the holy new martyrs of eastern russia - Coptic Orthodox teaching

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only after two weeks of travelling in a boat on a river. He was not given
anything to eat, he was left to sleep in the cold outside the forest cabins in
which the agents themselves lodged, he was dragged by the beard and
mocked in such a way that he began to ask for death for himself. He spent a
year under the rule of a communist in a forest where there were only two
hunting cabins."
During this period, Vladyka governed his diocese through his vicars,
Bishops Joasaph, Athanasius and Andronicus.
On March 25 / April 7, 1925, Patriarch Tikhon died. In his will, which was
read out in the presence of 60 hierarchs in the Donskoy monastery, it was
revealed that he had appointed Metropolitan Cyril as the first of three
hierarchs who were empowered to become locum tenens of the patriarchal
throne and take over the leadership of the Russian Church until a new
patriarch could be elected. Since Metropolitan Cyril was not allowed to return
to Moscow take up the locum tenancy, and since the second candidate,
Metropolitan Agathangel of Yaroslavl, was also in exile, the post fell to the
third candidate, Metropolitan Peter of Krutitsa.
In December, 1925, Metropolitan Peter was imprisoned for rejecting the
GPU's terms for legalization of the Church. In the event of his death he
appointed Metropolitan Cyril as the first candidate to the locum tenancy. And
so the GPU agent Tuchkov went to Metropolitan Cyril and put the same
terms for the legalization of the Church to him.
"If we have to remove some hierarch," asked Tuchkov, "will you help us in
this?"
"Yes, if the hierarch appears to be guilty of some ecclesiastical
transgression... In the contrary case, I shall tell him directly, 'The authorities
are demanding this of us, but I have nothing against you'."
"No!" replied Tuchkov. "You must try to find an appropriate reason and
remove him as if on your own initiative."
To this the hierarch replied: "Eugene Nikolayevich, you are not the cannon,
and I am not the bomb, with which you want to blow up our Church from
within!"
When Metropolitan Cyril refused to accept the locum tenancy on the
GPU's terms, he was sent back to Turukhansk. However, Tuchkov did not
leave him alone. According to Matushka Seraphima Bulgakova, a former cellattendant
of Metropolitan Cyril, "at the beginning of his locum tenancy
Metropolitan Sergius had been firm and uncompromising. At that point
Tuchkov went to Metropolitan Cyril, who was in exile at that time, in the
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