Venerable
Venerable Sebastian (Dabovich)
9 июня 1863 — 30 ноября 1940
Also known as: Севастиан Джексонский, Йован Дабович, архимандрит Севастиан (Дабович)
The first Orthodox priest born in America, a missionary, founder of the first Serbian parish in the USA and co-worker of St Tikhon; canonized by the Serbian Church in 2015 and added to the Russian Church's calendar in 2017.
St Sebastian (Jovan Dabovich) was born on 9 June 1863 in San Francisco to Serbian immigrants from Kotor and is regarded as the first Orthodox priest born in America. He served as a reader and teacher in Sitka and among the Tlingit of Alaska, was tonsured a monk in 1888, studied at the St Petersburg and Kiev theological academies and was ordained priest in 1892 for the Russian Church's diocese in North America.
He ministered to Orthodox Christians of many nations across the western United States, founded in Jackson, California, the first Serbian parish in the USA, wrote some of the first English-language books on Orthodoxy and translated services into English. St Tikhon (Bellavin) made him head of the Serbian Mission in Chicago with the rank of archimandrite in 1905. He served as a chaplain in the Serbian army during the Balkan Wars and the First World War, lived without possessions, moved to Serbia in 1936 and died at Žiča Monastery on 30 November 1940.
The Serbian Orthodox Church canonized him in 2015; on 6 October 2017 the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church added his name to its calendar. He is commemorated on 17 November (30 November New Style).