Macrina wrote:Dear Cyprian, Bishop Andrew (Andrei aka Igumen Andrew), as far as I know and he has stated in his bio, he has been among the Russian Orthodox abroad for some thirty years. Could it be another Fr Michael of the GOC which you are referring. Bishop Andrew was ordained a priest by blessed Met. Philaret in ROCOR. And he was not ordained "Michael".
Greetings Macrina,
Here is the biography that once appeared on the ROAC website. Notice how the biography merely glosses over the entire period between 1986-2004 by simply stating that Fr. Michael united with "churches of the Greek Old Calendar Movement."
Father Andrew (Maklakov), formerly Fr. Michael Maklakov, was born in 1953, the first of six children. He was raised in a Roman Catholic family, and wanted to enter the service of the Church from an early age. At the age of fourteen he entered the Carmelite Order and studied in their minor seminary. However, after the changes of Vatican II, he transferred over to the Ukrainian Uniate branch of Roman Catholicism. At the age of twenty, he was sent to Rome to study for the priesthood. However, after one year there, he became aware of Orthodoxy, and returned to the United States.
With the blessing of Archbishop Averky Taushev, he was baptized in Jordanville in 1975. A year later he became acquainted with Archbishop Andrei Rimarenko, who asked him to become his cell attendant, with whom he stayed until Vladika's blessed repose. Vladika Andrei instructed him in the Russian language, pastoral and dogmatic theology, and prepared him for the priesthood. Vladika Andrei sent him to Metropolitan Philaret for his examinations, which he passed. After the repose of Archbishop Andrei, Michael joined the US Air Force, and married Susanna Dickinson. They had two daughters, Elizabeth and Barbara. After his military service, Michael was ordained to the diaconate by Bishop Gregory Grabbe on August 2/15, 1982. On the feast of Dormition of that same year, he was ordained to the priesthood by Metropolitan Philaret at the Novo Diveevo Convent.
Father Michael's first assignment was at the Cathedral of the Ascension in Glen Cove, New York. Besides the parish work that he did there, he served as the Administrator of Diocesan Property for the Eastern American and New York Diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia. He also taught religion in the St. Sergius High School. He was also asked to move and reorganize the Synodal Candle Works from the Synod building in Manhattan to the Diocesan headquarters in Glen Cove.
In 1984, he was elevated to the rank of Archpriest and was transferred to Rome, Italy. A year and half later, he was transferred to Copenhagen, Denmark. In 1986, and in the years that followed, due to the turmoil within the ROCOR caused by Metropolitan Vitaly, Father Michael would strive to maintain the traditions he had learned from Archbishop Andrei by uniting with churches of the Greek Old Calendar Movement.
In 1999, Fr. Michael's wife of 19 years, who suffers from bipolar affectation disorder (manic depression), took his children and left him. Father Michael waited for her return for four years. However, after she married another man, he resolved to enter the monastic life and began searching for an appropriate place where he might realize this desire that had been with him since his childhood. His search ultimately led him to Dormition Skete and his return to the Russian Orthodox Church, under the omophorion of Metropolitan Valentine of Suzdal and Bishop Gregory of Denver, of the Russian Orthodox Autonomous Church.
Father Michael was tonsured into monasticism by Bishop Gregory of Denver and Colorado on the Feast of the Lord's Meeting in the Temple, in the Cathedral of the Dormition, on February 2/15, 2004, being given the name Andrew, after the First Called Apostle. We wish Father Andrew success and God's grace in his new vocation, serving the Church of God.
