Benjamin Famintsev

Holy Hieromartyr Benjamin Famintsev (Veniamin Ivanovich Famintsev) was an archpriest of the Russian Church, born on 19 January 1873 at Kolomna and shot on 14 March 1938 at the Butovo firing range, near Moscow. He served in the churches of the Moscow province, from 1919 at the church of the Nativity of the Mother of God in the village of Meshcherino. In 2003 he was numbered in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia. He is remembered on 1 March on the old calendar (14 March on the new), the day of his death, and in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs of Butovo. In some lists of the victims of repression the surname appears also as Fomintsev.

Youth

He was born on 19 January 1873 at Kolomna, in the family of the priest John Famintsev and his wife Maria. His father served as priest at the church of Saints Peter and Paul in Kolomna. He studied at the theological school in Kolomna, then at the Moscow theological seminary, which he finished in 1893. In 1894 he entered as psalm-⁠reader at the church in the town of Klin. According to the database "Memories of the Gulag and Their Authors", on 18 May 1894 he was appointed psalm-⁠reader at the Dormition church in Klin. He also passed the examination as teacher at the church school and worked without pay as a teacher at the Holy Trinity cathedral of Klin.

Service

In 1901 he was ordained deacon at the church of the Intercession in the village of Karpovo, Bogorodsk district. In 1906 he was ordained priest and appointed to the church of the Holy Trinity in the village of Troitskoye-⁠Zotovo, Bronnitsy district. Between 1912 and 1917 he was in the clergy of the Transfiguration church in the village of Gari, Dmitrov district. In 1918 he was moved to the church of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross in Kolomna. From 1919 he served at the church of the Nativity of the Mother of God in the village of Meshcherino, Kolomna district. According to "The Tree", he became rector of this church in May 1919, soon after a typhus epidemic in the parish. In 1925 he was raised to the rank of archpriest, and in 1931 he received a cross with ornaments. In 1897 he married Antonina Vasilyevna Famintseva. By the database cited, they had three children, but in the life materials of the Moscow Metropolis two are spoken of: a son Seraphim and a daughter. Seraphim, ill from birth, died in 1934, at twenty-⁠five, the daughter lived separately, and Famintsev's wife had died by then.

Arrest and martyrdom

In 1936 the village council of Meshcherino forbade Famintsev to go with molebens to the houses of parishioners. On 7 March 1936 the parish council of the church appealed to the All-⁠Union Central Executive Committee with a request to allow the priest to visit parishioners' homes, but received no answer. On 26 November 1937 the district newspaper "Forward" published an article in which Famintsev was given as an example of "undermining activity of church people". At the beginning of 1938 NKVD officers demanded from the secretary of the village council a character report on the priest, in which it was said that he "engaged in exploitation of children", baptized without the permission of the village council and held "anti-⁠Soviet" conversations with parishioners.

On 27 February 1938 he was arrested and shut in prison at Kashira. According to the "Orthodox Encyclopedia", he was charged with "praising the policy of fascism" and "slandering Soviet power"; he did not admit guilt. In the card of the "Open List" the charge is formulated as "anti-⁠collective-⁠farm agitation". On 9 March 1938 the troika of the UNKVD of the Moscow region sentenced him to death. On 14 March 1938 he was shot at Butovo and buried in an unknown common grave. In 1989 he was rehabilitated. On 6 October 2003 the Holy Synod of the Russian Church entered him in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of the Russian Church for veneration throughout the Church.