Former rector of St. Nicholas Church. Muzhinovo, Bryansk region
Former Rector of the Holy Nicholas Church in the village of Muzhinovo, Kletnya District, Bryansk Oblast; former cleric of the Klintsy and Trubchevsk Diocese of the Bryansk Metropolia of the Russian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate). Currently: a cleric of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU).
The priest himself is originally from the Odesa region, and his entire family lives in Ukraine; therefore, he was deeply pained by the beginning of the full-scale Russian aggression against this country. Many of his relatives suffered as a result of the war. A nephew was killed, and two other relatives were wounded. He delivered anti-war sermons in the church and spoke out against the war and its justifications on social media and in private conversations. Many of these statements were documented by the parish warden, Lyudmila Pustovit.
Initially, the secretary of the diocese, Archpriest Vasily Volikov, called the priest to exert pressure on him. Later, on October 28, 2022, he was summoned multiple times to the diocesan administration for an audience with the ruling bishop, Bishop Vladimir (Novikov), who forced the priest to write an explanatory note and threatened him with being defrocked.
A few days later, a tragic accident occurred: due to a severe power surge in the electrical grid, the wooden church where the priest served as rector burned down. This incident was used as a pretext to suspend him from serving and place him on the retired list. In addition to accusations of "negligence," the suspension decree explicitly cited his anti-war stance and his statements against the Russian army and President Putin.
On January 9, 2023, he was summoned to the criminal investigation department of the police in the urban-type settlement of Kletnya, where he was informed that a case had been opened against him by the Bryansk branch of the FSB based on statements collected by the parish warden, Lyudmila Pustovit. The investigator took a written explanation regarding this matter and released the priest. Fearing further persecution, he was forced to leave Russia.
On February 22, 2023, Alexander Dombrovsky wrote that he had learned that the Klintsy Diocese of the Bryansk Metropolia of the ROC-MP had initiated the process of defrocking him. According to the information posted by the priest on his personal Facebook page, he was subsequently received into the clergy of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine. Later, the Klintsy Diocese resorted to manipulating the facts and began circulating an alternative version, claiming that "the defrocking took place because of the priest's transition to the OCU." However, this narrative contradicts the officially documented timeline and the initial written version of the events.