The MThA Rector celebrated the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts at the Intercession Academic Church

Union with Christ in the Sacrament of Eucharist is the necessity for the Christian. The entire life of the Church is built around daily thanksgiving to God and Communion with His Holy Body and Blood. Therefore, the Divine Liturgy always becomes a solemn and festive event. 

On the days of the Holy Pentecost, a person is forced to leave the house of joy and set out on a journey through the waterless desert, into the depths of his heart. On this difficult journey, there are many dangers, but at the end of this path he will come face to face with his real self and gain something that he did not have before, it is the knowledge of himself. As St. Cyprian of Carthage said, to know God, you have to know yourself first (The Book of Demetrian).

Nevertheless, the Church, like a loving mother, does not let her children go on a journey without any spiritual food. To strengthen the soul, the Church established the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts officiated during the days of the Great Lent on Wednesdays and Fridays. 

On March 22, Friday of the first week of the Great Lent, the Bishop of Sergiev Posad and Dmitrov Kirill, Rector of the Moscow Theological Academy, celebrated the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts co-served by the academic clergy.

After the Sacrament verse, Seraphim Mishakov, a fourth-year undergraduate student, delivered a sermon. In his speech, the preacher talked about the repentant attitude that the Lord granted the most during the Great Lent. 

The Church asks us not to show deeds, which the great ascetics were famous for, but to direct our will to repentance. Seeing our intention and our efforts, the Lord will kindle repentance in our hearts and go unharmed through the fire of passions.

After the prayer behind the ambo, the clergy performed a prayer service with the canon to the Great Martyr Theodore Tiron. After that, Archimandrite Hilarion (Forkavets) offered a prayer to the Lord to bless the kolivo (boiled wheat with honey). 

Background information:

Chanting performed by the first academic choir under the conduct of E.V. Borovinskiy and the first mixed choir led by S.P. Borovinskaya.

MThA Press Office