After liturgy on November 14, a ceremony to rebury the remains of abbots and the brethren, discovered during the recent excavation work, took place at the Sarov monastery’s Dormition Cathedral. During the last two years, they were held in the monastery’s Transfiguration church. Now that the construction of the Dormition Cathedral has been completed, they were reburied in the original location.

The bishops, hegumens, hegumenias and the monastics attending the monastic conference in the Seraphim-Diveyevo monastery took part in the reburial ceremony.

According to the history of the Sarov monastery, the abbots and senior monks were buried beside the altar of the Dormition Cathedral. The examination confirmed that the remains found belonged to Hieromonk Ephraim († 1778), the sixth abbot of the Sarov monastery, and Hegumen Nifont († 1842), the ninth abbot, as well as treasurer monk Marcellin, Hieromonks Simeon and Nazariy. Twenty-one coffins were prepared for burial.

On the evening of November 13, the coffins were placed in the Church of Sts. Zosimas and Sabbatius of Solovki and the discovered remains laid in them. A funeral litya service was followed by the transfer of the coffins to the Dormition Cathedral. Bishop Barnabas of Vyksun and Pavlovsk presided at the evening service in the Dormition Cathedral.

The faithful could pay their respects to the deceased monastics and venerate their coffins in the Dormition Cathedral. At the end of the Divine Liturgy, Metropolitan George of Nizhny Novgorod and Arzamas served a Panikhida. During the service, the names of the deceased monastics of Sarov from a bygone era were solemnly announced. In the meantime, the rays of the sun penetrated the entire church space as if the Church in heaven rejoiced about the event together with the Church on earth.

Singing the Trisagion hymn, the clergy and the military personnel of the 94th Sarov Division of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation transferred the coffins from the Dormition Cathedral to the burial place by the altar near the eastern and northern walls and lowered them into the graves. A gravesite litya service was served for the deceased.