Greek Catholic (Melkite) Chapel of the Holy Face to Face Via Dolorosa - the way of the Cross of Jesus, Christian pilgrims who come to fully experience the sufferings of Christ. Here, in the sixth Station of the Cross, remember the legend of St. Veronica, who wiped them with the face of Jesus her veil.

This is a tradition - not in one of the episodes of the Gospel there. The story of the pious and compassionate Jew appeared much later, in the Apocrypha, and the many legends who identify it with different biblical characters. It is assumed that the Veronica - not his real name, and the distortion of the Latin vera icon («true image").

All the legends agree on one thing - during the journey of Jesus to Calvary His beaten and bloodied, she saw a woman coming out of his house to the cries of the crowd. Instantly there broke out of pity, and she held a handkerchief to Jesus, that He might wipe off the face of blood, sweat and dirt. Face of Christ imprinted on the fabric and then, by the same legend, helping to heal the sick.

There are several pieces of tissue that are believed could be thus veil of Veronica (the most famous stores in the Basilica of St. Peter in the Vatican and the Italian village of Manoppello), as well as several copies of the Holy Face Face. Officially, the Catholic Church does not recognize a genuine, no handkerchief.

Chapel of the Holy Face Face is the place where, according to legend, was the house of Veronica. Via Dolorosa then it narrows to wade through the crowds easily. Externally, the building of the chapel does not look like a church, but it is impossible to miss the desired station. There are unmistakable signs: black round sign with the Roman sixes and two arched doorways between them on the column, as if grown into a stone wall, engraved station name in Latin.

The left door is usually closed, pilgrims enter through the right, blue - for her is a small shop with icons. Turning left, the visitor sees the chapel itself - a long room, harsh arches resembling a cave. After the street noise is particularly quiet and peaceful. Austere stone altar - the work of the Franciscan architect Antonio Barluchchi which in 1953 revolutionized this little church, built in 1882. During the construction have been discovered and preserved fragments existed in Jerusalem in the VI century Monastery of St. Cosmas.

The chapel belongs to the community of the Little Sisters of Jesus - the unification of women who help the poorest and most powerless. Logically, this is where the pilgrims think about simple human compassion.