In the world - Anatoliy
Ivanovych Eletskykh
Born 30.01.1949
Name Day - Sunday of the Holy Ancestors of Christ
Consecration Date -
23.04.1989
Chairs cathedra since
22.11.2006
Archbishop
of Tulchin and Bratslav Ionafan was born on January 30,
1949 in the village of Shatalivka, Staryi Oskol district of the Voronezh
(now Belgorod) region (Russia) in the teacher family.
From
1951 he lived in the city of Severomorsk, Murmansk region.
In 1961 he moved to Kyiv where his father- military man was sent. In 1966 he
graduated from secondary school.
From
16 years he sang and read in the Kyiv churches. At the age of 17 he was secretly tonsured riassophore monk in the
Holy Trinity St. Sergius Lavra.
From
1968 till 1970 he served in
the Army.
In
1970 he entered the Leningrad (St.Petersburg) Theological Seminary, bore
obedience of the subdeacon of Metropolitan of Leningrad and Novgorod Nicodemus
(Rotov, †1978). He studied the Church music and the choir conducting in the
choirmaster classes at the LDA (tutor - the Doctor of Theology, professor of
the LDA, historic, liturgist and musicologist Nikolai Dmitrievich
Uspenskiy).
Throughout
1972-1976 he studied in the Leningrad Theological Academy from which he
graduated with the degree of a Candidate of Theology for the research paper
"The Venerable Theodore Abbot of the Studion and his religious-moral
doctrine". For several years he taught
the church singing in the LTS and in the choirmaster class and directed the
students' choir of LTA&S.
On April 5,
1977 he was tonsured a monk. On April 16 of the same year
ordained hierodeacon and on December, 24 1978 - to the rank of hieromonk.
From
1987 till 1988 - clergyman of the St.Volodymyr Cathedral in Kyiv.
Since
July 1988 - Deputy Abbot of the restored Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra. In
October 1988 he was elevated to the rank of archimandrite and approved at the
post of Lavra Superior. He brought back
the Lavra liturgical traditions, enlisted to the brethren and gave protection
to the famous spiritual poet and singer hieromonk Roman, conducted works on
restoration of deconstructed temples, buildings of the monastery and of the
Seminary, testified the beginning of the strong myrrh-bearing in the Far Caves
of Lavra, gave permission for the scientific research of the holy myrrh.
On
April 23, 1989 he was consecrated Bishop of Pereyaslav-Khmelnytskyi and
appointed Vicar of the Kyiv Exarchate.
In 1990 he was appointed Executive
administrator of the Ukrainian Exarchate.
In
1989 at the first Church Council of the UOC made a public speech against the
point of the Statute on Government of the UOC as for the interminable tenure of
Metropolitan Philaret (Denisenko) of the office of Primate of the UOC in
connection with the course of the latter for separation from the Russian
Orthodox Church. He was the only to
vote against adopting the Statute of the UOC adjusted for Philaret. He was
removed by Metropolitan Philaret from the office of the Executive Administrator
of the UOC.
On April 23,
1991 on the ground of the false evidence he was tried in
absentia and prohibited in service. On
June 3, 1991 he submitted an appellation to His Holiness the Patriarch Alexy II
in which he rejected all the accusations against him. In September 1991 at the
Holy Synod of the UOC of urgent convocation presided over by Metropolitan
Philaret he was deposed from the holy orders "for impenitence".
In
April 1992 he created the Committee of the Clergy and Laity in defense of the Orthodoxy
for resistance to the schism. In conditions of the informational blockade in
Ukraine concerning the events in the UOC he published and distributed the
leaflets against Philaret and the schismatics-autocephalists.
He
took an active part in the convocation and holding of the Zhytomyr Council of
the Ukrainian hierarchs, clergy, and monks, representatives of the Orthodox
brotherhoods and laity of the UOC. By the decision of the Council the actions
of the Kyiv Metropolitan were qualified as anti-church, and all the administrative
orders of the church administrative bodies he headed were declared as not
having the canonical effect for the Orthodox Church. In the appellation there was a requirement to bring Metropolitan
Philaret to the Church trial immediately.
In
1992 the Holy Synod of the UOC presided over by the new Primate of the
UOC His Beatitude Metropolitan of Kyiv
and All Ukraine Volodymyr (Sabodan) adjudged that deposing of Bishop Ionafan
from episcopacy had no canonical grounds and was not effective.
From
1993 - Bishop of Bila Tserkva, Vicar of
the Kyiv Metropolis.
From
1993 till 2000 hold the office of the Executive administrator of the UOC and
was appointed permanent member of the Holy Synod of the UOC.
Under
a pen-name Mark Gorsky he actively cooperated with Vasiliy Anisimov, the famous
journalist of the Kyiv newspaper "Nezavisimost", an only print national edition
at that time which was not afraid of publication of articles against the
autocephalous schism under conditions of the pressure on the part of the
government.
In
December 1993 appointed administrator of the Konotop Diocese (Sumy region). He
contested the returning of the Church of the Nativity of the Theotokos of
Glinka Hermitage and got the title of the Holy Archimandrite of this monastery.
July 28,
1994 he was elevated to the rank of
Archbishop.
From 1995
- administrator of the Sumy Diocese. Founded
the Sumy Pastoral Theological Seminary. Launched on the web the official site
of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church "Orthodoxy in Ukraine" and conducted it for
several years.
From
July 30, 1999 - Archbishop of Kherson and Tavriysk.
By
the decision of the Holy Synod of the UOC of November 22, 2006 he was removed
from the administration of the Kherson Diocese and appointed Archbishop of
Tulchin and Bratslav.
Activity
Archbishop
Ionafan is the author of three versions of Russian translation of the Great
Canon of Repentance of St. Andrew of Crete (including the rhythmically cadenced
one); the composer of the "Comprehensive guide for the Divine Liturgy" - eucharistological
handbook with the broad historical and theological commentary and the author's
exposition in Russian and Ukrainian of the prayers of the Divine Liturgy of the
Holy Hierarchs John Chrysostom and Basil the Great (published in Kherson).
The
author of numerous musical-spiritual works and adaptations - more than 1500 pages
of musical texts and canons. "The grave antiphons of ancient chants", "God with
us" of the Solovtsy chant, "Now the heavenly powers" of the Balaam chant", "You
clothing" of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra chant in musical adaptation of Archbishop Ionafan,
as well as his original works "Your Palace", "Having Slept in the Flesh" and
others entered the treasury of spiritual chants, they are recorded by secular
and church choirs to tapes and disks, are played in movies and in religious
radio and TV programmes.
He was the first to use the sections of the ancient Gregorian chants
(Liturgy of Peace),
as well as the evangelical Lutheran choral (chants of
the communicants with the words of Archbishop Ionafan) for writing the liturgical Orthodox music.
The author of the "Glas Liturgy" based on the ordinary chant of the 6th
glas of the Church Eight-glas system. Composer of the music for the
chants of Eucharist canon "A mercy of peace"
in Russian and Ukrainian with the author's arrangement of the texts of chants.
Throughout
2004-2006 he introduced the practice of celebrating the "missionary liturgy"
for the parishioners with reading out in the microphone of the Eucharist
prayers in Russian and Ukrainian, and with brief catechesis explanations of the
rites of Liturgy in course of service. He also celebrated together with the
clergy of Kherson Diocese the Divine Liturgy of St. Jacob. During the Lent he
practiced serving the Liturgy of Pre-sanctified Gifts in the evening according
to the Typicon. He practiced reading of the Great Canon of Repentance of
St.Andrew of Crete in Russian. The main issues of the missionary preaching of
Archbishop Ionafan are the Doctrine of the Church and the Divine service in the
spirit of historical and Eucharist theology of protopriest Mykolay
Afanasiev.
In
the thick of critical attacks at the activity and the missionary work of
professor of the MTA deacon Andrey Kuraev, with whom he was closely connected
by the years long spiritual communication, he gave the former his blessing for
publication of some of his most topical books.
He
took part in the International competition for writing the words for the state
hymn of Russia to the music of Glinka (God Righteous and Allmighty), in the
competitions for composing music and texts for the hymn of the Kherson Region
(Ukrainian Land by the Black Sea), and for the hymn of the Krasnodar area ("Oh Kuban, my native land").
Repeated
member of the jury of the International festival
of the church music in Hajnówka (Poland). At the invitation of Rector of the Freiburg University
(Switzerland) in 2004-2006 he read lectures on the Russian musical semiography
and liturgical chant in the Bern Conservatory and Amsterdam (Netherlands).
He
also established cooperation of the Church with the intellectuals of Kherson.
Together with the Rectorate of Kherson State University he organised
within the walls of the educational establishment the International scientific
readings on the church and historical issues.
In
the Kherson Diocese he organised the annual
summer Orthodox children's camp "God's bee" and the meetings of the Orthodox
and Evangelical Lutheran Youth in Germany and Kherson. In Hildesheim (Germany) he
took part in organisation of the labour
camps of the orthodox and catholic youth. He also assisted in organising of
treatment for the Kherson children suffering from leukemia in
Italy (Padova), visited the orphanages, prisons and hospices of the Kherson
Region.
Vladyka
is an author of the unique historical memoirs on the first years of
establishing of the UOC "I'm the only one to tell about it....» and the memoirs
of the first years of the life of the regained Church of the Kyiv-Pechersk
Lavra at the end of 80-ties.
He
anathematised the occult doctrine of Olga Asaulyak and the
doctrine of the excommunicated former metropolitan of Kyiv Philaret
(Denisenko), who overtly proclaimed the ecclesiological conception of the
possibility of existence of two autonomous centres
- two families of the Local Orthodox Churches within the One Catholic Church,
qualified it as a two-church heresy, aimed at justification of the local
internal schisms and the creation of global schismatic communities.
The
literary and musical works of Archbishop Ionafan were published on the official
Internet-site of the Kherson diocesan newspaper "Orthodox Tavria" and the
Internet-sites of Russia (Kliros ect).
Archbishop
Ionafan is a member of the Committee of the Holy Synod of the UOC on the
relations with Old Believers, for many years he had been the member of the
Theological Commission of the Holy Synod of the UOC and the commission on Canonization
of Saints. He took part in the work of the latter on the local canonisation
of the Kyiv Metropolitan Petro Mohyla.
Awarded
Church
orders:
- of the Venerable Sergius of Radonezh;
- of the Holy and Right-believing
Prince Daniel of Moscow (ROC);
- of the Venerable Anthony
and Theodosius of Caves (UOC);
- of St.
Mark (Jerusalem
Orthodox Church), and the nominal Panagia of the Ecumenical
Patriarch Bartholomew I.
State
Awards:
- In 2005
was submitted for nomination of the title "Honoured
Art Worker of Ukraine" to the President of Ukraine by the Kherson Regional Administration;
- The Badge of Honour of the Ministry of
Internal Affairs of Ukraine;
- In 2006 awarded
the commemorative badge "For Services to Kherson" by the territorial community
of the city of Kherson.
He has an honorary title of the colonel of Zaporizhzhya Warrior-host,
spiritual director and the tutor of the Kherson phalanx.
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