Ambrose of Belaya Krinitsa

Saint Ambrosii of Belaya Krinitsa
Born	1791 Maistra
Died	1863
Feast	November 12

Metropolitan Ambrose or Amvrosii (born Amoiraias Pappa-Georgopoloi, Greek: Ἀμοιραίας Πάππα-Γεωργοπόλοι, Andrey Popovich, Russian: Андрей Попович; 1791–1863) was the first Old Believers' Metropolitan of the Ancient Orthodox Church.

Ambrosii was born in 1791 in Maistra, at that time part of the Ottoman Empire. He was of Greek origin. He became a bishop in 1835, and converted to the Old Believers in 1846, thus establishing a full Church Hierarchy of the Old Believers. This hierarchy became known as the Belokrinitskaya Hierarchy.

The Old Believers (or more correctly Old Ritualists) are those Christians who separated from the Russian Orthodox church in protest against church reforms introduced by Patriarch Nikon of Moscow between 1652–66, and remained faithful to the ancient rites, dogmas and ecclesiastical structures of Russian Orthodoxy as it was before the reforms. Old Believers adamantly argue that Patriarch Nikon was wrong in introducing his reforms because they flew in the face of the Stoglav Council which was a venerable all-Russian council. Some of the Old Believers migrated to Siberia; others to Romania.

In 1844 the Austrian Government gave the Old Believers permission to found a bishopric at the monastery of Belaya Krinitsa ("White Fountain"), in Galicia, a few miles from the Russian frontier. The Old Believers founded the monastery of Belaya Krinitsa, as a place of freedom, thanks to laws enacted in 1783 by the Emperor Joseph II. According to reports from the Russian government, after the middle of the 17th century about 4,000 Old Believers lived in Austria, mostly in Bukovina, on the border with Russia at the Prut river, and about 36,000 lived the Ottoman Empire. Of the latter, the majority lived in Dobruja, north at the Danube delta.

Ambrosii was born Andreas Popovic in 1791 in Maistra, at that time part of the Ottoman Empire. He was of Greek origin.

In 1811, the future Metropolitan Ambrosii, then still Andreas, was married, and shortly after he was ordained as a priest by Metropolitan Matthew. In 1814 he lost his wife, who had given him a son, named George after his grandfather. In 1817 he was elected Igumen (abbot) of the Monastery of the Holy Trinity on the island of Halki. Patriarch Constantine had him locum tenens of the patriarchal Greek Church in 1827. As is clear from a document dated 9 September 1835, he was ordained as a bishop of Sarajevo in Bosnia by Patriarch Gregory, assisted by four other bishops. He remained in his position for five years before being removed by the Ottoman authorities.

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