Hieromonk
Saint martyr Macarius (in the world Mikhail Efimyevich Smirnov) was born on April 1, 1877, in the village of Melekhov, Saint Petersburg province, to peasant parents Yefimiy and Anna. From a young age, he aspired to leave the world and settle in a monastery. After graduating from the Theological Seminary, he took monastic vows under the name Macarius and was ordained a priest. After the monastery was closed in 1928, he served as a priest in a church, but in 1933 he was sentenced to one year in a correctional labor camp for tax evasion.
Upon his release from the camp, Hieromonk Macarius began serving in the church in the village of Krasnaya Polyana, where he arrived in the summer of 1937. On December 19, 1937, he was arrested for appealing to the parishioners for help in paying taxes and for defending the church from closure. During the investigation, he denied all charges of anti-Soviet agitation.
On December 27, the NKVD Troika sentenced Father Macarius to death by shooting. He was executed on December 29, 1937. Saint Macarius was canonized among the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia at the Jubilee Archpastoral Council of the Russian Orthodox Church in August 2000 for public veneration.
