Gerasim Popov

Gerasim Popov was a hieroschemamonk of the Russian kellia on Mount Athos, venerated by the faithful without synodal canonization. He was born on 24 June 1859 into a peasant family in the village of Rozhkovets, Orel province, and the family later moved to the Stavropol province. He was educated at home and from childhood inclined to the monastic life. At twenty-⁠three he set out for the Holy Mountain, arriving on 8 November 1882.

At first he lived at the kellion of St John the Forerunner under Elder Nikanor (Kashin). He was tonsured into the mantle on 10 December 1882 with the name Gerasim and ordained hieromonk on 8 November 1886. He gave all his property to improve the kellion, and after the elder's death he became its head. The brotherhood grew to eighty monks. He renewed the church, consecrated on 8 May 1902, and built a four-⁠storey stone building, consecrated in 1904, largely given over to a hospital. Father Phlegont (Lebedev) described him as well read, a strict ascetic and hospitable.

Because of the unrest in the East, he looked in Russia for a quieter place for the brotherhood. With the help of General Khvoshchinsky he received land at the foot of Mount Beshtau, near Pyatigorsk, on condition that he open a school for poor children. The monastery was attacked in 1905 and a building burned, but he rebuilt it, and the new buildings were consecrated on the feast of the Dormition in 1906. When the First World War began, links with Russia were cut and he devoted himself to the brotherhood of the kellion of St John the Theologian.

He reposed on 13 October 1933, aged seventy-⁠four, in the kellion he had built, surrounded by his spiritual children.