Theoctistus Smelnitsky

Holy Hieromartyr Theoctistus Smelnitsky (Feoktist Eliseevich Smelnitsky) was a priest of the Russian Orthodox Church, born on 17 January 1874 in the village of Tarasovichi, in the Oster district, Chernihiv province, and shot on 3 October 1937, in Kazakhstan. He was numbered among the new martyrs and confessors of Russia at the Jubilee Council of Bishops of 20 August 2000. He is remembered on 3 October, the day of his death (20 September on the old calendar).

Life

After his studies at the theological seminary in Chernihiv, he was ordained priest by Bishop Antony (Sokolov) of Chernihiv and Nizhyn. He served in parishes of the diocese of Chernihiv, was head and religion teacher at the zemstvo schools and the reading schools, and taught at the theological seminary in Chernihiv. Father Feoktist's last parish was the church of the Holy Trinity in the settlement of Losynivka, where he served until it was closed, in 1936. In the same year the priest was arrested and sent to "Karlag", in Kazakhstan, and in the following year he was sentenced to death by shooting. The sentence was carried out on 3 October 1937. The Ukrainian source says that after the Russian-⁠Bolshevik occupation of Ukraine he endured persecutions and that he was killed at half past eleven at night. The place of his burial is not known.