St. Nicholas Cathedral (Bangkok)

Founding of the Parish

Since the mid-1990s, an increasing number of Russians have settled in Thailand. Therefore, soon a large number of letters were sent to the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Alexy II and to the DECR of the Moscow Patriarchate asking for spiritual nourishment for Orthodox believers living and working in the Kingdom of Thailand ^[1] .

In June 1999, hegumen Oleg (Cherepanin) was sent to the Kingdom of Thailand ^[2] . Three months later, he returned to Russia with a report in his hands and was soon sent back to organize a parish in Bangkok ^[3] .

On December 28, 1999, the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church , after hearing the report of the DECR head, Metropolitan of Smolensk and Kaliningrad Kirill (Gundyaev) , decided to "form the parish of the Russian Orthodox Church in Bangkok (Thailand) in the name of St. Nicholas " and appointed hegumen Oleg (Cherepanin) him rector ^[4] .

Arriving in Thailand, Abbot Oleg first visited all Russian representative offices and commercial companies in order to personally get acquainted with the future flock, paid official visits to the ambassadors of Orthodox countries accredited in Bangkok. The Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Greece to Thailand refused to meet with the Russian priest, believing that Thailand is the area of ​​pastoral responsibility of the Patriarchate of Constantinople ^[1] . Relations with the Russian Embassy also did not initially develop ^[5] .

As one of the first parishioners Michelle de Valery noted: “For a while, Father Oleg had to conduct services under the mango tree in view of a number of difficulties with the premises. The first church was in the former building of the UN mission ” ^[6] . According to archimandrite Oleg: “The community gathered literally one at a time. At first, mainly the employees of the Russian Embassy and UN employees came to serve on life-long contracts ” ^[7]

Significant help for the parish was the meeting of Hegumen Oleg with the owner of significant real estate in Bangkok, Samanchit Thamovit. According to the recollections of Hegumen Oleg (Cherepanin): “By some intimacy we met Mrs. Samanchit Tamovit, a respectable elderly woman, the owner of a significant real estate in a prestigious area of ​​Bangkok, near the royal residence. It is difficult to explain why she was imbued with sympathy and understanding for us. Nobody knew about Orthodoxy then, everyone took us cautiously. Even local Christians asked: “Do the Orthodox believe in Christ?”. And so, without registration, only based on the personal property of this Thai woman, a Buddhist by religion, we managed to build the first temporary temple in Bangkok ” ^[5] .

First Temple

Samanchit Thamovit provided the St. Nicholas parish with a plot of land on which there were two residential buildings ^[5] . In one of which the church was originally built in the name of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker . Regarding the construction and beautification of the temple, statutory services and the formation of the Orthodox community of Bangkok immediately began ^[1] .

Quite quickly, the parish ceased to consist solely of immigrants from the former USSR. Thanks to the Charge d'Affaires ai of Romania in Thailand, Konstantin Surescu and his wife Cornelia, believers from Romania began to actively attend the parish ^[1] . In addition, on August 5, 2001, Father Superior Oleg baptized the first Thai, Danae Vannu ^{[8] [9]} .

On December 27, 2001, the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church established a Representation of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Kingdom of Thailand at the Nikolsky Parish with the assignment of spiritual care for the Orthodox flock in neighboring Cambodia and Laos ^[10] .

The abbot Oleg’s attempts to register the parish initially crashed: the Thai authorities denied the state recognition of the Russian Orthodox Church in Thailand as a new religious denomination. This was facilitated by the rather strict religious legislation of the country, as well as the wariness of the Thai authorities towards Russia inherited from Soviet times ^[1] . The normalization of the situation of the Orthodox parish in Bangkok and the strengthening of confidence in it were facilitated by the archpastoral trip of Metropolitan Kirill (Gundyaev) to Thailand, a letter from the head of the Traditional Sangha of Russia, hambo-lama Damba Ayusheev, to the King of Thailand with a request for state recognition of the Russian Orthodox Church in Thailand in 2002, the state visit of the President of Russia Vladimir Putin in 2003 and the return state visit of the Queen of Thailand Sirikit to Russia in July 2007 ^[11] .

In 2005, the parish built a small separate temple ^[12] . Divine services were held daily: 7.00 a.m. and at 19.00 p.m. on weekdays, on Sundays - at 7.00 and 9.30 a.m., and at 19.00 in the evening ^[13] . Thais more often came to the temple. If one of them expressed a desire to be baptized, then hegumen Oleg first spoke with him, gave him the Gospel, Christian literature, so that a person could prepare and consciously receive baptism ^[9] .

On December 13, 2007, the Cathedral was visited by the Deputy Chairman of the DECR of the Moscow Patriarchate, Bishop Mark Egorievsky (Golovkov) ^{[1] [14]} .

In early 2008, the Thai authorities, having examined the many years of activity of the Orthodox community in Thailand, recognized it as useful, consistent with the interests of the Kingdom, strengthening the moral and moral foundations of society. On June 20, 2008 ^[12] , it was decided to register the Orthodox community in Thailand as a legal entity in the format of a public foundation with the name “Orthodox Christian Church in Thailand” (มูลนิธิ ชาว คริสต์ ศา สนิก ชน ดั้งเดิม ออ ร์ โธ ด็ อก ซ์ ใน ประเทศไทย ประเทศไทย) ) ^[1] . After that, the head office of the Orthodox Church Foundation in Thailand is located at St. Nicholas Parish ^[12] .

On July 20, 2008, a meeting of the parish meeting of the Nikolaev Temple was held, at which a decision was made on the need to acquire ownership of a parcel of land in Bangkok and the construction of an Orthodox church on it ^[15] .

On December 19, 2009, on the feast day of St. Nicholas, a large clergy group arrived in Bangkok to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Orthodoxy in Thailand: the head of the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate, Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk (Alfeyev) , rector of the church in the name of Archpriest Dionisy Pozdnyaev , rector of Holy Trinity Church in Ulan Bator, priest Alexy Trubach, rector of the church in the name of Equal-to-the-Apostles Prince Vladimir in Jakarta riot police Joasaph (Tandibilang) , cleric of the Assumption Parish in Singapore, priest Alexander Dondenko, assistant to the DECR chairman, Protodeacon Vladimir Nazarkin. During the Divine Liturgy, Archbishop Hilarion elevated the clergy of St. Nicholas Church, Father Superior Oleg (Cherepanin), to the rank of archimandrite and awarded priest Daniel Bath the right to wear a leg gaiter ^[16] .

In 2010, Neskuchny Sad magazine described the life of the parish as follows: “A mountain of sandals stands in front of the doors of the Bangkok temple in honor of St. Nicholas, and the bare feet of parishioners slap on the tile inside the building. The abbot of the church, father Oleg, also serves without shoes, but in black socks. The reason for this behavior lies in the particular attitude of Thais to their legs, which in the country's culture are considered the dirtiest and lowest part of the body. <...> Instead of “ Lord have mercy ”, “Lord, have mercy” is heard in litanies. Parishioners sing all together, using the service text printed on the printer. These are mainly ethnic Russians and their Thai spouses, but there are also English speakers, Greeks, Romanians in the parish. <> The service is held alternately in Thai, English and Church Slavonic, with the predominance of the latter. Prayers for the health of the royal house of Thailand are offered. As such, there is no candle box in the temple, the candles are in the box without any indication of the “recommended donation size”, and there is a circle next to it ” ^[17] .

Modern Temple

The local architect designed the five-domed tented temple. As archimandrite Oleg (Cherepanin) noted: “In Thailand, there is a law prohibiting certain professions for foreigners. Only Thais can do architecture in the kingdom. Therefore, we have no other choice but to use the services of a local specialist. <...> The architect who works with us today has already prepared the projects for the churches of the Russian Orthodox Church that exist in the country today. He also created a project for the future St. Nicholas Church in Bangkok. We showed him pictures with views of the temple that we would like to have, and he embodied everything in the project, taking into account all Thai features and local construction standards ” ^[18] .

On January 1, 2012, a fundraiser was announced to purchase a plot of land and build its own temple ^[19] . Archimandrite Oleg (Cherepanin) described the situation as follows: “Today we have temples in Pattaya , Phuket and other places in Thailand, and Bangkok continues to be a very small rented place. This no longer corresponds to the status of our Church in the country, or to the needs of the community itself, since it has increased in recent years. In addition, due to the illness of the property owner, the rights of the premises we rented passed to her niece. But she was not so scrupulous in relation to lease agreements as her aunt, and the rental chamber began to rise quite sharply and often enough. Therefore, despite the fact that we have not completed the construction of temples in Samui and Pattaya, it was decided to begin the construction of the temple in Bangkok and attend to the purchase of land ” ^[20] .

In September 2012, the Bangkok District Architectural and Construction State Commission approved the design of the temple and other temple buildings. However, the Orthodox Church in Thailand was invited to make some changes to the design. The main change affected the construction of the foundation of the temple, since the construction of buildings above 15 meters provides for the need for an earthquake-resistant foundation. It was decided to make the necessary changes to the design of the temple and offer the architect to finalize the project taking into account the comments ^[21] .

On December 20, 2012, Archimandrite Oleg (Cherepanin), along with clergy of Orthodox parishes in Thailand - Priest Danai (Daniil) Vann, Priest Roman Bychkov and Hierodeacon Michael (Chepel) performed Chin at the temple site ^[22]

On January 29, 2014, on the occasion of the completion of the construction, Archimandrite Oleg sent words of gratitude and appreciation to the flock, donors and benefactors of the church ^[23] .

On February 16, 2014, the head of the Moscow Patriarchate’s Office for Foreign Institutions, Archbishop Mark Egorievsky (Golovkov), on the final day of his archpastoral visit to Thailand and Cambodia, led the consecration of the temple ^[24] .

On September 14, 2014, a Sunday school for children aged 6 to 12 years began to operate at the cathedral. Before that, Orthodox Sunday schools in Phuket and Samui were opened in Thailand ^[25] .

On November 29, 2017, the St. Nicholas Cathedral was visited by the Thai Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn , who was present at the service and got acquainted with the Orthodox shrines of the temple ^[26] .

On December 4, 2018, construction of the chapel in the name of St. Sergius of Radonezh to the left of the cathedral began. The need to erect a chapel was due to the frequency of divine services held in the cathedral, as well as the ever-increasing need for the service of the two Divine Liturgies on Sundays and holidays, especially during the celebrations of Christmas and Easter. In addition, it was considered more economical to use a chapel on weekdays, with a small number of pilgrims, rather than use the whole cathedral ^[27] . April 30, 2019 the construction of a chapel in honor of St. Sergius of Radonezh ^[28] .