Exactly one year later, in June 2018, 30 years will pass from the day when the first monks returned to the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra. At the outskirts of the USSR, the museum-reserve gave them the first temples in the Lower Lavra. It was in the summer of 1988 that the brethren resumed divine services, interrupted in 1961, reviving the surviving centuries-old walls with prayer. During the year "Today" together with the monks of the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra, its rector, Metropolitan Paul, historians of the reserve, icon painters and restorers, will tell how the pearl of Orthodoxy revived after the Soviet power. Now it seems to us that in the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra it has always been so beautiful, cozy and well-groomed. That the temples never collapsed, the roads were always comfortable, and the gardens always blossomed and fruited. And only the generation of the 1950s, remembering that it was here in Soviet times, without saying a word, now exclaims: "It can not be! What a beautiful Kiev Laurel!". Old-timers remember how the relics went to the relics' relics, like a museum, giving a ticket at the entrance, and inside the caves there was such stuffiness that people lost consciousness. They will remember that the gardens did not bear fruit at all, the roofs of the temples flowed and fell through, and the main road to the lower laurel was always blurred with snow and rain. A mute reproach was the fragments of the walls of the Assumption Cathedral.

"The first time I came to the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra in 1985," recalls the governor of the monastery, Metropolitan Paul. - I still remember two walls sticking out in the middle of the square - the limit of John the Theologian, the beloved disciple of our Lord Jesus Christ - this is all that was left of the Uspensky Cathedral that was blown up in 1941. At that time I did not yet know that the Lord would show such kindness and grant me the honor of participating in the restoration of the greatest shrine not only of Ukraine, but of the entire Orthodox world. When I learned about the decision of the hierarchy to transfer me to the Lavra from the parish in Western Ukraine (Vladyka was the abbot of the monastery in Nizhkinichi of the Volyn region. - Auto. ), I cried - from reverence and fear simultaneously. He understood that, on the one hand, it is a great honor, but on the other - this is a great test, because Lavra was in a deplorable state. It seemed to the human mind that the main shrine, the Assumption Cathedral, would never be restored. But the Lord God has His plans. In 1994, at the ruins of the Great Church, we met with His Beatitude Metropolitan Volodymyr (Heavenly Kingdom!) And conducted the first divine service on the street. As it is now, so it was then - it was the territory of the museum-reserve, and it was not allowed to hold liturgies. But we still served, overcoming the fear and attacks of atheists. I still remember how 50 storks circled above our heads in that first Liturgy! They wrote out eight for a long time. Since that time, the revival of the Lavra began - from storks, in the circle of which we saw the blessing of God and the Mother of God.

And indeed, miracles have begun! The Lord blessed us with wise people - architects, historians, icon painters. As the great date - the 2000th anniversary of the Nativity of Christ was approaching, we were very much helped by the President of Ukraine, Leonid Kuchma. How many tons of garbage we took from here! Trucks made thousands of walkers. Many buildings were not, from them there were only foundations on which over time, according to the projects of architects, the destroyed buildings. But first of all they restored the technical documentation. I was amazed - Lavra has been on the UNESCO list since 1980, but in 1994 two-thirds of the documents simply were not there! Where we just did not write, there were no commissions here - and the Ministry of Architecture, and the Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Finance. We brought documents from St. Petersburg, Vilnius, Moscow - they collected them bit by bit. The first stone in the construction of the Assumption we laid on the Pokrov in 1998. At the same time the St. Michael's Golden-Domed Monastery was restored in parallel, therefore we together with the main architect of "Ukrestrestoration" Nikolay Orlenko asked for help at once to both monasteries. And both were restored! There have been miracles - for example, in 1995, the discovery of the relics of Paul Tobolsky and the attempt to steal from us his holy relics. Now the relics of the saint are resting in the Far Caves of the Lavra, and those who tried to commit this atrocity died - one two days after the attempted theft, another - six months later. The truth is said: the Lord is not mocked! When I arrived, in the building No. 34 was the Italian Embassy, ??a tobacco factory, in the Church of All the Afflicted Joy - a jewelry workshop for falsifying jewelry, in the 70th building - a kindergarten and a library of four boxes of books. In a lamentable condition were the monasteries of Lavra - Kietaev Pustyn, where we restored the first thing the temple of Seraphim of Sarov, the Holosieva Desert was completely destroyed. In the Vvedensky Monastery was an American computer firm that refused to take away their furniture and equipment. My brother and I carried everything, carefully covered with an oilcloth and called the police to document all their property. Then the powers that were with pleasure helped to rebuild the monastery. Without the help of patrons of the monasteries and monasteries, as we see today, there simply would not have been. The Lord showed us: "Restoring the Lavra is not necessary quickly. It needs to be restored for ages ".

Assumption Cathedral. Destroyed by the explosion in 1941 and stood there for almost 60 years. UNESCO'S MISSION IN MARCH CONFIRMED: LAVRA MEETS ALL REQUIREMENTS Kiev-Pechersk Lavra - the greatest monument included in the UNESCO World Heritage List. Every 2-3 years he passes the monitoring missions of the Center for International Heritage and the International Council for the Preservation of Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS). Despite this, periodically in the media there are accusations of illegal buildings in the laurel. As far as this corresponds to reality, "Today" found out from the management of the reserve. "Most recently, in March, we had a UNESCO monitoring mission, it inspected all the facilities," Lyubomir Mikhaililina, head of the reserve, told "Today". - The mission concluded that all of them do not distort the value of the object. The final documents say: "The mission came to the conclusion that the works carried out by the monastery of the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra do not have a negative impact on the outstanding universal value of the object". All the insinuations around this issue - either because of the incompetence of the media, or black PR.

The reserve complains about a number of real problems, the most global one - the total lack of state financing during 2014-2016 for the restoration and conservation of architectural monuments! All work is carried out at the expense of the reserve and philanthropists. There are problems that concern not only the budget of the reserve, but also the budget of the country. "On the territory of the reserve without registration of a lease with the State Property Fund of Ukraine in one of the buildings there is a public organization that sublet the area of ??the building, that the controlling bodies (the Audit Chamber, the State Audit Service). Because of this, the state budget loses 94 thousand. UAH. By the way, often information in the media about alleged violations of legislation on the protection of monuments in the reserve is initiated precisely by this public organization, "says the museum's management. The Assumption Cathedral and the Refectory. Rebuilt by the year 2000.

Original article: How the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra was revived: 50 storks flew to the first Liturgy.