Patriarch Daniel of Bulgaria delivered an emotional and spiritually profound speech on the occasion of the celebration of Bulgaria’s Liberation, honoring the sacrifice of the heroes who fought for the country’s freedom and independence.
In his speech, he referred to the invaluable value of freedom, which is a gift from God, and emphasized the importance of historical memory and spiritual unity for the future of the Bulgarian people.
His message brought to mind the struggles of the past while simultaneously urging everyone to keep alive the faith and values that shaped their national identity.
Here follows the speech of Patriarch Daniel of Bulgaria:
Esteemed representatives of the state authorities,
Your Eminence,
Dear Fathers,
Beloved brothers and sisters in Christ,
The feast of Liberation, of freedom and independence for our people, is a day of remembrance and gratitude. Today, our Orthodox Church honors and prays for all the fighters and heroes of Bulgarian freedom, especially for those who, with the heroism of love, dedicated their lives to it. For the supreme gift of freedom, which we enjoy today, we owe gratitude first to God, for His blessing on our Orthodox people, and then to all the fighters of our spiritual and ecclesiastical Renaissance movement, who prepared the conquest of our national independence, which came as a result of the Liberation War, organized and implemented by the Liberator Tsar, the Russian Emperor Alexander II, and the combined efforts of his victorious army and our Bulgarian detachment. Everything that was achieved by all these individuals remains in European and world history as an example of the power of the spirit and Orthodox Christian unity, which finds one of its most categorical expressions in the fight for our freedom.
As Christians, we know that freedom is undeniably, first and foremost, a gift from God, but we also know that it—in its human dimension—must be conquered, earned, and protected, and that it always has a high price. Man is created by God to live and exist freely, but this freedom is something that must be constantly defended. Let us be grateful for this gift. The Christian understanding of freedom also teaches us that its highest expression is the knowledge of truth (see John 8:32)—the truth about God and the truth about man. For freedom is the presence of the Spirit of the Lord (see 2 Corinthians 3:17), which is the Spirit of Truth (John 14:17). In the knowledge of truth, we are called to live and bear witness to the truth—in order to be worthy of our present and future freedom.
Ingratitude, lack of recognition, and the disregard for historical truth due to temporary and fleeting circumstances can be considered a sin. A sin against the truth, which—as we have already said—makes us truly free. Our gratitude to all those who lost their lives and fought for the freedom of our beloved Homeland is absolutely natural for every Orthodox Christian. We thank God first, but we do not forget the people through whom God worked, so that we may be free today.
Today, our country has long been part of the free world, and our people live under conditions of spiritual and ecclesiastical autonomy, as well as state and political independence. Today, we have all that was, just a century and a half ago, a dream for our ancestors and an ideal for which they fought fiercely and were ready to sacrifice everything, even their lives. Although they lived under double dependency—spiritual and political—they had a living ecclesiastical and historical memory of the times when they were not slaves. With this living memory of their spiritual and ethnic identity, enslaved but not spiritually defeated, they managed to preserve themselves—with their faith, language, writing, and culture—so that, when the favorable historical moment came, they could restore their dignity as a free people—with history, traditions, and their own face among the other European nations.
When we celebrate our day of freedom, their heroism and the path they walked come alive before us in their complete grandeur and compel us to faithfully guard their legacy and their ideal for a free and independent Bulgaria: The State of the Spirit, as defined by the great Russian scholar Academician Dmitry Likhachev in 1978 during the celebrations for the centenary of our Liberation. For the true strength of our people lies precisely in their spirituality and culture, which, in turn, are based on our Christian faith—faith and hope in God, through Whom, as the Apostle of the Nations says, we live, move, and have our being (Acts 17:28). This faith has shaped, united, and preserved us as a people through the ages, even in the darkest and most desperate times, it has strengthened us, and it remains the only true guarantee for our present and future, for our continued existence as a people of God. It inspires our ancestors and our Orthodox brothers from near and far, who came here once to conquer our Liberation. Eternal and blessed be the memory of all the known and unknown heroes of Bulgarian freedom.
Happy and blessed Bulgaria’s Freedom Day!
May God protect Bulgaria!
† DANIEL, Patriarch of Bulgaria
