Metropolitan Arseniy of Istrinsky is a well-known bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church. In 1997 he received the clergy as an archbishop, and since 2014 he has become a metropolitan. Currently holds the position of vicar in the Moscow Patriarchate.
Priest biography
Metropolitan Arseniy Istrinsky was born in 1955 in the Moscow region. He was born in the small village of Vostryakovo, which is now one of the microdistricts in the Western Administrative District of the capital.
The hero of our article graduated from an ordinary Soviet school. And immediately went to work. He got a job at the post office, located at the Kazan station in Moscow. Having earned the first money in his life, Yuri Alexandrovich Epifanov (that was his name then), went to serve in the army.
Road to church
From the age of 15, the hero of our article already professed Orthodoxy. Purposefully, the future Metropolitan Arseniy Istrinsky chose a church career immediately after he served in the Armed Forces of the USSR. In 1975, at the age of 20, he became an altar boy at the St. Nicholas Church in Biryulyovo. Ordinary men from the laity were recruited for this church position. No separate training and education forbecoming an altar boy was not required.
The temple in Biryulyovo, where Arseniy used to altar, was named after Nicholas the Wonderworker. It was built shortly after the Civil War, in 1924. At that time, the Soviet authorities did not so openly interfere with the work of the church. At first it was wooden. And burned to the ground in 1956. In the next year, it was restored and consecrated. Almost secretly. This temple is unique because it was built during the years of Soviet power, when the clergy were oppressed in every possible way.
Seminary studies
Becoming an altar boy, the future Metropolitan Arseniy Istrinsky was convinced of his desire to give himself to the church forever. To do this, in 1976 he entered the seminary in Moscow. And then to the Moscow Theological Academy. He graduated in 1983.
After that, for six years he served as an assistant and personal secretary for the future Patriarch Alexy II. True, in those days Alexy was only a metropolitan. First Estonian and Tallinn, later Leningrad and Novgorod. He received the patriarchal rank only in 1990.
By that time, Arseniy broke up with him. In 1988, he received the post of cleric of the Holy Trinity Cathedral of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra in St. Petersburg. This is an ancient Orthodox church built during the time of Peter I.
Meanwhile, he had already received the rank of archpriest in those years.
Bishop of Ladoga
In 1989, the hero of our article received a new appointment. He became bishop of Ladoga and vicar of the Leningrad diocese. Thatis an assistant diocesan bishop who does not have his own diocese.
In September, he took monastic tonsure, receiving the name Arseniy in honor of Arseny Konevsky, an Orthodox Novgorod monk who lived in the 14th-15th centuries. (It was Arseny Konevsky who brought to Russia from Athos the icon of the Mother of God, later called Konevskaya. Together with this icon, he settled on the island of Konevets, located on Lake Ladoga. Over time, he founded a cenobitic monastery, which he dedicated to the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin).
At that time, it turned out that the new Patriarch Alexy II had not forgotten his former assistant secretary. At the very first meeting of the Holy Synod, after he took office, the hero of our article became Metropolitan Arseniy of Istra. The biography of the priest in the future developed very successfully. He received the rank of vicar at the Moscow diocese.
In 1997 he was elected to the secretariat of the Council.
The dignity of the archbishop
At the same Bishops' Council, where Arseniy entered the secretariat, he was conferred the rank of archbishop. So Metropolitan Arseniy Istrinsky went up the church career ladder. Many parishioners knew where the archbishop served.
In his Istra Vicariate, located in the Moscow region (in the city of Istra), people came from different parts of the country for advice and absolution. By the way, Metropolitan Arseniy is still in charge of it. For 27 years now.
In 2009, Arseniy became vicar of His Holiness Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia, who succeeded the deceased Alexy in this postII. His area of responsibility included the parishes of the capital.
Duties of the Metropolitan
Metropolitan Arseniy received in 2014. His immediate duties include supervising the capital's churches in the Southern and Central parishes of the capital. Since 2015, Metropolitan Arseniy has been a member of the Supreme Church Council. In fact, this is the executive body of power that functions under the Russian Orthodox Church.
Vicar of His Holiness Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia is engaged not only in monitoring the activities of parishes. He is also obliged to be responsible for the work and performance of his duties by the clergy and parish councils at the temples under his subordination.
He is one of the permanent members of the commission that examines the holy relics returned to the church or discovered again.
In recent years, the commission has confirmed the authenticity of the relics of many saints: in 1988, Alexander Nevsky, and in 1990, the Monks Savvaty, Herman and Zosima of Solovetsky (the founders of the world-famous Solovetsky Monastery back in the 15th century), Seraphim of Sarov (he founded the Diveevo convent), Patriarch Tikhon, who led the Russian Orthodox Church during the October Revolution and the Civil War.
In 1998, the authenticity of the relics of Matrona of Moscow (Matryona Dmitrievna Nikonova), a saint of the Russian Orthodox Church, who, according to rumors, consulted Joseph Stalin himself, was certified.
