On 27 September the Orthodox Church prayerfully celebrates the great feast, one of the Twelve Great Feasts, of the Exaltation of the Precious and Life-Giving Cross of the Lord!
On this feast day the Divine Liturgy was celebrated at Saint Alexius Cathedral. The service was led by the rector, Priest Igor Babakov.
On the eve, 26 September, the All-Night Vigil was celebrated with the bringing out of the Cross of the Lord, and all the worshippers were able to venerate and kiss the Cross.
The feast that the Orthodox Church celebrates on 27 September was established in memory of the finding and the exaltation of the Cross of Christ. It is perhaps the only feast that began at the same time as the very event to which it is dedicated. This remarkable event took place under Emperor Constantine the Great, the first of the Roman emperors to put an end to the persecution of Christians. On the day of the Exaltation we remember how the Empress Helena, Equal-to-the-Apostles, the mother of Emperor Constantine, found the Cross on which the Lord Jesus Christ was crucified. The Cross was found in 326 near Mount Golgotha in Jerusalem.
The feast of the Exaltation shows us that a person can be victorious over evil, sin and death if he accepts the love of Christ and wishes to answer it with his own. The Cross of Christ is the love of the God-Man, and it is open to all people. The cross of a Christian is his love directed towards God and towards all people.
At the end of the Divine Liturgy, after the veneration of the Precious and Life-Giving Cross of the Lord, Fr. Igor greeted the parishioners on the occasion of the great feast.
"May the power of the Precious and Life-Giving Cross, which overshadows us on the paths of our life, strengthen our desire to follow Christ, placing at the centre of our life the Cross of Christ and our own cross-bearing. May this grace-filled power help us travel to the end the path that was laid from Heaven to earth and that today raises man up to the Heavenly Mansions."
Before Thy Cross we bow down in worship, O Master, and Thy holy Resurrection we glorify!
After the service a moleben with the blessing of water was celebrated and the akathist to the Exaltation of the Cross was read; then the parishioners congratulated the rector, Priest Igor Babakov, on his birthday.
