Hieromartyrs Ephraim, Bishop of Selenga, and John, Priest, and Martyr Nicholas

Ephraim (Epiphanius Kuznetsov, 1875–1918) was born in a Cossack village in Transbaikalia and spent his life as a missionary there, heading the Transbaikal spiritual mission from 1905; in 1916 he became bishop of Selenginsk, a vicar of the Transbaikal diocese. He came to Moscow for the Local Council of 1917–1918 and in June 1918 was arrested by the Cheka at the flat of Archpriest John Vostorgov. On 5 September 1918, the first day of the Red Terror, he was shot in Moscow as a hostage, together with Vostorgov and former ministers of the tsar. Vostorgov and the layman Nicholas Varzhansky are remembered with him; they were canonized in 2000.