LA VENERAZIONE PER L’ICONA DELLA MADRE DI DIO DEL SEGNO DI KURSK (EN)

This is the original Icon that was found in 1295 by a hunter when he lifted it up and a spring of water came forth. He built a shelter for the Icon there. The original Icon is in New York now and with God’s will, it will return to it’s Home Roots as it has always done thru out its history. Many millions of Orthodox Christians are Praying for its safe return! A beautiful copy of the Kursk Root Icon was made a few years ago by ROCOR and sent to Russia so that they could have a Icon while they are waiting for the original Kursk Root Icon to return to it’s home roots. The Kursk Root Icon is Loved and Revered around the world. The Kursk Root Icon miracles and the Kursk Root Spring miracles have happened for many people of Russia and now from around the world. The Kursk Root Icon has a long and holy history in Russia that continues to grow as it travels all around the world.

The Kursk Root Icon Procession happens every year on Friday of the nineth week after Pascha, as the Icon “The Sign” is solemnly borne in procession from the Kursk Znamensky Cathedral to the place of its original manifestation at the Korennaya Hermitage in Svoboda Village, (about 30 km. from Kursk) where it remains until September 13th. Then it again would be solemnly returned to the Kursk Znamensky Monastery in the city of Kursk for the winter. This procession was instituted in the year of 1618 in the memory of the transfer of the Kursk Root Icon from Moscow to Kursk and to commemorate its original appearance in 1295. See the 2005 Procession Photos where over 30,000 Orthodox Christians attended the one day procession that happens twice yearly.

Informations about icons
The veneration of Icons is not directed at the physical icon but at the prototype of which the image was a symbol. With regards to the representation of Christ, St. John of Damascus the defender of Images, says that it was right to represent Christ in human form because He became incarnate, He became visible in the flesh. The Church Icons are so beautiful in the Korennaya Hermitage with most all the walls and ceiling covered with icons about stories from the Bible. Its like walking into the inside of a Bible. The Kursk Root Icon is a Theotokos icon and it is also one of “The Sign” icon. Icons are made with Iconography rules and regulation that have been passed down from the first Fathers of the Church.

Home Icons play an important role in Eastern Orthodox spirituality. On entering an Orthodox home, you may see Icons that act as a greeting. Usually honored on a eastern wall or corner, the icons extend an invitation to lift ones heart toward heaven. Icons have been said to be “portals into heaven. The history of icons and the 1st Christian icons at some point people began to create and distribute paintings of Christ. This also included his disciples and the really martyrs of the Christian faith. One of the earliest images we know of was a statue of Christ. Eusebius (c.325) tells us that a bronze statue of Christ stratching out His hands to a kneeling woman had stood till the time of the emperor Maximin Daia. Icons have been used for prayer from the first centuries of Christianity. Sacred Tradition tells us, for example, of the existence of an Icon of the Savior during His lifetime (the “Icon-Made-Without-Hands”) and of icons of the Most Holy Theotokos immediately after Him.