Birth and Formation in San Francisco
He was born in San Francisco on June 21, 1863 (June 9, Old Style), the son of Serbian immigrants from the Bay of Kotor region on the Adriatic coast, and was baptized John (Jovan) — a child of the very first generation of Orthodox church life on the American Pacific coast.
Formed in the Russian mission's church community in San Francisco, he was sent to Russia for theological education, studying at the academies of Saint Petersburg and Kiev. In 1887, while still a student in Saint Petersburg, he was tonsured a monk with the name Sebastian — by the common reckoning the first native-born American to receive Orthodox monastic tonsure — and was ordained a hierodeacon the same year.
First American-Born Orthodox Priest
On August 16, 1892, he was ordained a hieromonk by Bishop Nicholas (Ziorov), becoming, as he is generally counted, the first person born in the United States to be ordained to the Orthodox priesthood.
He served the mission wherever he was sent — at the church of St. Alexander Nevsky in San Francisco, at St. Mary's in Minneapolis (where he succeeded St. Alexis Toth), and at St. Michael's Cathedral in Sitka, Alaska, where he was appointed dean of the Sitka deanery in 1902, serving the mission field of the Aleut and Tlingit faithful that St. Innocent had once tended.
Apostle of the Serbs in America
Among the Serbian gold-country immigrants of Jackson, California, he organized the community whose church of St. Sava — whose construction he initiated — was consecrated in 1894 and is generally counted the first Serbian Orthodox church in America. He continued as a missionary up and down the Pacific coast, in Washington and California, and in the Midwest.
On August 15, 1905, Archbishop Tikhon — the future patriarch and confessor of Moscow, under whose omophorion the whole American mission then stood — elevated him to the rank of archimandrite, and he was appointed dean of the Serbian churches and head of the Serbian mission in America, which he led from Holy Resurrection Church in Chicago into the following decade. Sources credit him with helping to establish Serbian Orthodox communities in a number of states, and for this work he has been remembered as the 'Father of Serbian Orthodoxy in America.'
Writing the Faith in English
Sebastian was among the earliest to set down the Orthodox faith and services in English for American readers. His publications include The Lives of the Saints and The Holy Orthodox Church (both 1898) and Preaching in the Russian Church (1899) — some of the first English-language Orthodox books written in America.
A preacher in English, Serbian, and Russian, he understood that the Church in America would have to speak the language of the land, and his books and sermons anticipated by decades the English-language mission of the American Church.
Missionary Travels and Chaplaincy
The accounts of his life record that he crossed the Atlantic Ocean fifteen times and the Pacific nine times in the course of his ministry — a staggering itinerary for his era. His travels took him to Serbia and Russia, and to Japan, where he met St. Nicholas (Kasatkin), the enlightener of that land.
When war came to his ancestral homeland he went to serve it in person, laboring as a chaplain to the Serbian army in the Balkan Wars of 1912–1913 and through the First World War.
Later Years and Repose at Žiča
His last years were spent in the Serbian lands he had served. From 1936 he lived in retirement at Žiča Monastery, the ancient see then held by Bishop Nikolai (Velimirović), and there he reposed on November 30 (November 17, Old Style), 1940.
Bishop Nikolai presided at his funeral, and he was buried at Žiča — an American-born missionary at rest in the crowning church of the Serbian kings, until his homeland asked for him back.
Relics & Shrines
In 2007 his relics were exhumed from Žiča and translated across the world to St. Sava Church in Jackson, California — the parish he had founded more than a century before — where they now rest and are venerated.
The Jackson church, still standing above the old gold-country town, thus became the shrine of its own founder, and a place of pilgrimage for the Serbian Orthodox faithful of the American West.
Glorification
At its session of May 29, 2015, the Holy Assembly of Bishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church entered Archimandrite Sebastian in the calendar of saints, together with St. Mardarije of Libertyville — the first saints of the Serbian Church whose labors belonged to North America. The solemn glorification rites followed in September 2015, led by Patriarch Irinej of Serbia during his visit to the Western American Diocese.
His feast is kept on November 30, the day of his repose.
Miracles & Traditions
Historically Documented: His firsts are a matter of record — the first American-born Orthodox monk (1887) and priest (1892), founder of the first Serbian Orthodox church in America (Jackson, 1894), and author of some of the first English-language Orthodox books written in the New World. His relics were translated from Žiča to Jackson in 2007, and he was glorified by the Serbian Orthodox Church in 2015.
Traditional Accounts: The tradition of the Church remembers him for his complete nonpossessiveness — a missionary who kept nothing for himself, gave away what he received, and wore out his life in ceaseless travel for the sake of the scattered faithful. For his gathering of the Serbian communities of the New World he is honored as the 'Father of Serbian Orthodoxy in America.'
