Born in 1916, Olinka Arrsamquq Michael, known as “Matushka Olga,” was known in life as a humble and gentle priest’s wife who quietly cared for people in her community. After her death, she was venerated first by people in the deeply Orthodox Yukon-Kuskokwim region and then beyond, and became known as a healer to abused women.
In early November, the Orthodox Church’s national leadership voted to make Matushka Olga a saint, a process known as “glorification.” For some of her many descendants in Alaska, Matushka Olga is both a revered figure in the Orthodox faith but also a mother and grandmother.Seeing her become a saint has been a long time coming, said Matushka Helen Larson, Olga’s youngest living daughter. Larson lives inNapaskiak, where she is a pre-kindergarten teacher and married to the Orthodox priest, Father Alexander Larson.
Olga was also a traditional midwife in a time before women received hospital care for childbirth outside the village. Larson remembers sleeping by her mother’s side and awakening to her mother being called to attend to a laboring woman. Marie Sakar keeps an icon of Matushka Olga in her home. Originally from Chuathbaluk, she's moved all over the state as a teacher and takes the icon with her wherever she goes. She gave two of her daughters Matushka Olga's Yupik name -- Arrsamquq.
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