Ambrose, Bishop And Hieroconfessor Of Podolsk

Bishop Ambrose, in the world Alexander Alexeyevich Polyansky, was born on December (according to another source, November) 12, 1878 in the village of Petelino, Yelatomsk uyezd, Tambov province, in the family of a priest. In 1899 he finished his studies at the Tambov theological seminary. In 1901 he was tonsured and ordained to the diaconate. In 1902 he was ordained to the priesthood, becoming a hieromonk of the Kiev Caves Lavra. In 1903 he graduated from Kazan Theological Academy with the degree of candidate of theology, and was appointed a teacher in the Kiev theological seminary. In 1906 he became rector of the Kiev seminary with the rank of archimandrite. On October 22 / November 4, 1918, he was consecrated bishop of Vinnitsa, a vicariate of the Kamenets-Podolsk diocese. In 1922 he was transferred to the see of Kamenets-Podolsk and Bratslav. There he struggled well against renovationism. In 1923 he was arrested "for hiding former White officers" and exiled to Kharkov, and in 1924 - to Moscow. On april 12, 1925 he took part in the burial of Patriarch Tikhon and signed the act transferring the leadership of the Church to Metropolitan Peter. On November 30, 1925 he was imprisoned in the Moscow Butyrki prison, where he remained in the inner prison until May. On May 21 he was sentenced to three years in a concentration camp, and from June, 1926 to March, 1929 he was on Solovki. In July, 1926 he took part in signing the "Epistle of the Solovki Bishops" to the Soviet government. In April, 1929 he was transferred to Tobolsk (according to another source, Tashkent) via prison in Sverdlovsk. In 1930 he was in exile in Alma-Ata.

According to one source, he died in the summer of 1927 in Kazakhstan. According to another (Bishop Athanasius Sakharov), he died in 1932. It is known that at the beginning of 1932 he and Archbishop Procopius (Titov) raised Igumen Feogen to the rank of archimandrite. According to Protopresbyter Michael Polsky, "Archbishop Ambrose died in 1934 of sun-burns and stomach pains in the 'Hungry Steppe' of Kazakhstan, on the road from Chimkent to a distant settlement."

(Sources: M.E. Gubonin, Akty Svyatejshego Tikhona, Patriarkha Moskovskogo i Vseya Rossii, Moscow: St. Tikhon's Theological Institute, 1994, pp. 837, 961; Russkiye Pravoslavnye Ierarkhi, Paris: YMCA Press, 1986, p. 12; Protopresbyter Michael Polsky, Noviye Mucheniki Rossijskiye, Jordanville, 1949-57, part 1, p. 180; Besedy Starogo Svyashchennika, Moscow: Palomnik, 1995, p. 217; Lev Regelson, Tragediya Russkoj Tserkvi, 1917-1945, Paris: YMCA Press, 1977, pp. 530, 535; Krest na Krasnom Obryve, Moscow, 1996, p. 107; Ikh Stradaniyami Ochistitsa Rus', Moscow, 1996, p. 90; Pravoslavnaya Rus', N 14 (1587), July 15/28, 1997, p. 6; Za Khrista Postradavshiye, Moscow: St. Tikhon's Theological Institute, 1997, pp. 72-73)