« Metropolitan Anthony (Bloom) of Sourozh was born 110 years ago »

Andrei Borisovich Bloom was born on June 19 (6), 1914 in Lausanne in the family of an employee of the Russian diplomatic service. His ancestors on the father's side were immigrants from Scotland who settled in Russia during the time of Peter the Great; on his mother's side he was related to the composer A.N.  Scriabin.

His early childhood was spent in Persia, where the father of the family was a consul. After the revolution in Russia, the Bloom family found themselves in exile and, after several years of wandering around Europe, settled in France in 1923. The boy grew up outside the Church, but one day, as a teenager, he heard a conversation about Christianity from a prominent theologian. This meeting determined the entire subsequent life of the future Vladyka.

After the secondary school, he graduated from the biological and medical faculties of the Sorbonne.

In 1931, he was ordained as an altar servant to serve in the church of the Three Hierarchs Metochion, at that time the only church of the Moscow Patriarchate in Paris.

On September 10, 1939, before leaving for the front as a surgeon in the French army, he secretly took monastic vows; On April 16, 1943, he was tonsured a monk with the name Anthony in honour of St.  Anthony of Kiev-Pechersk. The tonsure was performed by the Rector of the Three Hierarchs' Metochion, Archimandrite Afanasy (Nechaev), his confessor and spiritual father.

During the German occupation, he served as a doctor in the anti-fascist underground movement. After the war, he continued to practice medicine until 1948.

On October 27, 1948, Metropolitan Seraphim (Lukyanov), at that time Exarch of the Moscow Patriarch,  ordained him a hierodeacon, and on November 14 - a hieromonk and he was sent to carry out pastoral ministry in England as the spiritual leader of the Orthodox-Anglican Society of St. Martyr  Alban and St. Sergius.

From September 1, 1950 he became Rector of the churches of the Holy Apostle Philip and St. Sergius in London;  Church of the Holy Apostle Philip, provided to the parish by the Anglican Church, was eventually replaced by the Church of the Dormition of the Mother of God and All Saints, of which Father Anthony became Rector on December 16, 1956.

In January 1953, he was elevated to the rank of Abbott, and by Easter of 1956 - to the rank of archimandrite.

On November 30, 1957, he was consecrated Bishop of Sergius, Vicar of the Exarch of the Patriarch of Moscow in Western Europe. The consecration was performed in the London Cathedral by the Exarch of the Patriarch of Moscow in Western Europe, Archbishop Nicholas of Clicia (Eremin) and Bishop Jacob of Apamea, vicar of the Exarch of the Ecumenical Patriarch in Western Europe.

In October 1962, he was appointed to the Sourozh diocese, newly formed in the British Isles within the framework of the Western European Exarchate, with elevation to the rank of archbishop.

Since January 1963, after the retirement of Metropolitan Nicholas (Eremin), he was appointed acting Exarch of the Patriarch of Moscow in Western Europe.

In May 1963 he was awarded the right to wear a cross on his klobuk.

On January 27, 1966, he was elevated to the rank of Metropolitan and confirmed as Exarch in Western Europe.  He carried out this ministry until the Spring of 1974, when his request for release from the administrative duties of the Exarch was granted in order to more fully devote himself to the organisation of diocesan life and the pastoral care of his growing flock.

Over the years of Bishop Anthony's ministry in Great Britain, the only parish that united a small group of emigrants from Russia turned into a multinational diocese, canonically organised, with its own charter and varied activities.

In Russia, the word of the bishop has been heard for many decades thanks to religious programs of the Russian BBC service; his visits to Russia became significant events; tape recordings and samizdat collections of his sermons were distributed throughout the country. Metropolitan Anthony's first books on prayer and spiritual life were published in English in the 1960s  and have been translated into many other languages ; One of them (“Prayer and Life”) was published in the “Journal of the Moscow Patriarchate” in 1968.

He was an honorary doctor of theology from the University of Aberdeen (1973), the faculties of Cambridge (1996), as well as the Moscow Theological Academy (1983, for his scientific and theological preaching works).  On September 24, 1999, the Kiev Theological Academy awarded Metropolitan Anthony the degree of Doctor of Theology honoris causa.

He was a participant in theological interviews between delegations of the Orthodox Churches and representatives of the Anglican Church (1958), member of the delegation of the Russian Orthodox Church at the celebrations of the millennium of Orthodox monasticism on Mount Athos (1963), member of the commission of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church on issues of Christian unity, member of the Central Committee of the World Council of Churches (1968-75) and Christian Medical Commission of the WCC;  member of the Assemblies of the World Council of Churches in New Delhi (1961) and Uppsala (1968), member of the Local Councils of the Russian Orthodox Church (1971, 1988, 1990).

At the beginning of 2003, he underwent surgery, after which on February 1, 2003 he submitted a request to retire for health reasons. On July 30, by a resolution of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church, he was released from the administration of the Sourozh diocese and retired.

He died on August 4, 2003 in a London hospice. The funeral service took place on August 13 at the Cathedral of the Dormition of the Most Holy Mother of God and All Saints.  He was buried at Brompton Cemetery, London.

Patriarchia.ru/Sourozh.org