Moscow, June 29, 2017
Photo: orthodox.pl His Eminence Archbishop Simon (Romańczuk) of Łódź and Poznań of the Polish Orthodox Church reposed in the Lord yesterday morning, June 28, 2017, reports the site of the Polish Church.
The late Archbishop Simon was born on August 12, 1936, in Gusczewina near Hajnówka. In 1955, he graduated from high school and began teaching in Bielsko Podlaski and then began studying philology in Minsk. After returning to Poland, he was a teacher of Russian, Belarusian, and Latin in school in Michałowo. In 1965, he began studying at the Christian Theological Academy in Warsaw, where he earned a doctorate for his thesis “Orthodoxy in the Literary Output of Dostoyevsky.” On February 11, 1970, he was tonsured as a monastic. He was ordained to the diaconate four days later, and as a priest another seven days later.
On February 21, 1970, he became the inspector for the seminary in Warsaw, and one year later he became the president of the Metropolitan Council’s Publishing and Press Committee. He became an official representative of the Church of Poland in 1971. In 1973, he was elevated to the rank of igumen, and to archimandrite on November 25, 1979.
The next day, he was consecrated to the episcopacy at the Cathedral of St. Mary Magdalene, as the bishop of Lublin, a vicar of the Diocese of Warsaw and Bielsk. He was nominated the ruling bishop of Łódź and Poznań on August 18, 1931, and on June 8, 1993, he was elevated to the dignity of archbishop.
He was a lecturer at the University of Łódź and a member of the Scientific Council.
Archbishop Simon’s funeral will be celebrated on July 1 at the Cathedral of St. Alexander in Łódź.
