Nicholas Kazansky

Holy New Martyr Nicholas Kazansky (Nikolai Fyodorovich Kazansky) was a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church, born in 1874 in the village of Dmitrovka, in the Berdyansk district, Tavrida province, and died in exile on 20 October 1942, in the Ustvymlag camp, in the Komi Republic. He served at Simferopol and was arrested and exiled several times. He was numbered among the locally venerated saints of the diocese of Crimea by the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in 1998, and in 2000, at the Council of Bishops of the Russian Church, among the new martyrs and confessors of Russia. He is remembered on 7 October, old calendar (20 October).

Service

He was born in the family of a servant of the Church. He studied at the Tavrida seminary, married after finishing and received the rank of priest, ordained by the bishop Nikolai (Ziorov). The places where he served before the revolution are not known. After the coming of Soviet power he served, with interruptions between arrests, at the Alexander Nevsky cathedral in Simferopol, until its demolition. After the second arrest he served in the only open church in Simferopol, the church of All Saints, but here too his service was interrupted by arrests. He returned to serve after the third arrest. In 1932 he became assistant to Bishop Porphyry (Gulevich) and served at the church of All Saints until the arrest of 1936. The church warden, a servant of the NKVD, who had taken the post in 1933 and watched the priest's actions, informed against him. He remained in the memory of the parishioners as a quiet, gentle and welcoming man. He was a deeply believing man and defended in every way the interests of Orthodoxy. In his service he was not afraid to say aloud the truth about the persecution of the Church. He condemned Renovationism. After the exiles he told the parishioners of the privations and troubles which the servants of the Church and other people met under Soviet power.

The arrests

The first time he was arrested together with Archbishop Nikodim (Krotkov), accused of "resisting the seizure of church valuables; theft and concealment of them; careless keeping; pretending theft of valuables; passive defence against the seizure". On 1 December 1922 a sentence was given, after which he was sent to the Nizhny Novgorod prison, for three years. He served the sentence together with Nikodim (Krotkov). He returned from prison in 1925. Despite the first arrest, he continued to denounce Soviet power and Renovationism in the Church, for which he was convicted again, two years later, in 1927. The third time he was arrested in 1933, after three months he was released. He continued to preach and to ask prayers for all the hierarchs and servants of the Church in prisons. The warden of the church of All Saints informed against him repeatedly and so Father Nikolai was interrogated regularly. In October 1936 he was arrested the fourth time, together with Bishop Porphyry (Gulevich). A series of interrogations and humiliations began. At the interrogations he conducted himself with dignity, said openly that he did not support Soviet power and considered it "anti-⁠Christian" and "godless". He condemned Renovationism and supported Patriarch Tikhon. He did not admit guilt. On 3 January 1937 he was found guilty of organizing underground monastic organizations and sentenced to five years of exile. He was sent to the Krasnoyarsk region, to the village of Novoselovo. But there too he stood on firm positions and so was arrested again in November 1937 and sentenced to ten years. The priest's health worsened and he was put in a colony for invalids.

Death and canonization

Father Nikolai died at the age of sixty-⁠eight, on 20 October 1942, in the Komi Republic, where Ustvymlag was. In 1989 the prosecutor's office of the Krasnoyarsk region rehabilitated him. In 1998 the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church canonized him as a locally venerated saint of the diocese of Crimea, in which he served the greater part of his life free of arrests and exiles. After two years the Council of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church numbered him among the new martyrs and confessors of Russia.