St Andronik Abp of Perm, New Hieromartyr

[Barbara]

Celebrated today, June 20

Holy Hierarch Andronik: A Life of Devotion and Martyrdom

St. Andronik, in the world, Vladimir Nikolsky, was born in 1870. After completing his studies at the Moscow Theological Academy in 1893, he embraced monasticism. In 1895, he was ordained a priest and, two years later, sent on a mission to Japan. There, he demonstrated apostolic zeal in spreading the Christian faith, and in 1906 he was consecrated as Bishop of Kyoto. However, two years later, illness forced Bishop Andronik to return to Russia.

Initially, he was appointed as a vicar in the Novgorod diocese, later transferred to Omsk, and eventually became the Archbishop of Perm. A tireless preacher of the Word of God, he organized rural parishes, provided aid to the poor and destitute, and made significant efforts to bring the Old Believers back into the fold of the Holy Church.

Immediately after the October Revolution of 1917, the Bolsheviks enacted a law separating the state from the Church and began persecuting believers. When a church message protesting against these measures was read at the Perm Cathedral, Archbishop Andronik instructed the archdeacon to pronounce an anathema on the persecutors. On June 4, 1918, the saint was promptly arrested along with the vicar bishop Theophan and subjected to a brutal interrogation, during which he did not utter a single word. To dispose of the hierarch, the Bolsheviks led him into a forest and ordered him to dig his own grave. After completing the task, the archbishop prayed to the Lord and lay down in the freshly dug pit. His tormentors immediately began burying him alive. After covering him halfway, they shot him and then buried him completely.

Bishop Theophan was drowned in the Kama River.

Upon learning of these events, the Synod decided to send a special commission to Perm to investigate the matter. The Bolsheviks stopped the train carrying the commission and killed all its members. When the local peasants, who had buried the bodies of the new martyrs, began to venerate them as saints, the authorities sent people to exhume and burn the bodies of the slain.This tragic series of events underscores the intense persecution faced by the Church and the steadfast faith and sacrifice of its leaders during that tumultuous period.

Pravoslavie.ru

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St. Andronik was born Vladimir Nikolsky on August 1, 1870, in Povodnevo, a village in Myshkin uyezd, Yaroslavl diocese. His father was a deacon. After finishing studies at the Yaroslavl Seminary in 1891, he entered the Moscow Theological Academy. On August 1, 1893, during his studies in Moscow he was tonsured a monk and given the name of Andronik. On July 22, 1895, he was ordained to the priesthood.After graduation, he was assigned as inspector and instructor, first, to the theological seminary of Kutaisi in the Caucasus and then at the seminary at Ardon. In 1897, he was assigned to the Russian Orthodox mission to Japan, under Bishop Nicholas (Kasatkin), later known as St. Nicholas of Japan, to assist in the missionary work that he began in 1861. Hieromonk Andronik was very surprised by this assignment and felt inadequate for the position, but ultimately he accepted it as God's will. His journey began in St. Petersburg on September 21, 1897, and then continued from Odessa with Archimandrite Sergius (Stragorodsky) on October 26. Traveling through European countries and the U.S.A. then on to Japan, they arrived in Japan on December 26. He wrote and published a book about this journey, A Missionary Journey to Japan (Kazan, 1899).

 
Hieromartyr Andronik of Perm as Bishop of Kyoto (1907)

On November 5, 1906, Andronik was consecrated bishop of Kyoto and assistant to Bp. Nicholas. He was the first bishop of Kyoto, which is the seat of the West Japan diocese of the Orthodox Church of Japan.

Although Bishop Andronik was the bishop of Kyoto, he lived in nearby Osaka which, while it then was the second largest city in Japan, was also the area where most Orthodox faithful lived. After he arrived in Osaka, he began to feel ill and found performing his duties difficult. After serving in Osaka for three months he asked leave to resign and to depart from Japan, and on May 27, 1907, he left Japan and returned to Russia. There he was assigned on October 26 to be the deputy to Bishop Eulogius of Kholm.

In 1908, he was assigned as bishop of Tikhvin in Novgorod diocese.

Bp. Andronik was a firm supporter of the Tsar. From his point of view it was God's will to let him reign over the empire, and thus that monarchy was the appropriate way for Christians. But this did not mean he supported tyranny. Rather, the Tsar should listen to his people so that all may have peace.

On July 30, 1914, he was appointed bishop of Perm and Solikamsk. Eleven days before, on July 19, World War I began. As the war progressed he worked energetically for the 1.5 million inhabitants and 570 churches in the region.

In summer 1916 he traveled to the army headquarters outside St. Petersburg where Tsar Nicholas II was leading the Russian Army. The purpose of the trip was to warn the Tsar about Rasputin. However, the Tsar would not take him seriously, and his trip failed. But Nicholas II was pleased with the gift Andronik gave him on behalf of his people, a pair of soldier's boots like those the province of Perm provided the army.

In 1917, he became Bishop of Perm and Kungur and became one of the seven hierarchs in the pre-conciliar council of the Local Council of the Russian Church in Moscow. He was active throughout the council, from August 1917 until April 1918, which was the end of its second session. As the agitation of the Bolshevik take-over intensified on January 25, 1918, Andronik made a written appeal to the faithful to defend the heritage of the Church from the aggressors and looters, as attacks became more frequent.In February, Bolsheviks in the Perm region started to loot churches and monasteries. After the second session of the council ended, Andronik returned to Perm.

Patriarch Tikhon had raised him to the rank of archbishop on April 12, Palm Sunday.

On Holy Thursday, April 16, the Bolsheviks carried out a search of his residence. He remained calm and continued the Holy Week services and that of Pascha.

The Bolshevik authorities increased pressure on the Church in the following weeks.

Finally Abp. Andronik was arrested at midnight on July 17. Clergy in Perm went on strike from the night he was arrested until July 26, halting all divine services in the region except baptism and the last rites for the dying.
But, on July 7, 1918, Abp. Andronik was martyred, being buried alive and shot.

In 2000, the Church of Russia glorified him as Hieromartyr Andronik, Archbishop of Perm, one of Russia's New Martyrs and Confessors.

 https://orthodoxwiki.org/Andronik_(Nikolsky)_of_Perm 
 
 

[Barbara]

[eish]

Unbelievable that the Sergianists didn't glorify him until 2000.

"Woe unto you! for ye build the sepulchres of the prophets, and your fathers killed them. Truly ye bear witness that ye allow the deeds of your fathers: for they indeed killed them, and ye build their sepulchres.”

[Barbara]

It MUST BE because he spoke the TRUTH in such a clear way - as witnessed by this slightly jumbled narrative [underlinings were from the original ; slight editing by me to correct minor mistakes, perhaps due to machine translation]:

Saint Martyr Andronik (Nikolsky), Archbishop of Perm.

Vladyka Andronik (Nikolsky) ascent up the Urals Golgotha began on July 30, 1914 with his appointment as Bishop of Perm and Solikamsk (renamed Perm and Kunguron July 1, 1916).
On July 19/August 1, 1914, the feast of St. Seraphim of Sarov, World War I began.

In August Perm heard the voice of Bishop Andronicus: “Amidst today’s terrible events the Lord has decreed that I should occupy the see of the enlightener of Perm, St. Stephen. There, in the west, blood-red clouds have already gathered… Yes, this war is terrible, it will demand much blood, many victims. But truly it is allowed by the Providence of God…
“This is a great mercy of God after all the heavy trials and humiliations which our Homeland has undergone in recent times. And it is all our fault, because we have willingly given our souls into captivity to every kind of foreign import, as if we even rejoiced to become complete Europeans and were leaving behind our so-called Russian backwardness. Now we see from bitter experience that this foreign forwardness is in fact complete barbarism, moral bankruptcy and spiritual perversion.

“»Modern wars with the perfect war means, held by the peoples, are terrible. More terrible is such a great war. For us, however, it is sacred because we are called upon to defend our Orthodox faith and our national identity. Of course, it is also important for other peoples as it carries a deep dividing line between the past and the future. When this war is over, the map of Europe will have radically changed. Spontaneously, one thinks that this is a revealing war, one of the wars that will precede the second presence of the Lord, as the Prophet Himself said: “One nation will rise against each other and one kingdom against each other will come hunger, sickness and earthquakes in various places “(Matthew 24: 7).

"That is why, my beloved spiritual children, we must gather all our strengths to prevent the enemy triumph. First and foremost, let’s all admit, like the ancient Ninevites. how we are worthy of such a terrible test, which was given by the Lord for our sins. Indeed, our malice is so blatant, which has ascended to the heavens (cf. John 1: 2).

“People have always been wrong and sinned, but never as they are now. Today’s people not only sin, they not only abdicate God but also boast of their sinfulness and rejection, pointing ]to] them as right and reasonable. Instead of the true God they bow to the gods of corruption, of drunkenness, of glory, of wealth, of pleasure.
With this idolatry they are glad, like the ancient Jews, who were punished by the Lord and scattered throughout the world.

“There was always sin, there always was apostasy from God, there was always a violation of His law both in our own country and in other countries. But the current situation is worse than any previous one. The saintly traditions of our fathers, our virtuous life, our beloved faith …“Let’s confess, then, how we have sinned heavily before God. Let us renounce the sinful pleasures and let us escape from the shallowness of our everyday life.
Let us armed with spiritual courage in front of the great events taking place according to divine providence. Let the centers of entertainment and corruption empty. There is no time for such. No feast when the plague is reaping ! We can not sin sinfully when our own brothers and siblings shed their blood on us at the borders of our homeland ! For their bloody sacrifices, let us be strict with ourselves. Let us live faithfully with fasting, prayer, temperance, charity, fear of God … ». (Translation Google)

“And so, beloved,” said Vladyka to his flock, “do not complain about sorrows as if they were a terrible misfortune. They wash away our sins, while giving extra holiness to virtue. It is not sorrows that are terrible, but carelessness, which destroys the man even while he remains at rest.”

He would say the following about the events in Russia: “It is a question… of a struggle between faith and faithlessness, between Christianity and Antichristianity… Masonry… will openly drive out Christianity… and pour into one man of iniquity, the son of perdition, the Antichrist. This is the clue to our most recent liberties: their aim is the destruction of Christianity in Rus’.”

“It is necessary to work in such a way as to organize the whole people into one family, firmly and consciously standing for the holy, historical heritage of the people-the Christian Faith and the autocratic Tsar. It is necessary obstinately and assiduously to steer clear of all parties, and to preserve the people precisely as a people, foreign to all party spirit, for wherever there is party spirit, there is division, there is struggle, there order is not to be looked for, and the whole is bound to disintegrate. And for that reason, when they say that amongst the parties there is a Russian party, this is either a lie or a misunderstanding. No, it is the Russian people itself, plucking up courage, consciously looking round on all sides and deciding firmly to stand for its treasure and not give in to the cunning schemes of its enemies…

A contemporary remembered: “Already at first sight his thin figure, assiduous prayer and cordial words made a most pleasant impression… Vladyka mixed his zealous, tireless service with heartfelt sermons, his lofty position-with simple, close relations with the Orthodox worshippers.

Fear of society’s displeasure did not embarrass the bishop-preacher. In his sermons Vladyka often reproved the frenzy of worldly spectacles with great boldness.

On the national question Vladyka wrote: “We [the Russians] have not violated and do not violate any of the peoples which are subject to us; we give to all, as before, freedom in all affairs of life on the basis of a common law that is equal for everyone, as also freedom of confession of his native faith for everyone. But we are the masters of the country and we wish to be such in fact, and therefore nobody must dare to mock us, or acquire power over us, or encroach on our higher rights.

"Still less shall we allow the dignity of our spiritual wealth and most important heritage-the Orthodox Faith and the Autocratic Tsar-to be mocked… A special word concerning the Jews: we did not accept them in our land and did not even conquer them. We cannot and will not give them equal rights, in accordance with the prophetic word of warning of the great writer of the Russian land, F.M.Dostoyevsky: ‘The Jews will destroy Russia.’ They do not want to use our tolerating them in our midst-so let them go wherever they want: we will not detain them at the gates; and we can live freely and prosperously without them. But if they remain among us, they will be as foreigners for us, not having the right to participate in the building of the people and the state.”  

Shortly before his arrest, on May 5, 1918, a priest tried to dissuade Vladyka from his martyric course: “How can you save the flock from the wolves who are destroying it and yourself not fall into despondency from the brutality in the people and the coming defilement of the holy things?”

Vladyka replied: “Believe me, Father, all this atheism and robbery is an assault of the enemy, a foul abuse of the good and God-fearing Russian soul. For the time being, because of their violation of their oath [to the tsar], God has removed the people’s reason and will, until they repent… It will be slow, but they will repent, at first gradually, but then they will completely recover their spiritual sight, they will feel strength and, like Ilya Muromets, will cast off this horror which has wrapped round the whole of our country… Perhaps I will no longer be in this world, but I am not deprived of the hope and certainty that Russia will be resurrected and return to God. Exhort everyone and reconcile the embittered with life, pour into them the principles of the radiant life according to the Gospel of Christ. Our work is to gather the flock of Christ… so that those who have become disillusioned with every kind of party here might find a living haven and good repose in the Church and amidst believers. The soul of the people will be resurrected-and its body, our healthy statehood, will also be resurrected. May the Lord help us. Forgive and pray for the sinful Archbishop Andronicus who invokes the blessing of God upon you…”.”

1,500 Red Army soldiers were summoned by the Bolsheviks for the arrest of Vladyka Andronicus. At three o’clock in the morning on June 4/17 he was arrested and put into a droshky taking him to the police in Motovilikhi. All those in the hierarchical house were also arrested.

On the next day, June 5/18, he was taken to the Perm Cheka, where he spent the night. In reply the superiors of all the churches of Perm and Motovilikhi carried out the order of their archpastor: “I am closing down for Divine services all the churches of Perm and Motovilikhi, and I forbid the carrying out of any Divine services except baptism and the last rites for the dying.” From the night of Vladyka’s arrest the Perm clergy went on strike. The city was in turmoil. Orthodox Christians gathered on the streets, demanding the release of Archbishop Andronicus and cursing the Bolsheviks.

Meetings organized by the Bolsheviks blamed the clergy for everything, and the Bolshevik press claimed that Vladyka had called on the worshippers to shoot the Bolsheviks, and that he was only trying to save his own skin.

Vladyka had been arrested by an armed detachment of Bolsheviks under the leadership of the former convict Myasnikov, who surrounded the home of the archpastor. “On the third night [June 6 to 7],” recalled Myasnikov, “we went for five versts along the Siberian highway, turned left into the forest, went on for about a hundred metres and stopped the horses. I gave Andronicus a spade and ordered him to dig a grave. Andronicus dug out as much as was required - we helped him. Then I said: ‘Go on, lie down.’ The grave turned out to be short, he dug out a bit more at his feet and lay down a second time. It was still too short, he dug some more - the grave was ready. I allowed him to pray. Andronicus prayed in all directions for about ten minutes. Then he said he was ready. I said that I would not shoot him, but bury him alive unless he repealed his decrees, but he said that he would not do this and would not refrain from attacking the Bolsheviks. Then we covered him with earth and I shot a few times.”

Myasnikov’s account more or less accords with the testimony of two Perm chekists Dobelas and Padernis, both of them Latvians, and was corroborated by a baptized Jew, a former communist party member who became a priest and was shot by the Bolsheviks. According to them, Vladyka Andronicus was buried alive and shot near the road from Perm to Motoviliha (the workmen’s suburbs) on June 7/20....

One of the archbishop’s executioners, Lashevich, was once dying in a hospital in Harbin, China. As he turned restlessly on his bed, he was heard shouting: “Why are you standing here, Andronicus, what do you want ?
I didn’t bury you, I was ordered to do it. You’ve come for me, don’t oppress me. You know I’m not guilty.”

And again he would say: “Andronicus ... blood ... Perm… Don’t ! Go away! Don’t torment me!” 

Exhort everyone and reconcile the embittered with life, pour into them the principles of the radiant life according to the Gospel of Christ… so that those who have become disillusioned here might find a living haven and good repose in the Church and