Armenian News-NEWS.am presents below a shortened version of journalist Peter Hughes’ article, which is published in The Telegraph daily of Great Britain.

“To this day the true glories of Armenia are spiritual. I visited 10 monasteries and churches in three days, the earliest dating from the fourth century. The newest was the least typical, not least because it had seats. In the Orthodox Church worshippers normally stand. [Capital city] Yerevan’s cathedral of St Gregory the Illuminator also has more windows than older churches. Consecrated in 2001 to celebrate 1,700 years of Christianity, it feels more auditorium than cathedral. Relics of St Gregory, who converted the country, are kept beneath an imported Baroque panoply.

“We drove south from Yerevan through a valley of scruffy agriculture; a shepherd chivvied his sheep down the road; watchtowers staked out the frontier with Turkey. At the monastery of Khor Virap there should have been a view of Mount Ararat across the border, but it was cloaked in cloud.

“West of the capital, at Echmiadzin, Mass was being sung in the cathedral. Nine priests, two in black hoods, glided before the high altar to a mystical choreography. Their gutsy plainsong swirled around the domes.

“Echmiadzin has been at the heart of Armenia’s religion since the fourth century. In elaborate silver-gilt cases in the cathedral museum, there are claimed to be not only splinters from Noah’s Ark and the True Cross but the heavy iron head of the spear that stabbed Christ at Calvary.

“The thrill of Armenia’s churches comes not so much from their ancient masonry or antiquities but from their energy as fervent power plants, steeped in the certainties and rituals of the faith they have kept for more than 1,000 years. At Geghard monastery, a Unesco World Heritage site, two churches have been cut into rock.”