Russian Cathedral in Paris

St. Alexandre Nevsky is the cathedral of the Orthodox Church in France. it started out as a center for the numerous Russian émigré's in Paris in the mid-19th century. The revolution swelled its ranks with the "best and the brightest" of émigré Christians, including people with names like Berdyaev, Bulgakov, Evdokimov, and a couple of Saints: my own Starets Sophrony (before he moved to England), and the remarkable Mother Marya Skobtsova — now St. Maria of Paris.

Santa Maria, like Dorothy Day, was an actual mother, as well as a spiritual one. She devoted her life to the poor, rescued thousands of Jews, and died as a martyr in Ravensbrucke.

Now there seems to be a whole new generation of émigrés. The place was packed. There were plenty of young people and small children at the liturgy this morning, which was celebrated by Archbishop Gabriel.

The Cathedral is a fine example of the national style. The iconography has a flavor of the jugenstihl, which can be a little startling at first, but I have grown to like it. Russian painters little-known outside Russia (because they painted mostly religious paintings and then came the anti-religious revolution) — such as Nesterov and Vaznetsov.

Nesterov ~ The Angelic Liturgy, 

Vaznetsov Theotokos

These two are examples of this style in other places, nit Paris. Copy and  enlarge the following picture to see what I mean. This ikonostas, completed in 1861, shows the beginning of the style, I think.

Iconostasis at Alexandre Nevsky Cathedral

In the North and South "transepts" I found painting is unusual for an Orthodox Church: not icons, but gigantic paintings depicting events in the Gospels, by the Alexey Bogolyubov, the landscape painter.

The proto--Deacon had the name of the composer of one of the Yale Russian Chorus's liturgical pieces. Nikolai Kedrov was associated with this cathedral. I assume the deacon is his descendant. Here is a sample of the choir, in dialogue with Deacon Alexander.