“The history of Solovki is a very strong proof of the existence of God”translated

On August 21, 2026, on the day of remembrance of Saints Zosima, Savvaty and Herman of Solovetsky, His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus' celebrated the Divine Liturgy in the Trinity Cathedral of the Transfiguration of the Savior Solovetsky Stavropegic Monastery. At the end of the service, the Primate of the Russian Orthodox Church delivered a sermon.

Your Eminences and Eminences, dear brothers and sisters!

I thank you all for today’s service, for your joint prayer, and you, Vladyka, for your kind words.

Every time I visit Solovki, I experience a special feeling of joy, because to see Solovki in the form in which they are now means to receive, perhaps, the strongest proof that God is stronger than any human power.

It would seem that no revival of Solovki after the tragedy of the 20th century, after the persecution of the Orthodox faith, after the transformation of Solovki into a difficult and terrible prison was possible. Only a shock to people's consciousness, comparable to an earthquake or a volcanic eruption, could lead to everything changing and turning 180 degrees. But it happened. And it happened not centuries or millennia ago, but practically in our time...