Located in what was once a house for
lepers on via San Gregorio (near corso Buenos Aires), Milan’s Russian Orthodox
church and sanctuary of San Nicolas welcomes a hundred or so worshippers every
Sunday morning. But recently, the church has seen an influx of non-Italian
worshippers, the result of reports that a painting of the Virgin Mary has shed
tears.
No stranger to
mysterious happenings, the parish church of the San Nicolas recently conducted
an exorcism on a parish member. Then, arriving for Sunday-morning mass in late
May, parishioners were amazed when, they allege, one of the icons the Virgin
Mary in the sanctuary started to ‘cry.’ Witnesses claim that a real tear fell
from the Madonna’s eyes on the so-called miraculous icon. It is the third time
since 2008 that this icon, an image painted on wood, has shed tears. Each time,
witnesses claim, the tears were accompanied by an equally mysterious scent of
roses.
Priest and
custodian of the church, Evloghios, originally from Germany, has lived in Milan
for 38 years; he explained that this painting is an ‘ongoing mystery that has
yet to be solved … a piece of
wood that sheds tears is something that cannot be explained. And we are the
first to ask ourselves why this would happen in our small church.’
