Peter Lyubimov

Holy Hieromartyr Peter Lyubimov, an archpriest, was born on 6 January 1867 in the village of Svitino in the Podolsk district of Moscow province, in the family of the psalmist Pavel Petrovich Lyubimov. He finished the spiritual school at Perervino in 1882 and the Moscow seminary in 1888. Until 1893 he taught at the church school in Vanilovo, then until 1900 at the one in Vertkovo. In 1900 he became psalmist at the church of Saint Nicholas in Plotniki, on the Arbat in Moscow, and on 26 September 1903 he was ordained priest and named rector of the Dormition church in the village of Kishkino, Bronnitsy district. Between 1903 and 1919 he was teacher of the Law of God at the primary school in Kishkino. In 1908 he asked Bishop Tryphon of Dmitrov to allow the building of a new stone church, because the old one had fallen into ruin. Through the labour of the priest and the parishioners, the new church was soon built and consecrated in 1912. In 1920 he received a pectoral cross, then was raised to archpriest and received a mitre.

In the years 1920 to 1930 the authorities tried several times to close the church in Kishkino, using the taxes, which they kept raising, but the priest tried to pay the sums required on time. In 1936 the priest Peter Kedrov of the neighbouring village of Martynovskoe was arrested, and the church warden there, Nadezhda Petrovna Abbakumova, began inviting Father Peter Lyubimov to serve for them; from then on he had to shepherd two parishes.

Archpriest Peter Lyubimov and the warden Nadezhda Abbakumova were arrested on 2 March 1938 and held in Kashira. The investigator asked whether he knew the citizen Abbakumova, what tie he had with her, whether they had spoken of the coming of war, and whether he admitted guilt of anti-⁠Soviet agitation. He answered that he knew her as warden of the church, that they had not spoken of war, and that he did not admit guilt. On 9 March 1938 an NKVD troika sentenced him to death. He was shot on 14 March 1938 and buried in an unknown common grave at the Butovo range.

He is commemorated on 14 March, on 29 May (a movable date) in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs of Butovo and on 5 September (a movable date) in the Synaxis of the Saints of Moscow, in the new style.