Benjamin of Petrograd

Saint Benjamin of Petrograd
Saint Benjamin (Kazansky), Metropolitan of Petrograd and Gdov
Heiromartyr
Born	29 April [O.S. 17 April] 1873 Olonets Governorate, Russian Empire
Died	13 August [O.S. 31 July] 1922 Kovalevsky Forest, Soviet Union
Venerated in	Eastern Orthodoxy
Canonized	4 April 1992, Danilov Monastery, Moscow, Russian Federation by Russian Orthodox Church
Major shrine	Nikolskoe Cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra
Feast	31 July Sunday on or following 25 January (the celebration of the Synaxis of the new Russian martyrs and confessors)

Saint Benjamin of Petrograd (Russian: Вениамин Петроградский, Veniamin Petrogradsky, 29 April [O.S. 17 April] 1873 – 13 August [O.S. 31 July] 1922) born Vasily Pavlovich Kazansky (Russian: Василий Павлович Казанский) was a hieromartyr, a bishop in the Russian Orthodox Church and eventually Metropolitan of Petrograd and Gdov from 1917 to 1922. He was martyred, executed by a firing squad by Soviet authorities. In April 1992 Benjamin was glorified (canonized) by the Russian Orthodox Church together with several other martyrs, including Archimandrite Sergius (Shein), Professor Yury Novitsky, and John Kovsharov (a lawyer), who were murdered with him.

Benjamin was born to a priestly family in the pogost (village) of Nimenskii in the Andreevksii volost of the Kargopol uezd near Arkhangelsk in the Olonets Governorate in the northwest of the Russian empire.

He graduated from the Olonets Theological Seminary in 1893 and earned his candidate of theology degree from the St. Petersburg Spiritual Academy in 1897, defending a thesis on Archbishop Arcadius of Olonets' anti-heretical activities. In 1895 he was tonsured a monk and given the name Benjamin; later that year he was ordained a hierodeacon (deacon-monk) and the following year he was ordained a hieromonk (priest-monk).