New Martyrs of Butovo
17 miles south of Moscow, there is a place that is known as the Butovo Shooting Range, which was an execution ground and mass burial site near the village of Butovo, used by the Soviets during Stalin's purges. Executions took place there on an industrial scale during the Great Terror. On some days they executed 500 people or more. Records show that 20,765 people were executed and buried at Butovo between August 1937 and October 1938, during the peak of Stalin's repressions, of that number, about 1,000 people were known to have been executed because of their Orthodox faith. There is now a Church dedicated to the New Martyrs on the site.[1] The Synaxis of the Martyrs of Butovo is celebrated on the 4th Saturday after Pascha.
