Every Easter eve a vigil far older than Russia begins in the Church of the Transfiguration of Our Lord, located in the village of Peredelkino, a residence of the Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church. At midnight the clergy and members of the congregation walk in procession around the church and enter through its main doors to celebrate the Resurrection. The Soviet authorities discourage religion, but they tolerate this rite—after a fashion. Alexander Solzhenitsyn describes the vigil at Peredelkino in the following story. It is published here in translation for the first time....
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