Hieromartyr
Hieromartyr Dimitry Rozhdestvensky
1863 — 1921
Also known as: Сщмч. Димитрий Рождественский, Дмитрий Павлович Рождественский, Димитрий Рождественский, протоиерей
An archpriest who served for over twenty years in Semirechye — in the city of Verny (now Almaty) and rural parishes of the Turkestan diocese; shot together with his son Anatoly in Verny on 19 February 1921. Glorified in 2000.
Hieromartyr Dimitry (Dmitry Pavlovich) Rozhdestvensky was born in 1863 in the village of Selets, Oryol province. After graduating from the Chernigov Theological Seminary in 1884, where he also worked as an observer at an astrophysical observatory, he was ordained priest and taught religion in a rural school; in 1894 he received a diploma as a correspondent of the Russian Academy of Sciences for his observatory work and climate observations.
In 1899, at the request of Bishop Arkady (Karpinsky) of Turkestan, he moved to Verny (now Almaty), where he served on the diocesan consistory, taught religion in local schools and at the Verny teachers' seminary, and was appointed guardian of the poor by the city duma. Until 1911 he was rector of the church in Tokmak and later served in the village of Vysokoye in the Chimkent district, where he carried out missionary work.
On 19 February 1921 he was shot in Verny together with his son Anatoly. Both were glorified by the Jubilee Council of Bishops in 2000. Feast: 6 (19) February; also in the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors of the Russian Church and of the Saints of Central Asia.