September 11, 2011 marked the 150th anniversary of the main Orthodox church in Paris - the Cathedral of St. Alexander Nevsky (La cathédrale Saint-Alexandre-Nevsky).
The laying of the Holy Alexander Nevsky Church took place in 1859.
The church was consecrated in 1861 on August 30 - for the feast of the transfer of the relics of the holy and blessed Grand Duke Alexander Nevsky.
"This monument is one of the most beautiful ornaments of Paris," wrote the Catholic abbot Getta, who soon converted to Orthodoxy, about the newly built Russian church. Its five pyramidal domes are completed with elliptical balls and sparkling crosses.
In the domes covered with gilding, beautiful windows are pierced. The fully gilded stone roof of the church porch is supported by four beautiful carved columns. Inside the church is decorated with a grandiose wall painting of beautiful execution.
All the walls are covered with bright paintings, shining with gold. "
The guides, stopping in front of the Alexander Nevsky Church in Rue Daru in the 8th arrondissement of the French capital between the Arc de Triomphe and the Park of Monceau, say that the Russians who died in Paris are singing here, and the most famous of them are called: writers IS . Turgenev (1883) and I.A. Bunin (1953), artists M.K. Bashkirtsev (1884) and V.V. Kandinsky (1944), the singer F.I. Chaliapin (1938).
They were buried in the Russian cemetery of Saint Genevieve de Bois.
The burial service was also carried out for the dead soldiers. It is known that the plaques with the names of Russian pilots were registered by the wife of the Nizhny Novgorod - Robert Lvovich (flying on the planes "Ilya Muromets") and Vera Alexandrovna, nee Kovanko.
In the Cathedral of St. Alexander Nevsky these days we performed the funeral of Andrei Tarkovsky (1986), Bulat Okudzhava (1997).
The church under the Russian mission of Paris existed since 1820 as a house in removable rooms.
In May 1846 the place of the priest in it was occupied by I.V. Vasilyev, soon decided to create a real church that could become the center of Russian Orthodox life in Paris.
The architects of the temple were Roman Kuzmin and Ivan Storm (the author of the Kiev Cathedral of Vladimir).
In terms of the church has a Greek cross, the apses are crowned with five turrets with bulbous domes. Its appearance is characterized by an eclectic (pseudo-Russian) style.
Decoration of the internal space of the Cathedral of St. Alexander Nevsky and his decor were to correspond to the "canons of Saint Sophia of Constantinople."
The temple was painted by Sokrokin, Bronnikov, Bogomolov and others.
In 1955-56, with the next major overhaul, the lower church in the name of the Holy Trinity was painted by the artists Albert and Margarita Benois.
In 1876, on two bell towers were installed bells, cast from bronze by the Guild of merchants of the city of Saratov at the expense of retired Colonel P.D. Buturlina. In the right belltower there is a small bell of a wall clock.
The interiors of the church continued to be adorned in the future. A.E. Beydeman created several images of Our Lady, Savior and Saints.
For the lower church, the artist G.S. Sedov painted the image of the Holy Trinity. The well-known marine painter AP Bogolyubov, who from the very beginning took an active part in the creation and decoration of the temple, wrote in the 1870s two large canvases - "The Sermon of Jesus Christ on Lake Tiberias" and "The Walking of Jesus by the Waters". 16 painter N.D. Dmitriev-Orenburg. The image "Flight into Egypt" and "Christ with the disciples on the way to Emmaus" was executed by V.P. Sheremetev.
After October 1917, the cathedral became the home of Russian emigration.
In this church, not only the burial service of the deceased, as we mentioned above, was, of course, crowned and baptized by the babies.
Prayed here the Emperor Alexander II with the Empress about getting rid of an attempt on their life in the Bois de Boulogne in 1867, and also Emperor Nicholas II and the Empress in 1896.
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