Demetrius Voskresensky

Saint Demetrius Voskresensky, hieromartyr, was a priest in Russia, in the Nizhny Novgorod governorate and in Chuvashia, and died in 1938 in a colony, after being repressed in 1937. He was numbered among the saints by the Russian Orthodox Church in 2007.

He was born on 7 September 1869 in the village of Urusovo, Alatyr district, Simbirsk governorate, in the family of the priest Basil Dmitrievich Voskresensky. His mother, Anna Ivanovna, died in 1875, in childbirth. His father fell asleep in 1907, having caught typhus from a peasant to whom he gave communion. His grandfather, Dmitry Ivanovich Voskresensky, had been a priest in the Nizhny Novgorod governorate.

Demetrius entered the theological seminary of Simbirsk and finished it in 1891, in the second category. His first place of service was the parish school of Urusovo. In 1892 he was appointed psalm-⁠reader, and in 1895 he was ordained priest of the village of Polibino, Alatyr district. In 1902 he moved to the village of Novye Monadyshi, Ardatov district. From 1908 to 1911 he was a member of the deanery council. In 1911 he was transferred to the village of Anastasovo (of the former Kurmysh district), where he served as priest until his arrest in 1937. For his service he received awards: in 1905 the priestly belt, in 1916 the kamilavka, in 1922 the pectoral cross. Later he was raised to the rank of archpriest.

Until 1937 he served in the church of Saint Nicholas in the village of Anastasovo, Poretsky district, Chuvash Autonomous Soviet Republic. He was arrested in October 1937. He died in the Alatyr colony no. 1 (the settlement of Pervomaisky) on 22 May 1938. In 2000 he was numbered among the new martyrs, and on 27 December 2007 the Holy Synod numbered him among the saints. The Russian source gives both dates without clarifying the relation between them.

His wife, Elizabeth Nikolaevna Voskresenskaya (née Ostroumova), was the daughter of a priest. Demetrius and Elizabeth had seven children: Boris, Nicholas, Alexandra, Olga, Basil, Valentine and Lydia.