In the Cathedral of the Resurrection of Christ, in Tirana, unprecedented images are unfolding. Citizens from every corner of Albania, with tears in their eyes and a flower in their hand, are turning up to say farewell to the late Archbishop Anastasios. The bad weather did not deter the people, who came to the Holy Church to venerate the skeleton of the enlightened prelate who not only revived the Church of Albania from its ashes, as the Archbishop of Cyprus said but opened his arms to all people in need, regardless of denomination, regardless of faith.

Albanian authorities are feverishly preparing for the funeral service, which will take place today at 11 am local time (midnight Greek time). The church was packed even after midnight with people flocking to say their last farewell to the enlightened and beloved Albanians, Greeks, and not only (as he was the one who preached the brotherhood of peoples and the universality of Orthodoxy) prelate, but the authorities expect that a large number of people will have gathered, although the funeral service will be attended only by officials and those who have special invitations. The crowd will be in the courtyard of the church, where two giant screens – to the left and right of the entrance – and special tents have been set up for television crews.

The plan is for the skeleton of the late Archbishop to leave the church after the conclusion of the exodus service and a procession around its perimeter. As Anastasios himself had planned, the procession will end at the special entrance to the crypt constructed for this purpose under the church’s sanctuary.

Watch live: the popular pilgrimage continues in an atmosphere of emotion

Amid a mood of excitement, the pilgrimage is being celebrated at the Holy Mass.

Emotion at the popular pilgrimage

Until this hour, the popular pilgrimage for the enlightened prelate who – as it turns out – left an indelible imprint in Albania continues in an atmosphere of emotion. The skeleton of the blessed Archbishop of Albania Anastasios arrived yesterday afternoon in the Albanian capital, where an honorary procession and members of the Holy Synod of the Albanian Church, clergy, and faithful received it and escorted it inside the church where it was exposed for popular pilgrimage.

Earlier, on the journey to Tirana, moving scenes unfolded, with people stopping the procession to say their last goodbye to Anastasios. Especially in the villages of the minority, crowds of citizens, with tears in their eyes, were bidding farewell to the Archbishop who did tremendous work throughout Albania. Albanian media noted that the Tirana Cathedral “is one of the few that Anastasios did not build, although he restored it, having built more than 160 million foundations, it is as if he built it as well.”

In addition to churches and monasteries, Anastasios created boarding schools, ran camps and schools, organized soup kitchens and cured people’s hunger in the darkest times, financed water supply and road construction projects in villages, and much more. And just as Anastasios loved that place and its people, never separating them from their faith, but also without renouncing his Greek identity, they prove how deeply they have him in their souls.

In the villages of the expatriate community, emotion abounds. In Argyrokastro, students of the local Orthodox Church’s Schools of Education work entirely by Anastasios, gathered at the entrance of the Cathedral of the Resurrection, built by the late Anastasios, and followed the coffin. “Saint” and “Worthy” they cried with tears in their eyes and praised it with laurels, until a Trisagion was chanted in his memory inside the church, by Metropolitan Dimitrios of Argyrokastro, supported by all the clergy of the Metropolis.

“Christ is risen” was sung with joy by the residents of Dervitsani, who came down to the Kakavia-Argrokastro highway and stopped the convoy with the skeleton to bid him farewell. At the last salute to Anastasios, in Tirana, they will also be present…