From January 31 to February 5, 2019, His Grace Bishop Macarie Drăgoi of the Romanian Orthodox Diocese of Northern Europe visited the Romanians from the communities in Denmark and Sweden.
On Friday, February 1, 2019, the Romanian Orthodox hierarch was in the northeastern part of Denmark, in the Romanian Orthodox parish in Nykøbing Mors, where he celebrated the Liturgy of the patronage of the church and baptized the fourth child of the parish priest Dragoş-Alexandru Cucuzel and his wife Alexandrina.
In his word of teaching, His Grace Macarie referred to the martyrdom and testimony of the heavenly Protectors of the Holy Martyrs Trifon, Perpetua and Felicitas. His Grace Macarie showed that it was noticeable the blind and angry leaning that pagan crowds had on the Christians in the early Church, the paroxysmal blood thirst that made people otherwise accustomed to want to see how young innocent mothers and young men were torn off by beasts and decapitated with savagery.
“The same hatred we see today, everywhere. Christians continue to be the most persecuted religious group in the world. They are killed, kidnapped, assaulted, banished from their homeland. More painful is that in societies built by Christianity we see how the same drum of anti-Christian fanaticism is fed and is blistering more and more. It is by all means the seeds of hatred against the Church, the cross, Christ and His people. Let us not believe that we are far from the times when the Holy Trifon and Saint Perpetua and Felicitas lived. We are not far from the same kind of fanatic and blind anti-Christianity. But we should be concerned, in particular, not to be too far from the Christian way of life of the first-century martyrs. Let us pray that it will not surprise us being overwhelmed by the cares and pleasures of this age, the times of persecution”, the hierarch said.
On the eve of the Feast of the Lord’s Presentation to the Temple, the Romanian hierarch served the all night vigil in the chapel of the Romanian monastery in Ikast, and on Saturday, February 2, 2019, His Grace Macarie, surrounded by a group of priests and deacons, celebrated the Divine Liturgy in the Romanian church in Viborg, Denmark, and baptized a child in the community. His Grace Macarie congratulated the parish priest Adrian Chiţulescu for the completion of the new iconostasis of the Romanian monastery, and then honored with the parishioners the Icon of the Lady of the Assumption.
Sunday, February 3, 2019 His Grace Bishop Macarie served the Divine Liturgy in the Romanian Parish in Roskilde, Denmark, together with the priest Mihai Marius Hornicar and the other servants invited to the feast, celebrating at the end the Icon of the Mother of God. The ambassador of Romania to the Kingdom of Denmark, Mihai-Alexandru Grădinar and the artist Ioan Nemţoi attended the service.
His Grace Macarie continued his pastoral visit to the Romanian communities in Sweden, stopping in the Romanian parish in Växjö, where he performed a memorial service for the rest of the soul of Priest Milică Văsuianu, passed to the eternal life after a road accident, preparing the repatriation of his body in Romania.
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