His Holiness Patriarch Alexy celebrated Divine Liturgy in the Archangel Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin

The Orthodox Church celebrates the Synaxis of Archangel Michael and all Bodiless Heavenly Powers on November 21. The feast was established at the Local Council of Laodicea in the early 4th century held some years before the First Ecumenical Council. Canon 35 of the Laodicea Council denounced and repudiated heretic worshipping of the angels as creators and rulers of the world and asserted their Orthodox veneration.

On 21 November 2005, His Holiness Patriarch Alexy II of Moscow and All Russia and Bishop Alexander of Dmitrov celebrated Divine Liturgy in the Archangel Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin. The Cathedral was built in 1505-08 on the site of an old Church of the Archangel built by Grand Prince Ivan Kalita in the early 14th c. in commemoration of the deliverance of Moscow from starvation. The Archangel Cathedral was the necropolis of the Moscow grand princes and tsars till the time when Emperor Peter I made St.Petersburg the capital city.

Praying at the divine service celebrated in the Archangel Cathedral on its dedication day were faculty and students of the Department of Orthodox Culture of the Peter the Great Strategic Missile Forces Military Academy, staff members of the Synodal Department for Relations with the Army and Law Enforcement agencies and representatives of the Union of the Archangel Michael.

His Holiness Patriarch Alexy congratulated all those present on the Synaxis of Archangel Michael and all Bodiless Heavenly Powers and on the dedication day of the Archangel Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin.

After the Divine service His Holiness Patriarch Alexy awarded the commandant of the Moscow Kremlin lieutenant-general S.D.Khlebnikov with the Order of the Holy and Right-Believing Prince Dmitry Donskoy, 2nd class. A group of servicemen was also honoured with the church orders.