Visit to Kirilov – Goritsky, Russion Orthodox Church and Monastery
This trip is primarily focused on the major Russian cities of St Petersburg and Moscow. The little towns in between hold varying degrees of interest for folks. At this point, many guests are starting to get a bit tired of seeing and hearing about churches and icons. Considering the soviet penchant for destroying anything that was ‘faith-based’, it’s amazing that these St Petersburg Russian churches survived at all. Of course, many did not.
A few words about St Petersburg Russian Eastern Orthodox Christian churches:
- There are no pews; there is no place to sit. Everyone stands during services – and sometimes the services are quite long – going on 2-3 hours. The theory is that Christ suffered mightily when he died on the cross for you; the faithful can manage standing up in a church for a couple hours – that’s endurable suffering. Stand there and be quiet!
- The altar is not in view, but is hidden behind a wall of icons, called the iconostasis. (Per Wikipedia: In Eastern Christianity an iconostasis (plural: iconostases) is a wall of icons and religious paintings, separating the nave from the sanctuary in a church.) The idea here is that the altar is a part of heaven and no one on earth can know what heaven is like. So the people stand in the church (you are alive and this is part of this current life) and that what is beyond will not be known until after death. Thus the mystery of what is behind the iconostasis.
- Icons and religious scenes are painted on church walls as frescos and also created an individual paintings hung around the church.
We are now spending a few hours in the very small town of Kirilov. The tour consists of 3 parts: a visit to the Kirillov-Belozerskiy Monastery, a visit to a timber construction place and a visit to a childrens’ arts & crafts center.
We actually dock at Goritsky home of the St Petersbug Russian Goritsky Resurrection Convent and here I quote the ‘daily program’ we get each morning: “It was founded by Princess Efrosiniya, wife of Ivan III’s son, Prince Andrey Staritsky.
The princess and her son were imprisoned here in 1563 by Ivan and subsequently her son and his family were murdered and the was drowned in the Sheksna River by the Tsar’s order. Thereafter, the convent was used to imprison women of disgraced noble families.”
So then – short 5 miles away (by bus) is the small St Petersburg Russian town of Kirillov and our first stop is the Kirillov-Belozerskiy Monastery, founded in 1397. This is one of the largest monasteries in the Russian north. By 1427 the brotherhood consisted of 53 monks. They owned thousands of acres of land and had 20,000 serfs.
By the 17th century, it was the strongest fortress in Northern Russia. Polishj-Lithuanian armies besieged it six times but their attacks failed. Think of the monastery as a large fortress – with massive walls all around. Within the grounds are many churches, buildings for monks and others to work and live, etc.
This is a map of the monastery grounds and our ship tied up at the dock:
Inside the monastery
Frescos adorning an arch.
It was a beautiful day. We even got to hear some wonderful St Petersburg Russian singing by these four fellows.
Another church inside the grounds.
Next stop is a business where they work with timber. This structure on the left is part of a windmill being constructed to be sent as a gift to the settlement at Fort Ross.
The picture on the right shows the bottom part of the windmill.
The picture on the left shows the bottom layers of a house reconstruction they are doing. It’s the start of the drawing on the right. It will be built it and then assembled on the final site. They are cutting everything with axes.
These are pictures of the St Petersburg Russian countryside from the bus.
The visit to the St Petersburg Russian Childrens’ Arts & Crafts Center was a failure as far as we were concerned. It was billed as a place where children can go to learn about traditional St Petersburg Russian crafts – to keep the cultural skills and arts alive.
What we found in actuality was children making break dough wall arts, making lanyards out of yarn, small models of animals. It was OK for kid-type efforts, but not worthy of a tourist stop. We were disappointed –plus the building was hot.
We both walked out midway through the ‘tour” and “presentation” – too hot and uncomfortable, plus a waste of time. Not all travelers felt this way, but we did.
We gave Uniworld immediate feedback via the tour evaluation forms we get on our beds each night. We are asked to evaluate the day guides and the tours each day.
That’s all for now.
Carol
Posted June 16, 2103 by JB Leep (Google Profile)
Original date June 5, 2012 St Petersburg Russian Eastern Orthodox Christian Monastery in Kirilov Goritsky, JB Leep and Carol Martin