John Florovsky

Holy Hieromartyr John Florovsky, a priest, in the world Ivan Ivanovich Florovsky, was born in 1877 in the village of Istomino, in the Tarusa district of the Kaluga province. After studying at the Theological Seminary, he received the priesthood in 1897 and went to serve in the town of Bobrov in the Voronezh region. He served there until his arrest in 1937.

On 17 March 1937 Father John was sentenced to five years of exile in Kazakhstan and had to look for a place to live in the settlement of Maiskoe in the Pavlodar region. There he was arrested again, accused of belonging to the group of "Archimandrite Gregory (Rebeza)", which was said to carry on "counterrevolutionary activity" in Maiskoe. Though the accused categorically denied his guilt, the troika attached to the UNKVD of the East Kazakhstan region sentenced him to the supreme penalty. At two o'clock in the night, on 2 December 1937, the priest John Florovsky was shot. The place of his burial is not known.

The Church commemorates him on 2 December, the day of his death, in the new style, on 31 July, in the Synaxis of the Saints of Kaluga, and on the movable day of the synaxis of the new martyrs.