On Monday the 26th and Tuesday the 27th of September, the divine services for the great feast of the Exaltation of the Cross of the Lord were held in the Synodal Cathedral of the Sign in New York City. Officiating the All-Night Vigil and performing the Rite of the Exaltation of the Cross was Metropolitan Nicholas of Eastern America & New York, First Hierarch of the Russian Church Abroad.

Serving alongside His Eminence were: Archpriest Andrei Sommer (cathedral dean), Archpriest Vasily Zelenyuk (diocesan cleric), Abbot Zosimas (Krampis; rector of the cathedral’s English Mission), Protodeacon Nicholas Mokhoff (cathedral cleric), and Hierodeacon Panteleimon (Jigalin; diocesan cleric).

The choir sang the divine service beautifully under the direction of Vadim S. Gan.

The keynote moment of the evening service was the triumphal Rite of the Exaltation, which is performed by bishops in diocesan cathedrals, as well as by abbots in large monasteries.

On the very day of the feast, Divine Liturgy in the cathedral was celebrated by its dean, Fr. Andrei. Most of those who gathered to venerate the Lord’s Cross communed of Christ’s Holy Mysteries.