On June 20 Metropolitan Korniliy, vizited the Governor of St. Petersburg, Alexander Dmitrievich Beglov. During the meeting, the question was raised about the church of St. Metropolitan Peter in the building of the Chubykin almshouse, as well as about the architectural ensemble of the Diocesan Orthodox Old Believers Spiritual and Educational Center of the St. Petersburg and Tver diocese on the territory adjacent to the Gromovsky Cemetery.
Metropolitan Korniliy appealed to the governor with a request to transfer to the Church the premises of the church in the name of svt. Peter. The Chubykin almshouse with the church of Metropolitan Peter at it belonged to the Gromovsky community of St. Petersburg before the revolution. In the conditions of atheistic oppression, the entire building and the temple were seized from the Church, but even after the revolution for some time believers found the opportunity to worship in the temple.
In 2010, in order to preserve the memory of the Chubykinskaya almshouse, the Government of St. Petersburg adopted Resolution No. 167 dated February 19, 2010 “On the installation of a memorial plaque at the Chubykinskaya Almshouse”, according to which in 2010 a memorial plaque was installed on the facade of House No. 108 on Moskovsky Avenue with the following text: “The building of the Chubykinskaya Almshouse with the church of St. Peter, Metropolitan of Moscow, built in 1899 at the expense of the merchant-Old Believer Peter Ivanovich Chubykin. Here in 1905-1922 was the center of the Petrograd-Tver Diocese of the Russian Orthodox Old Believer Church.”
One more point of discussion was the project of restoring the architectural ensemble of the Diocesan Orthodox Old Believers Spiritual and Educational Center of the St. Petersburg and Tver Diocese on the territory adjacent to the Gromovsky Cemetery. Here was the Church of the Intercession of the Most Holy Theotokos, built by architect Martyanov. In 1933, the temple was blown up. The Intercession Orthodox Old Believers Community of St. Petersburg has been dealing with the issue of recreating the temple complex for several years, supervises archaeological research and works with archival materials.
The Gromov Old Believers Cemetery was founded in the first half of the XIX century by the Gromov merchants, the largest suppliers of timber. A large Old Believers’ center, similar to Rogozhsky in Moscow, was formed here. By the beginning of the last century, it included more than a dozen buildings, including three temples. In the cemetery part of this complex there were canals, now there is a pond in which there used to be clean running water and where water consecration took place. After the destruction of the temples at the Gromovsky cemetery, the Old Believers continued to gather here for prayer. The prayer was performed near the crypt-tomb of the Smirnov merchants, which has been preserved to this day.
Part of the Gromovsky cemetery site has already been transferred to the church. In order to begin work on the revival of the prayer building here, it is necessary to form a single plot of land and clear the site for construction.
The governor noted that the return of the church of St. Peter presents a great difficulty, however, expressed his willingness to support the registration of a land plot at the Gromovsky cemetery and the reconstruction of a prayer room here.
