By Fr. Sergei Sveshnikov

The Church is the Body of Christ, and just as Christ united in Himself human and heavenly nature, in the Church the heavenly is united with the earthly. The Church is not only comprised of apostles, saints, and holy monks, but also of us—exactly in as much as we submit our earthly selves to the heavenly—”I no longer live, but Christ lives in me” (Galatians 2:20); in as much as we live in Christ. As the Lord builds His Heavenly Church through the saints, He builds the Earthly Church through us.

In the Old Testament times, God gave His people commandments by which they could live righteous lives that were pleasing to God. One of the commandments was a law about tithing. Having received earthly blessings, the people of God gave the first and best—a tenth of all they had—for the upkeep of God’s Temple. The Temple of the Lord was magnificent and the services went on without ceasing.

Now that we no longer live under the law; we are not required to fulfill the Old Testament commandments: we don’t have to eat kosher foods, nor are we forced to tithe ten percent of our income. But Christ came not to destroy the law, but to fulfill it (Matt. 5:17). That is, He came to fulfill with everything perfect and good; and now it is not the fulfillment of commandments that God requires of His people, but holiness: “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matt. 5:48). It is no longer “an eye for an eye,” but “love” (Matt. 22:39); no longer “give ten percent”, but “I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of Mine, you did for Me ” (Matt. 25:40).

From the very beginning, the time of the holy apostles, the Church of Christ has cared for orphans, fed the hungry, cared for the needy, sent missionaries to those people who had not yet heard the Gospel: to the Romans and Galatians, to the Jews and Greeks, to the Franks and Slavs. And what churches were built! How the people cared for the House of God! And how they loved the Church services!

Sadly, nowadays not very many Orthodox Christian communities can care for the poor, send missionaries, or even hold daily services to the One Who continually cares for us. The priests and deacons who serve in the Holy Altar are forced to leave God’s services and, in violation of canon law, obtain secular employment in order to feed themselves and their families. The Church is now standing with an outstretched hand, begging Christians (!) to give to God’s temple at least a small part of what rightfully belongs to Him.

We are not required to bring a tenth of our income to the Church; we can bring twenty, thirty, or even one-hundred percent, as did the poor widow (Mark 12:42-43). But we can start with a small step. We can at least bring as much as the Old Testament Hebrews, at least the ten percent that rightly belongs to God and not us. But if we don’t have as much zeal for the temple of God as the Old Testament people had, then the Lord will accept and bless even seven or five percent or any other amount offered with a pure heart. We must begin somewhere!

Please feel free to drop in for a chat and a cup of coffee or tea.

No appointment is necessary.

Holy Martyr Tsar Nicholas II

Behind all wars, revolution, downfall of kingdoms, – all the political events of external history – we see the hidden working of spiritual laws and, in the final analysis, God’s Providence concerning the fates of peoples and nations. Any other explanation of the reasons for the revolutions of 1905 and 1917 would be incomprehensible and inaccurate. One thing is certain: the Russian society’s apostasy from God and the Church brought down God’s wrath upon Russia. As in the many cases of ancient Israel’s apostasy from God, about which we read in the Bible, Russia’s malady could not be cured by ordinary measures. For the sake of instruction and correction God would hand the Jews over into the hands of infidels; the very same fate befell Russia in the beginning of the 20th century.

Through Tsar Nicholas II – an irreproachably pure and wonderful person – God’s will was made manifest in the world. His fate, in essence, was deeply tragic. He was born on the day of St. Job the Much-suffering and was keenly aware that his life was similar to Job’s martyric path.

His knowledge of his fate was truly prophetic. “I have more than a presentiment, – he used to say, – that I am doomed to terrible trials, and that I will not be rewarded for them in this world.” Beginning with Russia’s defeat in the Russo-Japanese war, which was followed by the revolution of 1905-1907, which diminished the Tsar’s power and freed the forces of anarchy and outright evil, the foundations of Russian sovereignty tottered more and more. “I am unsuccessful in all my undertakings, – the Tsar bitterly concluded, – I have no luck. However, man’s will is so powerless anyway.” He realized that he was not subjectively to blame for Russia’s misfortunes; the good of the motherland meant more to him than anything else, and he did everything he could for this good. Tsar Nicholas’s conscience was clear before God, but his moral suffering, nevertheless, reached extraordinary proportions. Thus once, – this was during the first Russian revolution, – from the depths of his inner anguish the Tsar uttered prophetic words which indicated with absolute accuracy the role he was invisibly assigned to play in Russia’s fate by God Himself. “Perhaps a sacrifice is needed for the salvation of Russia, – said the Sovereign. – I shall be that sacrifice. May God’s will be done.” In saying this the Tsar was like the martyrs of ancient times, who freely and without coercion gave themselves up to suffering for Christ. Nicholas II was murdered in July of 1918 not simply as a helpless and defenseless person: the extraordinary courage of his behavior as he descended into the cellar of the Ipatyev house with his sick son in his arms, and even earlier, when he and the Empress refused to emigrate or flee the country, – all this speaks of the fact that their souls were ready for sacrificial and Christ-like suffering, which fulfilled the prophetic words spoken by him 10 years before.

When Austro-Hungary declared war on Serbia, Russia came to the aid of this small Slavic nation. This event still lives in the historic memory of the Serbs; and if among European nations there is still anyone who loves Russia and Russians – it is the Serbs. However, their greatest love was for Tsar Nicholas II, who had sanctioned Russia’s participation in the war. It was the Serbs who began venerating the Russian Tsar as a saint, placing him on a par with their great Saint Savva of Serbia. And it was among the Russians in Serbia that the issue of canonizing the Royal Family was brought up for the first time in 1938.

The Holy Princesses Olga and Tatyana

The beginning of the war brought success to the Russians at the front, and the country was gripped by patriotic fervor. The rear provided immense aid to the front; the Empress and the Princesses took an active part in it. After learning the art of nursing, they daily spent many hours in the hospitals. The Empress and her daughters Olga and Tatyana tended the wounded and sat with the dying, providing great comfort to the sufferers. The Empress and Tatyana also worked as surgical nurses; it is not hard to imagine their courage, patience and truly Christian love: assisting the doctors in numerous amputations of injured limbs required, besides training, great moral strength. The Winter Palace was also turned into a huge hospital. This enterprise also included the preparation of undergarments, warm clothes, and other items needed by the soldiers at the front; the entire work was organized by the Empress. She also sent to the front a multitude of Gospels, icons, and crosses, which were handed out to the soldiers. One can imagine the joy of a soldier who had received such a blessing from the Empress!

Soon, however, our armies’ offensive stopped, while our losses began to increase. Discontent arose in the top circles of society – both in the capital and at military headquarters. The revolutionaries made use of the lack of success at the front, in order to disseminate their propaganda at the front and in the rear. The Germans quickly moved toward the heart of Russia; in these conditions, wishing to raise the spirit of the troops, the Tsar took upon himself the supreme command and moved to General Headquarters, deployed at Mogilev. Prince Alexis went with him to the front.

However, making use of the Tsar’s absence from the capital, oppositional aristocracy increased its activity. The court discussed the advisability of a coup d’etat, placing Grand Duke Nicholas (the Tsar’s uncle) on the throne. The opposing faction asserted that the Tsar and the Empress stood in the way of Russia’s victory in the war; Grand Duke Nicholas sent the Tsar a telegram, entreating him to abdicate the throne. Similar telegrams were also sent by the majority of the commanding officers at the front. And when a revolution occurred in February 1917, the Tsar’s entourage took the side of the provisional government. The Tsar was assured that only his abdication from the throne could save Russia. And in the face of such betrayal the Tsar sacrificed himself, heeding these voices. After a fervent prayer during the night in front of an icon, he abdicated the throne; this took place on March 2nd. “There is no sacrifice that I would not make for the true good and salvation of Russia. For this reason I am ready to abdicate the throne” – such is the telegram he sent to the chairman of the Duma.

However, after the abdication everything turned out contrary to what the opposition was expecting: the people began to fall prey to their basest passions and moral decay set in; with unbridled speed Russia rushed towards destruction. The Tsar’s sacrifice was accepted by God, but not in the way that the architects of the abdication had in mind: there was no immediate outward benefit from it. The Tsar had been that mystic principle which had restrained the forces of evil; now nothing prevented anti-Christian elements from entering into the world.

A new era began for the Sovereign and his family: their worldly life ended and their saints’ life began, together with their Christian exploits. The Tsar and his entourage were kept under guard at Tsarskoye Selo. The prisoners pinned their hopes only on God’s will, and the Lord helped them retain their inner peace until the very end. The Tsar and his family were subjected to humiliation and mockery from the guards and the other “new” people who now surrounded them. On July 31st the martyrs’ path to Golgotha began: they were taken from their palace and sent on to Siberia.

Holy Martyr Empress Alexandra

On August 6th the Royal Family arrived in Tobolsk on the ship “Rus’.” “My heart bleeds inexpressibly for the dear homeland,” – these words of the Empress in a private letter describe the inner state of the entire family. But its members were cheerful: they were fortified by their faith, the Church, and God’s grace. They faithfully participated in church services; the Empress and the children sang in the choir. Through their suffering the Royal Martyrs’ spirit grew stronger. “God’s way is a daily cross,” – the Empress wrote these words of St. Isaac the Syrian in her notebook. “Christians must undergo sorrows and external and internal warfare, in order to conquer these blows through patience. Such is the path of Christianity,” – another of her excerpts (from St. Mark the Great) reveals to us the inner state of the sufferers.

On the eve of Pascha of 1918 the Royal Family was parted. A commissar arrived from the Bolsheviks in Moscow and announced to the Tsar that he would be taken away. The Empress decided to accompany her husband despite great inner agony, since she was thus being forced to part from the sick Prince Alexis. Princess Maria went together with her parents…This parting was a torment for the entire family.

The royal couple was detained by the Bolsheviks in Yekaterinburg. In early May the other members of the family came here, together with several loyal servants. The martyrs had two and a half months to live. They were tormented with increasing subtlety, but even among the brutal guards there were those who bowed down before their Christian meekness and humility.

The Holy Royal Martyrs

During the night of July 17th the greatest crime was committed: innocent, holy people, together with God’s anointed, were heinously murdered. Three days before this villainy a church service was served for the Royal Family. When the prayer “Grant repose with the saints…” was sung, the martyrs unexpectedly got down on their knees. As though sensing their imminent end, they sang a funereal hymn for themselves… That fatal night the guards came for them, saying that they were being taken out of the city. Instead, they were taken down to the cellar; several chairs were standing there, and the Tsar sat in the middle, holding the Tsarevich in his arms. Together with the Royal Family were Doctor Botkin and their loyal servants. They waited for a sign of departure, but instead a commissar entered the cellar accompanied by soldiers.

The commissar – his name was Yurovskiy – announced the forthcoming execution. The Empress only had time to make the sign of the cross; she was killed instantly, at the same time as the Emperor. Prince Alexis and Princess Anastasia suffered longer than the rest; the first bullets did not bring them death, and so the soldiers killed them off with bayonets. The doctor and the three servants died also, sharing the fate of the Royal Family out of love for them. This sacrilegious murder was not simply a private crime of the political revolution: it was a universal sin. The burden of the sin of regicide still continues to lie upon Russia.

Tsar Nicholas II and his family were the carriers of the ideals of Holy Russia, of the ideals of Orthodoxy. In contrast to many people of that era – Christians in name only – they treated Orthodoxy with all seriousness. They were God’s elect and, therefore, people not of this world; they were alien to the society of those times. As true Christians, they were persecuted in this world; their sorrowful path was crowned by martyrdom. Now, together with all the other Russian saints, they stand before Christ in prayer for Russia.

( from http://www.holy-transfiguration.org/library_en/royal_providence.html)

by Rheta Childe Dorr

On the afternoon of the day when Nicholas II, deposed emperor and autocrat of all the Russias, with his wife and children left Tsarskoe Selo and began the long journey toward their place of exile in Siberia, I sat in a peaceful convent room in Moscow and talked with almost the last remaining member of the royal family left in complete freedom in the empire. This was Elizabeth Fyodorovna, sister of the former empress and widow of the Grand Duke Serge, uncle of the emperor. The Grand Duke Serge was assassinated, blown to pieces by a bomb, almost before the eyes of his wife, by a revolutionist on February 4 old style, 1905. He was killed when going to join the Grand Duchess in one of the churches of the Kremlin in Moscow. She rushed out and saw his mutilated remains lying in the snow. The Grand Duchess Serge had long been known as a noble and saintly woman, and her conduct following the horrible death of her husband perfectly illustrates her character. She besought the Czar to commute the death sentence passed upon the assassin, and when he refused she went to the prison where the wretched man waited his death, gained admission to his cell, and almost to the end prayed with him and comforted him. No children had ever been born to her, and after the event which cut the last tie that bound her to the life of royal pomp and glitter she retired from society and gave herself up to religion. As soon as possible she became a nun. Her private fortune, to the last rouble, investments, palaces, furniture, art treasures, jewels, motor cars, sables and other fine raiment were turned into cash and the money used to build a convent and to found an order of which she became the lady abbess. The Grand Duchess Serge literally obeyed the edict of Christ to the rich young man: “Sell all thou hast and give it to the poor.”

The Convent of Mary and Martha, of the Order of Mercy in Moscow, is a living token of her great sacrifice. Here for the past eight years she has lived and worked among her nuns, at least one of whom was a court lady, and many of whom are women from the intellectual classes. Some of the nuns were from humble households, for the order is perfectly democratic. Every one who enters the House of Mary and Martha does so with the understanding that her life is to be spent in service, spiritual service such as Mary of the Gospels gave, and material service such as the practical Martha rendered her Lord. The somewhat dreamy and passive Russians will tell you that Elizabeth Fyodorovna’s convent is one of the most efficient institutions in the empire, and they usually add: “They say she makes her nuns work terribly hard.”

When the days of revolution came, in February, 1917, a great mob went to the House of Mary and Martha, battered the gates open and swarmed up the convent steps demanding admission. The door opened and a tall, grave woman in a pale silvergray habit and white veil stepped out into the porch and asked the mob what it wanted.

“We want that German woman, that sister of the German spy in Tsarskoe Selo,” yelled the mob. “We want the Grand Duchess Serge.”

Tall and white, like a lily, the woman stood there. “I am the Grand Duchess Serge,” she replied in a clear voice that floated above the clamor. “What do you want with me?”

“We have come to arrest you,” they shouted. “Very well,” was the calm reply. “If you want to arrest me I shall have to go with you, of course. But I have a rule that before I leave the convent for any purpose I always go into the church and pray. Come with me into the church, and after I have prayed I will go with you.”

She turned and walked across the garden to the church, the mob following. As many as could crowd into the small building followed her there. Before the altar door she knelt, and her nuns came and knelt around her weeping. The Grand Duchess did not weep. She prayed for a moment, crossed herself then stood up and stretched her hands to the silent, staring mob.

“I am ready to go now,” she said.

But not a hand was lifted to take Elizabeth Fyodorovna. What Kerensky could not have done, what no police force in Russia could have done with those men that day, her perfect courage and humility did. It cowed and conquered hostility, it dispersed the mob. That great crowd of liberty-drunk, bloodmad men went quietly home, leaving a guard to protect the convent. It is probably the only spot in Russia to-day where absolute inviolability may be said to exist for any members of the hated “bourju,” as the Bolsheviki call the intellectual classes.

On the August day when I rang the bell of the convent’s massive brown gate I did not really know that I was to see and speak with the grand duchess. Mr. William L. Cazalet, of Moscow, the friend who took me there, doubted very much whether I could be received thus informally, without a previous appointment. The gravity of the times, and especially the situation of the Romanoff family, placed the Grand Duchess Serge in a position of extreme delicacy, and Mr. Cazalet said frankly that he expected to find her living in strict retirement. The best he could promise, he said, was that I should see the convent, where one of his young cousins was a nun.

The convent, which is situated in the heart of Moscow, is a group of white stone and stucco houses built around an old garden and surrounded by a high white wall, over which vines and foliage ramble and fall. A key turned, the brown gate swung open to our ring and we stepped into a garden running over with the richest bloom. I remember the pink and white sweet-peas against the wall, the white madonna lilies that nodded below and the carpet of gay verbenas that ran along the pathway to the convent door. There were many old apple trees and a forest of lilacs, purple and white.

In her small room, combination of office and living room, we were received by the executive head of the convent, Mme. Gardeeve, for many years the intimate friend of Elizabeth Fyodorovna. Like the grand duchess she had had a life full of tears and tribulation, in spite of her rank and wealth, and when the grand duchess took the veil she followed her example and became a nun. The business of the convent is transacted under her direction, and most ably, I was told. Efficiency and ability are written in every feature of Mme. Gardeeve’s fine face, in her crisp, clear voice and quick though graceful movements. Her enunciation was a joy to hear, an especial joy to me, for I have difficulty in understanding the rather indistinct French spoken by the average Russian. Mme. Gardeeve’s French was of that perfect kind you hear spoken in Tours more often than in Paris or elsewhere. I understood every word. Woman of the world to her finger tips, Mme. Gardeeve wore the picturesque habit of the order with the same grace that she would have worn the latest creation of the ateliers. She smiled and chatted with Mr. Cazalet, who is very well known in the convent, and was most kind and cordial to me. After a few minutes’ conversation my friend said to her that I had told him some extremely interesting things about public schools in America, and he wanted me to repeat them to her.

So I told her something about the extraordinary experiments that have been worked out in Gary, Indiana, and the work that was being done in New York and elsewhere to give children, rich and poor alike, the complete education they merit. As I talked she exclaimed from time to time: “But it is excellent! I find it admirable! The Grand Duchess should hear of this!”

I said hopefully that I would like very much to meet the Grand Duchess and she replied she thought it might be arranged. Not to-day, however, as the Grand Duchess’s time was completely filled. How long did I expect to remain in Moscow? A week? It could certainly be arranged, she thought. Meanwhile what would I like to see of the convent? Everything? She laughed and touched a little bell on the desk beside her. A little nun appeared and Mme. Gardeeve handed me over to her with orders that I was to see everything.

I saw a small but perfectly equipped hospital, with an operating room complete in all its details. The hospital had been devoted to poor women and children before the war. Now most of the wards are filled with wounded soldiers. I saw a room filled with blinded soldiers who were being taught to read Braille type by sweet-faced nuns. Blindness is bitter hard for any man, but for illiterates it must be blank despair. I saw a house full of refugee nuns from the invaded districts of Poland. I saw an orphanage full of slain soldiers’ children. I lingered long in the lovely garden where nuns were at work, some with their habits tucked up, among the potato rows, some pruning trees and hedges, some sweeping the gravel paths with besoms made of twigs, some teaching the orphan girls to embroider at big frames, to knit and to sew. They made a fascinating picture, and I could hardly leave them even to see the church, which is one of the most beautiful small gems of architecture to be found in Europe. I never really saw that church at all, as it turned out, for just as we entered and I was getting a first impression of its blue and white and gold beauty, a messenger hastily opened the door and said that the Grand Duchess wanted to see me.

We went back to the convent and I was taken to a tiny parlor, which is the private retreat of the Lady Abbess. It is not much bigger than a hall bedroom, and it gave the same general impression of blue and white and gold that one sees throughout the place. There were many books bound in the lapis blue which seems to be the Grand Duchess’s favorite color; a few pictures, mostly of the Madonna and Child; some small tables, one with Stephen Graham’s book, “The House of Mary and Martha,” held open upon it by a piece of embroidery carelessly dropped. There were easy chairs of English willow with blue cushions, and a businesslike little desk crammed with papers. Everywhere, in the window, on tables and the desk, were bowls and vases of flowers. Every room in the place, in fact, was filled with flowers.

The door opened and the Grand Duchess came in with a radiant smile of welcome and a white hand outstretched. “I am so glad to find that I had time to meet you to-day, Mrs. Dorr,” she said, in a rarely sweet voice.

“Your highness speaks English?” I exclaimed in surprise, and she replied, waving me to a comfortable armchair: “Why not? My mother was English.”

I had forgotten for the moment that the Grand Duchess and her younger sister, the former Empress of Russia, were daughters of the Princess Alice of England and granddaughters of Queen Victoria. Russia seemed to have forgotten it also and to have remembered only that the father of these women was the Grand Duke of Hesse and the Rhine. The Grand Duchess added when we were seated that when she was a child at home they always spoke English to their mother, if German to their father. “I welcome an opportunity to speak English, because if one is wholly Russian, as I am, and especially if one is orthodox, he hears little except Russian or French.” Then she said, with another radiant smile: “Tell me what you think of my convent.”

I told her that I felt as though I had stepped back into the glowing and romantic thirteenth century.

“That is just what I wanted my convent to be,” she replied, “one of those busy, useful medieval types. Such convents were wonderfully efficient aids to civilization in the middle ages, and I don’t think they should have been allowed to disappear. Russia needs them, certainly, the kind of convent that fills the place between the austere, enclosed orders and the life of the outside world. We read the newspapers here, we keep track of events and we receive and consult with people in active life. We are Marys, but we are Marthas as well.”

The Grand Duchess’s interest in the outside world is patent. She asked me eagerly to tell her how things were going in Petrograd, and her face saddened when I told her of the riotous and bloody events I had witnessed during the days of the Julyrevolution, scarcely past. “Times are very bad with us just now,” she said, “but they will improve soon, I am sure. The Russian people are good and kind at heart, but they are mostly children-big, ignorant, impulsive children. If they can find good leaders, and if they will only realize that they must obey their leaders, they will emerge from this dreadful chaos and build up a strong, new Russia. Have you seen Kerensky, and what do you think of him?”

I replied rather cautiously. Like every one else, I still hoped that Kerensky would succeed in getting his released giant back into its bottle, and I did not want to unsettle any one’s confidence in him even to the extent of an expressed doubt. Kerensky, I told her, was greatly admired and liked, and I hoped he might prove the strong leader Russia needed in her trouble.

“I hope so,” replied the last of the Romanoffs, “I pray for him every day.”

The bells of the little church chimed the hour softly, and the Grand Duchess paused to cross herself devoutly. “I want to hear about those wonderful public schools of yours,” she said, “but first tell me what America is doing in war preparation.”

As I talked she listened, nodding and smiling as if immensely pleased. The great airplane fleet in course of construction seemed to amaze and delight her, and when I told her of the conservation of the food supply and the restriction of the manufacture of alcohol she fairly glowed. “America is simply stupendous,” she exclaimed. “How I regret that I never went there. Of course I never shall now. To me the United States stands for order and efficiency of the best kind. The kind of order only a free people can create. The kind I pray may be built some day here in Russia.” And then she made her one allusi ‘on to the deposed Czar. I did not know that at that minute the Czar was on his way to Siberia, but it is very probable that she knew it. She said: “I am glad you are going to protect your soldiers from the danger of the drink evil. Nobody can possibly know how much good the abolition of vodka did our soldiers and all our people. I think history should give the Emperor credit for his share in that act, don’t you?” I agreed that the Emperor should receive full credit for what he did, and I spoke with all sincerity.

Elizabeth Fyodorovna kept me for nearly three quarters of an hour talking to her about the Gary schools, which she is eager to see in Russia; about American women and their part in the war, and about welfare work for children, especially for tubercular and anemic children. “It is wonderful,” she said with a sigh. “I can scarcely help envying you sinfully. Think of a great, young, hurrying nation that can still find time to study all these frightful problems of poverty and disease, and to grapple with them. I hope you will go on doing that, and still find more and more ways of bringing beauty into the lives of the workers. How can you expect workmen who toil all day in hot, hideous factories or on remote farms, with nothing in their lives but work and worry, to have beauty in their souls?”

She wanted eagerly to know about the women soldiers, and said that she greatly admired their heroism. What was their life in camp like, and were they strong enough to stand the hardships? The Grand Duchess Serge is a good feminist and she agreed with me that in Russia’s crisis, as in the situation in all countries created by the war, it had been completely demonstrated that women would have henceforth to play a role equally important and equally prominent as that of men.

They would have to share equally with men in the successful operation of the war whether on the battlefield or behind the lines. She had always had a special devotion to Jeanne d’Arc and believed her to have been inspired by God. Other women also had been called of God to do great things.

“I am glad you like my convent,” she repeated as we parted. “Please come again. You know that it does not belong to me any more, but to the Provisional Government, but I hope they will let me keep it.”

I hope they will. The House of Mary and Martha, with the beautiful woman in it, is one of the things new Russia can least afford to lose.

(From Inside the Russian Revolution by Rheta Childe Dorr. Chapter 15 “The House of Mary and Martha”. Palace Personalities – 1917 Interview with Elizabeth by Rita Childe Dorr, New York, The MacMillan Company 1918 A reprint of this book is available from the Ayer Publishing website)

Fr. Martin commented that, “The property is a blessing as the new church built there will be both visible and accessible  to literally thousands of people every day, and will serve as a beacon attracting people to Orthodoxy.”  Father said, “This is a historical moment for the parish, as it is more than just the groundwork for a new building. It is an opportunity for St. Basil’s Church to more assertively fulfill the Great Commission given to us by our Lord, Himself .”(Mt. 28:19)

The property is located just west of the intersection of Interstate 270 (the outer beltway around St. Louis) and Dougherty Ferry Road, in the city of Des Peres. This parcel of land, which is part of a larger 11 acre tract, offers easy access from virtually any location in the St. Louis metropolitan area.  Mr. John Surgant, who was instrumental in helping to identify and secure this location said “It really gives parishioners and visitors about a 20 minute commute from almost anywhere in the metroplex. Even our parishioners from Illinois can enjoy the convenience of using the east/west Interstates 64 (to the north of the property), or 44 (to the south), exiting at Dougherty Ferry Road from either direction.” 

Mr. Mike Orlando, President of the parish council, indicated that this contract launches several due diligence activities including property survey, title insurance review, and environmental analysis. “While several months are allocated by contract for these activities, we are optomistic that we will not need that much time. We will also need to secure approval of a site plan and architectural drawings from the city of Des Peres, but we are not expecting any surprises there.”

Stay tuned for future announcements on the web site, and articles in the monthly newsletter with property photos and descriptions.

Sister Varvara Yakovleva, also known as Sister Barbara Yakovleva or simply Nun Barbara, (reposed July 18, 1918), was a Russian Orthodox nun in the convent of Grand Duchess Elizabeth Fyodorovna. She was killed by the Bolsheviks along with the grand duchess and Prince Ioann Konstantinovich of Russia, Prince Konstantin Konstantinovich of Russia, Prince Igor Konstantinovich of Russia, Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich of Russia, Fyodor Remez, Grand Duke Sergei’s secretary, and Prince Vladimir Pavlovich Paley at Alapaevsk.

She was later canonized as a martyr by both the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia and the Russian Orthodox Church within Russia.

Life

Yakovleva, small in stature and deeply pious, served as Grand Duchess Elizabeth’s maid before taking the veil.[1] [2] Her nickname was Varya.[1] On April 15, 1910, she took vows as a Russian Orthodox nun. The Grand Duchess and other women also took vows on that date. As sisters of Grand Duchess Elizabeth’s convent, the women were well-known throughout Moscow for performing acts of charity. They took food to the homes of the poor, set up a home for women suffering from tuberculosis, established a hospital to care for the sick, and established homes for the physically disabled, pregnant women, and the elderly. They also established an orphanage. Their charitable efforts later spread to other cities in Russia.[1]

Exile and death

Yakovleva voluntarily accompanied Grand Duchess Elizabeth when she was arrested following the Russian Revolution of 1917 and sent into exile.[3] The group was confined at Yekaterinburg and later at Alapaevsk. On the afternoon of July 18, 1918 they were herded into the woods outside Alapaevsk at gunpoint, clubbed on the back of the head, and thrown one by one into a mineshaft in the woods.[2] All but Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich, who had been shot in the head, survived the fall. They could be heard singing hymns from the bottom of the shaft. One by one they lost consciousness and died.[4]

Yakovleva was canonized as a martyr by the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad as a victim of Soviet oppression along with the other members of the group. She was later also canonized as a martyr by the Russian Orthodox Church inside Russia.

(from Wikipedia)