Ministry of defence Republic of Serbia
 
09.04.2014.

Religious service in the Training Command



Chapel of the Holy Great Martyr Theodore Tyron opened in early March doors to Orthodox believers of the Training Command. Its consecration is scheduled for 5th May, the feast of Holy Hieromartyr Platon of Banja Luka, former military priest.

Chaplain Lieutenant Selimir Vagic, a clergyman of the Diocese of Backa, perceived the furnishing and consecration of the chapel as the first major trial, but also the joy of his missionary task. With his assistant, Staff Sergeant Milan Dimitrijevic he worries about the religious life of Orthodox Christians, who work in that unit, trying, as he says, to re-establish what was destroyed a few decades ago, by the will of ideological opponents of the Church.

Accepting the duty of a military priest, Father Selimir faced the challenge to rebuild a culture of life in Orthodoxy in the environment in which the attitude towards the Orthodox faith and the Church has been neglected for decades.

- It is not our job to be a part of the chain of command, or to directly advise officers about what they service should do in service. Military clergy builds and nurtures the ideals that are preached by both Orthodoxy and civic morality. The media have often addressed trivial matters when it comes to religious service in the military, starting with what the issue of the amount of salaries for chaplains to the matter of acceptable beard length. What is really important is how much our presence and work in the units would contribute to the quality of spiritual life, and therefore the quality of the work of people serving in the military – Llieutenant Vagić says.

Describing the first few months of his work in the Training Command, particularly job of organising the the Holy Great Martyr Theodore Tyron, Father Selimir Vagic recognized meaning in seemingly random circumstances.

- It is no coincidence that our chapel is dedicated to the Great Martyr Theodore Tyron. Tyron means recruit, and this is the Training Command. Here come those who are recruited for the first time to enter the military ranks – he says.

Every detail of the chapel which our interlocutor showed has its own "story" of four spirally carved columns of iconostasis, made from discarded pieces of wood, symbolizing the four members of the First Army, who lost their lives in 1999, not far away from this place, in the defence from NATO, to the choir which was also accidentally found and restored by members of the Training Command and inmates of therapeutic community "Country of the Living" – the institution of the Serbian Orthodox church which deals with the treatment of addictive illnesses.

Although the works on the iconostasis have not been completed yet, the chapel has already been radiating specific beauty. Father Vagic emphasizes that this place would not be "holier" by simply bringing a few icons, but the attitude that the Church would built with the people for whom it was raised there.