Location on the map: Holy Dormition Zhirovichi Monastery

For 500 years, the Holy Dormition Zhirovichi Monastery has been a stronghold of Orthodoxy in the Belarusian lands. Moreover, it all started with the appearance of a small miraculous icon of the Mother of God, which today is one of the hundred most revered shrines of the Orthodox world.

A national treasure of Belarus, a place of amazing history and spiritual power, the Holy Dormition Zhirovichi Monastery was founded in the 16th century. It has not been closed for centuries, and today it is the largest Orthodox center in the country.

According to legend, once in the forest in the possession of the treasurer of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania Alexander Soltan, shepherds noticed a bright light shining through the branches of a wild pear tree. It turned out that it came from a small image of the Mother and Child. Shepherds removed the image and took it to the owner, but he did not attach any importance to the story, and locked the icon in a casket.

In the evening, Soltan decided to show the find to the guests, but it was not in the casket. The next day, the shepherds again saw the image of the Mother on the same pear tree and brought it to the magnate. The owner accepted the icon with reverence, vowing to establish a temple on the site of the apparition. Therefore, for the icon, called Zhirovichskaya, a new church was built.

Around 1520, a fire broke out in the town, during which the wooden church burned down, and the icon was never found on the ashes. Only the church school survived. Once, after school, local children wandered up a hill and saw the Mother of God in a radiant glow on a large stone, and in her hands – a lost shrine. The children hurried to the village and called the adults, who found a miraculous image on a boulder with a candle lit next to it. This event was the second appearance of the Zhirovichi icon.

Today, the Zhirovichi icon is widely known both as a miraculous shrine and as a unique artistic, historical and cultural phenomenon. This is the smallest of the venerated icons of the Mother of God – an oval plate of jasper – 5,6 by 4,4 cm - with a relief image of the Virgin Mary and the baby Jesus, who gently presses his cheek to the Mother's face.

Zhirovichi Monastery was Orthodox and Uniate, was destroyed and restored, was forgotten and returned to life again, but never ceased to function and serve as a shelter for the faithful.

This "city within a city" was built over the years, combining elements of different styles – Baroque, Rococo, classicism. All year round, the monastery welcomes pilgrims who can stay in houses for the night. Those who wish to spend a few days here are included in the monastic obediences-prayers, divine services, and work for the benefit of the monastery.

For those who come for the day, guided tours are available. Pilgrims can get acquainted with the history of finding the miraculous image of the Mother of God of Zhirovichi, the past and present of the monastery, and the shrines of the monastery. The program includes visits to churches, monastic cemeteries, and the Minsk Theological Seminary.

By faith, people here receive healing from ailments and spiritual help in difficult circumstances. 

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