MOSCOW — Thousands and thousands of Orthodox believers stood outside in temperatures as low as 8 degrees Wednesday, in lines that stretched for nearly 2 miles, awaiting their own personal miracle.
Theirs was a mood of thanksgiving. Inside the Cathedral of Christ the Savior lay a decorative, glass-topped box holding part of a camel-hair belt believed to have been worn by the Virgin Mary more than 2,000 years ago. Its presence here was miracle enough, but the relic is thought to grant women fertility and health.
Those at the front of the line had been outdoors close to 20 hours, waiting to file quickly past the box and touch it reverently, if briefly. They smiled as if they had been waiting all of their lives for this moment.
“This is our one opportunity to see it,” said Yevgenia Leskova, who had gotten in line just after midnight Tuesday and was positioned to reach the cathedral by 8 p.m. Wednesday. “The Mother of God wore this belt when she was pregnant, and it can help women get pregnant and cure us of disease.”
The belt so revered by women belongs to a Greek monastery on Mount Athos, where only men may visit. It has been kept in Greece for centuries, until this visit to Russia, and went on view in Moscow at midnight Saturday after being displayed in St. Petersburg and other cities. About 1 million people are expected to see it in Moscow before it leaves Sunday.
Evelina Khachaturyan was holding her 3 1/2-year-old grandson, Saveli, puffed up with down against the cold, about 22 degrees in late afternoon.
“Our boy coughs very often,” she said, “and we want him to touch the belt so he can be cured.”
Last year, Saveli’s mother had a miscarriage. “We want his mom to have a second child,” Khachaturyan said.
Nearly 14,000 police officers have been deployed to keep order, many brought from outside Moscow. They keep groups of about 200 within separate, fenced enclosures along the riverbank, and when the gates are opened to the next staging point, the elderly and young alike sprint ahead a few hundred yards, stop and wait again.
“We run,” said a 50-year-old woman named Galya. “It keeps us warm.” Her knot of people, though happy to chat, did not wish to give their full names. Galya revealed, however, that she was hoping for the miracle of pregnancy.
“I’m superstitious,” said Anya, 25. “If you really have a dream, you can’t talk about it.”
On the other side of the cathedral, Alexei Bogdanov, a 32-year-old truck-parts salesman, already had seen the relic and was waiting for his wife. Tears came to his eyes when he touched the box. “We lived in our country for almost 70 years without faith,” he said. “And now we have found it again.”
