Synaxis Synaxis of the Saints of the Central Asian Metropolitan District

The Synaxis of the Saints of the Central Asian Metropolitan District commemorates the saints whose life and witness are connected with Central Asia. The Metropolitan District, created by the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church on 27 July 2011, unites the dioceses of Tashkent, Bishkek and Dushanbe and the Patriarchal deanery in Turkmenistan.

In September 2016 the Synod of the Metropolitan District petitioned Patriarch Kirill to establish the feast; its journals were approved by the Holy Synod on 27 December 2016. The Patriarch blessed its celebration on 26 August (8 September, new style), the feast of the Meeting of the Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God and the day of the Central Asian Metropolitan District. The Synaxis was first celebrated on 8 September 2017 at the Dormition Cathedral in Tashkent, where a newly painted icon of the Synaxis had been brought the evening before.

The list of saints of the Synaxis was approved by the Holy Synod on 16 May 2023. It consists mostly of twentieth-century new martyrs and confessors who suffered or lived in Central Asia, such as Hieromartyr Pimen (Belolikov), Bishop of Verny, and Confessor Heraclius (Motyakh) of Issyk-Kul, together with the ancient Martyr John of Merv.