Ioanichie Moroi

Ioanichie Moroi, born in 1859 at Zărnești, was a protosyncellus and, between 1909 and 1944, abbot of Sihăstria Skete, whose monastic life he reorganized entirely. He died in the autumn of 1944. He is venerated by the faithful, without synodal canonization; the sources available to us give no sure day of commemoration.

He first married and had two children. Wishing to follow Christ, he entered monastic life together with his wife and children. He was a disciple of the pilgrim Gheorghe Lazăr, who asked him to spend a year at Ialomicioara Cave Skete, reading a Psalter every day. The Paterikon tells that at that time he was tempted by a stranger who persuaded him to return home, because his wife was living with others; the old pilgrim then told him to remain in the family for a time. In 1890 he went to the Lord's Tomb and, in the cave of Saint Xenophon, a hermit told him not to let himself be led by any man, but by Scripture and the Fathers, and foretold that he would be a monk on the Holy Mountain, then priest and founder of brotherhoods, and at the end of life would have great temptations, but would be crowned. The Paterikon says the prediction was fulfilled.

Between 1890 and 1900 he struggled at a Romanian skete on Athos, then nine years at Neamț. In 1909 he was named abbot at Sihăstria, which was in ruin, and remained thirty-⁠five years. From the first day he introduced the daily Liturgy and the seven praises after the order of Neamț. The service did not begin until all the brothers were gathered. For twenty years he served the Liturgy daily, being the only priest and confessor of the skete. His disciples, among them Cleopa Ilie and Ioil Gheorghiu, said that throughout his rule he endured temptations, want, illness and threats. In Great Lent he took no food except on Saturday and Sunday. The rule was: the whole community at Matins and Liturgy, general confession on Friday. He gathered more than forty disciples and made of the deserted skete one of the choicest hermitages. He died in the autumn of 1944.