Vatican
City, 20 April 2013 (VIS) – Cardinal Leonardo Sandri, prefect of the
Congregation for the Oriental Churches, accompanied by Msgr. Maurizio
Malvestiti, under secretary of the same dicastery, visited the Russian
Monastery of the Dormition in Rome on the occasion of the arrival of some
aspirants to the monastic life these past months.
The
cardinal recalled the great richness of the Eastern monastic tradition at the
heart of the Church of Rome, called to preside in charity over the entire
Church, and offering its prayers in a special way for the intentions of the
universal Pastor, Pope Francis. These prayers, the prefect affirmed, will
sustain the life of all the Oriental Catholic Churches, which are often beset
by suffering and persecution, and they will represent an inestimable assistance
on the path toward the reconciliation and unity of all Christians.
The
community, which supported itself in the past by creating icons and liturgical
vestments for bishops and priests, will resume the activity of its workshops.
The
Monastery of the Dormition of Mary (Uspenskij in Slavic) was officially
established on 15 December 1957, in realization of the wishes and commitment of
the then-secretary of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches, Cardinal
Eugenio Tisserant, as well as the dedication of the Jesuit fathers. Founded
during the years of persecution that the Church behind the Iron Curtain
suffered, the monastery was blessed by Pope Pius XII so that it might
contribute, with its prayers, to the spiritual rebirth of the Eastern European
lands, especially Russia. In an audience granted to Cardinal Tisserant in 1956,
he agreed to the establishment in Rome of a Russian monastery for women in
order to “beg the clemency of God Almighty toward the Russian peoples”.
The monastery’s liturgy, as Cardinal Tisserant
desired, is in the Byzantine Rite, always carried out in communion with the
Bishop of Rome, who is named seven times in the daily office of prayers. For
more than 50 years this prayer has continued without interruption. The
monastery has been considered an island of Russia, through which Russian
students, prelates, monks, and nuns have passed, feeling themselves at home.
One such visitor was the current patriarch of Moscow, Kirill I, who came to
know the monastery when he was a young priest.