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<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/i><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/i><\/a>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\nOn the night of January 7, the feast of the Nativity of Christ, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate\u2019s Department for External Church Relations (DECR), celebrated the Divine Liturgy at the Church of the \u2018Joy to All the Afflicted\u201d Icon of the Mother of God. Rev. Dimitry Ageyev, assistant to the DECR chairman, and clerics of the church concelebrated. Grand Compline and Matins were celebrated in the evening of January 6.
\nThe Moscow Synodal Choir conducted by the Merited Artist of Russia Alexei Puzakov sang at the service.
\nMetropolitan Hilarion addressed the worshippers after the reading from the Gospel. He congratulated them on the feast of the Nativity of Christ that fills the hearts with joy and human nature p with the purity of God\u2019s presence.
\nHe said that over centuries the whole nations had been searching the way to God. \u2018There was one nation whom God has entrusted with the mystery of knowing the One God. Thanks to Divine Revelation received through prophets and teachers, these people knew that God is One, that one should fear and honour Him, but a thought that one can love Him had hardly entered their heads.\u2019
\n\u2018In order to make people understand that God is not far from them, that they can love Him and come closer to Him, to feel Him amongst them, the incarnate Son of God became a man.\u2019
\n\u2018We comprehend this while looking at the divine countenance of Christ on many icons and reading about Him in Holy Scriptures.
\n\u2018Any time we recall an event from Christ\u2019s life, be it His Nativity, Epiphany, the Entry into Jerusalem, or His Passion on the Cross, death and Resurrection, the Eucharist is the highest point of our celebration. Only those feasts are the true feasts of our spirit at which we partake of the Holy Mysteries. The Lord has left us the Sacrament of the Eucharist so that we can understand the meaning of the events narrated in Gospels and at the same time to comprehend the meaning of the events in our own life.\u2019
\n\u201cLet us cherish this priceless treasure of the Church \u2013 the Eucharist and try to partake as often as possible, at least on feast days and Sundays, remembering that the Lord has brought us to church as He brought the Magi to His manger so that we can change for the better and convey the grace we receive here to other people.\u2019
\n\u2018Let us thank God for His Incarnation, let us thank God, who over centuries was leading people to salvation and lives amongst us. Let us trust all momentous happenings in our life and rejoice as God is with us!\u2019
\nPrior to Holy Communion, Hegumen Filaret (Tambovsky) read out Christmas Message of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia to the Archpastors, Pastors, Monastics and All the Faithful Children of the Russian Orthodox Church.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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The Moscow Synodal Choir conducted by the Merited Artist of Russia Alexei Puzakov sang at the service.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1,12,94],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56028"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56028"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56028\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}