This Thursday evening and Friday morning, October 15-16, the Kursk Root icon will be brought to Walla Walla. At 6:00 Thursday evening we will serve a moleben and akathist, then Friday morning at 6:30 there will be a Divine Liturgy.

In the Church’s experience, God works in both individuals and objects to bring people to faith, illumination, healing and salvation. The Kursk icon is one of many “wonder-working icons,” associated with miracles and divine intervention throughout its 700-year history.

The icon depicts Mary, the mother of Christ. In hymns she is described as “More spacious than the heavens,” because she contained in her womb the Uncontainable God. Here she is depicted inviting all to honor Christ who is in her. This particular type of icon, known as “The Sign,” is a visual confession of the incarnation of God the Word as a Human being. Orthodox Christians call Mary Theotokos, meaning “the one who gave birth to God.”

Found in 1295 near the ruins of the city of Kursk, at the root of a tree (and known ever since as the Kursk Root Icon), it is known for countless miracles, healings and for assistance in misfortunes. It was before this icon that Saint Seraphim of Sarov received complete healing. In 1966, Saint John the Wonderworker of Shanghai and San Francisco departed this life before this same icon.

The icon has been in the care of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia since the Communist revolution, and after World War II it was brought to America, where since 1957 it resides in the Cathedral of the Mother of God of the Sign in New York City. Many believe that this Cathedral and the area around it were spared in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 because of the presence of the icon there.

More about the Kursk Root Icon

This autumn, the Kursk Root icon was brought back to Russia to be venerated by the faithful. On September 23, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia brought the icon to the Kursk Root Hermitage, where it was originally discovered. In Kursk, which today has a population of 300,000, a throng of 30,000 people walked in procession through the city with the Patriarch and the icon.