Conon of Valaam

Holy Venerable Martyr Conon of Valaam was one of the thirty-⁠four monks of the Valaam monastery put to death for the Orthodox faith on 20 February 1578. In their synodikon he is written "the monk Conon".

The Valaam monastery, lying near the border between the lands of Novgorod and Sweden, had been plundered several times by the Swedes. Under King Gustav Vasa (1523-1560) the Reformation had been carried out in Sweden, and in the time of his son John III a band of soldiers, recent Lutherans, still full of the zeal of their young faith, in the words of Saint Ignatius Brianchaninov, pursued the Orthodox Karelians, crossed over the ice to the island and attacked the monastery. Eighteen elders and sixteen novices were put to death as martyrs for their steadfastness in Orthodoxy.

Their names, marked "beaten by the Germans at Valaam, elders and servants", came into a synodikon later kept at the Vasilievsky monastery: the priest-⁠monk Titus, the schemamonk Tikhon, the monks Gelasius, Sergius, Barlaam, Sabbas, Conon, Silvester, Cyprian, Pimen, John, Samon, Jonah, David, Cornelius, Niphon, Athanasius and Serapion, and many novices. On Valaam there is no stone that does not bear the mark of the blood of ascetics. In the nineteenth century a monk near the hermitage of Abbot Nazarius saw in a vision unknown monks walking in two rows out of a sunlit grove and chanting funeral prayers; only when they drew near did he see that all were sprinkled with blood and covered with wounds, and that the grass was not crushed beneath their steps.

Every year at Valaam, on 20 February (4 March in the new style), the Liturgy was served for their repose, with a common memorial service. At the Jubilee Council of Bishops in August 2000 the martyrs were numbered among the saints of the Russian Orthodox Church. Saint Conon is commemorated on 5 March, in the new style, and by movable observance also on 3 June, with the saints of Karelia, and on 22 August, with the saints of Valaam.