Fr. Ilya Kunashov reposed on June 19, 2013, leaving behind his wife, Matushka Marina, and their six children.
They all live together in a small apartment in the small Moscow suburb of Noginsk where their beloved husband and papa spent his entire life.
The loss of their father was hardest on the eldest child, Ivan, who didn’t speak to anyone for quite some time after the funeral. He simply withdrew and closed in on himself for a long time. He quit the technical institute where he was studying and started working.
The children are Matushka’s primary joy and comfort. She works at a publishing house, where she receives a small wage, and the rest of the time she is with the children, driving them here and there. They’re a very close-knit family, bearing all their hardships together.
Most of the children have health problems that are in dire need of attention. Matushka also has problems with her legs, and she needs surgery on her veins, but this mother of several children always puts it off.
They have an old car that they bought while Father was still alive. It’s not a luxury, but a necessity. They can’t get anywhere without a car, especially considering the problems with Matushka’s legs.
The house that the deanery helped to finish building after Father’s death has no gas heating, so for now, they only use it in the summer, though it is especially dear to them, because it was Fr. Ilya who began to build it for them.
Of course, Matushka needs help raising all the children, to give them a chance to get a good education and follow their dreams and aspirations. The two older sons help their mother. The second is a professional chef, just like his father was in his youth. One daughter, Olga, is in college, and the rest are still in school.
Fr. Ilya was born to a working-class family in Noginsk on May 15, 1973. His father was a factory worker. The whole family came to faith later in life, and Ilya’s father became a priest in 1996.
After school, Ilya studied the culinary arts. He served in the military, which he never had any thought of trying to avoid, and the army life greatly tempered his character. Immediately after his service, he left for Pskov Caves Monastery, where he had the obedience of cooking in the trapeza.
At that time, the future pastor was uncertain if he should get married or become a monk. Then an incident occurred at the monastery: Ilya broke his leg. Elder John (Krestiankin) told him it was a sign and blessed him to go home.
Thus, the Lord Himself helped him make this momentous decision, with the help of the Elder. Ilya returned home and started serving in the altar.
In 1996, he married Marina Grishina. At first, they lived with Matushka’s parents in a village, where their first two sons were born. In 1999, they moved to Noginsk, where Ilya served as an altar boy, reader, and prosphora baker at the Theophany Cathedral.
On December 17, 2000, Ilya was ordained to the diaconate in the Holy Dormition Church at Novodevichy Monastery. In those years, he was very active in anti-abortion work. He would go to local maternity hospitals to hold talks with women who wanted to have an abortion. He literally saved many unborn children, and many women later thanked him for dissuading them from this fateful step and helping them find the happiness of motherhood.
As Matushka recalls, Fr. Ilya loved his first profession as a cook, and in all the trips and gatherings he organized, he always did the cooking. He also loved to cook for his family, though they had years in which they knew true hunger. Quite often, they didn’t have a single penny to buy bread and milk, but in the meantime, the family continued to grow and multiply.
Dcn. Ilya bore all these hardships with patience and humility. His wage was scanty, but he humbly bore his obedience as a deacon, never clamoring for the priesthood. He waited for a blessing for this high ministry from the Lord Himself.
He really loved the services and always arrived well before they started, often in the dark of winter, to carefully prepare for the service and pray in silence.
He served as a deacon for nearly 11 years.
On January 30, 2011, he was honored to be ordained to the priesthood, which made things a little easier for the family financially speaking, though Father never thought about material things. He was always so busy with the services that the family almost never saw him, though they did carve out rare moments to go somewhere, to have a little vacation with all the children.
Life gradually began to get better and became more stable, but an insidious disease was imperceptibly undermining Fr. Ilya’s health. The doctors recommended various diets for him, but he never followed them.
On June 3, 2013, Father took the children out to mow the grass, when he started feeling sick. At the hospital, he was misdiagnosed with hepatitis, and when they failed to confirm this diagnosis, he immediately left for church.
On the feast of the Ascension, Fr. Ilya served his final Liturgy and confessed. His health continued to deteriorate rapidly. He was soon scheduled for an operation, but on the day set for the procedure, he departed to the Lord. After his death, they found out that he had had a malignant tumor of the liver.
In the memory of those who knew him, Fr. Ilya remains a simple, gentle, sympathetic, and truly pious man—a kind pastor whose life was defined by his ministry to God and man.
