Добротолюбие Православие, вяра, църква
Bulgaria remembers April 16, 2018, the victims of the world’s most horrific terrorist attack of its time – the blowing up of the St. Nedelya Cathedral in Sofia 93 years ago, in 1925, by the then outlawed Bulgarian Communist Party.
The bombing of the St. Nedelya Cathedral in Sofia in 1925 murdered 213 people, and wounded about 500 others, primarily representatives of the political, military, and intellectual elite of the Third Bulgarian Tsardom (1878/1908-1944). At the time, the St. Nedelya (“Holy Sunday”) Cathedral in Sofia was known as “Sveti Kral” (“Holy King“) because since the 18th century it has preserved the relics of Serbian King St. Stefan Uros II Milutin (ruler of the Serbian Kingdom in 1282-1321 AD).
After the failure of the September Uprising in 1923 and the prohibition of the BCP by the Bulgarian Supreme Court of Appeal on 2 April 1924, the Communist Party found itself in a difficult situation. The government arrested many activists and the organization’s very existence was under threat. A Special Punitive Group was established as part of the Central Committee of the BCP, including Yako Dorosiev, Captain Ivan Minkov and Vulko (or Valko) Chervenkov. The Military Organization (MO) of the BCP, led by Minkov and Major Kosta Yankov, set up small isolated groups („шесторки“, „shestorki“) that carried out individual attacks. This, however, did not prevent the police from discovering and destroying the illegal structures of the BCP with relative ease.
In connection with the bombing Archimandrite. Boris, subsequently a Metropolitan of Nevrokop, murdered by the Communists in 1948, said the following:
In our lives there have been not only a few sufferings and torments, not a few heavy and tragic moments. But they did not seem to soften our heart, they did not dilute our soul, they did not clarify our consciousness. Accidents befell us, but we are not startled; we were troubled, but we did not recall; we have had misfortunes, but we have not been remembered; there were shocks, but we were not startled; there were crashes, but we did not understand!…
The April 16 Assault – the Darkest Day in Our Life! It is so unusual and monstrous that we were at first weary and could not understand what was going on. On this day in which the Bulgarian Fatherland and the Bulgarian name were immersed in the greatest sorrow and covered with the greatest shame, the astonishment was so great that we could not see all the miraculousness of the mischief that the children of antichrist did, and all mercy and wisdom of the miracle that God has done with us…
These events have not only local-Bulgarian, not only European but also world-religious character. In our country we can no longer talk about rumors – we have paid no attention to them for a long time, we can not talk about crimes – they have become commonplace for us. In our country there is already an unusual struggle between different beliefs and beliefs, different currents and movement, different strata and spirits…
Our phenomena reveal the centuries-old struggle that has been taking place since the evil has penetrated man and the world: this is the struggle between truth and lie, between virtue and vice, between righteousness and inexperience, between light and darkness, between good and evil, between the kingdom of Christ and the kingdom of antichrist. This is the struggle that has become fierce and irreconcilable since the Divine Love and Righteousness, the Divine Truth and the Light have plummeted upon the earth, and denounced malice and unrighteousness, lying, and darkness…
Eternal memory of the victims!
