Tallinn, Estonia, April 19, 2018

His Eminence Metropolitan Cornelius of Tallinn, the head of the Estonian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, has reposed in the Lord, Sputnik reports.

He was 94 years old.

Met. Cornelius (Vyacheslav Vasilievich Jacobs in the world) was born on June 19, 1924 in Tallinn into the family of a Royal Army colonel. He graduated from high school in 1943 and preserved as a chanter in the Church of the Nativity of the Theotokos in the Estonian capital.

He was ordained as a deacon on August 19, 1945, and as a priest on February 8, 1948, being appointed as the rector of the Church of St. Mary Magdalene in Haapsalu. He graduated from the Leningrad Theological Seminary by correspondence in 1951.

He was arrested by the Vologda Region KGB on February 27, 1957 for “anti-Soviet agitation,” and was sentenced to 10 years in political camps in Mordovia. The sentence was later reduced to 5 years, and on September 7, 1960 he was released early on parole.

He returned to Estonia in November 1960 and was appointed as the rector of St. John the Baptist in Tallinn.

He was appointed as the bishop of Tallinn and vicar to His Holiness Patriarch Alexei II on July 20, 1990. He was tonsured as a monk at the Pskov Caves Monastery on August 21, 1990 with the name of Cornelius. He was elevated to the rank of archimandrite on September 6 and consecrated as a bishop on September 15 at the St. Alexander Nevsky Cathedral in Tallinn.

He thereby became the primate of the Estonian Orthodox Church which was simultaneously granted autonomy by the Moscow Patriarchate. He was elevated to the rank of archbishop in 1995, and to that of metropolitan on November 6, 2000.

Before his death he was the oldest bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church.

May his memory be eternal!

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