Romanians flock to a new cathedral that is the world's largest Orthodox church

BUCHAREST, Romania — Thousands of pilgrims turned out Sunday in Romania’s capital for the consecration of religious paintings inside the world’s largest Christian Orthodox church that was being opened after 15 years of construction.

Worshippers and officials arrived in droves at the People’s Salvation Cathedral, known as the National Cathedral, which at its highest point stands more than 125 meters (410 feet) and has an inner capacity for 5,000 worshippers in the deeply Orthodox country. The cathedral's opulent interior is covered with frescoes and mosaics depicting saints and icons.

Proposals for a national cathedral in the country of about 19 million people had been put forward for more than a century, but its fruition was hampered by two world wars and the decades of communist rule, w