SREMSKI KARLOVCI: October 18, 2023
An exhibition dedicated to the 160th anniversary of the birth of Metropolitan Anthony (Khrapovitsky) was opened in the cradle of the Russian Church Abroad

On Monday, October 16, 2023, at the Patriarchal Palace in Sremski Karlovci, Serbia, His Grace Bishop Basil of Srem (Serbian Orthodox Church) opened an exhibition dedicated to the memory of the first Primate of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, Metropolitan Anthony (Khrapovitsky) of Kiev and Galicia.

After the greetings of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill were read out by Archpriest Vitaly Tarasiev, rector of Holy Trinity Church in Belgrade, a brief biography of the late hierarch compiled by the seminarians was read. Vladyka Basil highlighted Metropolitan Anthony's fruitful work for the Serbian Orthodox Church and some aspects of the presence of the Holy Synod of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia in this building, in which the exhibition is now open.

Metropolitan Hilarion of Budapest and Hungary called Metropolitan Anthony the greatest and most influential theologian of the Russian Orthodox Church of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and noted his path as an outstanding church figure who led the Russian church diaspora in difficult circumstances, thanking the Serbian Orthodox Church and the Serbian people for the fraternal attitude they showed towards the exiles. He noted the division of the diaspora into different jurisdictions and the subsequent path to restoring the fullness of communion with the Russian Orthodox Church.

The head of the House of Russia Abroad, V.A. Moskvin, expressed gratitude for the opportunity to organize a joint exhibition with the Diocese of Srem. He noted the "gigantic work" carried out by Metropolitan Anthony to maintain and administer church life in the Russian diaspora, which was reflected in particular in his correspondence with Grand Duke Nicholas Nikolaevich, on one of the exhibition panels.

He pointed to the presence of the representative of the Russian Church Abroad, Secretary of the German Diocese, Archpriest Nikolai Artemov, and asked him to speak. Fr Nicholas noted Metropolitan Anthony's creation of liturgical texts and thanked the Serbian Orthodox Church for its fraternal support in difficult times, when the atheistic authorities, at gunpoint, were extorting concessions from the Moscow Patriarchate, from the "closure of the church administration abroad" mentioned by Metropolitan Hilarion in 1922 until the ban of Metropolitan Anthony from the priesthood in 1934, which in Serbia was correctly understood. The Serbian Orthodox Church did not renounce the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia in the difficult decades that followed, preserving together with the Patriarchate of Jerusalem the Eucharistic communion that unites it with Universal Orthodoxy, as His Eminence Hilarion noted earlier.

The exhibition was followed by a concert by the student choir in the assembly hall of the Sremsko-Karlovci Seminary, where the rector of the seminary, Archpriest Jovan Milanović, and V.A. Moskvin announced a large donation of Russian books to the seminary library, which now has 20,000 books. Then there was a tea party with pancakes and lively conversations of the participants in the small refectory.