+ PAPIST + FILIOQUIST + AZYMITE +: Orthodox icon to protect British royal family

Sunday, March 29, 2009

Orthodox icon to protect British royal family

Queen Elizabeth II ordered a unique Russian Orthodox icon to be delivered to the Buckingham Palace, Russian web-site Life.ru reports. She hopes it will protect her family and help avoid conflicts and other misfortunes.

His Royal Highness Prince Michael of Kent expressed his wish to obtain a holy Orthodox icon as a gift for the British Queen a year ago during his informal visit to the town of Nevjansk in Sverdloskiy Region. His Royal Highness was particularly impressed by the icons he saw at the House of Nevjansk Icons, a local artisan work shop, world famous for its priceless icon painting.

“The Nevjansk artisans have preserved the ancient craft’s secrets, not only reviving old traditions, but also applying new modern technologies,” Natalya Savkina, deputy director of the House of Nevjansk claims.

Michael of Kent admired the holy icons and wondered if he could get one of the wonderwork to bring to the Queen. "I'd love her to see this miracle," the Prince explained. “There’s an amazing energy emanating from your icons!”

The Prince particularly liked one of the most highly cherished icons in Russia, Our Lady’s icon, “Tenderness.” St. Seraphim of Sarov, (see pic to right) a highly revered 19th-century Russian monk, kept it in his cell and treasured its magical power of healing the sick. He called this icon “Umilenie” (Tenderness), representing Mary's feelings of tenderness at the Annunciation the “Joy of All Joys”.

“Besides having a miraculous healing power, it also has a pacifying holy effect,” icon painters explained to the Prince. People turn to this icon in times of distress and family discord, asking for apology. The Prince agreed that it was exactly what the Queen needed – young Prince Harry who had recently parted with his girl friend, was making her constantly worried.

Painting the “Tenderness” icon took Nevjansk icon painters almost a year. In the process, they used the most modern technology while religiously observing all ancient traditions. “It is an extremely time consuming process. The icon is made of copper, covered with braid gold and painted with special dyes made by a special formula minerals found only in the Urals", they explained.

The Queen’s Private Secretary’s office sent to Nevjansk a formal reply confirming that the icon had found its place in one of the Buchingham Palace halls. “Her Majesty sincerely thanks you for the miraculous icon, “ it said.

Queen Elizabeth has already offered her prayers for her family and her subjects before the icon, Life.ru reports.

Pope Urges Pastors
to Learn and Teach Liturgy

Pope Benedict XVI is encouraging pastors to catechize parishioners about the depth of the liturgy and the meaning of the sacraments as encounters with God.
The Pope affirmed this in a meeting Feb. 26 with parish priests of the Diocese of Rome, a Lenten tradition, in which he answered their questions and concerns.
He noted, "What is really important for me is that the sacraments [...] not be something foreign along with more contemporary endeavors." He added, "It can easily happen that the sacrament remains somewhat isolated in a more pragmatic context and becomes a reality that is not altogether inserted in the totality of our being."
The Pontiff stressed the need for catechesis in the parishes. He affirmed that it is important that God "not be distant but reconcilable, concrete, that he enter our lives and really be a friend with whom we can talk and who talks with us."
He continued, "We must learn to celebrate the Eucharist, learn to know Jesus Christ, the God with a human face, up close, really enter into contact with him, learn to listen to him and to allow him to enter into us."
Sacramental communion, explained the Holy Father, is not just taking a piece of bread, but rather is opening "my heart so that the Risen One will enter the context of my being, so that he is within me and not just outside of me, and thus speaks with me and transforms my being."
"He gives me the sense of justice, the dynamism of justice, in zeal for the Gospel," noted Benedict XVI.
He affirmed, "This celebration, in which God not only comes close to us, but enters into the fabric of our existence, is essential to really be able to live with God and for God and to take the light of God to this world."
Body of Christ
The Pope stated that this understanding also "leads me to the other because the other receives the same Christ, as I do."
He continued: "Hence, if the same Christ is in him and me, we also are no longer separate individual beings. Herein lies the birth of the doctrine of the Body of Christ, because we have all been incorporated if we receive the Eucharist correctly in the same Christ.
"Hence, my neighbor is truly close: we are no longer two separate 'I's, but we are united in the same 'I' of Christ."
The Pontiff told the pastors that "Eucharistic and sacramental catechesis must really go to the depth of our existence, to be, in fact, education to open myself to the voice of God, to let myself be opened to break this original sin of egoism and to open my existence profoundly, so that I will really be just."
He noted, "We must all learn the liturgy better, not as something exotic but as the heart of our being Christian, which does not open easily to a distant man, but which is, on the other hand, precisely openness to the other, to the world."
The Holy Father emphasized: "We must all collaborate in celebrating the Eucharist ever more profoundly: not only as a rite but as an existential process that touches me profoundly, more than anything else, and changes me, transforms me and, by transforming me, sparks the transformation of the world that the Lord desires and of which He wishes to make me an instrument."

Sunday, March 29, 2009

Orthodox icon to protect British royal family

Subscribe To Posts