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On Demetrius Saturday, the Orthodox Church holds a special commemoration service for the reposed. We submit the names of all our Orthodox departed friends and relatives, of those we respect and love, and those we hope the Lord will have mercy on in the next life. In remembering the dead we present three stories of the dying written down by the well-known author Nina Pavlova\u2014may her memory also be eternal.<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Related by Nun Angelina from the Sts. Martha and Mary Convent, Moscow.<\/p>\n \u2014I was already a secretly tonsured nun, but I was still working as a nurse in the neurological ward of the 57th hospital. One night during my shift a woman dying of cancer was brought to our department. Instead of a chest she had a cavity filled with foul-smelling pus. Her legs were black with gangrene, and copious, putrid pus was dripping from her onto the floor. The hospital room was immediately filled with the smell, and by morning such an unbearable stench hung over the entire ward that the doctors told me off: \u201cWhy did you accept her into our ward? She has a whole bouquet of illnesses\u2014you could have sent her to any other ward.\u201d \u201cBut what was I to do,\u201d I said, \u201cif there was space left only in our ward?\u201d<\/p>\n Of course we took measures to get rid of the smell; we put basins with solution and containers with salt around her bed. But nothing helped. She was rotting alive, and the face of the woman who lay unconscious was contorted with unbearable suffering. Meanwhile her husband was prancing around her and shouting so loud that the entire ward could hear, \u201cWhy aren\u2019t the doctors helping? The doctor is obligated to help!\u201d<\/p>\n This was an elderly couple, and the husband loved his wife so much that he was begging her, \u201cDon\u2019t die! I can\u2019t live without you!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhy don\u2019t you let her go?\u201d I asked the husband. \u201cCan\u2019t you see that she is suffering and wants to depart to God? It will be better for her there.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhat does that mean, \u2018better\u2019?\u201d Her husband didn\u2019t understand.<\/p>\n He was not a religious man. But nevertheless I managed to find the right words, and we agreed to meet by his wife\u2019s bed and pray for her after the doctors had left for the evening. He would pray in his own words, and I would use a prayer book.<\/p>\n So, evening came. I poured holy oil on the patient\u2019s wounds, while her husband stood by his wife\u2019s bed, holding a burning candle. He spoke softly that if his beloved wife wants to go to God, then let her go to that better world. I started reading the Canon for the Departure of the Soul. But I had barely finished the first ode when the woman heaved a breath of relief and left us for that better world.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat? Is that all?\u201d the husband marveled. \u201cIt\u2019s that simple?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNow you can see for yourself,\u201d I said to him, \u201chow the Lord loves us, how He heard our prayers.\u201d<\/p>\n But the most amazing thing is how the stench immediately disappeared, and the husband noticed it. I also noticed it, but not trusting myself I asked the orderlies from the morgue to wrap the suppurating leg in plastic\u2014otherwise the pus would drip onto the floor of the corridor\u2014and people had already suffered enough from the stench.<\/p>\n We rolled the bed with the reposed to the morgue for a rather long time\u2014first in the service elevator, and then along the long underground corridors. But there wasn\u2019t the slightest hint of a smell. There was only the feeling of reverence before the mystery, when the Lord hears our\u00a0prayers.<\/p>\n The nurse, Angelina, relates:<\/p>\n The famous Russian sculptor Viacheslav Mikhailovich Klykov was taken home by his family when it became clear that he was dying and the doctors were helpless to save him. A nurse I know, Lena, took care of him at his home. We talked often on the phone, and one day I asked her to kiss for me the hand of the sculptor who sculpted the wonderful memorial statue for our convent of the\u00a0Holy Royal Martyr Elizabeth Feodorovna.<\/p>\n I learned the history of his illness later. Viacheslav Mikhailovich had a malignant tumor successfully removed, and then having immersed himself in his work he didn\u2019t go back to the doctors. They called the last year of his life, \u201cBoldino Autumn\u201d,1<\/sup>\u00a0and how inspired he was in his work then! He was hurrying to live, to finish his work, and now he was dying in terrible suffering. He had refused painkillers, knowing that they cloud the mind. In order to make\u00a0confession\u00a0one has to concentrate, and he confessed three times before his death. Meanwhile his suffering increased. One day Archimandrite (now Metropolitan) Tikhon, the Klykov family\u2019s father confessor and friend, told the nurse that she should at least give him sedatives to somehow ease his suffering.<\/p>\n On the very day of the Ascension of the Lord, June 1, 2006, Lena called me and asked me to bring the necessary drugs from the hospital. I was riding the subway with the medicines for Klykov and reading the Akathist to the Mother of God, \u201cShe Who is Quick to Hear\u201d. I remember how I entered the room of Viacheslav Klykov and the first thing that met my eyes was a large icon of \u201cShe Who is Quick to Hear\u201d, which the Klykovs had acquired, as they later told me, just after he had begun going to church. Viacheslav Mikhailovich was in very poor condition.<\/p>\n \u201cHas it been long since you gave him Communion?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n \u201cYes, a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n I sent Lena right away for a priest from the Martha and Mary Convent, and it is a good thing that it\u2019s located right nearby. Soon our confessor, Priest Victor Bogdanov, arrived with the Holy Gifts. Viacheslav Mikhailovich lay with closed eyes and seemed to be unconscious. How can one commune a man in that condition?<\/p>\n \u201cViacheslav Mikhailovich,\u201d I said, \u201chere is the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. Do you want to receive the Body and Blood of Christ?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI do,\u201d he said firmly.<\/p>\n After Communion I asked him, \u201cViacheslav Mikhailovich, are you strengthened?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m strengthened,\u201d he replied.<\/p>\n Later Priest Dimitry Roshchin gave him Divine Unction. It was a long, difficult night\u2014his friends called, and Fr. Tikhon (Shevkunov) called and blessed us to read the Canon for the Departure of the Soul. We read it.<\/p>\n Lena left to rest, and I sent Klykov\u2019s wife, Elena Sergeyevna, to her bedroom. I told her to rest at least an hour because she was worn out. I prayed all night at Klykov\u2019s bed and crossed him many times with the Jerusalem Cross with which the family had walked the way of Christ on Golgotha. Suddenly I felt that Viacheslav Mikhailovich was departing\u2014I have had such experiences. Before his passing he opened his eyes and looked off to the distance with such an illumined and joyful face that I can only describe it in one word: He shone. I ran to the bedroom shouting, \u201cElena Sergeyevna, Viacheslav Mikhailovich is leaving! Run quickly and kiss him!\u201d<\/p>\n His wife came in time to kiss her husband and say goodbye to him. And he was lying there so illumined and happy that everyone agreed with me: \u201cHe shone!\u201d<\/p>\n This was the death of a righteous man.<\/p>\n One con artist bought a burned house near\u00a0Optina Monastery\u00a0for a song, covered the charred logs with siding, and put it on sale through the internet for such a ridiculous price that a house in Florida could be bought instead. Nevertheless, a buyer was found. He called the seller and came to Optina Monastery with big money in hand, so that he could seal the deal right then and there. Outwardly the house looked fine. But when the buyer started tapping the walls he discovered that behind the lovely siding were completely charred logs.<\/p>\n \u201cI would do better to give this money to the monastery than pay for a scam!\u201d the man said in his indignation.<\/p>\n And he really did donate the money to the monastery then. He prayed there in Optina Monastery, received Communion, and on the way home, died in a car accident.<\/p>\n Later his widow came to Optina and related:<\/p>\n \u201cMy husband called me from the monastery and said, \u2018You know, I looked at that burned house and suddenly understood just how corruptible everything on earth is, but only the Kingdom of Heaven is real. Don\u2019t worry about the money\u2014our whole family has been written in the monastery prayer books for eternal commemoration. And just imagine, I will be commemorated eternally\u2019.\u201d He must have had some premonition, since his soul was already reaching toward eternity.<\/p>\n\u201cWhy don\u2019t you let her go?\u201d<\/h3>\n
He shone!<\/h3>\n
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A premonition<\/h3>\n
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