Amazing trip to Diveevo
There is such a town in the Nizhny Novgorod region - Diveevo with seven thousand people. And it stands on the Vichkinza River, which in Mordovian means “Raspberry Shores. ” And the Holy Trinity Serafimo-Diveevo Convent is located in Diveevo. From 12 to 16 September we were lucky enough to visit him. I learned about the monastery from my father, who wanted to visit there for a long time.
And here we are in place. We were settled at the monastery, as they wrote to me in the correspondence, in cells, as it later turned out that this is a modern house with all amenities, a kitchen, a beautiful courtyard with a beautiful garden, we were assigned to food (free of charge) in the monastery refectory. Two meals a day from plastic disposable tableware, which is used repeatedly, but this does not bother anyone. We were not hungry.
The history of the monastery has its roots in the distant past and is closely connected with the name of Seraphim of Sarov.
The Mother of God appeared to Seraphim of Sarov 12 times, and she ordered him to found a community and showed him how to surround the place of this community with a ditch and a rampart. They say that the Mother of God visits her destiny every day.
Seraphim of Sarov himself was only twice personally in Diveevo, but for many years he was the spiritual mentor of the sisters. He was constantly in Sarovo. There were his deserts. Now a mere mortal cannot get into Sarovo in any way, because of all the cities of Russia there was no suitable town for a nuclear center, except in Sarovo. closed city. They even wanted to demolish the bell tower from the face of the earth, but the director of the then center intervened, who explained that the development of photography was proceeding at an unprecedented pace and the bell tower as a landmark for directing enemy strikes would soon be irrelevant, spending state funds on the destruction of the bell tower was not expedient. Thank God, state funds decided save, and the bell tower was not destroyed. Currently, the relics of the Reverend Elder are in the Trinity Cathedral.
On the territory of the monastery there is the Kazan Church, in it the Church of the Nativity of Christ and the Church of the Nativity of the Virgin; bell tower, Abbess' Corps Trinity Cathedral, Transfiguration Cathedral, Refectory Church and, of course, the Holy Kanavka.
The territory of the monastery is pleasantly clean, there are a lot of flowers. The services are very solemn and did not seem heavy to me. .
The nature is very beautiful, everything is green. I hope I can upload photos and you can see everything too
450 nuns currently live in the monastery. Life in a monastery starts early and ends late. At 5-30 the first service begins, and ends on weekends at about 23. After the day of service, the nuns arrange a religious procession along the Kanavka. Lots of very young people. To my question that young people themselves often do not yet know what they want, and monastic life, you know, is quite harsh, I was told that obedience itself is very strict for young novices, that not every novice takes tonsure
It is interesting to observe the faces of people who are leaving the service. You can see a lot of really enlightened faces. But during the service, almost everyone stands and asks God - give me, and very rarely you will see a face on which it is literally written - take it from me.
Once in the service I witnessed such a scene. Before us stood a family of gypsies - father, mother and their little daughter, 5-6 years old. The girl stood very patiently, occasionally jumping somewhere, if something is unclear, she will ask her parents. And dad had a folding chair on which he sat. Our people still, even in such a place, in my opinion, cannot behave correctly. I came to the temple, choose a place for yourself and stand, listen to the service. No, you need to arrange a Brownian movement, walk around the temple. And here exactly the same. In the place where this gypsy dad was sitting on his chair, when viewed from above, an empty space formed, and the people began to go there. They arrive, but there is no place. And in front of him a path was formed, along which everyone who wants to walk. I must say that we were standing not far from the entrance and exit. And in the middle of the service, two ladies of a very well-fed appearance come in and stand in front of this dad. And here in the course of the service everyone needs to kneel. And these aunts literally flop down on their knees in front of him in a rather picturesque pose. We are behind dad. I can see his reaction - he is outraged and bewildered. Pause. After a minute, he so gently touches the sirloin of one of the women and, in response to her indignant look, meekly says, “Move aside, otherwise you will tempt me. ”
In Diveevo itself there are three springs with healing water, where you can take a bath. The water temperature in the springs is about 4 degrees. And the source of Seraphim of Sarov is located in the village of Tsyganovka. Here you can take water from the source with you. . A lot of people plunge, they say it helps a lot, but I plunged twice. The first time the sensations were indescribable - cheerfulness, freshness.
The second time I dipped in another spring and started coughing and sneezing. As experienced people explained to me - lack of faith in me. I think they are right.
We also went to the village of Suvorovo, and also went to the Sanaksar temple - this is already in Mordovia, and there is a male monastery there. The relics of Fyodor Ushakov are located in the Sanaksar Monastery. His estate was nearby, but in our time nothing remains of it.
The only unpleasant moment is the process of registration with the police.
This process takes an unreasonably long time.
The trip went well. I'm glad about it, because this year an incredible thing happened to me - I had absolutely no desire to go anywhere. I was planning a trip to the UK with "Fairy", it's time to apply, I even opened a sterling plastic card in the bank, and I'm looking for a reason why I shouldn't go - and I found - I need a personal presence at the embassy. And there was no time to go. Well, I look further - on September 6 with the same "Fairy tale" you can go to Switzerland. Allegedly, it does not work out with work. The key word here is "supposedly". OK. From September 12 you can go to France. It seems decided, I'm collecting documents. I visit my parents, inform about the upcoming trip, and then my father offers me this magical trip to Diveevo. Great, let's go. But what about the far abroad? I am considering the option with Geopolis at the end of September and come across outright rudeness in response to the review of the tourist Irina Veretennikova. The question of the trip disappeared by itself.
Good luck and happy travels to all. and once again I say to myself, that God does not give, everything is for the best.
If anyone has any questions about this route, I will be happy to answer.
