Relics of Venerable Confessor Schema-Archimandrite Sebastian, Elder of Karaganda

Hagiography of Venerable Confessor Schema-Archimandrite Sebastian, Elder of Karaganda

Venerable Confessor Sebastian of Karaganda (in the world, Stepan Vasilyevich Fomin) was born on October 28, 1884, in the village of Kosmodemyanskoye in the Oryol Province, into a poor peasant family.

On January 3, 1909, Stepan was accepted into the skete of Optina Monastery as an aide to Elder Joseph. After Joseph's death, he came under the spiritual guidance of Father Nektary and remained his aide. This allowed him to absorb the grace-filled spirit of the Optina Elders. Stepan was tonsured as a monk with the name Sebastian in 1917, at the beginning of the time of persecution against the Church of Christ.

In 1927, Monk Sebastian was ordained as a priest. After the death of Elder Nektary, Father Sebastian moved to the city of Kozlov, where he was appointed to the Church of St. Elijah. He served there from 1928 until his arrest in 1933.

In February 1933, Father Sebastian was arrested. During interrogations, he gave a straightforward response: "I view all the measures of the Soviet government as God's wrath, and this government is a punishment for people. I expressed such views among my close associates, as well as among other citizens with whom I had occasion to discuss this topic. I said that we need to pray, pray to God, and live in love, only then will we be delivered from this. I was very dissatisfied with the Soviet government for closing churches and monasteries, as this destroys the Orthodox faith."
Seeing his authority, the authorities tried in every possible way to close the church, but they were unsuccessful.

On April 3 (April 16, new style) 1966, Father Sebastian took monastic vows in the schema from Bishop Pitirim (Nechaev), who came to him to perform the tonsure.

Having absorbed the traditions and grace-filled spirit of the Optina Elders and being a disciple of its great elders, enduring exiles and imprisonments in Bolshevik concentration camps, he carried out his eldership service in the capital of the scorching steppes of Central Kazakhstan, in the much-suffering city of Karaganda, by the unfathomable destinies of God.

Reverend Elder Schema-Archimandrite Sebastian passed away on April 19, 1966, on Radonitsa, and was buried at the Mikhailovskoye Cemetery in Karaganda.

In October 1997, by the decision of the Synodal Commission on the Canonization of Saints and with the blessing of His Holiness Patriarch Alexy II of Moscow and All Russia, Elder Sebastian of Karaganda was glorified as a local saint.

On October 22, 1997, with the blessing of Archbishop Alexy of Almaty and Semipalatinsk (now Metropolitan of Tula and Efremov), the relics of St. Sebastian were uncovered. For half a year, the relics of the elder were kept in the Church of the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos in Mikhailovka, which he had founded. On May 2, 1998, a solemn procession with Easter hymns, led by Archbishop Alexy of Almaty and Semipalatinsk and a host of clergy, transferred the reliquary with the relics of St. Sebastian to the main church of Karaganda, the Cathedral of the Presentation of the Mother of God. Thousands of Orthodox believers from Karaganda and numerous pilgrims from various cities of Kazakhstan and Russia participated in this spiritual celebration. The reliquary with the relics of St. Sebastian is placed for veneration in the right part of the central nave in a magnificent shrine under a canopy made by craftsmen from the city of Sergiev Posad. In August 2000, at the Jubilee Bishops' Council, the name of St. Sebastian of Karaganda was included in the diptych of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia for universal veneration.