Feognost (Pivovarov)

In the world, Feodor Pivovarov, born in 1873 in the town of Belopolye, Kharkov Province (now Ukraine, Sumy Region), came from the petty bourgeois class.

On November 28, 1904, he took monastic vows at the Glinsk Hermitage. Father Feognost was a highly educated monk who led an ascetic life. He had strong administrative abilities.

In the early 20th century, Father Feognost, along with other monks from the Glinsk Hermitage, was invited by Bishop Alexander (Kulchitsky) to the Holy Trinity Men's Missionary Monastery, founded in 1882 on the shores of Lake Issyk-Kul with the purpose of spreading Orthodoxy and spiritually enlightening the Asian nomads in the Turkestan region. Father Feognost served at the Issyk-Kul Monastery from August 25, 1905.

On April 26, 1906, Feognost was ordained as a hierodeacon, and on July 22 of the same year, he was ordained as a hieromonk.

 Starting from November 2, 1906, he served as the dean of the monastery.

On December 8, 1908, he was appointed as the acting abbot of the Issyk-Kul Monastery.

From 1916, he served as an assistant spiritual guide for laypeople.

In the summer of 1916, a rebellion broke out in Semirechye. The Kyrgyz rebels attacked the monastery, demanding that the monastic valuables be prepared by a certain day, threatening violence if their demands were not met. As a result, some monks, including Father Feognost, fled the monastery, some to the mountains and others to nearby villages. The older monks stayed, trusting in God's will. On the appointed day, the Kyrgyz arrived, broke down the monastery doors, desecrated icons, stole church valuables, and executed the monks with sabers, sparing no one. In the evening, the monks who had fled returned and the next morning buried the murdered monks in a common grave. After this tragic event, Father Feognost moved to the city of Verny (now Almaty).

In 1919, the monastery was closed by the revolutionary government.

From 1913, hieromonks Seraphim, Feognost, and monk Irakliy began constructing a skete.

By 1916, Father Feognost took up permanent residence in this skete.

On the morning of August 11, 1921, Father Feognost was murdered in his cell by Red Army robbers who had arrived the previous night. He had a habit of praying in a cave at night. Possibly exhausted from his nightly prayers, he lay down to rest in his cell—only God knows—but he remained lying with his arms crossed on his chest when they shot him in the heart. Before murdering the sleeping Father Feognost, the bandits had killed Father Seraphim with a shot in the back while he was standing in prayer. After searching the cells for money and finding none, the murderers left. The next day, policemen arrived, assessed the situation, and gave permission for burial. A grave was dug, lined with boards, and the monks were buried without coffins, wrapped in their mantles. Father Anatoly (Smirnov) performed the funeral service for them in the skete on Mokhnataya Hill. A forty-day memorial service was held in all the churches of the city of Verny, as the murdered monks were greatly revered in the city. The murderers were found, but the military tribunal refused to try them.

Despite state atheism, throughout these years the names of the slain monks never disappeared from the memorial synodika of the parishioners of the Holy Nicholas Cathedral in Almaty, and pilgrimages to the grave in the Aksay Gorge continued to be made.

In 1991, on the 70th anniversary of the tragedy, a memorial cross was erected at the site of the monks' murder, and in 1992, a chapel canopy was installed.

By the blessing of Patriarch Alexy II, on August 11, 1993, local veneration of the new martyrs—Hieromonks Seraphim and Feognost and those with them who suffered in the land of Kazakhstan—was established.

Both martyrs, Seraphim and Feognost, were glorified for general church veneration at the Jubilee Bishops' Council of the Russian Orthodox Church in August 2000.