Presbyter
Saint Peter Semenovich Smorodintsev was born in 1866. He entered the Perm Theological Seminary but left after the first year in 1880. In 1885, he was appointed a psalmist in the church in honor of the Unmercenary Healers Cosmas and Damian in the village of Yushkovskoye, and in 1899 he was ordained as a deacon. In 1906, Deacon Peter was transferred to the Ascension Church, and later to the Holy Trinity Church in the village of Brusnyatskoye. In 1908, he was ordained as a priest at the Church of the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos in the village of Krasnopolye.
Father Peter was a man with great practical abilities. He built a steam mill, brought electricity, and equipped a repair workshop, which transformed the village into an autonomous industrial-agricultural complex. Father Peter was also interested in the issues of material independence for peasants and created a credit society. In 1917, he was released from active duty, but in 1918 he was appointed to the Church of John the Baptist in the village of Kochnevskoye.
After serving on the feast of Pentecost, he went to the village of Yushkovskoye, where he was arrested by the Red Guards and sent to Kasli. Bidding farewell to his family, he blessed them, saying: “Live with God, for I shall not see you again!” In Kasli, he was sentenced to execution, and on June 23, 1918, he was shot near the river Gorkaya. His head was crushed, and two gunshot wounds were found on his body.
Father Peter was buried in Kasli next to the Assumption Church alongside Protopresbyter Alexander Miropolsky and Priest Peter Belyaev.
