Date: 2026-08-15T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Pastoral

Instructions to the Priest Appointed to the Conversion of Non-Christians

Saint Innocent of Alaska

Royal Archives

2026

Copyright

The modern English translation and the cover design are © 2026 Royal Archives. All rights reserved.

The underlying source text is in the public domain.

Published by Royal Archives

First published 2026

Translated by Royal Archives

Source: Наставления священнику, назначаемому для обращения иноверных

Cover: Sailing Ship on the High Seas by Moonlight (1840s) by Ivan Aivazovsky (Russian, 1817–1900), Wikimedia Commons, which is in the public domain.

Edition identifier: urn:royalarchives:instruction_to_the_missionary_priest:en:1

Introduction

St Innocent of Alaska

He was born on 26 August 1797 in Anginskoye, a village in the Irkutsk region of eastern Siberia, and christened John—the son of a church sacristan who died when the boy was six. Poverty and early loss shaped him; so did the seminary at Irkutsk, which he entered at nine and a half. There, according to a custom of the time, he was given a new surname in honour of the recently reposed Archbishop Benjamin of Irkutsk, and so John Popov became John Veniaminov, the name by which the Church would come to know him before his monastic tonsure. He married, was ordained deacon in 1817 and priest in 1821, and was serving a prosperous parish at the Church of the Annunciation in Irkutsk—respected, comfortable, and by every worldly measure well placed—when the decision came that would carry him to the far edge of the world.

In 1823 he left Irkutsk for Russian America, arriving on the Aleutian island of Unalaska in the summer of 1824. What followed is among the great missionary careers of the modern age. For fifteen years he lived among the Aleut (Unangan) people, learned their language, devised an alphabet for it, compiled a grammar, and translated the Gospel and the catechism into their tongue. In 1833 he wrote, first in Aleut, the little spiritual classic that became famous across Russia in translation, Indication of the Way into the Kingdom of Heaven. In 1834 he transferred to Sitka to work among the Tlingit. He built churches with his own hands, kept clocks and made instruments, studied the weather and the peoples he served, and travelled by boat, sledge, and on foot across distances that still seem scarcely credible.

The turn of his life came in the late 1830s. Travelling in Russia to press the cause of the Alaskan mission, he learned that his wife had died. He was tonsured a monk in 1840, taking the name Innocent after St Innocent of Irkutsk, and within weeks was consecrated the first Bishop of Kamchatka, the Kuril Islands, and the Aleutians—a diocese stretching from Siberia across the sea to the Alaskan mainland. Raised to archbishop in 1850, he extended his labours to the Yakut and other peoples of the Russian northeast. In 1868 he was called, unexpectedly, to the highest post in the Russian Church, succeeding his friend Metropolitan Filaret as Metropolitan of Moscow. Even then his missionary heart did not cool: in 1870 he presided over the founding of the Orthodox Missionary Society, which gathered support for missions until the Revolution, and he encouraged the young Nicholas Kasatkin, the future apostle to Japan. He reposed on Holy Saturday, 31 March 1879, and was buried at the Trinity–St Sergius Lavra. In 1977 the Russian Orthodox Church, at the request of the Orthodox Church in America, glorified him as a saint, and he is honoured as Equal-to-the-Apostles, Enlightener of the Aleuts, and Apostle to America.

The six short writings gathered here belong to this life at its various stages—the working priest, the field missionary, the reigning bishop, the aged hierarch composing his last words. None is a treatise. Together they let us hear, in his own unguarded voice, the practical wisdom of a man who spent forty-five of his eighty-two years in journeys for the Gospel.

Occasion and Purpose

These are minor pieces by design, and they are best read together—not as a system but as a set of samples from a single, coherent pastoral mind. They were not composed as a book, and they come from widely separated occasions.

The two Instructions to missionaries are the earliest in spirit and the most celebrated. Both grow directly out of Innocent’s own field experience in Alaska. The Instruction to the Nushagak Missionary, Hieromonk Theophil was written in 1842, when the newly consecrated bishop dispatched a mission to the Nushagak redoubt on the Bering seacoast—a place he himself had first visited as a priest years before. It is a concrete field order to one man setting out for one station. The longer Instructions to the Priest Appointed to the Conversion of Non-Christians is a generalized redaction of the same counsel, expanded and reordered so as to serve any missionary priest; its opening chapters run almost word for word with the Nushagak text before broadening into a fuller manual. Taken together they form the document that later readers have regarded as a small classic of Orthodox missiology—the distilled method of a missionary who never disturbed the customs of a people without first understanding them.

The Homilies for Fasting Penitents belong to the parish and the confessional. They are four short sermons—with an opening dedication prayer—addressed to govelshchiki, the faithful keeping a fast in preparation for confession and Holy Communion. Here Innocent is not the strategist of missions but the ordinary pastor, catechizing plain people in the barest essentials of the Christian hope.

The Note on the Religious Education of Children comes from the end of his life, written at St Petersburg on 13 February 1869, when he was Metropolitan of Moscow. It addresses not a frontier but the Russian heartland, and takes up a question then much debated: how are the great mass of ordinary people, and above all their small children, actually to be taught the faith?

The Autobiographical Note (1863) and the Spiritual Testament (dated 14 December 1869) are the most personal. The first was provoked by a published article about him that he judged inaccurate and, worse, flattering; he set out to correct it, and in doing so left almost the only first-person account of his early years. The second is his literal last will—the practical and spiritual dispositions of a man preparing to die. What unites all six is the sensibility of a working missionary bishop who never lost the parish priest’s directness, and who insisted, again and again, that the whole work is God’s and the labourer only an instrument.

The Six Writings

The two instructions to missionaries may be treated as one work in two forms, and they are the centre of gravity of this collection. Both open with the same solemn preamble: to leave one’s homeland for wild and comfortless places in order to enlighten those still in darkness is “a work truly holy and equal to that of the Apostles,” blessed for the faithful labourer and terrible for the negligent one who makes his converts “sons of Gehenna, twofold more than himself.” Both cite the imperial edict of 1777 warning that hasty baptism without instruction is “an abuse of one of the greatest sacraments.” From there the counsel unfolds in numbered rules. Preparation comes first, and it is inward before it is outward: begin with prayer; keep “a modest and humble disposition of spirit,” promising oneself no guaranteed success, for grace is not given to the proud; approach the work calmly and never with carelessness; and above all preach with love, “for love alone builds up.” Practical wisdom follows—go to people when they are gathered, never begin the services in a new place without first offering at least a brief word, choose a devout interpreter and keep the same one. Then comes the heart of the method: “Christianity is a need, satisfaction, and consolation of the heart above all, not of the intellect alone,” and so one must “act more upon the heart than upon the mind” and “speak from the heart.” The order of teaching is to follow the order of Providence itself—first the Creator known from the visible world, then the moral law written on every heart, then the consequences of keeping or breaking it, and only then the Gospel proper, beginning as Christ began, with the call to repentance. The fuller Instructions to the Priest carries this into further chapters on the conduct of church services, on bearing patiently with new and imperfect Christians, and on relations with the local civil authorities; the Nushagak text divides its matter explicitly into the priest’s “spiritual” duties as a preacher and his “external” duties as a member of the settlement’s ordered society.

The Homilies for Fasting Penitents open with a shepherd’s prayer—“O Jesus Christ! My Good Shepherd!… teach me to do Thy will”—and then move through four brief sermons of rising sequence. The first, On the Kingdom of Heaven, begins with the largest question a plain person can be asked: “For what was man created?” Not to be born, toil, and vanish like the animals, Innocent answers, but for blessedness—and no earthly thing, not even Solomon’s wealth and wisdom, can supply it; only the Kingdom of Heaven, which is simply “life with God,” and which the poor and unlettered may reach as surely as the great. The second homily turns to the receiving of the Holy Spirit and to repentance; the third lays out, with a catechist’s clarity, the five conditions for a fruitful confession; the fourth prepares the penitent for Holy Communion. The movement is exactly that of the preparing soul—from the goal of life, through repentance and confession, to the Eucharist itself.

The Note on the Religious Education of Children is a short piece of pastoral argument. Innocent asks who is really responsible for teaching the faith—parents, godparents, or clergy—and observes, without bitterness but without illusion, that parents mostly do not, godparents never, and so the whole burden falls on the pastors, whose sermons and school lessons reach only those already able to understand them. The great mass of the people, and above all children under six or seven who cannot yet enter any school, are left in “ignorance of the most necessary matters of the faith.” Schools alone cannot answer this, he argues, because they “enlighten and cultivate only the mind, and not the mind and heart together,” and because they will take generations to reach everyone. His remedy is the Church herself, “that most loving of mothers,” and above all the ordinary parish priest, who needs no special learning to gather the little children and teach them the sign of the cross, the Lord’s Prayer, the Creed, and the commandments “in simple words.” It is the mature reflection of a man who had spent his life teaching the unlettered.

The Autobiographical Note is unlike the rest—occasional, wry, and self-effacing. Correcting a laudatory article, Innocent disputes small facts (the day of his birth, the age at which he first read the Epistle aloud in church) precisely in order to prevent anyone thinking “something extraordinary” of him. But the corrections become the occasion for a remarkable confession of Providence. He recounts how every human calculation had counted against his going to America—a good parish, esteem, his own house, a larger income—and how he refused the appeal of the old Aleut settler Ivan Kryukov, until one day, overhearing the same man speak to the bishop of the Aleuts’ zeal for prayer, he was “suddenly and, one might say, wholly inflamed with the desire to go to such a people.” Even the accident of a spring ice-break, which cut the seminary rector off from the city and let the young Veniaminov marry, he reads as the hand of God turning him from the Academy toward Alaska. The refrain of his life sounds here plainly: “from the Lord are a man’s paths made straight,” and “all of us, servants of His Church, are nothing other than instruments in His hands.”

The Spiritual Testament, the shortest of the six, is his literal last will, written in 1869 as his eyesight failed. It begins with thanksgiving to God and a full, mutual forgiveness—of all who had wronged him and by all whom he had wronged—and then disposes of simple matters: burial in the common brotherly cemetery, no funeral orations, no monument beyond “a plain cast-iron slab with a most simple and brief inscription.” Strikingly, the same text he asked to be preached from in the Instruction and the Autobiographical Note returns here as the only permitted eulogy: if anyone must speak, let him speak from “From the Lord are a man’s paths made straight,” pointing to the departed only as an example, “to the glory of God, but without any praise of me.” A metropolitan of Moscow arranges to be buried like the humblest monk.

Theological and Spiritual Significance

For all their variety of occasion, these pieces are held together by a single conviction, stated most fully in the missionary instructions but present in every one of them: that the salvation of a soul depends “in no wise on us or on our skill, but directly and solely on God,” and that the preacher is “nothing other than an instrument in the hands of God.” This is the theological root of Innocent’s famous humility, and it is not false modesty but a working doctrine of grace. It frees the missionary from anxiety about results and forbids him pride in success; it makes prayer, not eloquence, the first tool of the trade; and it grounds the astonishing patience of his method.

That method is the collection’s most enduring contribution. Against every temptation to force or hurry conversion—a temptation the 1777 edict itself had condemned—Innocent insists that Christianity is first a matter of the heart, that one must “speak from the heart” to reach the heart, and that the faith must be unfolded gradually, in the order in which God Himself unfolded it to humankind, meeting people where their own conscience and their own dim memories of the truth already stand. He assumes that the “natural law” is written on every heart, even the most primitive, and that the missionary’s task is partly to “awaken this feeling” and build upon it rather than to demolish. This respect for the person being evangelized—his language, his understanding, his pace—is what has led later readers to regard the Instructions as a small classic of Christian missiology, and it anticipates by more than a century much of what the wider Church would later say about the inculturation of the Gospel.

The pastoral and personal writings translate the same convictions into other keys. The homilies show the doctrine of the Kingdom made plain enough for a fisherman or a child; the Note on Children’s Education shows the same pastoral realism turned on the Christian heartland, refusing to trust that mere schooling can form the heart; the Testament and Autobiographical Note show a man who preached that the labourer is only an instrument, and who then arranged his own death and reputation to say exactly that. Read together, they are an unusually unified witness: the theology of the instructions is simply the life of the man, seen from the inside.

Reception and Influence

Innocent’s missionary method outlived him. The Orthodox Missionary Society he founded in 1870 carried his approach into the wider Russian Church, and his counsel directly shaped the young missionary Nicholas Kasatkin, later the apostle to Japan, whom he urged to master the Japanese language exactly as he himself had mastered Aleut. His larger devotional work, Indication of the Way into the Kingdom of Heaven, became beloved across Russia; the shorter writings gathered here, long available in Russian in his collected Works, have circulated more quietly, chiefly among those interested in the history and practice of mission. His glorification in 1977—jointly cherished by the Russian Orthodox Church and the Orthodox Church in America—set the seal of the Church’s veneration on the whole of this labour, and secured for these modest documents a permanent place among the memorials of one whom the Church now numbers among the equals of the Apostles.

The Text and This Edition

The six writings in this volume are presented together in a fresh modern English translation prepared for this edition and rendered from the Russian originals as preserved in the public-domain text of St Innocent’s collected works. Each piece was translated on its own terms—the numbered rules of the instructions, the plain homiletic flow of the sermons, the argumentative prose of the note on education, the personal registers of the autobiography and the testament—with care to keep the directness and warmth of the saint’s own voice rather than to smooth it into a uniform style.

This edition follows the house conventions of the series. The author is named as the Church receives him—St Innocent (Veniaminov) of Alaska—and any who assisted in bringing the text into English are credited as translators, never as authors. Scripture and chapter references are given in the modern style. Where the original divides a work into parts, chapters, or numbered points, those divisions are preserved so that the reader can follow the structure the saint himself gave. Because these are minor pieces, best introduced and read as a group, they are gathered under a single introduction; but each retains its own integrity, and the reader may take them in any order—beginning, perhaps, with the Autobiographical Note, to meet the man before hearing his counsel, or with the missionary Instructions, to encounter first the work for which he is most remembered.

Preamble

To leave one’s homeland and go to places remote, wild, deprived of many comforts of life—in order to turn to the path of truth people still wandering in the darkness of ignorance, and to enlighten with the light of the Gospel those who have not yet seen this saving light—is a work truly holy and equal to that of the Apostles. Blessed is he whom the Lord shall choose and set upon such a ministry; but doubly blessed is he who labors with all zeal, sincerity, and love in the work of conversion and enlightenment, bearing the toils and sorrows encountered in the field of his service—for his reward is great in heaven! But woe to him who is called and set to preach the Gospel, and does not preach it; and worse still to him who, having traversed land and sea in order to convert others, makes those he converts into sons of Gehenna, twofold more than himself.

Preparation for Faith-Preaching

The instructions concerning this subject are stated clearly enough in the edict of 1777, where it is said “that he (the preacher) is not to consider his calling and duty fulfilled in the hasty administration of baptism to those being converted by him, but is to endeavor to instill in them both the force of Christian teaching and guidance in every good conduct, without which baptism administered to savages can scarcely be called anything other than an abuse of one of the greatest sacraments of the Christian faith.”

1) The first and effective preparation for this is prayer, which alone can open the source of higher guidance and call down blessing upon every good beginning and work; and therefore always, especially before every conversation with those who as yet have no knowledge—whom we wish to enlighten with the light of truth—turn to God with fervent prayer.

2) Always maintain a modest and humble disposition of spirit, and do not promise yourself presumptuously extraordinary or certain success in your work. Such promises arise from pride, and grace is not given to the proud.

3) Every time you take up the work, bring yourself to a state of calm and full presence of spirit; otherwise you cannot express even what you know firmly and thoroughly.

4) Do not approach the work without prior reflection, and do not carry it out with distraction and negligence; for your work is the work of God, and cursed is he who does it with carelessness.

5) Always remember that if a preacher does not have love—both for his work and for those to whom he preaches—then even the finest and most eloquent exposition of the teaching may remain without any benefit; for love alone builds up, and therefore strive to have within yourself the spirit of holy love.

6) Make it a rule for yourself: when visiting remote places (those where a beginning of Christianity has already been made), not to begin the celebration of divine services and offices until you have offered at least a brief instruction to the parishioners you are visiting.

7) The preaching of the Word of God naturally begins first in the place where you will have your permanent residence; but if circumstances compel, or opportunities arise to be in other more distant places, then, notwithstanding that you have accomplished but little among those living with you, do not miss the opportunity to be wherever possible, and offer your word everywhere and to all, according to age, condition, and circumstance.

8) Choose the time for instructions and conversations with the native peoples preferably when they are gathered together; to this end you may either go to them, or, if possible, invite them to yourself.

9) At the outset, not knowing the language of the native peoples, you will have to use a translator for your discourses; endeavor to choose him from among the most well-intentioned and devout people, and instruct them in the catechism beforehand. It is better if the same interpreter is always with you.

The Order of Faith-Preaching

10) Christianity is a need, satisfaction, and consolation of the heart above all, not of the intellect alone; and therefore in teaching the doctrine of the faith one must strive to act more upon the heart than upon the mind. The curiosity of the mind is insatiable; but he who with his heart has felt the need of faith and tasted its consolations will receive it quickly and readily, and it will not be fruitless in him. But to act upon the heart, one must speak from the heart. For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. And therefore only he who is filled and overflows with faith and love can have the mouth and wisdom that the hearts of those who hear him cannot resist—and which rightly indicate how, where, and what to speak.

11) The manner of teaching the doctrine of the faith varies: according to the inner state of the soul of the one being taught, and according to age and intellectual capacity. In this regard, bear in mind that those with whom you will have to deal are—by their habits and understanding—pagans and the erring, and—by their degree of education—children. The method and order of teaching them saving truths must be adapted to this.

12) The order in teaching the doctrine of the faith must be conformed to what Providence itself has shown us.

The Mosaic Law was given before the Law of the Gospel; and even before the written Mosaic Law, the unwritten natural law was known, and its Author, God the Creator and Providence. Immediately before the era of the Mosaic Law a solemn sign of the power, omnipotence, and glory of God was manifested.

Keeping this great and universal pattern in view, arrange your own small and particular work thus:

a) From the existence and good order of visible things, demonstrate the existence (in which, however, none of them seems to doubt), the omnipotence, might, and glory of the Creator of the universe, His goodness, omniscience, and so forth. At the same time, briefly relate the history of the creation of the first man and the origin from him of all peoples and nations—who in this respect are living memorials and visible proofs of the Creator’s omnipotence and wisdom. Then set forth the composition of man from soul and body, the difference from other animals, the immortality of his soul, and indicate God’s purpose in creating man—that is, blessedness.

b) Then demonstrate the moral law of Moses, as the God-written natural law, as the means of attaining blessedness—simply and briefly.

Speaking of the law, you will likely hear from even the most primitive peoples an echo and confirmation of the truths of this law, indelibly inscribed upon the tablets of every heart. Strive to awaken this feeling in them and make use of it for your purpose.

c) When your hearers are convinced of the existence of God and the law, then demonstrate to them the necessity of fulfilling the law as the will of the Creator, and the visible consequences of fulfilling and not keeping the law. As an example of this, briefly relate the story of the Flood (some account of which, however confused, exists among primitive peoples), as a consequence of not keeping the law of God; and the blessing of God upon the patriarchs after the Flood, especially upon Abraham (whose descendants exist to this day), as a consequence of fulfilling the law.

d) After that, begin the preaching of the Gospel proper, just as Jesus Christ Himself began it—that is, by proclaiming repentance and consolation, or the nearness of the Kingdom of Heaven. Endeavor to bring them to a feeling of repentance, or close to repentance. This can be achieved by convincing them that for not fulfilling the law written in their hearts they will inevitably be punished, both in this life and in the life to come.

Bringing to a feeling of repentance and contrition is one of the most difficult tasks of the preacher; but this state is one of the most important in the conversion of a person, and is the tilled soil for the planting of the seed of Christianity. For then it can fall into the very depths of his heart and, with the subsequent cooperation of grace, bear abundant fruit. The proclamation of the Saviour to a sinner who feels himself guilty before the law instills in him beforehand and without any persuasion a love for this Saviour, whom he does not yet know. And he who has come to love Jesus Christ in this way will love Him all the more upon coming to know Him, and will believe everything that He said and everything that you shall say of Him.

e) Having demonstrated the necessity of the redemption of the human race and the greatness of God’s love for it, teach concerning the coming into the world of the promised Redeemer, His eternal birth from the Father (here the mystery of the Holy Trinity must be mentioned), His incarnation, nativity, and earthly life; concerning His teaching, suffering, death, resurrection, ascension, His constant abiding with believers, and His second coming; concerning the resurrection of the dead, the life to come, and the recompense for the righteous and sinners.

f) Finally, say that Jesus Christ during His earthly life had many disciples, from among whom He chose twelve, gave them a special grace and power, and sent them into the whole world to preach the Gospel to every creature; and that all they taught, and all that Jesus Christ commanded, is written in their writings, which have come down to us and are known to almost all nations; and that all good and simple-hearted people who have had occasion to hear their teaching have received it with joy and have followed and continue to follow it. Such people are ordinarily called Christians; and those among them who exactly observed the word of Jesus Christ have become saints, and the bodies of many of them have remained incorrupt for many centuries, and so forth.

After this it is very fitting to put to all the proposal: whether they too would wish to enter the number of those who believe in Jesus Christ and through Him hope for eternal salvation, blessedness, and so forth.

For those who have not previously heard the word of salvation, this teaching of the faith is sufficient for the first time.

13) In the explanation of matters of the faith one must speak thoughtfully, clearly, and distinctly, and as briefly as possible; otherwise your preaching will have little success. In explaining the teaching of Jesus Christ, it is not necessary to be very expansive—that is, not to mention everything that Jesus Christ said, but only to say that the whole teaching of Jesus Christ consists in this: that we repent, believe in Him, and have toward Him and toward all people a selfless, pure love. In confirmation of His teaching, mention His miracles as well.

14) When you see that your hearers have understood you correctly and express a desire to be numbered among the flock of Christ, then propose to them: a) the conditions for those wishing to enter the number of believers; b) holy baptism, as the mystical rebirth from water and the Spirit introducing one into the new life of Christianity, and the other sacraments, as means of receiving the grace of Jesus Christ; and c) how one who wishes to be a true Christian must conduct his life, and consequently make use of all the gifts of salvation.

a) The conditions under which those who desire may enter the number of disciples of Jesus Christ are: to renounce the whole of their former faith; to abandon shamanism, and to cease listening to shamans; not to follow customs contrary to Christianity; to agree to fulfill all that the new law and the Church shall require of them; to confess their sins.

b) To those who desire and agree to fulfill all the stated conditions, say that entering Christianity is a great and important matter; and therefore entry into it must be solemn—the one wishing to enter must renounce before witnesses all that is contrary to the Christian faith and give a promise to be a disciple of Jesus Christ; and all this is to be sealed with holy baptism, which is at once a visible sign of entry into Christianity and a means of cleansing the soul from sins, and the door to receiving the other gifts—or means of imparting the grace of God—that is, the sacraments of the holy Church.

c) Regarding the teaching of how a Christian should conduct himself—do not be very expansive the first time, but say only that he who wishes to be a true Christian—that is, a disciple of Jesus Christ—and to make use of all the gifts of the redemption, must: 1) with faith, hope, and love give himself over to Jesus Christ; 2) imitate Him in all things—that is, strive, as much as possible, always to act as He acted.

15) Finally, one must say that no one—especially he who relies on his own strength and himself—can be a true disciple of Jesus Christ without the help of God; and had Jesus Christ, in His great love for people, not granted us His help, no one could ever have become a perfect follower of His.

16) Such teaching is sufficient for the newly converted. The further teaching of Christianity—such as the extended and more spiritual exposition of the Ten Commandments, the explanation of the words of Jesus Christ transmitted in the Gospel, the teaching of the Apostles, and in part the traditions of the holy fathers—comprises the subject not of preliminary catechetics, and is spiritual food not for infants in the faith, but for those who are mature, or at least growing, in Christianity.

Part Two. Special Instructions Concerning Teaching, Divine Service, and Conduct With the Native Peoples

17) The dogmas of the faith and the essence of active teaching must be adhered to so firmly that nothing contrary to them should be said or permitted, even if open death should threaten you.

But condescension to those newly converting, as to infants in the faith, in regard to certain deficiencies in outward observance, must necessarily be shown—partly on account of local circumstances, partly in expectation of their growth in faith and in life.

18) Keeping the fasts in the customary way—that is, by substituting animal food with purely vegetable food—is almost entirely impossible for the inhabitants of that region by reason of the very locality; and a fast for them may more conveniently consist not in kind but in quantity and manner, and in abstinence from labor and games, in the intensification of prayer, in greater and more diligent attendance at divine services, and so forth.

19) Attendance at ordinary divine services, other than the Liturgy, is not to be established as a strict obligation for those newly converting, and strict fulfillment of this is not to be required; and therefore, during your travels to remote places—when all those you visit are usually gathered together and when divine services cannot ordinarily be conducted—replacing them with instruction in the Word of God will be the most beneficial substitute and the most appropriate service.

20) Easements in the strictness of the rules regarding marriages may be permitted only for very weighty reasons and in extreme necessity, and what exactly these easements may be, special instructions will be given to you. The sparseness of the local population makes marriage relations, which would otherwise be quite inadmissible, somewhat less objectionable.

21) Do not suddenly wean them from old customs not contrary to Christianity, but only explain to them that these are permitted by condescension.

22) As for native peoples who have not received holy baptism—if there is no prospect that any offense against what is holy or breach of decorum might arise from them—not only do not forbid them to be present at the celebration of our divine services such as Vespers, Matins, and the other general services, but as far as possible encourage this.

As for the Liturgy, although by the rules of the Church the catechumens are not permitted to hear the Liturgy of the Faithful, yet since once the ambassadors of St Vladimir in Constantinople, being pagans, were permitted to hear the entire Liturgy—and this served as an occasion for the conversion of Russia to Christianity—one may permit this to pagans who are being converted or who are very well disposed toward Christianity, with the proviso that they not be told that they are already counted as Christians.

23) No matrimonial unions and agreements concluded before baptism are to be considered an obstacle to the reception of holy baptism; and no marriages contracted before baptism—including the most closely consanguineous (which in any case can hardly be encountered)—are to be dissolved; and in examining marriage matters among the newly converted, one must in general proceed with great leniency and condescension.

24) Under no circumstances—neither before baptism, nor at baptism itself, nor soon after it—are gifts of any kind to be given to the newly converting, or permitted to the godparents to give, lest this might become for the native peoples a lure or an occasion for various stratagems (as has happened among us).

25) By virtue of the holy antimins given to you, you have the authority to celebrate the Divine Liturgy in any place: in a clean uninhabited house, and in the open air; but for this, for many reasons, it is more fitting to have a special tent, which is to be pitched in places as needed.

26) Have your more permanent residence where it will be more useful and needful. Doubly happy is that preacher whose presence among them the native peoples count as their own happiness.

27) In teaching by the above-described order, take care not to proceed to the explanation of subsequent subjects before all your hearers, or at least the greater part of them, have understood the preceding—even if this should delay the matter, for it is better to do one thing well than two things poorly.

28) In the teaching of the faith and the Christian law, no proofs not confirmed by Holy Scripture are to be used; still less are false miracles or revelations to be invented, under pain of the most severe condemnation. But if anywhere the Lord should visibly manifest His power in some sign or miracle, make careful use of it in your preaching.

29) In order to increase the number receiving holy baptism, do not employ any measures and means incompatible with the spirit of the Gospel and unbecoming a preacher—such as compulsion, threats, gifts, promises of benefits, and the like.

30) Do not proceed to the administration of holy baptism to native peoples earlier than they have been taught by you the above-mentioned matters of the faith and the law, and when they themselves express their agreement.

31) All peoples living in our Russian colonies are counted as belonging to Russia; but those among them not yet enlightened by holy baptism do not yet know that they are under the powerful protection of Russia, and that the peace they enjoy is the fruit of this protection. When the occasion arises, this may be pointed out to those inclined toward Christianity as an additional inducement.

32) Upon arriving at your appointed place, do not say at all that you have been sent by the government; do not present yourself as any sort of official, but as a simple traveler desiring true well-being for those near him, and come solely in order to show the means to attain that well-being.

33) From your first entry into office, by your conduct and the virtues befitting your rank and calling, strive to earn a good opinion of yourself and respect—both from the native peoples and from the Europeans living there. A good reputation compels respect; and when you are respected, then your word carries weight and your influence is great.

34) By no means show open contempt for their manner of life, customs, and so forth, however deserving of it they may seem; for nothing can so offend and irritate savages as open contempt for them and mockery of them and everything that is theirs.

35) From your first meeting with the native peoples, strive to gain their confidence and goodwill—not by gifts or flattery, but by prudence, readiness for every help, good and sensible counsel, and sincerity. Otherwise, who will open his heart to you, or trust you in anything?

36) In giving instruction and in conversations with the native peoples generally, be brief, gentle, simple, and by no means adopt a lofty, teacherly manner—by which one can greatly harm the success of one’s work.

37) When one of the native peoples speaks to you, listen attentively, patiently, and with forbearance; and answer their questions intelligibly, with special warmth and gentleness—for a question from a native person concerning spiritual matters is a great thing for the preacher, and questions are a special sign of trust and attention.

38) Those unwilling to receive holy baptism, even after several persuasions, do not offend in any way, and especially do not compel them to receive baptism. And although justice requires that in dealing with savages one be more warm and attentive to those who have already accepted Christianity than to those who have not, yet in no case does the preacher of the Gospel have the right to treat anyone with cruelty or violence.

39) Among some of the local savages one may encounter polygamy, but always only among the rich and powerful; and therefore, in inclining them to monogamy, act with all prudence, and by no means act with authority here, lest you thereby harden and irritate them.

40) From those newly converting and the newly converted, under no pretext whatsoever demand any contributions or offerings for the church or for any other pious purposes; but do not reject them either, and receive with goodwill any willing and sincere offerings.

41) Without extreme necessity, do not take or demand from the newly converted guides or workers for your journey—especially on a compulsory basis—lest thereby you give them cause to think that by accepting Christianity they at the same time become slaves or hired laborers of the missionaries.

42) Under no pretext whatsoever accept from the newly enlightened or other native peoples any gifts or offerings, and do not enter into any trade relations with them, either personally or through intermediaries, under pain of the most severe judgment—even for the purpose of giving them to the church or to the poor.

43) Undertake journeys at a convenient time—that is, when the local inhabitants are more free from the hunting of wild animals and fishing—so that an ill-timed journey does not deprive the native peoples of their advantages. But if it should prove that visiting a certain place requires more time and difficulty at a convenient season, it is better to take the more difficult journey at the inconvenient time.

44) Supplies for journeys and for the discharge of your duties—such as a translator, a kayak, guides, and traveling provisions for them—are to be requested from the nearest local authorities. But such requests must be limited to strict necessity, lest excess in this matter give occasion for complaint or prejudice the reputation of the ministry.

45) In order to be more effectively and fully useful to your parishioners, you must in a short time learn their language—at first, at least, to the degree of being able to understand it. The deacon with you is also under a strict obligation to learn the language of those native peoples among whom he will reside, and in a very short time—enough to understand them and to say the most necessary things.

46) Strive to learn thoroughly: the faith, rites, customs, inclinations, character, and entire way of life of your parishioners—especially in order the more surely and conveniently to act upon them.

Note: To do justice to their good customs is no small matter for your success.

47) During your visits and stays in various places, when time permits, give the savages advice and instruction concerning the improvement of their way of life and manner of living—but without any compulsion or offense, sincerely and in a friendly manner, and let all such counsel and instruction be given as if proceeding from genuine concern for their welfare.

48) Do not enter into the resolution of worldly matters, and do not weaken in the eyes of the native peoples any authority, whether set by the government or their own, either by open or by secret suggestions—just as Jesus Christ Himself, living on earth, in no way undermined any administration, and when asked to adjudicate between brothers over an inheritance, said: “Who made me a judge or divider over you?”

49) Judging by the meek character of many of the savages, it seems that with peaceable conduct befitting a preacher of the Gospel, no attack or attempt upon life can be expected from them; but if, against all expectation, any danger should arise, then in that case, being not only a preacher of the Gospel but also a servant of the Sovereign and the State, defend yourself by all lawful means.

50) During your stay in America, should any matter concerning state secrets come to your knowledge, on no account write of it in private letters to anyone, but proceed in exact accordance with the ukaz of His Imperial Majesty Peter I, given by him in 1720.

Order of Church Matters

51) At all colonial churches there must be a church warden (starosta), chosen by the parishioners or appointed by the colonial authorities with the agreement of the priests.

At missions, however, where in the early period there will be only field churches, the having of a church warden is left to the discretion of the missionary.

52) At each church and mission, income-and-expenditure books are to be kept for recording church property, and maintained in proper order. The keeping of the books and the compiling of returns is the duty of the church warden under the close supervision of the clergy. But where there is no warden, this duty falls on the clergy themselves.

53) Where there is no church warden, the property of the church is the full responsibility of the clergy, who in the event of loss or negligence are subject to every form of accountability.

54) Without the knowledge and permission of the dean, no one may make significant expenditures of church capital.

55) At every church and mission there must be kept:

a) Register books, to be maintained with all diligence according to the form established by the diocesan authorities.

b) Confession registers of all Christians belonging to that parish. At missions, the registers are to indicate (if only approximately) how many are still unenlightened and how many are ready to receive baptism.

c) A search book for the contracting of marriages, in which marriages of Europeans with natives and of Creoles (that is, children born of a European and a native woman) are to be entered in the ordinary form. Marriages of native peoples, for the time being, may be entered only in the register books.

56) They are also to keep a special memorandum book for entering all reports and communications—which may be needed for various references and as evidence.

57) In order that the authorities may be able to see the progress and labors of each priest and missionary, and thereby to assess them, each of them is obliged to keep a journal, in which are recorded all actions pertaining to their duties, as well as whatever seems worthy of note concerning the life, customs, and other circumstances of the native peoples.

58) In those parishes where chapels are located in places distant from the church, the administration of them in all respects must be under the supervision of the priest of that parish, and their property is to be accounted under the church as a separate item.

Relations With the Local Authorities

59) The dean of the American churches is the immediate superior over all the churches and missions; and therefore: a) for all that exceeds the authority of the priest and missionary, and for every difficulty or doubt, resolutions, instructions, and counsel must be requested from the dean; b) all complaints, whether from the clergy or from the laity, must be addressed to the dean.

60) The dean, being the immediate superior of the colonial clergy, is at the same time the guardian of the churches and missions in all respects; and therefore all returns, accounts, requisitions for churches, and so forth must be submitted to the dean over a common cover.

61) Since the maintenance of churches will for the most part depend on the resources of the American Company, the satisfaction of requisitions can only be through it; and therefore, upon the compilation of returns, accounts, and requisitions to be transmitted by the dean to the Company, the latter is obliged to fulfill them promptly—to the extent of its means.

62) All communications with the colonial authorities, should any arise, are to be made only through the dean; whereas communications with the local authorities—such as requests for assistance for journeys, or the like—each priest may make on his own behalf, while church matters are to be dealt with through the dean.

No mention is made here of the fact that you must beyond all this fulfill all instructions as they are given—since it goes without saying that all general and particular regulations concerning churches, and those not incompatible with local institutions and the spirit of the preaching of the faith, must be fulfilled in all their force and exactness.

Remember that you are in a place where you may more and more quickly than many receive rewards—both heavenly and future, and earthly and present. The heavenly rewards are in the hands of the Great Rewarder, who will always see your deeds, and your intentions, and the spirit in which you act. As for earthly rewards, attention will be given to the following: your diligence, your manner of fulfilling your ministry, the number of those converted and baptized by you, and the degree of their establishment in the Christian life and in the faith.

Colophon

Instructions to the Priest Appointed to the Conversion of Non-Christians
by Saint Innocent of Alaska.

This edition was produced by
Royal Archives.

The cover features
Sailing Ship on the High Seas by Moonlight (1840s)
by Ivan Aivazovsky (Russian, 1817–1900), Wikimedia Commons, which is in the public domain.

The text is set in Palatino and Georgia.

The first edition of this ebook was released on
August 16, 2026.

Table of Contents

- Title Page
- Copyright
- Introduction
- Preamble
- Preparation for Faith-Preaching
- The Order of Faith-Preaching

- Part Two. Special Instructions Concerning Teaching, Divine Service, and Conduct With the Native Peoples

- Order of Church Matters
- Relations With the Local Authorities
- Colophon