Father Alexander Pavlovich Vasiliev (1894,

Yekaterinoslav Dnipro is Ukraine's fourth-largest city, with about one million inhabitants. It is located in the eastern part of Ukraine, southeast of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on the Dnieper River, Dnipro River, from which it takes its name. Dnipro is t ...

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

– c. 1944) was a

Russian Orthodox The Russian Orthodox Church (ROC; ;), also officially known as the Moscow Patriarchate (), is an autocephaly, autocephalous Eastern Orthodox Church, Eastern Orthodox Christian church. It has 194 dioceses inside Russia. The Primate (bishop), p ...

priest who later secretly entered into communion with the

Russian Greek Catholic Church The Russian Greek Catholic Church or Russian Byzantine Catholic Church is a ''sui juris, sui iuris'' (self-governing) Byzantine Rite Eastern Catholic Churches, Eastern Catholic particular church that is part of the worldwide Catholic Church. Hi ...

Biography

Born in 1894 in

, Russian Empire (now

Dnipro Dnipro is Ukraine's fourth-largest city, with about one million inhabitants. It is located in the eastern part of Ukraine, southeast of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on the Dnieper River, Dnipro River, from which it takes its name. Dnipro is t ...

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

), Vasiliev graduated from high school in

Mariupol Mariupol is a city in Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine. It is situated on the northern coast (Pryazovia) of the Sea of Azov, at the mouth of the Kalmius, Kalmius River. Prior to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, it was the tenth-largest city in the coun ...

and attended the

Moscow Theological Academy Moscow Theological Academy () is a higher educational institution of the Russian Orthodox Church, training clergy, teachers, scholars, and officials. The Academy traces its origin to the Slavic Greek Latin Academy, which was founded in 1685 by th ...

. He was ordained a priest on 1 October 1927 by Bishop Bartholomew Remov, a notable Orthodox hierarch who would later secretly convert to Catholicism. Following his ordination, Vasiliev served as rector of the Church of Saint Nikita the Martyr in Krylatskoye, near

Moscow Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...

. On 25 December 1928, Vasiliev was secretly received into the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

by Bishop Pie Eugène Neveu, the clandestine Apostolic Administrator of Moscow. On 15 February 1931, he was arrested in Moscow as part of a wider case targeting the underground Greek-Catholic community. The charges against him included espionage and distributing counterrevolutionary literature. It was reportedly suggested that the charges would be dropped if he returned to Orthodoxy, an offer he refused. On 18 August 1931, he was sentenced to 10 years in the

Gulag The Gulag was a system of Labor camp, forced labor camps in the Soviet Union. The word ''Gulag'' originally referred only to the division of the Chronology of Soviet secret police agencies, Soviet secret police that was in charge of runnin ...

. In 1934, he was transferred to a labor camp in the Chita region. The exact date and place of his death remains unknown, though he is believed to have died in the camps no later than 1944.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Vasiliev, Alexander Pavlovich 1894 births 1944 deaths People from Dnipro Converts to Eastern Catholicism from Eastern Orthodoxy Russian Greek-Catholics Former Russian Orthodox Christians Moscow Theological Academy alumni