Procession to Ganina Yama

VERHNYAYA PYSHMA (Sverdlovsk region), July 17 - RIA Novosti. The Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus' led a 100,000-strong religious procession from the center of Yekaterinburg to the burial place of the family of Nicholas II in the Ganina Yama tract and performed a funeral service in the monastery of the Holy Royal Martyrs founded here, RIA Novosti correspondent reports.

On the day of the centenary of the execution of the royal family, the patriarch led a procession of many thousands, which passed from the center of Yekaterinburg to the burial place of the royal martyrs. It began from the Church on the Blood, where the patriarch celebrated the night liturgy. In total, the primate of the Russian Orthodox Church and the pilgrims covered 22 kilometers. According to law enforcement agencies, the number of participants in the procession exceeded one hundred thousand people.

“Even more people will come than came out. Services are performed throughout the city, while this river is moving through the streets of the city, groups of people join from different sides. Despite fatigue and age, everyone wants to participate in the procession as best they can,” RIA Novosti reported. Viceroy of the Monastery of the Holy Royal Passion-Bearers in the Ganina Yama tract, Bishop of Nizhny Tagil and Nevyansk Eugene.

In Ganina Yama, Patriarch Kirill performed a prayer service at the worship cross, installed near the mine, where the Bolsheviks tried to destroy the remains of members of the royal family.

“Those who cannot enter our monastery, and it is small, as you can see, will be able to see the service on large screens. We will feed everyone, give tea, share the gifts of the monastery. Believe me, baking a hundred thousand pies is a feat,” said Bishop Eugene .

The Monastery of the Holy Royal Passion-Bearers was founded in 2000 by decision of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church. For three years, until September 2003, 7 wooden churches were built and consecrated here in honor of the royal martyrs, St. Seraphim of Sarov, St. Sergius of Radonezh, the Iberian Icon of the Mother of God, the Sovereign Icon of the Mother of God, St. Nicholas, the World of Lycian Wonderworker and righteous Job the Long-suffering.

"With a joyful feeling, I walked this sorrowful path together with all of you. We believe that today the family of the royal martyrs is with us in this prayer and in this procession. Lifting up a prayer to them, we ask them, first of all, to be intercessors before God for the land our Russian, for our people and our Church, so that the Lord would protect us from all turmoil, schisms, divisions and all human untruth, in order to keep us the truth of faith and the piety of our people," said Patriarch Kirill after the end of the service and the procession.

Holy Rus' led by the Holy Tsar Martyr Nicholas. Holy Rus' is going to the Urals. At the Royal Golgotha. Here are Belgorod and Tobolsk, Tomsk and Moscow, St. Petersburg and Vladivostok... Here is Kyiv and Kievan Rus. Prayer books in white kerchiefs arrived from Kyiv itself. The icons were presented with the image of the Mother of God "Look for humility" and the Cathedral of the Kiev-Pechersk Saints...

Unprecedented spiritual power - the boundless line of Orthodox prayerfully marches through the night streets of Yekaterinburg. Along the road used to take out the holy bodies of the Royal Martyrs.

Procession along this road to Ganina Yama in Yekaterinburg. One hundred years later. Twenty kilometers from the Ipatiev House, where the Church-on-the-Blood is now. On royal blood. From the place where the demons who took human form brutally dealt with the Crowned Family.

When the Sovereign was killed, when the Mystery of Lawlessness was being performed, the Sverdlovsk demons hoped to hide all traces. The mutilated bodies of the holy Martyrs were taken to a deaf and gloomy pine forest. To an abandoned mine - a pit. To Ganina Yama. There, the bodies were completely destroyed. Doused with acid, burned. The demons of Sverdlovsk carefully concealed everything. In the deaf Ural forests.

The procession stretched for several kilometers. Adult sixty-year-old men, hurried and out of breath teenagers, grandmothers mincing intently. Children seven years old and babies in strollers. All ages and all of Russia in the procession for the centenary of the Royal Golgotha. His Holiness Patriarch Kirill walked briskly at the head with the bishops and many clergy. He went all the way, which impressed many experienced crusaders...

Five hours of endless prayer. - Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of God! Have mercy on us! - male voices sing. They are replaced by women. Prayer calls for grace. Prayer sets the pace.

Either the Serbs, or some other Slavs sang in such a way that the prayer song flew a couple of kilometers ahead. They sang in Russian with an accent, but from the bottom of their hearts.

The great July night passed quickly. Before reaching the forest, on the outskirts of Yekaterinburg, dawn broke. Yekaterinburg is a gloomy city. Lies on this city the seal of the terrible sin of regicide. It is especially felt on all our people here, in Yekaterinburg. Although the streets are spacious, the boulevards are decorated with openwork fences and carved benches. Although the trams, and the subway, and the architecture of the capital, pompous, noisy. And gloomy for some reason. The procession led us out of this Sverdlovsk gloom. From these featureless bedroom communities and industrial zones. Holy Rus' is freed from the gloomy shackles of the Yekaterinburg tragedy in a procession of the cross. One hundred years have passed. We are going on the procession. Lots of crusaders. And yet this is a small handful against the background of all the generations of our people who have lived and are living without a Tsar.

The King is the Anointed One of God. We often repeat these words. Yes, presidents, ministers and generals, high secular leaders are ordinary people. The King is the Anointed One of God. He is responsible for all generations of his people. The Orthodox Tsar is responsible for the whole world. He keeps this world from falling into the abyss of lawlessness. The President is responsible to his constituents. The king is before God.

But now we hear sly speeches. As if the enemy is telling us: “Why are you, Russians, dreaming of a Tsar, of an invincible power? Well, here you are, Russians and greats, play around for now. Here's a little baby in a rubber crown, bathe him in a bath, sew royal clothes ... Well, have fun with your amusing monarchy. And we, serious people, initiated into the secrets of lawlessness and doing lawlessness, do not interfere ... ".

The Russian Tsar is invisible. He is holy. And all his family is holy. Do not invent a cardboard monarchy for Russia! Do not play with the Russian people!

Rus' is walking in procession, choosing the path of Truth. Truth on the Cross. On Golgotha. The truth is Jesus Christ. In Christ forever abides our Russian Tsar, ascended to his Golgotha. Holy Rus' in Christ.

It's dawn. The Ural sky through the dark green branches of the pines near Ganina Yama. The sun on the domes of the monastery churches. The air is transparent, saturated with needles and incense. The crusaders have arrived. They walked all night. Banners, icons, sovereign banners - flutter under the monastic sky. Russian faces, tired, happy, illuminated by grace. Read Akathist over Ganina Pit. - Holy Royal Passion-bearers, pray to God for us! - Orthodox sing. Russian prayer is strong. Strong is the prayer to the Tsar of Russia. The Orthodox are begging for Russia. They beg for the Sovereign King. In the Urals. In the heart of Great Rus', the conciliar prayer of our people flies to Christ.

Romanov Igor Anatolievich , Center for Church-State Relations "Bereg Rus"

Today at Yekaterinburg within the framework of the Orthodox festival "Royal Days" the main divine service was held, the apogee of the event was the religious procession that began at 2.30, in which not only the head of the Russian Orthodox Church Patriarch Kirill, but also the new presidential envoy in the Urals Nikolay Tsukanov, as well as the Sverdlovsk Governor Evgeny Kuyvashev, reports the correspondent.

It was a warm night in Yekaterinburg, so the pilgrims traditionally rested on the lawns and slept on the benches in the literary quarter before the start of the religious procession; a large number of believers.

The religious event was guarded by more than ten PPS cars. First on the road to Ganina Yama an ambulance and a fire engine went. An hour before the night march, two dozen operatives with metal detectors and service dogs checked the central streets for safety - they looked into trash cans and even into electrical panels.

The procession preceded the pool of VIP cars. The foot column was led by Patriarch Kirill, he was surrounded by "men in black" - apparently guards. Evgeny Kuyvashev and Deputy Chief of Staff of the Governor's Office Vadim Dubichev also took part in the procession. Also among the crusaders was the commissioner for human rights in the Sverdlovsk region Tatyana Merzlyakova.

The marchers will walk 20 km from Church-on-the-Blood which was erected on site Ipatiev house , where the former Tsar Nicholas II and his family were shot a hundred years ago. Believers will go on foot to Ganina Yama, where the remains of the royal family were supposedly destroyed. The church authorities always adhered to the version that the bodies were not preserved, but in the 1970s, the expedition of a geologist Alexandra Avdonina found a burial near the Old Koptyakovskaya road in a place called Porosenkov Log. In the 90s, the process of extracting and studying the remains began, the government of Boris Yeltsin insisted on the speedy recognition of the remains of Nicholas II, but the Russian Orthodox Church still refuses to recognize the authenticity of the remains, although, initiated in our time, it came to the conclusion that on the Old Koptyakovskaya road the remains of the royal family and Nicholas II were found. The ROC does not comment on the results of the work of forensic experts and ignores DNA research. Perhaps the Church will announce its official position in two years at the Council of Bishops.

Religious processions have become a tradition since the 1990s, when several dozen pilgrims came to Yekaterinburg, today there are already several tens of thousands of pilgrims, previously it was said in the Russian Orthodox Church that at least 100 thousand people would gather for a century of tragic events. This year Procession will be officially held for the eleventh time, not only residents from other regions, but also foreigners will participate in it.

It is noteworthy that the MP Natalia Poklonskaya known for its reverence Nicholas II, this year she did not come to the "Russian Golgotha".

Head of the Synodal Department for External Church Relations, Metropolitan of Volokolamsk Hilarion, speaking of the "Royal Days", began to promote the ideas of further de-Sovietization of the streets, he went further and proposed renaming the entire Sverdlovsk region into Yekaterinburg on the eve of the centenary of the execution of the royal family, and also erecting a monument to Nicholas II near the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow.

To the "Orthodox Festival" Yekaterinburg prepared in a peculiar way: a "blue line" was drawn through the city - a route going through the religious sights of the city. But whether toilets and resting places were built for hundreds of thousands of visitors is unknown. It should be reminded that the residents of the houses, through whose yards the pilgrimage usually passes, complained more than once that the lack of toilets forces believers to use their entrances for other purposes.

Also, more than once, the solution to the transport issue was criticized - how do people get in the morning from Ganina Yama home, there were often not enough buses. The route of the procession begins from the central streets, which are specially blocked and "cleared" from obstacles, runs through visa, sorting and then the path goes to the villages Seven keys and Shuvakish. The column, singing prayers, stretches for kilometers, the crusaders arrive at their destination already before dark.

On the night of July 16-17, 2018, on the 100th anniversary of the execution of the royal family, His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus' led the traditional Royal procession from the place of the martyrdom of the holy Royal Passion-Bearers and their faithful servants to the Monastery of the Holy Royal Passion-Bearers in the Ganina Yama tract ( distance - 21 km). The procession was attended by many bishops who served His Holiness at the Liturgy. In total, according to law enforcement agencies, about 100 thousand people took part in the procession.

Route of the procession: st. Royal - st. Tolmacheva - Lenin Ave. - st. Tatishchev - st. Bebel - st. Technical - st. Reshetskaya - Railway forest park - Shuvakish village - Ganina Yama tract.

By tradition, the procession was made with banners and icons, including a two-meter icon of Emperor Nicholas II, created in 2017 for the temple in honor of the icon of the Mother of God "Reigning" on Ganina Yama. The weight of the icon with the kiot is about 150 kg. Since the icon is very heavy, special stretchers on wheels were made to move it.

Volunteers took part in organizing the work of tent camps in Yekaterinburg and on Ganina Yama, the night service and the procession royal days. Volunteers include representatives of Orthodox youth associations of the Yekaterinburg Metropolis and other dioceses of the Russian Orthodox Church. Also, representatives of secular organizations participated in the organization of the Tsar's Days: the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the Union of Rescuers, the Union of Volunteers of Russia, the Sverdlovsk Regional Medical College, etc.

The procession was also accompanied by 25 mobile groups of the Orthodox Service of Mercy, which consisted of clergy, representatives of the Assumption Orthodox Brotherhood of Yekaterinburg, sisters of mercy, and volunteers. They helped those people who, due to weakness, could not go through the whole way of the cross.

Field kitchens were organized near the fence of the monastery on Ganina Yama and tents were set up for rest of pilgrims.

His Holiness Patriarch Kirill walked the entire route of the procession. On the morning of July 17, a procession led by the Primate of the Russian Orthodox Church arrived at the Monastery of the Holy Royal Passion-Bearers at Ganina Yama. In the monastery in front of the venerable cross near shaft No. 7, His Holiness Vladyka performed a prayer service to the holy Royal Passion-Bearers.

Then His Holiness Patriarch Kirill addressed the faithful with the First Hierarchal Word:

“His Eminence and Grace Bishops! Dear fathers, brothers and sisters!

With a joyful feeling, I walked this mournful path together with all of you on the day when we remember and celebrate the tragic event -we celebrate, because through this event the royal family was canonized as a saint. And we believe that today she, the family of the Royal Passion-Bearers, is with us in this prayer and in this procession.

Lifting up a prayer to the holy saints of God, we ask them to be intercessors before God for our Russian land, our people, our Church, so that the Lord would protect our Fatherland, and the people, and the Church from all confusion, divisions, splits, all human unrighteousness, in order to keep us the truth of faith and the piety of our people. We believe that if we save this, then we will save Russia, and the country will be great and the people will prosper. With their prayers, may the Lord protect the Russian land. Amen".

The procession to the Ganina Yama and the prayer service at the Monastery of the Holy Royal Passion-Bearers were the last events in the program of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill's First Hierarchal visit to the Yekaterinburg Metropolis, timed to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the execution of the royal family.

Brief information

At the turn of the 19th–20th centuries, iron ore was mined in the Ganina Yama tract. According to available information, miners were called "gans". Subsequently, the mines left by them became known as ganin pits. There were about 30 of them.

In 1991, with the blessing of the Archbishop of Sverdlovsk and Kurgan Melchizedek, the first worship cross was installed on Ganina Yama.

On July 17, 1992, the first Royal procession arrived at the site of the destruction of the remains of the royal family. This is how the tradition of the Royal Days, the days of remembrance of the Royal Passion-Bearers, was born. If initially about a dozen people participated in such religious processions, today there are about a hundred thousand.

On the night of July 17, 1995, the Divine Liturgy was performed for the first time at the cross over Ganina Pit. After that, night liturgies on the tragic day of remembrance began to be performed here every year.

At the Jubilee Bishops' Council, held in Moscow on August 14, 2000, the royal family was glorified as martyrs.

On September 23, 2000, His Holiness Patriarch Alexy II, upon his arrival at the Ganina Yama tract, blessed the construction of the monastery of the Holy Royal Passion-Bearers at the place where the remains of the members of the royal family were brought after the execution. The monastery was established by the decision of the Holy Synod on December 28, 2000. The builder of the monastery was shiigumen Sergius (Romanov). For three years, by September 2003, 7 wooden churches were built and consecrated here (according to the number of members of the royal family) in honor of: the Royal Passion-Bearers, St. Seraphim of Sarov, St. ”, St. Nicholas, the World of the Lycian Wonderworker, the righteous Job the Long-suffering.

The center of the monastery is mine No. 7, where the remains of members of the royal family were abused and which, in fact, became an antimension itself. This is how His Holiness Patriarch Alexy II called it in his sermon after the prayer service: “The entire space of Ganina Yama is a living antimension, permeated with particles of burnt holy relics.”