творческая работа учащего 7 класса "Святое Белогорье"

The Source of Fresh Water in the Spiritual Desert of the World

   Belgorod region is the wonderful place where spiritual and real life is combined. Many famous people lived here, but unfortunately not everybody knows their names.

There is a wonderful place in our native town Rakitnoye which is so called “custodian” of it. It protects us from misfortunes and disasters and attracts many believers and pilgrims. This is St. Nicolas church in Rakitnoye. I want to tell you about this place. I would like more people to know about it.

    When I was a little boy my grandmother often took me to the St. Nicolas church. Every time I visited it I felt myself more obedient and calm. I didn’t understand why?

Once after the Sunday church service my granny took me to the Father Seraphim’s graves on the territory it. We burnt candles,   and she told me that   it was a holy place. It helps many people to find their faith and to deliver from illnesses.”

Many tourists, pilgrims and believers come to the grave, pray or just stay near it and ask for help.

   Some years had passed but I still think about the holiness of this place. Why is it so? I by chance   got a book about Seraphim Tyapochkin. That book answered   all my questions. On the pages of my composition I would like to share my knowledge about Father Seraphim and his holiness. I   want descendants to remember him and his love for people.  

   Dmitry Tyapochkin lived in a deep faithful family. Once he saw an icon of Seraphim Sorovsky and said that he would like to be saint. Since that time his spiritual life had began. He graduated from Moscow Spiritual Academy in 1936. Then Dmitry (Father Seraphim) was a priest in Dnepropetrovsk region. It was a terrible time when temples had been ruined, priests were arrested. Father Seraphim fought   for pureness of Orthodox Church. He was sent to prison in 1941 and had been there for 15 years. He was a priest in a north town of Igarka.  That hard life didn’t conquer the Father Seraphim’s spirit, but taught   him to have sympathy and love. He was praying   all the time and helped people around him. How loving and humble was he!

   Since 1961 and till the end of his life Father Seraphim was priest in St. Nicolas church in Rakitnoye.  By that time the church was in a very bad condition, windows were broken. On the first day here Father Seraphim slept on the floor in baptismal room.  He   held services in the cold empty, temple. The walls of altar were covered with rime, the snow was falling down. Father Seraphim didn’t notice it. He prayed and felt God’s power and help. And then gradually the reconstruction of the church began.

   Father Seraphim hid his ability to recover people because of his deepest humility. He could always listen to a person and give him or her opportunity to change his or her life. Father Seraphim couldn’t help everybody and he suffered from it. During the pray about his spiritual children there was a deep love in his eyes. He told people simple words and they felt it, were happy and thanked God for such saint.  

Father’s recovering didn’t come at once. There was an interesting story about blind artist Mikhail from Kharkov. Father Seraphim met him and said: “Pray and you will go to monastery.” Mikhail was staying in our church for some time and he really could see and became a monk.

     Many years had passed after Father Seraphim’s death. He was   the source of living water in the spiritual desert of the world its heart which is still beating protecting us from the evil and misfortune. That is why the place where Father Seraphim lived is holy. Hundreds of people come to Father Seraphim’s grave and find decisions to their problems; become more calm and spiritual healthy. Archimandrite Kirill said: “That was really a person not from this world”. I would like people always remember   and follow the example of Father Seraphim, our spiritual mentor for his deep love to people.