Margaret Gunaropulo

Saint Margaret (in the world Maria Mikhailovna Gunaropulo, 1865-1918) the venerable martyr was abbess of the Prophet Elijah convent at Menzelinsk in the diocese of Ufa. She was born in Kyiv in a Greek family and was killed by the Bolsheviks at Menzelinsk on 9 (22) August 1918. She was canonized as a locally venerated saint of the Ufa diocese on 26 October 1999, and in August 2000 the Council of Bishops of the Russian Church entered her in the synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia, for veneration in the whole Church, with commemoration on the first Sunday after 25 January (7 February). The Greek sources place her commemoration on 25 January.

Her life

She was born in 1865 (or 1866) at Kyiv, in a Greek family. Her spiritual father was Archpriest Alexander Korsakovsky, rector of the church of Saint George in Kyiv. Her long-⁠time acquaintance Prince Nikolai Zhevakhov writes in his memoirs that Father Alexander understood the state of Maria Mikhailovna, who suffered and longed in the world. She had no half-⁠measures, no compromise with conscience; on every question she turned for counsel to her spiritual father. Her boundless love of neighbour, which sought occasions to show itself, her unlimited indulgence of human weaknesses did not give birth to compromises with conscience, nor to duplicity, nor to anything that is usually covered with piety and in reality shows only indifference to Christian duty. Such people, who give everything to others and receive nothing from others, are always lonely; no one asks them whether they too need something, whether they too need support and affection in return; they are sought out when needed, but not noticed when the need has passed.

She was tonsured a nun in 1917. After the tonsure she was for a short time in the "Joy and Consolation" convent on the estate of the Counts Orlov-⁠Davydov near Moscow, where Magdalina (Orlova-⁠Davydova) was abbess. On 18 January 1917 she was appointed abbess of the Prophet Elijah convent at Menzelinsk, with elevation to the rank of abbess; the elevation took place in Moscow in the presence of Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna, who grew fond of Mother Margaret. By 1917 the convent had fifty nuns and 248 novices. Abbess Margaret was famous for her strict ascetic life and for ordering the life of the convent in the spirit of ancient piety. She cared for the good order of the convent and the inner spiritual peace of the sisters. According to the Greek source, she organized the convent on the model of the old monasteries of Greece; in her time the convent flourished spiritually. She was distinguished by learning, prudence and a strict ascetic life, which the nuns also followed under her guidance. The convent had orchards of fruit trees, vegetable gardens, workshops of icons, gold embroidery and photography.

Revolution and martyrdom

In April 1917 the wave of revolution reached the convent of Saint Elijah. By a decision of the Provisional Government, parish schools were to pass to the Ministry of Education, but Abbess Margaret managed to protect the convent school from this transfer. On 18 April 1918 she was elected to the diocesan council. In May 1918 the Czechoslovak revolt began, and by July the Ufa governorate had been freed from the Bolsheviks, but fighting continued on the western borders of the governorate, and Menzelinsk passed from hand to hand. In summer 1918 the Bolsheviks left Menzelinsk; the inhabitants formed a volunteer detachment to guard the town, with the help of White Army detachments. On 21 August the Bolsheviks again launched an offensive on Menzelinsk. The White Army detachment and the guard detachment held out for four hours, but the Bolsheviks burst into the town and carried out a massacre. The number shot at Menzelinsk on 21-22 August reached two hundred. In this bloody reprisal Abbess Margaret also died. The pretext for the killing was a nun's attempt to protect from reprisal some officers who had not the strength to leave the town. She was buried in the Prophet Elijah convent at Menzelinsk, beside the altar of the Ascension church.

According to the Greek source, in September 1918, when the White troops left the Kazan region, the abbess, fearing the Bolsheviks, followed them with other refugees. But Saint Nicholas appeared to her in a dream and said: "Why are you fleeing from your crown?" The abbess returned to the convent and prepared for her burial. The next day, during the Divine Liturgy, the revolutionaries seized her, dragged her to the church door and executed her. The Greek source calls the convent that of Saint John the Baptist, the Russian one that of the Prophet Elijah.

In August 2000 the Council of Bishops entered her in the synaxis of the new martyrs, on the proposal of Archbishop Nikon (Vasyukov) of Ufa and Sterlitamak.