www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Blessed Leonid Feodorov: Bishop and Confessor

By the way, you are indicated as over your PM limit.

Diak is welcome to disagree on this point. But I wish that someone would translate Father Deacon Basil's book.

Fr. Serge

I found out there is another book on Blessed Leonid published in 2002. It's titled Leonid Feodorov by Alexey Yudin in Russian (ISBN 5-94270-018-4).

There is mention of the book here: http://www.cathmos.ru/content/ru/publication-2009-12-16-16-47-32.html

I used Google translate to read the article; it appears that the book has been translated into English and Italian.

Has anyone seen and read this book?

Sophia Likilariova, his biographer to whom we owe many of the details given above, says that the location of his grave is known.

latinmasstrad,

Since you have written about Blessed Leonid for a traditional Roman Catholic publication, were you aware of an article about Blessed Leonid that appeared in a magazine by the Transapline Redemptorists? (This was years before they reunited with Rome.)
It was a commemorative issue that contained articles and rare pictures of Blessed Leonid, Blessed Nicholas Charnetsky, Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky, etc.
An online version of the magazine was posted on their website, but is no longer available.
It still can be viewed through the Wayback Machine website.
You can read the article here: http://web.archive.org/web/20071218104949/www.redemptorists.org.uk/red/mag/russian1.htm

What has really struck my interest is the following quote from that article:


I don't know who this Sophia Likilariova is. I have not been able to find any books or articles wriiten by her on Blessed Leonid. If she knows the location of his grave, then I am very interested to know if there has been any effort to recover his relics. What a tremendous blessing for Russian Byzantine Catholics everywhere for the holy relics of this magnificent man to be recovered for veneration.

We venerate an icon of the two exarchs of the Russian Catholic Church, Blessed Leonty and Blessed Klimenty at St. Michael's Chapel. There is also an icon of the Abba of the Russian Greek Catholic Church, Andrej Sheptitskyj in the altar. Through their holy prayers, O Savior, save us!

Russian Greek Catholic Church? Met. Andrej Sheptytsky?

g-c,

Yudin is a member of the editorial board of the Russian Catholic Encyclopedia, which was published a few years ago. I read the translated article, as well, and agree that it appears to say the book has been translated to English and Italian. But, I've hunted high and low and can't find any reference to its publication other than in Russian.

Many years,

Neil

Nelson is correct. Metropolitan Andrij was the ranking Eastern Catholic hierarch in that portion of the world and exercised a canonical omophor in regards to the fledgling Russian Greek-Catholic Church, including the small community of Katolicheskaja Stariobriodtsi (Russian Catholic Old Ritualists), as well as the Georgian Byzantine Catholic Church.

He was instrumental in obtaining papal assurances that each of these bodies be permitted to retain, unaltered, the liturgical praxis from which they had come. It is likely that he appointed Father Exarch Shio Batmanshivili, ultimately martyred for his Faith, as the Georgian Byzantine Exarch and he was closely allied to Blessed Leonid. In 1928, Metropolitan Andrej declsred that Old Believer rituals were to be preserved intact by the , Katolicheskaja Stariobriodtsi, forbidding any admixture of Synodal and pre-Nikonian praxis in their Divine Services.

Many years,

Neil

Catholic Old Believers! Apparently that's too bizarre not to be true...are they now extinct though?

Dear Father Serge,
I would also be interested in a translation of Father Deacon Basil's book. If it were possible to obtain a copy of his book, I have friends who are able to translate Russian for me. Any advice on how to obtain it?
In the Mother of God,
latimasstrad

The Exarch Leonid in full episcopal vestments. This is the important photograph that lends weight to the opinion that the Exarch was secretly consecrated a bishop by Metropolitan Sheptytski

The three-day Russian rite Greek-Catholic Synod presided over by the Met-ropolitan opened on Monday, 29 May. Besides the Russian clergy, the principal Roman Catholic dignitaries of the capital were there. The Metropolitan showed everyone the authenticated copy of the pontifical document written by Pope Saint Pius X which authorised him to exercise his jurisdiction in Russia. He announced the nomination of the Exarch with episcopal jurisdiction. The nomination was at once recognized by the Provisional Government. Presumably the episcopal consecration of the Exarch was done in private for reasons which can easily be guessed and a public announcement that Exarch Leonid was a bishop could easily have condemned him to death.

1913 Archairos Rasaphor monk Leontios

The Metropolitan wanted to consecrate Fr. Leonidas to the bishopric with his subordination directly to Rome and thereby complete the program outlined by Pius X, but yielded to the personal request of the exarch to postpone. Firstly, until the position on the Russian exarchate is completely settled in Rome, and secondly, to give him, Fedorov, to test his strength and prepare for the episcopal service.

...His spiritual image is especially vividly manifested in connection with the question of appointing a Russian bishop for the exarchate. This is how he is expressed in letters to Metropolitan Sheptytsky dated April 6, 1922 and July 1, 1923:

"You write" ut exsarcha fiat episcopus "(let the exarch become a bishop) ... Do not accuse me, dear Vladyka, of cowardice, of a desire to throw off a heavy burden from myself, from my shoulders and lay it on someone else. I remember what I promised You will not give up the episcopacy when necessary, but these five years of my hierarchical ministry have shown me that I am completely unsuitable for this great dignity ... I do not have the most essential properties necessary for a bishop, I, unfortunately, do not even the spirit of love for my faithful, there is little spirit of prayer, there is no firm, unshakable will to carry out my reforms, there is no perspicacity and knowledge of people, the ability not only to "lead your own line", but also to inspire it to others ...
I have no love for human society. They rightly say about me that "he is a martyr, but not an organizer" in the very sense that I am, of course, hardy, but I do not know how to force those around me to be imbued with my ideas ...
How grateful I am to the Creator that you then (that is, when you were appointed exarch) held your right hand and did not put it on me. I do not belong, as you know, to those hypocritically modest subjects who, having declared with a cry and sobbing about their unworthiness, then humbly substitute "your own" under the omophorion. I am a man of sound and dry mind, which makes me take seriously every work, and especially the work of the Holy Church. If I am a good preacher, I have a detailed knowledge of the Eastern Church, I can serve well and feel the spirit of the Eastern rite; if I am patient like a donkey and know how to bend in all directions; if I sometimes develop great energy, defending the Church and do not spare strength and health for this, this is not yet a patent for a bishopric. All this can be done with success by any priest ...
They will tell you about my love, kindness, they will extol my meekness and patience, they will even talk about my ability to penetrate the human soul. But all these are just my individual efforts, virtus ex necessitate (efforts of necessity), efforts that do not fit into my essence are never made by my inner "I" ... I strictly checked myself and came to the conviction that "born crawl, cannot fly. "
I may be the ideal creator of other people's assignments, but not the creator, and not Israel, struggling with God, but Job, lying on the rot. I have mastered Western thought and clarity, but the flabby oriental nature is firmly entrenched in me and does not lend itself to any influences.
A book, a cell, a quiet standing in the kliros and endless services, and above all loneliness and flight from people - this is my atmosphere ... But I cannot combine the apostolic life with the contemplative one. You know how much I love the Jesuits, but I will never dare to join their order, tk. this ideal is unattainable for me ... The hardest thing for me is people ...
In these difficult years, sometimes broken and exhausted, instead of going to bed, I sat in a chair and in complete silence and loneliness, in the light of only lamps, sat in a chair for two or three hours and enjoyed solitude. I realized that I was completely cut off from the world, I hardly thought about anything and looked at the face of Christ, illuminated by the quiet light of the lamp ... "all is vanity and vexation of the spirit." What a sheer truth.
An indefinable craving for monasticism and solitude is growing in me so much that I no longer think about the Studites [the monastic oriental order restored by Father Clement, brother of Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky], but about the Kamaldul [hermit monks] ...
Brought up in the rules of strict discipline , I do not understand at all how a subordinate can disobey his boss. And at a time when a real bishop, taking into account human weaknesses, must bring the unconquered to the senses by means of fatherly love influence, I am only able to punish him ...
For Russia, as a bishop, now a saint is needed, filled with gravitate sacerdotali (priestly authority), perspicacious, firm, able to inspire respect for himself ... I can still manage to stretch out for several years as an exarch, but take on such an enormous responsibility , i.e. to be the first Eastern bishop in Russia is beyond my strength ... " Source. [catholic.ru]

Fr. Peter Knowles also authored a nice article about Blessed Leonid...

I would also be interested in a translation of Father Deacon Basil's book. If it were possible to obtain a copy of his book, I have friends who are able to translate Russian for me. Any advice on how to obtain it?

В 1956 году приступил к написанию биографии экзарха Апостольского экзархата России Леонида Фёдорова, которая была издана в Риме патриархом УГКЦ Иосифом Слипым в 1966 году. Далее уехал в США, где перевёл эту биографию на английский язык.

In 1956, he began writing a biography of Leonid Fedorov, Exarch of the Apostolic Exarchate of Russia, which was published in Rome by Patriarch of the UGCC Joseph Slipyj in 1966. He then went to the United States, where he translated this biography into English (Google Translate) .