One legend says that when John the Theologian was in exile on the island of Patmos, he had a vision - two beautiful temples named after him. The first of these temples was supposed to be built here, and the second - somewhere on the other end of the earth. The place intended for the construction of the second church was opened to the Orthodox people only about two centuries ago.
Lord Parthenius's insight
The history of the Russian Patmos in the distant Altai Mountains begins with the visit of the Tomsk Bishop Parfeny in the 1850s to the village of Nemal, located on the banks of the Katun River. There were few Orthodox believers in these places - the locals worshiped their idols.
Arriving in the village of Chemal, where several families of Russian peasants from the Biysk district had recently settled, the bishop saw an amazingly beautiful rocky island separated from the village by the stormy stream of the Katun River. Shocked by the spectacle, Vladyka crossed over to the island, consecrated it and named it Russian Patmos. The fact that this place is from the vision of John the Theologian was indicated to Parthenius by the fact that the first Orthodox church in the village of Chemal was named after this apostle.
On the same day, another miracle happened, convincing Parthenius of the correctness of his judgments. As soon as Vladyka returned to the village, two of the most respected shamans in the district came to him, who burned their tambourines in front of him and asked him to baptize them into the Orthodox faith.
A few years after these events, a beautiful temple of the Apostle John arose in Russian Patmos, and a solid suspension bridge connected the island to the coast.
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The first saint
In 1861, Hieromonk Macarius (Nevsky) became the rector of the church in Russian Patmos. However, in addition to leading the parish, the young priest was engaged in missionary work for several years. Macarius was remembered here as an energetic and deeply religious clergyman who easily found a common language not only with his flock, but also with the local idolaters. The hieromonk fearlessly floated down mountain rivers, crossed the dense taiga in order to get to distant villages. During these long marches, the priest slept in the forest, slept on the bare ground and did not have hot food for a long time. Macarius communicated easily with the native Altaians, and even the most ardent pagans listened to his words with deep attention, and after conversations with the priest they willingly accepted Orthodoxy. The priest did not hesitate to do dirty work. He helped the poorest parishionersrepairing their squalid houses and digging up beds in their gardens. In addition, rumors circulated throughout the district that the prayer of the Russian priest forced serious illnesses to recede.
Soon Macarius was appointed head of the Altai spiritual mission, and then head of the Tomsk diocese.
Macarius met the 1917 revolution with the rank of Metropolitan of Moscow and Kolomna. He spent the last years of his life in the village of Kotelniki near Lyubertsy, where he was buried in 1926.
In 2000, Macarius was canonized, and today his image is one of the main shrines of Russian Patmos.
Such different artists
At the beginning of the 20th century, the Church of St. John the Theologian in Russian Patmos became a courtyard of the Barnaul Znamensky Women's Monastery, the skete of which was founded on the banks of the Katun River - right opposite the church.
In the 1920s, the beautiful temple was closed and soon destroyed. In the village of Chemal, they tell the following story about this event. Once a city artist came to the picturesque shores of the Katun for sketches. He admired the Church of John for a long time and painstakingly painted it at different times - under different lighting conditions. When the creation of the home-grown painter was completed, the painting delighted the author so much that he set fire to the beautiful church, which, in his opinion, was inferior to his "masterpiece" in all respects. Together with her, the suspension bridge connecting the Russian Patmos with the village burned down. The act of the city barbarian hurt the feelings of local residents, but they were even more offended that the new authorities did not even start an arson case, but simply dismantled the conflagration and threw the firebrands into the river.
And in the early 1990s, these places were visited by another master - the famous Moscow photo artist Viktor Pavlov. Having learned about his colleague's crime, he decided to return the beautiful temple to the local residents. Returning to Moscow, Viktor Nikolaevich diligently studied the history of Russian Patmos, found the surviving drawings of the destroyed church, and then, having sold all his property, moved to Chemal with his wife. Here Pavlov bought a small temporary hut, and invested all the money in the construction of a new church.
Soon, on the site of the burnt church, the Cathedral of St. John the Theologian was built, built of cedar logs, which, as before, is connected to the village by a solid suspension bridge.
I must say that, having presented the faithful with the revived cathedral from the vision of the last apostle, Viktor Pavlov died a few months after the temple he had rebuilt was consecrated.
Wonders of the island
During its short history, the temple, rebuilt by Viktor Pavlov, has become one of the most famous in Russia thanks to the numerous miracles that occur within its walls. One of them is the mysterious renewal of shrines. Once Victor Nikolaevich was presented with an ancient icon of the Mother of God. The image was in a depressing state - time and improper storage killed almost all of its colors. Pavlov decided to give the icon over for restoration, and temporarily placed it in the chapel at the church. But not even a month had passed, as it turned out that restoration of the icon was not needed! The faces of the Mother of God and the Child, as well as the folds of their clothes, began to appear miraculously on it. Now the icon has been moved to the temple, where it amazes numerous pilgrims with new rich colors, and people who are unfamiliar with the history of the image quite often mistake it for the creation of modern icon painters.
Another image, updated in Russian Patmos, is the icon of the Lord Almighty. And now this shrine is streaming myrrh - on the glass covering the image, small drops of peace regularly appear. Moreover, they appear almost before the eyes of visitors to the temple and even during a church service. The sisters of the monastery say that this icon hears all the prayers of the faithful addressed to it.
The unique shrine of the Russian Patmos is the face of the Mother of God, carved on one of the rocks. It was created several years ago by the nun Felofeya, who before taking the tonsure was a climber and sculptor. They say that a similar image of the Mother of God on this rock once appeared to the former abbess of the monastery, Abbess Natalia. One mysterious story is also connected with this bas-relief. A few months after the work of Felofei was completed, the face of the Virgin was hidden by overgrown grass. And then on the island, it is not clear where wild rabbits appeared, which ate it in a few days.
Another man-made miracle of the island is a small belfry, where small beams hang - the predecessors of bells. If you hit them with mallets, then their ringing scatter not only over the Russian Patmos, but also over the village of Chemal. Moreover, the sound stays in the air for quite a long time, bringing the grace of the wonderful island to the Orthodox people.
Magazine: Secrets of the 20th century №25, Anna Muromtseva