On 23 January 2021 the clergy and parishioners of the Church of the Great Martyr George the Victorious in Samarkand welcomed their archpastor, the head of the Central Asian Metropolitan District, Metropolitan Vikenty of Tashkent and Uzbekistan. On this day, when the Holy Church commemorates St. Gregory of Nyssa and St. Theophan the Recluse of Vysha, Metropolitan Vikenty celebrated the Divine Liturgy in this Samarkand church.
Concelebrating with His Eminence were the dean of the Samarkand Deanery, Archpriest Roman Zagrebelny; the rector of the church, Priest Timofei Fishelev; Priest Igor Babakov; Priest Vladimir Matveev; and Priest Oleg Lin.
The sermon before Communion was delivered by the rector of the church, Father Timofei.
After the Sacrament of Communion and the prayer before the ambo, Metropolitan Vikenty offered his prayer to St. Theophan and then addressed the worshippers with an archpastoral word, congratulating everyone on the feasts of the Nativity of Christ and Theophany and noting:
"We celebrate these feasts over many days so that we may be imbued with the depth of their meaning, receiving from them, besides the abundant grace of God that the Lord sends so richly in these days, also lessons that can help us grow in God. The gifts that the Savior brought in these days must find a response in our soul and in our life.
In these feasts we can see a great many edifying things that Christ the Savior brought to us on earth, for He came to earth in order to raise us up to heaven. He came to give us blessed eternity. Therefore by His own example He showed the path to eternal life here on this earth. We see that the Lord, knowing our infirmity, our weaknesses, our falls and our fallen nature, appeared on earth to endow everyone with the great grace of God for our enlightenment and sanctification, so that by God's grace we might gain wisdom to walk the path to the Kingdom of Heaven, to the eternal mansions."
In his sermon His Eminence also said a few words about the saints commemorated on that day:
"St. Gregory of Nyssa lived in the 4th century; he was the brother of Basil the Great. They were pillars of the faith of Christ at a time when schismatics and various heretics had already appeared, among them the Arians, who even persecuted the champions of Orthodoxy. For this reason St. Gregory of Nyssa was driven from his see for several years and endured many sorrows, but he bore his obedience humbly and obediently, turning people from the false path to the true Orthodox faith.
For us the family of Basil the Great is an example. There were ten brothers and sisters in this family, and almost all of them have been numbered among the saints. The whole family is holy. They fulfilled what is required of us; they strove for holiness.
We are called to holiness, and we have everything we need for it. We have Baptism and the grace of this Sacrament; we have the Sacraments of the Church, among them the Sacrament of Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ; we have the grace of God; God is with us. We have everything; only our desire is lacking. They had this desire to attain holiness, and they attained it. Of course, we must enlighten ourselves, our relatives and our grandchildren, and bring them to God.
God grant that through the prayers of St. Gregory of Nyssa and St. Theophan the Recluse the Lord may grant us zeal for our salvation and a longing for eternal blessed life, so that by our earthly life we may earn eternal life."
