Metropolitan Vikenty Concelebrates with Patriarch Kirill at the Liturgy before the Church on the Blood on the Centenary of the Royal Family's Execution

On the night of 16 to 17 July 2018, the centenary of the execution of the Royal Family, His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia celebrated the Divine Liturgy on a platform in front of the Memorial Church on the Blood in Honor of All Saints Resplendent in the Russian Land in Yekaterinburg. The platform was set up on the area before the gates of the lower church, which houses the "Royal Room", a chapel dedicated to the Holy Royal Passion-Bearers built on the site where the Royal Family was murdered.

The service at the place of the martyric death of the Holy Royal Passion-Bearers and their faithful servants was the culmination of the Royal Days in the Metropolis of Yekaterinburg, dedicated to the centenary of the tragic events. The Holy Royal Passion-Bearers, Emperor Nicholas Alexandrovich, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, Tsarevich Alexei and Grand Duchesses Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia, met their martyric end 100 years ago, on the night of 16 to 17 July 1918, in the basement of the Ipatiev House. In 2000–2003, the Memorial Church on the Blood was built on the site of the Ipatiev House, which had been demolished in 1977.

Concelebrating with His Holiness were: Metropolitan Onufriy of Kiev and All Ukraine; Metropolitan Juvenaly of Krutitsy and Kolomna; Metropolitan Vladimir of Chisinau and All Moldova; Metropolitan Alexander of Astana and Kazakhstan, head of the Metropolitan District in the Republic of Kazakhstan; Metropolitan Vikenty of Tashkent and Uzbekistan, head of the Central Asian Metropolitan District; Metropolitan Varsonofy of St. Petersburg and Ladoga, Chancellor of the Moscow Patriarchate; Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, chairman of the Department for External Church Relations; Metropolitan Veniamin of Vladivostok and Primorye; Metropolitan Kirill of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye; Metropolitan Mark of Ryazan and Mikhailov, chairman of the Financial and Economic Department of the Moscow Patriarchate; Metropolitan Nikodim of Chelyabinsk and Miass; Metropolitan Pavel of Khanty-Mansiysk and Surgut; Metropolitan Sergiy of Barnaul and Altai; Archbishop Alexander of Baku and Azerbaijan; Archbishop Peter of Chicago and Mid-America; Archbishop Sergiy of Solnechnogorsk, head of the Administrative Secretariat of the Moscow Patriarchate; Archbishop Nikolai of Salekhard and Novy Urengoy; Archbishop Matfei of Yegoryevsk; Bishop Alexander of Daugavpils and Rezekne; Bishop Theodosius of Seattle; Bishop George of Canberra; Bishop Nestor of Korsun; Bishop Feodosy of Isilkul and Russkaya Polyana; Bishop Pyotr of Kalachinsk and Muromtsevo; Bishop Savvaty of Tara and Tyukalinsk; Bishop Pitirim of Dushanbe and Tajikistan; Bishop Innokenty of Mariinsk and Yurga; Bishop Innokenty of Magnitogorsk and Verkhneuralsk; Bishop Antony of Akhtubinsk and Enotaevka; Bishop Roman of Rubtsovsk and Aleisk; Bishop Mitrofan of Severomorsk and Umba; Bishop Methodius of Kamensk and Alapaevsk; Bishop Grigory of Troitsk and Yuzhnouralsk; Bishop Paisy of Shchigry and Manturovo; Bishop Evgeny of Nizhny Tagil and Nevyansk; Bishop Vikenty of Zlatoust and Satka; Bishop Alexy of Serov and Krasnoturyinsk; Archpriest Maxim Minyailo, senior priest of the Church on the Blood; Hieromonk Kirill (Korytko), secretary of the diocesan administration of the Diocese of Yekaterinburg; and the clergy of the Metropolis of Yekaterinburg.

Attending the service were: N.N. Tsukanov, Plenipotentiary Representative of the President in the Ural Federal District; E.V. Kuyvashev, Governor of Sverdlovsk Region; S.A. Gavrilov, chairman of the State Duma Committee on the Development of Civil Society and Public and Religious Associations; L.V. Babushkina, chair of the Legislative Assembly of Sverdlovsk Region; S.V. Stepashin, chairman of the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society; A.V. Gromova, chair of the board of trustees of the Elisabeth and Sergius Educational Society foundation; the leadership of Sverdlovsk Region and of the city of Yekaterinburg; and representatives of the House of Romanov: Grand Duchess M.V. Romanova, O.N. Kulikovskaya-Romanova, P.E. Kulikovsky-Romanov and L.A. Kulikovskaya-Romanova.

Praying at the Liturgy were residents of Yekaterinburg and numerous pilgrims who had come to the capital of the Urals from various regions of Russia and from abroad: Azerbaijan, Australia, Austria, Belarus, Bulgaria, the United Kingdom, Germany, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, China, Lithuania, Moldova, New Zealand, Serbia, the USA, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Ukraine, France, Estonia, South Korea and Japan. A tent camp where pilgrims could eat and rest was set up near the church.

The liturgical hymns were sung by the clergy choir of the Diocese of Yekaterinburg (precentor Priest Alexy Rusin) and the hierarchal choir of the Holy Trinity Cathedral of Yekaterinburg (precentor M.Yu. Litvinenko).

The Patriarchal service was broadcast live on the Soyuz TV channel and on the Patriarchia.ru portal. Many of the faithful watched the broadcast on large screens set up on Tsarskaya Street next to the Church on the Blood.

After the Augmented Litany, the Primate of the Russian Orthodox Church offered a prayer for peace in Ukraine.

The following petition was included in the Litany for the Departed: "Again we pray for the repose of the souls of the departed servants of God slain in this place, Ioann, Alexy and Anna, and of all who were slain by the godless in the time of fierce persecution, who died of wounds, sickness and hunger in camps, in prisons and in bonds, who were tormented in bitter labors, and all who labored in the struggle of confession, and that they may be forgiven every transgression, both voluntary and involuntary."

Before the Communion of the laity, His Holiness Patriarch Kirill addressed the faithful with his Primatial Word.

His Holiness presented a processional cross as a gift to the Church on the Blood, and 15 altar Gospels for other churches of the Diocese of Yekaterinburg.

After the Divine Liturgy, His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia led the traditional Royal procession of the cross from the place of the martyric death of the Holy Royal Passion-Bearers and their faithful servants to the Monastery of the Holy Royal Passion-Bearers at Ganina Yama (a distance of 21 km). The route of the procession: Tsarskaya Street, Tolmacheva Street, Lenin Avenue, Tatishcheva Street, Bebelya Street, Tekhnicheskaya Street, Reshetskaya Street, the Railway Forest Park, the village of Shuvakish and the Ganina Yama tract.