The speech of the Head of the Orthodox Church of Kazakhstan, Metropolitan Alexander of Astana and Kazakhstan, upon the transfer of the copy, “measure for measure,” from the miraculous icon of the Mother of God “Healer,” to the Church in honor of the Nativ

Your Reverence, Father abbot Hieromonk Alexy!
All-honorable fathers! Dear brothers and sisters!

On the bright days of Christmastide, when Heaven and earth, angels and people rejoice, celebrating the appearance of Christ the Life-Giver into the world, you and I become participants in a special spiritual celebration - an exact copy, “measure for measure,” from the miraculous icon of the Queen of Heaven “Healer” is transferred to the church dedicated to the Nativity of the Mother of God. Meeting the miraculous face of the Mother of God, each of us can exclaim in the Gospel like the righteous Elizabeth: “But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me??” (Luke 1:43).

Last May, with the blessing of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus', this great shrine, glorified by numerous manifestations of the power of God, visited the city of Alma-Ata. For the first time, the miraculous icon left the Alekseevsky Stavropegic Monastery in Moscow to travel to the borders of Kazakhstan - to delight the faithful here with the great and rich mercy of the Most Holy Theotokos, to grant people through touching the shrine liberation from ailments, consolation in sorrows, deliverance from everyday adversity. In a short period of time, over 30 thousand residents of the southern capital bowed to the miraculous image. In response to numerous requests from believers, it was decided to create an exact copy of the miraculous face of the Queen of Heaven so that the new shrine would bless our city with its presence and console the Orthodox people. A talented and experienced icon painter repeated the ancient image of the "Healer" in the smallest details. The copy "measure for measure" was consecrated at a solemn service before the miraculous icon of the Mother of God in the presence of many clergy and a huge number of parishioners and pilgrims.

From this day on, the icon of the Holy Mother of God "Healer" will be here, in the Nativity of the Mother of God Church and every resident of our city or guest of the Southern capital will be able to bow to this shrine, ask the Most Blessed Lady for spiritual and physical health, and pray for the healing of relatives and friends.

The Holy Church at the dawn of the Christian era called the Mother of God "Healer". In the very first Akathist to the Most Holy Theotokos (6th century), we exalt Her with the following words: "Rejoice, healing of my body; rejoice, salvation of my soul." Every day in our morning prayers we address the Mother of Christ, the true Healer of souls and bodies: "Having given birth to a physician, heal the many years of suffering of my soul." The icon, which was donated to the church today, depicts the miracle of the healing of a seriously ill man by the Most Holy Theotokos. An ancient legend tells how the Queen of Heaven appeared to the bed of a suffering clergyman and, in response to his fervent prayers, granted him complete recovery. The healed man, who was a well-known person in the city, immediately rose from his bed, went to the church and began to sing prayers, glorifying the Most Holy Theotokos, which astonished all the townspeople. Reading these lines, one can ask the question: why was this man granted such a miracle? It was not an angel or a saint who brought him the long-awaited healing, but the Most Pure Virgin Herself, higher in honor than the Cherubim and incomparably more glorious than the Seraphim. The sick man was granted a merciful visit from the Mother of God because, as the legend goes, this priest had a good custom: every time he heard the chimes striking a new hour, he would give praise to the Most Holy Theotokos, proclaim the Archangel's greeting "Rejoice, Blessed One!" and add words of his own prayers, "doing this day and night." Love for the Queen of Heaven, remembrance of her blessings to the human race, faith in maternal intercession made this amazing event possible. This ancient story, imprinted in church memory and depicted on the icon, it is a call to us from the depths of centuries to honor and glorify the Most Holy Virgin, who served the mystery of the Incarnation and became the Mother of our Savior. From the Gospel times to the present day, the Mother of God's care for believers has not ceased. The Mother of the Savior experienced pain and suffering, poverty and human cruelty in Her earthly life, and now, abiding in heavenly glory, She sees every tear, hears the lamentations and prayers addressed to Her.

The Lord revealed to us the truth in the Gospel: healing from physical ailments must necessarily be preceded and accompanied by deliverance from sinful ailments, that is, repentance. “See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you” (John 5:14), the Savior warns the paralyzed man He healed. A necessary condition for liberation from illness is a strong faith in God. Christ speaks of this when He addresses the bleeding woman: “Your faith has healed youl” (Luke 8:48) and the father of the possessed child: “If you can believe, everything is possible for one who believes” (Mark 9:23). Therefore, before the miraculous icon of the Mother of God, called "The Healer", we will ask the Queen of Heaven not only for the return of physical health, deliverance from illnesses and sorrows, but, above all, for the gift of faith and spiritual health, the removal of cruelty and coldness, callousness and indifference, merciless and disdainful attitude towards people from our lives. Let us pray to the all-powerful Mother of God and our kind Mother for the cleansing of us from passions, bad habits and inclinations that poison our lives, separate us from our neighbors, distance us from Christ, deprive us of God's grace, make us spiritually ill. Changing the reality around us for the better, returning joy and well-being to life - all this begins with the correction of the soul, with the cleansing of sins, with a return to God. May the presence of the icon of the Holy Mother of God “Healer” in the Nativity of the Mother of God Church always strengthen the weak, heal the sick, console the saddened and motivate us all to do good deeds.

Christ our God, born in Bethlehem, save us through the prayers of the Mother of God!