This is the moment a top Romanian cleric does his best to ignore a woman believed to be suffering from lockdown stress who suddenly turns up and starts dancing around him during a religious ceremony.
Police have warned the clergy that they might experience parishioners showing signs of disturbance as a result of being locked down because of the coronavirus pandemic, and the four priests and the Archbishop pictured here had decided that warning properly applied to the woman as they did their best not to upset her.
The incident was filmed outside the Cathedral of Saints Peter and Paul in the city of Constanta in the south-eastern Romanian county of the same name when Teodosie Petrescu, 64, who has been the Archbishop of Tomis since 2001, was officiating at an outside mass.
In the footage, the dancing woman is seen wearing sunglasses over what appears to be a full-face covering as the clergymen attempt to carry on with the service being held outside the cathedral because of the restrictions on gatherings in closed spaces.
As the clergymen carry on with the Orthodox mass, the woman continues dancing and is seen weaving in and out between them.
Eugen Tanasescu, spokesperson for the local archdiocese, said that none of the clergymen paid the devotee any attention and did not attempt to halt her religious expression.
Tanasescu said: “We realised we were possibly dealing with a person with an amount of emotional instability and we were worried about how she might react.
“We have been warned by the authorities that lockdown may be causing a number of behavioural problems.”
Tanasescu said that he did not recognise the woman and had never seen her attending mass at the cathedral before.
He added that she disappeared shortly after the ceremony and has not been seen again.
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Story By: Gheorghi Caraseni, Sub-Editor: Michael Leidig, Agency: Central European News
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