Sebastian Dabovich

Sebastian Dabovich (now St. Sebastian of Jackson and San Francisco; San Francisco, California, United States of America, 21 June 1863 - Žiča, Serbia, Kingdom of Yugoslavia, 30 November 1940) was a prominent Serbian cleric in the Russian Orthodox Mission in America in the 1890s and early 1900s. Dabovich founded numerous churches and was the author of several books. He is best remembered as an apostle to émigré Serbs from the Austrian and Ottoman Empires who settled in the America in the 19th- and early 20th-century, not to mention those who arrived directly from Serbia and Montenegro looking for opportunities like other immigrants. He died in Serbia, then part of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1940 and was glorified as a saint on 29 May 2015. His feast day is commemorated on 30 November.Also, at the same time, Mardarije Uskokovich, the first Serbian bishop of North America was elevated into sainthood by the Serbian Orthodox Church.

Life

John Dabovich (Jovan Dabović) was born in San Francisco, California on 21 June 1863, to Serbian immigrant parents who originally come from the village of Sasovići near Herceg Novi, at the entrance of the Bay of Kotor in Montenegro. He grew up as a church-going Christian in San Francisco where his parents operated a store. After finishing high school he served his parish as a reader and schoolteacher.

In 1884, he was assigned to assist at St. Michael's Cathedral in Sitka, Alaska before he was sent to Imperial Russia to prepare for a life as a missionary priest. After three years of study at the St. Petersburg and Kyiv Theological academies, John was tonsured a monk in 1887 with the name Sebastian and ordained a deaconFollowing his ordination, Sebastian returned to San Francisco where he served as a deacon at the San Francisco cathedral. He also taught at the pastoral school in San Francisco.

On 16 August 1892, Sebastian was ordained a priest by Bishop Nicholas. He was soon sent to Minneapolis, Minnesota to replace Fr. Alexis Tothas the priest of St. Mary's Church there. While there he also taught at the Missionary School. After a year, Fr. Sebastian returned to San Francisco where he organized the first Serbian Orthodox Church, dedicated to Saint Sava, in Jackson, California. Additionally, Fr. Sebastian was also asked by Bishop Tikhon to be a member of the North American Mission administration. Additionally, he was a legitimate force in helping organize the Orthodox Christians - particularly in the Pacific Northwest of the United States, though his missionary work brought him as far south as Arizona - into communities that were capable of supporting churches. Some of the places where he did this include Seattle (the future St. Spiridon Cathedral), where he even served as a temporary priest before Fr. Ambrose Vretta's arrival in November of 1895, Wilkes-Barre,Washington, Portland, Oregon, and Butte, Montana (the future Holy Trinity Church). During the turn of the century, Sebastian corresponded with Rev. Francis J. Hall, D.D., of the Anglican confession on the subject of inter-relations between the two Communions.In 1902, he continued his missionary activities, returning to Alaska as dean of the Sitka deanery. While he was in Alaska, he helped establish Saint Sava Church in Douglas.

As more Serbians emigrated to the United States, Archbishop Tikhon (Bellavin) asked Fr. Sebastian to lead a Serbian Mission in the North American diocese. With his appointment to head the mission, Abp. Tikhon elevated Fr. Sebastian to archimandrite on 15 August 1905. For the next five years Archimandrite Sebastian led the Serbian Mission from its center at the Holy Resurrection Serbian Orthodox Church in Chicago, Illinois, where he was the parish priest.

In 1910, Sebastian asked for a release from the Serbian parish so that he could return to missionary work. Then, a year or so later, he joined the faculty of the newly-opened St. Platon Seminary in Tenafly, New Jersey. Shortly thereafter feeling a call to serve the church in his ancestral homeland the Serbia, Sebastian asked Archbishop Tihon (Bellavin) for a release from the American Mission.He went on to serve as a chaplain in the Serbian army in the Balkan Wars and World War I. Other than for brief visits to the United States in 1915 and 1917, Father Sebastian spent the rest of his life serving the Church of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.

Archimandrite Sebastian died in Serbia on 30 November 1940 and was buried at the Monastery of Žiča and diocese of the same name headed by his friend and father confessor Bishop Nikolaj. In 2007, Archimandrite Sebastian (Dabovich) remains were disinterred and brought back to the cemetery at Saint Sava Church in his native Jackson, California for reburial.

Writings

• The Lives of the Saints (1898)
• The Holy Orthodox Church (1898)
• Preaching in the Russian Church (1899)

Sources

• Orthodox America 1794-1976 Development of the Orthodox Church in America, C. J. Tarasar, Gen. Ed. 1975, The Orthodox Church in America, Syosset, New York, p. 96.
• Archimandrite Sebastian Dabovich: Serbian Orthodox Apostle, by Hieromonk Damascene (Christiansen), The Orthodox Word 43:1-2, (January-April, 2007)
• Archimandrite Sebastian Dabovich: The First Serbian Orthodox Apostle, by Alexander Vallens (2005)
• History of St. Spiridon's Cathedral Seattle
• Articles on Dabovich at OrthodoxHistory.org
• Holy Missionaries MARDARIJE (Uskokovic) and SEBASTIAN (Dabovich) Newly Proclaimed Saints of the Orthodox Church! Western American Diocese of the Church of Serbia.
• E-Serbia article about the Serbian cemetery in Jackson, California
• Photos of a new headstone
• Report on a 2015 Symposium in Honor of Newly-Glorified St. Sebastian Dabovich
• Information on St. Sava Church in Douglas, Alaska
• Archimandrite Sebastian Dabovich - The Beginning of His Apostolic Labor eSerbia.org site

See also

• Mardarije Uskokovich
• Nikolaj Velimirović
• John Kochurov
• Theophilus Pashkovsky
• Boris Pash
• Alexis Toth

References

• From Orthowiki: Sebastian (Dabovich) - OrthodoxWiki  This article incorporates text available under the CC BY-SA 2.5 license.

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