Innocent (Moruev), Abbot of Valaam Monastery, passed away on this day in 1828. If you asked me to name the most characteristic areas of Russia, I would answer: the Volga and the Russian North. This, and the fact that I have not yet written about a churchman from the Synodal period of Russian Church history (1721–1917), is why I chose Abbot Innocent as the subject of today’s report. He was born in 1741 into the family of a wealthy peasant in the Russian region of Karelia (Olonets Province). At the age of just 12, the future abbot joined Valaam Monastery. In 1772, he became a monk and was sent to St. Alexander Nevsky Lavra in the Imperial Capital (St. Petersburg). The monastery reform implemented by Catherine II (the Great) in 1764 classified all Russian monasteries into three categories according to the state funds allocated to them annually. The funds were given to the church in exchange for confiscated land. I cannot help noticing the similarity between this reform and Khruschev’s economic oppression of the church about which I wrote yesterday. In this situation, when some of the monasteries, which were not included in the categories – like Optina Hermitage – had to close. There nonetheless remained centers of spiritual life. One such foundation was Sarov Monastery in Сentral Russia. The famous builder of Valaam Monstery, Abbot Nazarii, received his monastic formation there. When he arrived in Valaam in 1782, Metropolitan Gabriel (Petrov) of St. Petersburg ordained Fr. Innocent priestmonk and sent him back to Valaam to assist Fr. Nazarii. Metropolitan Gabriel was an outstanding hierarch. During his tenure, the Slavonic translation of the anthology termed Dobrotoliubie (Philokalia) was published. The manuscripts were “smuggled” across the Russo-Ottoman border from Neamţ Monastery in Wallachia. In 1793, Metropolitan Gabriel commissioned a group of Valaam monks to go on a mission to Alaska, which was an “extension” of Siberia at that time. After Abbot Nazarii resigned, Fr. Innocent succeeded him in 1801. He continued the hard work of his predecessor, building metochia (podvorʹia) of the monastery in Serdobol and St. Petersburg, rebuilding the monastery itself. All this happened during the reign of Alexander I. He was profoundly affected by the murder of his father, Emperor Paul. The first book of Holy Scripture, which Emperor Alexander read at the age of 18 or 19, was the French translation of the Book of Revelation. He was what one might call today a “spiritual tourist,” attending a Quakers’ silent prayer meeting in London and visiting the Russian recluse Fr. Antipas on Valaam. During his visit there in 1819, Alexander I raised the monastery to the First Class according to income and ordered that the day of the translation of Sts. Sergius and Herman of Valaam’s relics be celebrated throughout the Russian Church. He wanted to elevate the monastery’s abbot to the rank of archimandrite, but Abbot Innocent humbly requested to keep them in the rank of hegumenos. In 1823, the ascetic Abbot Innocent resigned to lead the life of a simple monk. He passed away in 1828. I first learned about him, working on this report, from St. Herman’s Calendar, published by the St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood in Platina, CA. |
