Crowds filled churches on Aug. 19 to celebrate the Feast of Transfiguration, the appearance of Jesus Christ along with God and the Holy Spirit.
It was not an Easter holiday, but crowds flooded churches on Aug. 19 for an event important to the faithful.
Ukraine’s Orthodox churches celebrated the Feast of the Transfiguration. It is a day when Orthodox followers recall how a resurrected Jesus Christ appeared around 4 A.D., along with God and the Holy Spirit for the first time ever. Believers circled Ukraine’s Orthodox churches to get sprinkled by holy water (1, 7).
Church-goers also blessed apples, earning the tradition another name, Apple Spas (“spas” means salvation in both Russian and Ukrainian). Vendors sell this fruit outside churches along with field flowers and herbs, to make a profit on the tradition (4, 6). Women wear traditional embroidered shirts to the mass (5).
President Victor Yushchenko prayed at Transfiguration Church in Poltava Oblast while visiting the annual farmers’ and artisans fair in Sorochyntsi village (2). The feast falls on one of the harshest fasting periods of the year, when believers must abstain from meat, eggs, dairy and fish. Fasting started on Aug 14, which is known as the Honey Spas. It ends with the Dormition holiday on Aug 28, which is otherwise called the Nuts Spas. Visit St. Volodymyr’s Cathedral at Shevchenko Boulevard (3) to soak up the atmosphere and buy some nuts, apples and honey.
