Presbyter
Saint Martyr Basil was born in 1869 in the village of Fili, Moscow district, in the family of priest Viktor Guryev. After graduating from the Moscow Theological Seminary, Basil was ordained a priest and served in the Znamenskaya Church in the village of Kuntsevo. In 1929, he was arrested and sentenced to five years of imprisonment, but the sentence was later changed to a fine. In 1932, the Znamensky Church was closed, and Father Basil began serving in the Church of the Savior Not Made by Hands in Setun. Father Basil was arrested on September 21, 1937, and held in Taganka prison in Moscow. Witnesses who testified against him characterized him as a deeply believing person. Father Basil denied belonging to a counter-revolutionary organization. On October 10, 1937, the NKVD troika sentenced him to execution. Priest Basil Guryev was shot on October 13, 1937, and buried in a common unmarked grave at the Butovo firing range near Moscow.
