Pimen

(Sergei Mikhailovich Izvekov). Born July 10 (23), 1910, in the city of Bogorodsk, now Noginsk, Moscow Oblast. Patriarch of Moscow and all Russia. Doctor of theology, honorary member of the Leningrad (1962) and Moscow (1963) theological academies.

Pimen became a monk in 1927 and took holy orders in 1930 as hierodeacon and hieromonk. In 1946 he became an abbot. He served for 20 years in churches in Moscow, Murom, Odessa, and Rostov-on-Don. In 1949 he became vicegerent of the Pskov-Pechora Monastery and archimandrite in 1950. In 1954, Pimen was appointed vicegerent of the St. Sergius Trinity Laura in Zagorsk, Moscow Oblast. He was made a bishop in 1957. From 1960 to 1961 he served as archbishop in charge of the Moscow patriarchate, was a permanent member of the Holy Synod, and had oversight of the Tula and Belev eparchies. In 1961 he became metropolitan of Leningrad and Ladoga. In 1963 he was made metropolitan of Krutitsy and Kolomna. From 1970 to 1971, Pimen was acting patriarch of Moscow. He was elected patriarch in 1971 at the Council of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Since 1963, Pimen has been a member of the World Peace Council, the Soviet Committee for the Defense of Peace, and the Soviet Committee for Cultural Ties With Compatriots Abroad. He represented the Russian Orthodox Church at the Warsaw (1963) and Geneva sessions of the World Peace Council, at the World Congresses for General Disarmament and Peace in Moscow (1962) and Helsinki (1965), at the World Assembly for Peace in Berlin (1969), at the Assembly of the World Peace Council in Budapest (1971), and the World Congress of Partisans of Peace in Moscow (1973). For his deeds in the defense of peace, Pimen has been awarded testimonials and personal medals by the Soviet Peace Fund (1969 and 1971) and the gold Fighter for Peace medal from the Soviet Committee for the Defense of Peace (1970).