Basil Zalessky

Holy Hieromartyr Basil Zalessky was a priest at Astrakhan and was shot on 15 February 1938, after serving a term in the camps for having served memorial services at the graves of martyred bishops.

Beginnings

He was born on 4 February 1887 in the village of Fyodorovka in the Astrakhan district, in the family of the psalm-⁠reader Daniel Zalessky. He graduated from the Astrakhan seminary in 1908 and in the same year was ordained deacon at the church of the Nativity of Christ in the city. On 5 October 1916 he was ordained priest at the church of Saint Alexis, Metropolitan of Moscow, attached to the Alexandrine Asylum. That church was closed by the new authorities, and in 1920 he was appointed again to the church of the Nativity.

In the summer of 1922 the Renovationists, backed by the authorities, tried to seize control of the Church. Bishop Anatoly of Enotaevsk recognized the Renovationist Supreme Church Administration and urged the clergy to do likewise, but after two weeks many priests, learning of its program of reforms, sent protests. Father Basil was among them. In September he went to Moscow with a delegation from Astrakhan, saw the situation there and came back even more convinced of the danger of the new movement; he then spoke in the churches and urged the faithful to hold to Orthodoxy. When in 1923 the Renovationists seized the church of the Nativity, he moved to the church of the Protection.

The memorial services and the arrest

The priest honored the sacrifice of Archbishop Mitrophan of Astrakhan, shot in 1919 with his vicar, and for many years went with the faithful to their grave to serve memorial services. In 1927 the OGPU resolved to stop every sign of veneration of them. On 13 July the Astrakhan plenipotentiary wrote that the priest had organized, in the last days of April, a procession to the graves of the two men who had been shot and had publicly served a memorial service, which he called a political demonstration. On 15 July Father Basil was arrested. Questioned, he said that the services were held year after year at the request of the faithful, that he knew of no prohibition and that he did not consider himself the organizer. He did not admit guilt.

On 12 September he was released on condition that he not leave the city. On 19 December 1927 the Special Council of the OGPU sentenced him to three years in a camp, reduced by a quarter under an amnesty. He reached Kem in February 1928 and stayed there, working from 1929 as an assistant in a warehouse.

The last years

At the beginning of January 1930 a theft case was opened against the management of the store in the camp, and on 3 January the priest's belongings were searched. A receipt, twenty rubles, a cross with a silver chain and new boots were found; he said he had bought the boots. He was arrested, and on 20 June the OGPU Collegium sentenced him to eight years, counted from 1927. He worked on the White Sea-⁠Baltic Canal, first at ordinary labor and then as an accountant.

In 1934 he was released and returned to Astrakhan. At first he did not serve in church, since he needed the permission of the authorities, but the faithful came to him to confess and to ask advice. On 6 August 1936 Archbishop Andrew Komarov gave him leave to serve at the church of Saint Prince Vladimir. The Renovationists tried to seize that church too, and in 1937 the faithful were forced out and the church was closed.

On 20 January 1938 Father Basil was arrested again. False witnesses signed what they were asked to. At his interrogation of 25 January the priest rejected the charge of anti-⁠Soviet activity and did not confirm the witnesses. On 2 February an NKVD troika sentenced him to death. He was shot on 15 February 1938 and buried in an unknown common grave.

The saint is commemorated on 16 February and, in the new style, on 7 February (movable) in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of the Russian Church, on 24 May in the Synaxis of the Saints of the Astrakhan Metropolis and on 23 August in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Solovki.