Sretensky Monastery

On Bolshaya Lubyanka stands Sretensky Monastery, a stauropegic monastery of the Russian Orthodox Church and one of the oldest in Moscow. The complex combines a 17th-century stone cathedral with a grand modern church dedicated to the New Martyrs, giving the monastery the dual character of both a monument to the city’s medieval history and one of the most striking works of church architecture of recent decades.

The monastery was founded in 1397 by Grand Prince Vasily I of Moscow to commemorate the city’s deliverance from the invasion of Tamerlane: two years earlier, Metropolitan Cyprian had met a religious procession bearing the Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God on this very spot, and, according to legend, the conqueror’s armies soon turned back. The monastery originally stood on Kuchkovo Field and was later moved to its present location near Sretenka Street. In 1552 it was here, at the monastery walls, that the citizens of Moscow and the clergy came out to greet Tsar Ivan IV, returning victorious from Kazan.

During the Time of Troubles, the militia of Minin and Pozharsky was headquartered within the monastery walls, and it was here that the prince, wounded on Sretenka in 1611, was nursed back to health. In 1613 the monastery welcomed the newly elected Tsar Mikhail Romanov. The present stone Cathedral of the Meeting (Sretenie) of the Vladimir Icon was built in 1679, and a side chapel dedicated to John the Baptist was added later. In the autumn of 1812 a hospital for soldiers wounded at the Battle of Borodino was set up here, and the great Moscow fire spared the monastery itself — for a time its walls even housed the seat of the Metropolitan of Moscow.

After 1917 persecution began: the monastery was closed in 1925, and in 1928–1930, under the pretext of widening the street, the Church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, the bell tower, and other buildings were demolished — the bells were sold to England, and some of them later ended up at Harvard University. The surviving buildings were taken over by the NKVD, and the famous “Exaltation of the Cross” icon entered the collection of the Tretyakov Gallery. Revival began in 1991, when the cathedral was returned to believers; in 1995 the monastery received stauropegic status under Abbot Tikhon Shevkunov, and a seminary opened at the turn of the century.

In 2011 it was decided to build a large new church on the monastery grounds in memory of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia who had suffered nearby, at Lubyanka, during the Soviet years. Following a competition, the design by the studio of architect Dmitry Smirnov was selected, and on 25 May 2017 the Cathedral of the Resurrection of Christ and the New Martyrs was consecrated by Patriarch Kirill in the presence of the President of Russia. The sixty-meter building, crowned with seven golden domes, is faced in white limestone and can hold about two thousand worshippers; the lower church is dedicated to John the Baptist and the twelve apostles.

Today Sretensky Monastery brings together two eras within a single architectural ensemble: a quiet classical cathedral from pre-Petrine Russia stands alongside a monumental work of 21st-century church art dedicated to the memory of those who suffered for their faith in the 20th century. For Moscow it is a rare example of a living monastery where the city’s history can be traced from the invasion of Tamerlane to the present day.