The holy martyr John Vsevko

Ivan Vesko - the son of the psalmist in the village of Kosarichi Bobruisk district of the Minsk province. In 1913, being 23 years old, he graduated from the Minsk Theological Seminary. In 1915, he was ordained a priest to the Pokrovskaya church in the village of Krivonos, where he served all his life.

In 1920, part of the territory of the Minsk province was occupied by Polish troops, the officers stopped at the priest’s house on the wait, but treated him unfriendly for defending their peasant-peasants. He was arrested and was in the Slutsk prison for some time.

In 1928, he was arrested for the second time by the Soviet authorities on charges of untimely taxes and sentenced to nine months of imprisonment. Returning from prison, he continued the service in the Pokrovsky Church.

The authorities, intending to close the temple, eventually began to demand from the priest the payment of increasing taxes. Father John did not have his own funds, and he went home to the peasants, asking for help; Some peasants donated, others had to borrow. Seeing that the priest continues to defend the temple, the employees of the OGPU decided to arrest him and members of the church council.

On March 18, 1933, a priest and 5 members of the parish council were arrested on charges that they were:

“Under the leadership of the priest, Vecorko, using as a preposition to raise funds among parishioners to pay taxes, are engaged in active, organized anti -Soviet counter -revolutionary activities, aiming to disrupting all the events of the Soviet government, in particular the disruption of the spring campaign ... collapse of collective farms, the spread of all kinds of counter -revolutionary rumors.”

The priest said:

“I do not recognize guilty of disrupting the economic and political campaigns aimed at disrupting economic and political campaigns, and in general in any counter-revolutionary work. I think that the charge against me ... has its goal to close the church. In my activity, I did not leave the limits of religious rites and consider myself an apolitical person. ”

After the end of the investigation, Father John was sent to Slutskiy prison.

On April 17, 1933, the Troika of the OGPU sentenced the priest to be shot.

Shot in prison in the city of Ss. Buried in an unknown grave. The property was confiscated, and the family was sent to the north.