"My personal perception of the feast of Holy Etchmiadzin": Father Nerses Asryan

Today is the feast of Holy Etchmiadzin, which for me personally is one of the dearest holidays. The Cathedral of Holy Etchmiadzin is not only a special church for me, this stone temple seems to be a living spiritual being, a spiritual parent who shaped and educated me in his womb, gradually turning me from a worldly believer into a servant of God's house. It was in the Cathedral of St. Etchmiadzin that I, a student of the Gevorgyan Theological Seminary, received the first four degrees of the scribe of our Church. In the Cathedral I received the right to bear an oration, in the Cathedral I was ordained a deacon and, finally, in the Cathedral I was ordained a priest. More than once I thought with a shudder that I was praying in the place where the Only Begotten Son of God descended and where for centuries the greatest, brightest faces of our Church, the real saints, was praying.

In recent years, our spiritual life lacked an essential value: the Cathedral did not work, it was under reconstruction. I look forward to a happy moment with great excitement when in a few months the cathedral will be re-consecrated and will start functioning again. And the heart of the Armenian Church will beat again, bringing its life-giving blessing to our churches around the world.

May the Lord unshakably preserve the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin established by Him.: