Tikhon (Zaitsev)
Archbishop Tikhon (Zaitsev) (, secular name Alexander Viktorovich Zaitsev, ; born 13 April 1967), is the archbishop of Podolsky and the primate of the diocese of Berlin and Germany of the Russian Orthodox Church; he holds the title of "Archbishop of Berlin and Germany". Early life Alexander Zaitsev was born in Moscow in 1967. After graduating from high school, he then attended vocational school and graduated in 1985. From 1985 to 1987, he served in the Soviet Army. Religious life After completing his military services, Zaitsev entered the Moscow Seminary, which he successfully completed in 1991. In the same year he was admitted to the Moscow Theological Academy, which he graduated in 1995, defending his inaugural dissertation on the dignity of the candidate of theology in the department "The Venerable Theodore Studites - teacher of the monastic order". After completing his studies at the Academy, Tikhon continued his work as a teacher in the Moscow seminary, where he taught liturgy, homiletics and Ancient Greek. On 25 March 1993 he was consecrated a priest by Patriarch Alexy II, and was shortly after tonsured a monastic monk by the Archimandrite Benedict (Knjasev), the first Prorector of the Moscow Spiritual Academy and the