Feast Day ~ November 20
As is usual for those glorified as saints by the Church, St. Cyril lived a holy life of prayer and fasting; like some of the saints, he was killed for his refusal to deny Christ. But St. Cyril also spent much of his life being a “thorn in the side” of the Enemy of the Church – in this case, the Bolsheviks who tried to take control of the Church in Russia and lead it away from Truth.
The son of a church Reader, Constantine Smirnov also desired to serve the Church and entered the St. Petersburg Theological Academy, graduating in 1887. After marriage to his wife Olga, he was ordained priest to serve churches in St. Petersburg and later in Kronstadt, where he became good friends with the future St. John of Kronstadt. Tragedy struck Fr. Constantine’s family when his daughter died from swallowing a needle and his wife died soon after. Fr. Constantine decided to enter the monastic life and at his tonsure was given the name Cyril. He was assigned to lead the Orthodox mission to Persia, where Nestorians were being catechized and received into the Orthodox Church.
In 1904, Fr. Cyril was consecrated bishop of Gdov and was elevated to Archbishop in 1913. In his attempts to improve the lives of his people, Archbishop Cyril often preached against drunkenness, the use of foul language, and resistance to education. He was also intent on raising the standard of clerical conduct.
The Bolshevik Revolutions of 1917 completely changed Russia and the Russian Church, eventually leading to the destruction of churches and monasteries and the massacre of clergy and people. When this downward spiral began, the Russian patriarchate, which had been abolished two hundred years earlier, was revived and St. Tikhon, who had been bishop in the U. S., was elected.
In November of 1919, Archbishop Cyril was arrested for the first time, beginning a long series of arrests, imprisonments and exiles. The charges were usually “counter-revolutionary agitation” because he refused to recognize the authority of the Bolsheviks as legitimate. When Cyril was made Metropolitan of Kazan, he was arrested for leaving Moscow without their permission. In 1921, the authorities demanded that the valuables belonging to the churches of Kazan be turned over to them for the benefit of the starving but later that same year, the metropolitan was arrested for his involvement with an American relief organization which provided food for the starving.
There were some Christians in Russia at this time who tried to cooperate with the Bolsheviks, now renamed Communists. They tried to reach some sort of compromise but, in reality, placed themselves completely under the control of the Communist government. Called “renovationists”, they were strongly opposed by St. Cyril.
Because of the precarious position of the hierarchs of the Russian Church, Patriarch Tikhon appointed St. Cyril as one of three metropolitans to act on his behalf if he were unable to carry out his duties. When the Patriarch died under suspicious circumstances in 1925, Metropolitan Cyril was in exile after one of his many arrests and was not allowed to return to Moscow to fulfill those duties.
From camps in Siberia and solitary confinement in prisons, St. Cyril continued to fight against the authority of these godless persecutors and to try to reason with those churchmen who had compromised with the soviet officials. Finally, in 1937, Metropolitan Cyril, along with Metropolitan Joseph of Petrograd who had been imprisoned with him, were arrested for “participating in a counter-revolutionary underground organization of churchmen” and were executed by firing squad for their “crimes” on November 20.
As Christians, we know that we are to lead holy lives of prayer and fasting and that we may, in the uncertain position of Christians in parts of our world today, be killed for our faith. But between this beginning and end, we may also be required to be a “thorn in the side” of the Enemy of Christ, the devil in whatever form he may take. Through the prayers of St. Cyril, may we have strength to do what is required. Holy Cyril, pray for us.