Description of the attraction
The Church of the Equal-to-the-Apostles Saints Constantine and Helena is located in the village of Flotskoe (formerly Karan). The temple festival is celebrated on May 21 (June 3).
Church of Sts. Constantine and Helena is a one-nave basilica decorated with a portico with a triangular pediment. The building, rectangular in plan, is covered with a gable roof. The north and south walls have three rectangular windows with triangular cornices (cornices).
The history of the temple on the outskirts of the city of Sevastopol goes back to the distant Middle Ages, when the Crimea was inhabited by 300 thousand Greeks. A small stone church was erected by the Greeks in the middle of the 15th century. In 1778 the Christians of the Crimea were forcibly resettled to the Azov region. As a result, the church was in disrepair for more than 60 years. After the annexation of Crimea to Russia, the Balaklava Greek battalion was located in Balaklava itself and the surrounding villages, including in Karani. The temple was renovated and consecrated. During the Crimean War, the church was destroyed, but after its end it was reconstructed with funds donated by parishioners. The re-consecration of the temple took place in 1856.
In the pre-revolutionary period, a highly revered icon of Sts. Constantine and Helena, which previously belonged to the Balaklava Greek battalion. In 1898, there were 197 people in the parish of the church, a priest and a sexton conducted the service, and in 1910 there were more than 400 people in the parish. In the 1920s. the temple was closed. After the end of World War II, its building was used as a club and cinema. In the 1990s. Thanks to the efforts of Archimandrite Augustine, the old church was returned to the faithful, and in 2001 restoration work began. The temple is ranked among the Balaklava St. George Monastery.
Today the church of Sts. Constantine and Helena is a working temple in which regular services are held.
