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→Life: grammatical correction
The future hierarch was born Vassily Mikhailovich Skurla on [[January 1]], 1928, in the village of Lodomirovo, Czechoslavakia, to Mikhail Ivanovich and Elena Mikhaolovna Skurla. His family was devotedly Orthodox Christian in an area of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire that was strongly influenced by [[Roman Catholic]]s.
When he was five, Vassily began serving at the [[altar]] of the [[Church]] of St. Job at the Pochaev [[Monastery]] in Ladomirova, which was the [[parish]] church for the local Orthodox population. At the age of eight, young Vassily approached the [[abbot]] of the monastery, [[Archimandrite]] Seraphim, to accept him as a [[novice]]. In 1939, at the age of eleven, his father gave him permission to join the monastery, and he began to fully participate in the monastery life while he continued his required secondary education. He remained with in the monastery throughout World War II, until the approach of the Soviet Army in 1944.
As the army approached, the brotherhood evacuated the monastery, first to Bratislava, and then on to Germany and Switzerland. While in Geneva, Switzerland, at the age of sixteen, Vassily became a novice. In 1946, after the war, the brotherhood, including Vassily, emigrated to the United States and joined [[Holy Trinity Monastery (Jordanville, New York)|Holy Trinity Monastery]] in Jordanville, New York.
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