Vladimir Morinsky

Holy Hieromartyr Vladimir (Vladimir Alexandrovich Morinsky) was a priest, born on 24 June 1883 in Saint Petersburg and shot on 15 September 1937 in Kazakhstan. The Russian Church numbered him among the saints as a holy hieromartyr, in 2000, for veneration throughout the Church. He is commemorated on 2 (15) September and in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia.

He was orphaned early and was given to be raised in a private church patronage choir. In 1903, with the choir, he moved to Moscow and sang in its churches. In 1912 he received the post of singing teacher in the town of Klin. At the same time for half a year he was conductor of the cathedral choir. Then he moved to the village of Spas-⁠Kvashonki, in the Kalyazin district, Tver province, where he taught singing at the local school and led the church choir. From 1916 to 1917 he served as a private in the 238th reserve infantry regiment in Oryol. In 1917 he taught singing in the schools of Moscow. From 1924 he worked in various Soviet institutions and sang in the choir.

On 27 July 1934 he was ordained deacon for the church of the Holy Martyrs Adrian and Natalia at Losinoostrovskaya, near Moscow (today within Moscow). In August he was ordained priest at the same church. He fulfilled the duties of a pastor with zeal and was known as a diligent man of prayer and ascetic. Later, at the investigation, witnesses told that healings took place through the priest's prayers.

He was arrested for the first time on 1 April 1935, on a charge of anti-⁠Soviet agitation, and imprisoned in Butyrka prison. He did not admit guilt. He was sentenced to three years in a camp in the Burmino section of the Karaganda camp, where he worked as head of a fodder warehouse. He was arrested a second time in the camp on 1 September 1937, in the group case of Bishop Damascene (Tsedrik). He was accused that, "being a prisoner and serving his sentence in Karlag, he continued his counter-⁠revolutionary activity, which consisted in that Tsedrik, Morinsky and Lilov gathered and held singing of prayers in the building of the post office, and with Goryachev repeatedly held the reading of evening prayers and urged a prisoner not to renounce holy orders". He did not admit guilt. He was shot by decision of the troika of the NKVD administration for the Karaganda region of 10 September 1937, together with Bishop Damascene, Euthymius (Goryachev) and others.