Cyril of Bulgaria

Born in Sofia, Bulgaria, to a family of Aromanian descent, he adopted his religious name of Cyril in the St. Nedelya Church on December 30, 1923 and became Metropolitan of Plovdiv in 1938.

Cyril's historical role in the Bulgarian popular resistance to the Holocaust is recounted in the oratorio A Melancholy Beauty, composed by Georgi Andreev with libretto by Scott Cairns and Aryeh Finklestein.

The text describes "Metropolitan Kyril" in 1943 confronting the captors of Bulgarian Jews slated to be deported.

Kyril first pledged to go with the deportees in solidarity and then told the guards he will block the train with his own body.

For his work in saving Jews, Cyril, as well as Stefan I of Bulgaria, were recognized by Yad Vashem as the Righteous Among the Nations in 2001.