The Holy Services of Orthros and the Great Hours of Christmas were celebrated in the Holy Patriarchal Monastery of Saint Savvas of Alexandria with great devoutness, heralding the great event of the Incarnation of the Word of God.
His Beatitude Theodoros II, Pope and Patriarch of Alexandria and All Africa presided over the Holy Services.
His Eminence Germanos Metropolitan of Tamiathus, Head of the Holy Monastery, brought in procession the Holy Gifts, which were offered by the Magi from Persia to our Lord, when they found themselves as humble pilgrims before Him. The copies of the Holy Gifts were given to the Patriarchate of Alexandria by the Abbot of the Holy Monastery of St Paul on Mount Athos, the Very Reverend Archimandrite Parthenios.
At the end of the Holy Services, His Beatitude read the blessing of the Wearing of the Cassocks (Rhasophoria) to the seminarians of the “Athanasios the Great” Patriarchal Academy of Alexandria, and then addressed words of paternal love to them, praying that they will honor the holy rhaso and become preachers of the Holy Gospel in their homelands, under the wings of the Ancient Patriarchate, which for centuries has laboured sacrificially for the sowing of the word of the Lord throughout the African Continent
