lie in it. They were the last Fathers Superior of the monastery, who ruled over it in succession till its closure in the 30-s of the 20^th century. There is a tomb of Archimandrite Abel (Seraphim (Makedonov) in schema) who was the father superior of the cloister since the first years of its revival. Father Abel did much for its spiritual and material growth. Office for the dead for the starets-archimandrites is served here in the church-crypt on Saturdays after the Divine Liturgy in the upper church.

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