The full day of celebrations in Minsk (Belarus) of the 1025th anniversary of the Baptism of Rus’ began with an outdoor Divine Liturgy celebrated in the Old Town square with some 50,000 people. The square was once the site of the oldest church in Belarus, the church of the Nativity of the Theotokos which for unknown reasons was either never finished or destroyed soon after it was built in the 11th century. There is realistic hope that a new church will be built there, and as a sign of that the Primates and Metropolitan Filaret of Minsk placed a foundation stone on the site.
