Saint Hermogenes

Georgiy Yefremovich Dolganyov (Георгий Ефремович Долганёв; 25 April 1858 – April 1918) was a prominent Russian Orthodox religious figure, a monarchist and anti-communist, who supported the Union of the Russian People and Black Hundreds. In 1917, he was appointed as Hermogenes, Bishop of Tobolsk and Siberia (Russian: священномученик Гермоген, епископ Тобольский и Сибирский). In April 1918, he was arrested by Bolsheviks and drowned in the Tura River. He was canonized on 31 March 1999 being regarded as a Saint martyr. Georgiy, the son of a priest, went to school in Ananiv, a city (near Odessa) where half of the population was Jewish. He studied law, mathematics and philology at Novorossiysk University. (Because of his high-pitched voice, it was believed Hermogenes had castrated himself in 1890, influenced by the ideas of the Skoptsy). Influenced by Nicanor, Bishop of Kherson, he chose the Orthodox ministry. Following his education in Saint Petersburg Theological Seminary in 1892, Dolganyov accepted the name Hermogenes. In 1893 he became the inspector of the Tiflis Theological Seminary in Tbilisi, and in 1898 became its dean. In 1899, Hermogenes was responsible for expelling one of seminary's most famous students, Joseph Dzhugashvili (Joseph Stalin), who had been reading Ninety-Three (a book on the French Revolution by Victor Hugo) and lecturing students on Marxism. In 1903 he became the Bishop of Saratov and Tsaritsyn and had a seat in the Holy Synod. In the church he introduced singing by the people, promoted processions, founded schools, and started mission work. Hermogenes founded the Annunciation Convent and Saint Trinity Monastery in Khvalynsk, in Volsk the Town Church of Annunciation. In 1905, Hermogenes, probably the most widely respected figure in the Russian Orthodox Church, became a friend of Grigori Rasputin from the time he arrived in the capital.