Servant of God Andrzej Cikoto

Archmandrite Andrei Tsikota MIC (/(t)sɪˈkoʊtə/; Chinese: 祁高德;Belarusian: Андрэй Цікота; Polish: Andrzej Cikoto), also anglicised as Andrew Cikoto (5 December 1891 – 11 February 1952), was a Belarusian Roman Catholic and Greek Catholic priest, Superior General of the Congregation of Marian Fathers of the Immaculate Conception, Ordinary of the Russian Catholic Apostolic Exarchate of Harbin, member of the Rada of the Belarusian Democratic Republic. Andrei Tsikota was born into a peasant family in Plavushka, now Smarhon District, northwestern Belarus, then part of the Russian Empire. He graduated from a gymnasium in Ashmiany, Vilnius Priest Seminary and from the Saint Petersburg Roman Catholic Theological Academy (1917). On 13 June 1914, he was ordained to the priesthood by Archbishop Vincent Kliuchynski. After graduation, Fr. Tsikota served as the pastor of the Maladzechna parish. In May 1917, Tsikota participated in the first congress of Belarusian Roman Catholic clergy that took place in Minsk. In 1918, Tsikota moved to Minsk to teach at a priest seminary. In the same year, he also became member of the Rada of the Belarusian Democratic Republic. In 1919, he was member of the Provisional Belarusian National Committee (Belarusian: Часовы беларускі нацыянальны камітэт), a Belarusian coordination body on the territory controlled by Poland during the Soviet-Polish War. In 1920, Tsikota entered the novitiate of the Congregation of Marian Fathers, making his first vows in September 1921. Between 1921 and 1923, Tsikota was on a mission in the United States, serving the Lithuanian American community as well conducting retreats parish missions for Lithuanian, Polish, and Belarusian immigrants. After returning to the Second Polish Republic in 1923, Tsikota served at the Marian parish in Druja, West Belarus. He was instrumental in the organization of a local school and supervised the organization of the Congregation of the Sisters Handmaids of Jesus in the Eucharist.