Holy Assumption Orthodox Church

Alaska Oldest Russian Orthodox Church

Holy Assumption Orthodox Church in Kenai, Alaska is the oldest surviving Russian Orthodox church building in Alaska, built between 1894 and 1896, and a National Historic Landmark. The parish traces its roots to 1844, when Igumen Nikolai Militov established the first permanent Orthodox community on the Kenai Peninsula. Today the church remains an active parish of the Diocese of Sitka and Alaska, holding regular services in Church Slavonic and English on the Julian calendar.

Orthodox history on the Kenai Peninsula began as early as 1795, when the missionary Father Juvenaly spent a winter here. Half a century later, Igumen Nikolai not only founded the parish but also saved the local population from a smallpox epidemic by sending to St. Petersburg for vaccine. Next to the church stands St. Nicholas Chapel, built in 1906, marking the exact site of the first Russian chapel here and serving as the burial place of Igumen Nikolai and his assistant Makary Ivanov. The journals of a later parish priest are now held in the Library of Congress as an important historical record of Alaska Native life at the time.

The parish is very much alive today: in March 2026, it received an archpastoral visit from Archbishop Alexei, and a small gift shop next to the church shares more of its history with visitors. If you find yourself in Kenai, this church on the bluff above the river is one of the few places where nearly two centuries of the history of Russian Alaska can be seen firsthand.