Pilgrims looking for holy places in Russia will be interested in Tashla in the Samara region. This village is famous for the Holy Trinity Church with several ancient icons and a spring with healing water. Even tourists from other countries come to this place. There were known cases when Catholic pilgrims changed their faith and were baptized in the Tashli church.
Grace route
“Small Motherland” of the village of Tashla - Samara region. How to get to the holy place? This question often interests Orthodox pilgrims. Many travel agencies offer to visit a temple, venerate an icon, and plunge into a holy spring. One of the most famous in the region is the Radonezh pilgrimage service. The company regularly organizes trips not only to Tashla, but also to many other holy places in the region, Russia and abroad. You can independently organize a trip to the holy spring.
It’s easy to get from Samara to the wonderful village: you need to take the M5 highway to the village of Zelenovka, which is in the direction of Tolyatti, and then follow the signs. The path goes through the villages of Vasilyevka, Rassvet, Uzyukovo. Almost every resident of Tolyatti knows how to get to the village of Tashla. Samara region, people living here value and love their blessed shrine.
Holy Trinity Church
The temple in Tashla is revered by both local residents and visiting believers. Its rector Nikolai Vinokurov opens the church at seven in the morning and begins the service. The temple is similar to a typical monastery in terms of operating hours, and the holy spring of Tashly in the Samara region can be visited at any time.
If more believers gather than the building can accommodate, the archpriest goes outside and continues to conduct the service there. Every day several dozen people come here for repentance or communion. Sinners come to the temple from far away who want to talk to the abbot and cleanse their souls. The needs of visitors may be different:
- healing the physical body from ailments;
- baptism of adults and children;
- relief from mental anxieties and thoughts of suicide;
- prayers for the health of family and friends;
- just a tourist trip to an interesting place;
- research purposes.
After the end of the service, people do not leave; they wait for the distribution of locally produced unleavened buns. They are prepared in holy water, so some tourists take them home to give communion to their relatives. And once the archpriest of the Russian church, Dmitry Leskin, visited here.
There is a souvenir shop on the territory of the temple. Here you can buy pectoral crosses, candles made of natural wax, icons and brochures, and incense boxes with the relics of saints. Products can be consecrated in the church and worn as an amulet and talisman. And at five o'clock in the evening the liturgy begins, it continues until 23:00. It is usually visited by local residents, as well as those who can stay in the village for the night.
Legend of a miracle
The main shrine, revered by all believers without exception, is the famous icon “Deliverer from Troubles.” According to legend, she was accidentally found by village girls in a local ravine. The image was placed in a local church, where a prayer service was served. Since then, parishioners began to notice that the icon was capable of performing miracles - the sick were healed, and those who asked for something received what they wanted. In the place where the holy image was found, after some time a spring began to flow, which became another attraction of the village of Tashla. The Samara region is fraught with many holy places, but the Holy Trinity Church is perhaps one of the most famous and revered.
Directions
It is better to get to Tashla by your own car. This applies to distant cities - the Stavropol Territory, Ryazan, the capital. It will take about two hours to cover the distance from Samara. A new highway was recently built towards Togliatti, so there are no problems with movement. Rural roads pass through Zelenovka and Vasilyevka, they are on the map. But it is more difficult to drive along them.
There are regular buses, they go from Tolyatti . But a lot of time is spent on transfers and waiting. Pilgrim tours are organized from some cities. In this case, you will have to stand in line to get to the source, but such trips are much cheaper than individual ones. The temple is open on weekdays from 9 am to 7 pm, there are practically no visitors.
On weekends there are much more parishioners, so the reception lasts from 8 to 20 hours.
Special day
Every year on October 21, a special, solemn service is held in the church in honor of the icon “Deliverer from Troubles.” Believers go in procession to the holy spring, serve a prayer service, and return to the temple full of peace. Despite the autumn weather, everyone considers it their duty to take a dip in the holy spring, receive a blessing from the priest, confess and be sure to take communion. A truly wonderful place is the village of Tashla. The Samara region has become home to more than one shrine, but this one is a real pearl of the Volga region. Conducting the sacrament of baptism on this day in the temple is the greatest joy for a newly converted Christian.
Orthodox springs are holy and healing.
Historians suggest that the ancestor of the future Shigon is the village of Novy Teply Stan on Nogai Brod, which was already found in census books of the late 17th century. Nogaisky Brod was first mentioned in documents as a village with a church in 1707. And since the local church was later consecrated in honor of the holy Archangel of God Michael, the village acquired another name - Arkhangelskoye, Nogaisky Brod, and so on. Initially, Shigony belonged to the Zvenigorod Savvo-Storozhevsky Monastery. The first church was built in 1701. For 18 years these lands belonged to His Serene Highness Prince Alexander Menshikov. In 1768, the village of Shigony became the property of the brothers Count Orlov, then the Orlov-Davydov. At the beginning of the 19th century, Shigony was bought by landowner Dmitry Krotkov, who immediately set about building a stone church. The new temple in its appearance resembled the church of the Moscow Savvo-Storozhevsky Monastery. In Shigony, two springs have long been known to which believers came with prayers. The Troitsky spring - in the upper part of the village near the famous trap - is one of the most powerful in the Samara province in terms of water flow. Its water goes through pipes to all the houses in the district - village residents speak enthusiastically about the unusually tasty spring water, rich in silver. The fact that in 1830 a stone chapel in the name of the Holy Trinity was erected on the spring with donations from peasants is evidence of how they valued their spring, or rather, springs - previously there were 12 of them. Before the revolution, thousands of residents of the volost came here in a religious procession. On Orthodox holidays - Epiphany, the Holy Trinity and the Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God - water-blessing prayers were served and the blessed water was transported hundreds of kilometers away. Wicker and wooden gutters were laid from the source, along which the water flowed further through the village, into the Usa River. In 1934, the chapel was destroyed. When priest Nikolai Kibalyuk was appointed to the local parish in 1990, the village turned to him with two requests: “To restore the temple in the name of the Archangel Michael of God and to improve the holy spring in the name of the Holy Trinity.” Residents of almost the entire region gathered at the spring for Epiphany. The source is included by pilgrimage organizations in the route of excursions to the holy places of the Samara region. In total, there are 80 clean springs in the area. What are they asking for? Water relieves inflammation of internal organs. One of the pilgrims was healed of sinusitis. Old-timers of the village of Shigony also remember about another source - in honor of the Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God, which was located in a field, on the White Springs. There once stood a stone chapel here. Every year on July 6th there was a religious procession here. When a gas pipeline was built here in Soviet times, the soil was dug up, after which the source went into the ground. The chapel was destroyed.
Note to the pilgrim
When visiting holy places, it is important to follow some rules. Before going on a pilgrimage trip, you need to receive the blessing of the priest. Believers must dress appropriately: men in trousers, women in long skirts and with their hair covered. There must be a cross on the neck, and awe and reverence in the heart.
If you plan to swim in a holy spring, then you need to prepare appropriate clothes or a change of outfit, a large towel. It is better to have a small container with a lid with you to take home holy water from the source.
From the heart
When worshiping holy places, it is important to monitor not so much your appearance as your state of mind. A person must be pure in thoughts, repentance and obedience live in his heart. Leave all worldly worries and problems, enter the temple completely detached from everything, pray quietly, bow to the icon “Deliverer from Troubles.” Plunge into the font, drink holy water, collect some healing liquid for your family and friends. Numerous pilgrims claim that after visiting the Holy Trinity Church, illnesses recede, problems are solved, peace of mind and balance are restored. Faith in God, sincere repentance and the kind heart of a parishioner help a miracle happen.
Miracles of the Source
Regardless of the weather, crowds always gather around the spring wanting to draw holy water. But most people gather on weekends and Christian holidays. Rural residents have always been in dire need of divine help and intercession. One of the women constantly had a dream in which two angels carried an icon of the Virgin Mary, and then left it in an abandoned wasteland.
Before this, a resident of Tashla ignored the visions, but on this autumn day she decided to listen to him. She told her neighbors about everything, and together they found the icon. It lay in the ground for many years, but was preserved in good condition.
The image was immediately taken to the temple, but on the first night it disappeared . The next day, the residents again went to the excavation site, where they discovered a large spring, although it had never been there. The water in it turned out to be healing. A person who is sick in soul or body could come here, wash his face, or simply talk out his problems. And he felt better. And if he read the akathist to the Mother of God at the same time, he would get rid of his ailments.
Young parents bring babies here for baptism and collect water for their elderly relatives. Although the waters here are not hot or thermal, parishioners are not afraid to plunge into them.
Within a few years, the fame of Tashla and its source spread far beyond the borders of the state. People from all over Russia and other countries began to come here. An abandoned part of the village has turned into a well-groomed area, always ready to receive new parishioners.
The spring began to flow in 1917. Not only did it help those who were sad at heart, the source saved people during drought and war - its waters have not been exhausted to this day. Every year thousands of pilgrims come to the Samara region to venerate the icon and bathe in the spring. Some people claim that they personally saw the image of the Blessed Virgin Mary above the source. She appeared in the sky at full height, holding her Son in her arms. Pilgrims believe that this is how She blesses them to bathe in the waters and receive healing.
Against all odds
The Holy Trinity Church has survived a lot: persecution, revolution, and the defeat of atheists. Once they even literally covered it with horse manure, and they tried to destroy the icon. But through the efforts of believers, the temple and shrine were not only preserved, but also glorified for centuries. Each believer must have a destination marked “Holy Spring – Tashla”. The Samara region welcomes every guest who sets foot on the Volga land!
Today the church plays an important role in the formation and maintenance of peace, mutual understanding, and harmony on earth. The parishioners have noticeably become “younger”, which means that there are more and more kind, open hearts in the world in which God lives. Now you know that the home of the village of Tashla is the Samara region, how to get to the shrine and how to behave correctly on a pilgrimage trip.
