Gregory of Pelshma

Saint Gregory of Pelshma (second half of the fourteenth century to after 1441) was an ascetic from Galich, founder of the Pelshma monastery near Vologda. He was canonized at the Council of Macarius in 1549, among the venerable saints. He is commemorated (Old Style) on 23 January, in the Synaxis of the Saints of Kostroma, on 30 September and in the third week after Pentecost, in the Synaxis of the Saints of Vologda.

Monastic youth

He came from the family of the Galich boyars Lopotov, rich and honoured parents. According to the Life, when he was fifteen his parents wanted to marry him off, but they died before carrying out their plan; Gregory buried his parents, left his inheritance and received monastic tonsure at the Nativity of the Mother of God monastery near Lake Galich. The Menaion redaction says that he left for the monastery while his parents were still alive and without connection to a marriage. Later he was ordained hieromonk and became abbot of the monastery, eleven versts north-⁠east of Galich. Oppressed by fame, he left the monastery and went to Rostov, to the holy relics. He stayed there at the Abraham monastery, and later was archimandrite of the Saviour monastery at Peski. For two years he led the monastery, then left Rostov secretly at night, went to Saint Dionysius of Glushitsa and became his disciple.

The hermit

After a time he asked Dionysius's blessing to leave the desert for complete solitude and came to the bank of the river Pelshma, where he made himself a cell. Soon the priest Alexei joined him, whom he tonsured a monk with the name Alexander and who became the second abbot of the monastery built there, with the blessing of Bishop Ephraim of Rostov. In 1426 he built the church of the Synaxis of the Mother of God. His monastery became known, and he enjoyed the respect of all.

Repose

The sources do not agree on the year of his death: Philaret (Gumilevsky), N. P. Barsukov and E. E. Golubinsky give 1441, Leonid (Kavelin), I. Martynov and G. V. Markelov give 1442, and according to other reports, during the siege of Vologda by Prince Dimitri Shemyaka, in the winter of 1449 to 1450, Gregory took the part of the townspeople, and the prince ordered him thrown from a "platform". By the register of the Pelshma monastery of 1667 there was in it a church in Gregory's name, with his relics. In 1683 the church burned and a chapel was raised over the grave. In 1706 a wooden church in his name was built, in which the relics remained under a stone. In 1810 a shrine was made, in which his iron chains were placed. In 1833 the wooden building was replaced by a stone one. In 1926 the Pelshma monastery was closed, and the church with the relics is today in ruins; the relics have not been found and rest under a stone.