Saint Herman of Alaska

Saint Herman, born in 1751 near Moscow to a peasant family, became a great ascetic and servant of God, joining the first Orthodox Christian mission to North America. In his youth, he learned from a wise elder in his cell and was miraculously healed of a deadly illness, leaving doctors in awe. After military service, he was tonsured at Valaam monastery and 11 years later was chosen to join a mission to the Russian colony in Alaska. After nine months of dangerous seafaring, Herman and nine other monks arrived at Kodiak and brought thousands of natives to Christ and built a school, a church and a monastery. Defending the natives from vicious exploitation, the monks came under persecution. Herman relocated to the wilderness of Spruce Island where he spent 40 years raising Aleut orphans. He ate very little, wore a heavy iron cross and chains under his clothes, and used a wooden board and two bricks as his blanket and pillow. Cherished by all who knew him, Saint Herman joined Christ in 1836.