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Commemorated on March 24
The Holy Martyr
Peter of Kazan together with the martyr Stephen suffered from the Kazan
Tatars for his conversion to Christianity from Mussulmanism.
After the leaving of
the Russian army, the natives seized him by force from his home and addressed
him by his former mussulman name, hoping that he would abjure from Christ. But
to all the endearment and persuasion Saint Peter answered: "Father for me
and mother – is God glorified in Trinity: Father and Son and Holy Spirit... If
ye believe in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, then ye be kin to me;
in holy Baptism the name Peter was given me, and not that, by which ye address
me".
Seeing that he would
remain steadfast in the faith, his family gave him over to torture, during the
time of which until his very death amidst fiercesome torments he did not cease
to confess the Name of Christ, uttering: "I am a Christian". The holy
martyr was buried in Kazan on the spot, where later was situated an ancient
church of the Resurrection of Christ, at the Zhitny-Grain marketplace.
About the holy
martyrs Stephen and Peter of Kazan is account: "Journal of the Moscow
Patriarchate", 1977, No. 9, p. 79-80.
© 1996-2001 by translator Fr. S. Janos.
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