MOSCOW, October 14 (RIA Novosti, Ivan Korzun) - The Russian Orthodox Church is celebrating the Protection of the Mother of God on Wednesday, with church services dedicated to the feast.

According to church doctrine, the feast symbolizes Mary's intercessory prayers for Christians to Jesus, her "protecting veil."

On this day, also called the Intercession of the Theotokos or the Veil of Our Lady, the Russian Church prays for those in jails, and the head of the Russian Church, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia, addressed believers in a statement.

Bishop Alexander of Dmitrov read the patriarch's message during a liturgy in the Protection Church in Butyrka, a Moscow pre-trial detention center.

"Care for those in prisons is one of the Church's social services. The Church wishes to heal the wounds that sin inflicted upon human souls with love," the statement said.

Russia and Ukraine are the most ardent celebrators of the Protection feast, which remembers the miraculous appearance of the Mother of God, in the tenth century, in the Blachernae church in Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul) where her veil was kept.

Prince Vladimir baptized medieval Kievan Rus, which comprised parts of modern-day Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, in the year 988. The canonical Orthodox Churches in Ukraine and Belarus are subordinate to the Russian Orthodox Church.