Galaktion (Novikov)

Born into a peasant family.

On June 20, 1900, he entered the Transfiguration of the Savior Valaam Monastery.

On October 19, 1904, he was admitted as a novice.

On March 1, 1908, he was tonsured as a monk.

On March 24, 1911, he was ordained as a deacon by Archbishop Sergius (Stragorodsky; later Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia) of Finland and Vyborg in the Church of All Saints Skete.

On December 24, 1915, he was ordained as a hieromonk.

He served as a supervisor of workers in the monastery, and after October 1917, he became an economist at the Valaam Metochion in Moscow.

Since 1925, he served at the Church of the Rzhevskaya Okovetskaya Icon of the Mother of God in Moscow.

On June 29, 1927, he was arrested on charges of espionage; by a decision of the Collegium of the OGPU on July 25, 1927, he was sent to the Solovetsky Special Purpose Camp for 5 years.

Returning in 1932, he settled in the village of Verkhniy Posad in the Zvenigorod district of the Moscow region; he served in one of the district's churches.

On November 4, 1936, he was arrested on charges of "conducting anti-Soviet agitation, explaining the Holy Scripture in a counter-revolutionary spirit"; he was imprisoned in the Butyrka prison in Moscow. He did not plead guilty. On January 20, 1937, he was sentenced by the OSO at the NKVD to 5 years of exile in Kazakhstan. He served his sentence in the village of Taldy-Kurgan.

In November 1937, he was arrested on charges of anti-Soviet agitation. Witnesses described him as a supporter of Patriarch Saint Tikhon and an opponent of the Renovationist movement. He did not plead guilty to counter-revolutionary activities.

On December 4, 1937, he was sentenced to execution by shooting by the Special Troika of the NKVD of the Alma-Ata region. He was buried in an unmarked mass grave.

He was glorified by the decision of the Holy Synod on December 27, 2000.