A very important day for the capital - the Ascension Day in Belgrade 2024 is celebrated on Thursday, 13th June. His Holiness Serbian Patriarch kyr Porfirije will preside over the Holy Liturgy and will lead the solemn patronal feast procession. The holy cross at the procession will be carried by the best student of the Belgrade Theological Seminary of Saint Sava, Nikolaj Stanic.
Everyone who wants to attend the Savior's Day procession is invited to come to Kralja Milana Street, near the City Assembly, at 18:00. The start of the procession is at 19:00 in the Church of the Ascension. The solemn patronal feast procession with the reliquary containing the relics of our Venerable Father Justin of Celije and the wonderworking Icon of the Mother of God of the Sign will move along Kneza Milosa and Kralja Milana streets, through Slavija Square where the Patriarch will read a passage from the Holy Gospel. This cross procession, for the consecration of the city’s streets and squares and prayer for peace among people and nations, will conclude at the Church of Saint Sava where the spiritual leader of all Orthodox Serbians, His Holiness kyr Porfirije, will deliver a sermon and serve an Akathist to our Venerable Father Justin of Celije. The faithful will then be able to venerate the relics of Saint Justin and the wonderworking Icon of the Mother of God.
A long time ago, the despot Stefan Lazarevic declared Belgrade the capital. In the same year, 1403, the city took Ascension of the Lord Savior's Day as its St. Patron's Day. And what a fitting symbolism: elevation - the ascension of the city. They have always tried to conquer this territory. They never succeeded. They will never be able to.
The Ascension of the Lord is one of ten holidays in the church calendar dedicated to Jesus Christ. It belongs to movable holidays and is always celebrated 40 days after Easter, and ten days before the Descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles of Jesus. And always on Thursdays.
In the past, the city celebrated its St. Patron's Day intermittently. Finally, without exception, it has been celebrated since the mid-1990s when, after many years, the solemn patronal feast procession started through the city streets, led by Patriarch Pavle.
There are numerous customs. It is most often mentioned that men should not shave, women should not wash their faces, and children should not bathe. No one should sleep during the day, and whoever can't resist the bed will be sleepy all year round. On the Ascension of the Lord Day, no work is done in the field or in the garden.
