A Good and Faithful Servant: The Year of Saint Innocent

by Lydia Black

An exhibit catalog commemorating the bicentennial of the birth of Ioann Veniaminov, St. Innocent, 1797-1997.

Paperback

First published January 1, 1997

Reviews

[Bridget Arnold · Rating 3 out of 5]

This probably deserves like 3.5 stars tbh. I liked that it was super concise and gave me a great overview of St. Innocent’s life, but it did paint him as quite the Mary Sue which like, okay. It was written for an exhibit commemorating the bicentennial of his birth (1797-1997) so I get it. And he’s an orthodox saint so like, yeah talking trash isn’t really the move. I liked that he was a big proponent for universal education and that he also thought women should be educated (but kinda only because mothers are the best teachers, but he was so close!) And yeah, super cool that he was creating written languages for Native groups but like, the RAC was still enslaving Unangun and Sugpiaq people during their tenure in Alaska and they also like, built the Russian Bishop’s House. Idk. I get that it was missionary work and it was great that he didn’t believe in forcing Native people to abandon their language and customs (looking at you, mid 19th century Sitka Presbyterians), but in the end it’s like “cool motive, still colonialism.” Yknow?

But he seems like he would’ve been fun to talk to and he was a real intellectual and he documented a ton of stuff about Alaska which is interesting. Seems like a deserving enough saint to me, for all I know about Russian Orthodoxy.