Peter and Paul
Church
The Church of Sts. Peter and Paul at the Yauzsky Gate (on Kulishki) is an Orthodox church in Moscow’s Tagansky District. It is part of the Pokrovsky neighbourhood of the Moscow diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church. It is a sub-church of the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia and a sub-church of the Serbian Orthodox Church. The main altar is consecrated in honour of the icon of the Mother of God “The Sign”, the side chapels are in the name of St. Peter and Paul Apostles and the Kazan icon of the Mother of God. For the first time documents mention a stone church on this place in 1631. The one-domed church was named “Peter and Paul of the high church on the hill”. Evidence has been preserved that in 1693 the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Adrian buried in the temple the wife of a “distinguished man” Vassa Stroganova. The modern building was built with the blessing of Patriarch Adrian in 1700-1702 in the Naryshkin Baroque style. The main altar was consecrated in honour of the icon of the Mother of God “The Sign”, the altar of the Apostles Peter and Paul was placed on the northern side in the warm winter side-chapel. In 1731 in the southern part of the warm church a side chapel in honour of the Kazan icon of the Mother of God was built. In 1748 the church was badly damaged by fire, but was quickly restored at the expense of the parishioners. In 1771 a new three-tier bell tower was built. In 1812 the church building managed to survive almost painlessly the time of looting and fires, only priests’ houses and other church buildings were burnt down. According to the project of architect Alexander Popov, in 1876 the southern aisle of the church was enlarged and consecrated on 24 November 1878 by Bishop Amvrosy (Klyucharyov) of Dmitrov. After 1917 there were repeated attempts to close the church. But, unlike most of the churches of Ivanovskaya Gorka the Church of Sts. Peter and Paul was never closed. In the temple were transferred to the shrines of closed churches and received the clergy without a place. Archpriest Arkady Konstantinovich Ponomarev (1884-1948), awarded in 1944 with the medal “For the Defence of Moscow”, served as rector of the church from 1935 until his death. On 9 September 1945 in the church was celebrated the consecration of Archimandrite Joseph (Orekhov) as Bishop of Voronezh and Ostrogozh. The Serbian suburbs in Moscow were first established in 1874. By the decree of Emperor Alexander II, the Church of St Cyrus and St John on Solyanka and the buildings attached to it were granted to the Serbs as a suburbs. But in 1918, the churchyard was liquidated by the Soviet authorities, and the church was destroyed in 1933. In 1999, according to the decree of Patriarch Alexy II, the Church of Sts. Peter and Paul was transformed into a Patriarchal sub-church, under which the representation of the Serbian Orthodox Church was reopened.
Address: Moscow, Petropavlovsk lane, 4-6, p. 8
