Alexander Hotovitzky

Saint Alexander Hotovitzky
Photograph taken before 1909.
Missionary and Hieromartyr
Born	February 11, 1872 Kremenetz, Volhynia, Russia
Died	August 19, 1937(1937-08-19) (aged 65)
Canonized	1994
Feast	December 4 (Day of glorification as a saint)

Saint Alexander Hotovitzky (or Hotovitsky), hieromartyr of the Bolshevik yoke, Missionary of America, was a Ukrainian who came to the United States in the 1890s as a lay missionary and was ordained to the priesthood while there. He was active as a missionary among the emigrated Uniates in the northeastern United States before being ordered back to Europe 1914. He was to become vicar of the congregation of the Russian Embassy in Berlin. Because of the outbreak of the First World War he was instead made vicar of the Orthodox congregation in Helsinki, Finland, then a part of imperial Russia. In 1917 he was assigned to Christ the Savior Cathedral in Moscow. After the Bolshevik coup he was subjected to many cruelties by the revolutionaries as he defended the Orthodox faith, his people, and church property. Subjected to many arrests and exile Father Alexander serviced his beloved Church as best he could through these tumultuous times until after a final arrest he was executed during the Great Purge on August 19, 1937. His glorification is celebrated on December 4.

Alexander Hotovitzky was born on February 11, 1872, in the city of Kremenets in Volhynia (now Ukraine). His father, Alexander, was a priest who was the rector of the Volhynia Theological Seminary. Fr. Alexander was educated at the Volhynia Seminary before entering the St. Petersburg Theological Academy. Upon graduation from the academy in 1895 with a master's degree he was sent to the Diocese of the Aleutians and North America as a lay missionary and as reader at the St. Nicholas Church in New York City. He was ordained a deacon after his marriage to Maria Scherbuhina, who was a graduate of the Pavlosk Institute of St. Petersburg. Bishop Nicholas Ziorov ordained Fr. Alexander to the priesthood on February 25, 1896, at the diocesan cathedral in San Francisco.