During the Crucifixion Week of Great Lent, on April 7, 2024, about 100 parishioners of the Yekaterinburg church in the name of St. Stephen of Velikopermsky with prayers reached the Kazan temple, where they delivered a unique relic – an ancient cross with particles of 34 saints of God. The procession was led by the rector of the church, Priest Alexander Karachev.
Along the way, the prayer procession made two stops – at the site of the Church of the Ascension of the Lord, demolished in the XX century, and at the monument to the children of the orphanage who gave their lives for Russia in the Great Patriotic War. The participants of the procession prayed and got acquainted with the history of the first temple of the village of Nizhneisetsky, now the Himmash district of Yekaterinburg.
According to Father Alexander Karachev, the beginning of the history of the first church in Nizhneisetsk dates back to 1755, when a chapel in honor of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul was created in the Epiphany Cathedral, located in the city center.
The parish in honor of the Kazan Icon of the Mother of God greeted the participants of the procession with a bell ringing. According to Orthodox tradition, pigeons were launched on the porch of the Kazan Temple in honor of the feast of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
At the end of the procession, the abbots, ministers and parishioners of the two churches performed joint glorification of the Holy Life-Giving Cross of the Lord and the Most Holy Theotokos. Parishioners of the Kazan Church prepared a festive lunch for the guests.
The "Stefanovites" left a shrine – a Cross-a reliquary – in the Kazan church for a week. Next Sunday, the fourth Week of Lent, the Cross will be returned in a "reciprocal" procession.
Processions between two temples, on the territory of the Yekaterinburg settlements of Himmash and Nizhneisetsky, have become traditional and are performed three times a year – in the Week of the Cross, the feast of the Ascension (Origin) of the Honest Trees of the Life-Giving Cross of the Lord and the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross of the Lord.