John Pavlovsky

Holy Hieromartyr John Pavlovsky, a priest, in the world John Petrovich Pavlovsky, was born on 28 January 1876 in the village of Popovonavolotskoe, Shenkursk district, Arkhangelsk province, in the family of a priest. In 1892 he finished the theological school at Shenkursk, and in 1893 was dismissed from the first class of the Arkhangelsk Seminary. On 14 August 1893 he was appointed psalmist at the church of Saints Peter and Paul in Ust-⁠Kozhva, and on 13 September 1894 moved to the church of the Saviour in Bakurino. In 1900 he passed the deacon's examination before the Seminary commission and on 19 March 1900 was ordained deacon, but remained, for diligence, psalmist at the same church. In July 1901 he was removed from the post, but on 19 December 1901 was appointed psalmist at the church of Saints Zosimas and Sabbatius in Zamezhenskaya. On 9 August 1908 he was admitted again to the diaconate, and on 15 February 1910 confirmed as deacon of the Saint Nicholas cathedral in Ust-⁠Tsilma.

On 23 July 1912 he passed the priest's examination before the commission of the Arkhangelsk Seminary, and on 25 August 1912 was ordained priest for the church of the Synaxis of the Mother of God in Moshyug. Between 1894 and 1901 he was catechist at the church school in Bakurino, and between 1912 and 1918 at the village school in Moshyug. After 1918 he served, it is presumed, at the same church. In 1933 he was investigated by the NKVD on suspicion of concealing valuables, but was not tried. From 1935 he lived in the village of Bolshoe Galovo in the Izhma district, Komi, and served as a priest, but not for long.

On 30 June 1937 he was arrested and held in the Izhma prison. He was accused, among other things, of "carrying on counterrevolutionary agitation among the collective farmers, saying that the system would soon change and Soviet power would fall, and praising Hitler". On 16 September 1937 the troika of the UNKVD of the Komi ASSR sentenced him under article 58-10 to the supreme penalty. He received the death of martyrdom by shooting in the village of Izhma on 19 December 1937. The Holy Synod, by decision of 6 October 2001, numbered him among the saints, in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia of the twentieth century.

The Azbyka page gives the day of the execution as 19 December, while in the list of commemorations it gives 19 September; he is commemorated also on 11 February in the Synaxis of the Saints of Komi, on 1 November in the Synaxis of the Saints of Arkhangelsk, and on the movable day of the synaxis of the new martyrs.