Joseph the Confessor

Saint Joseph the Confessor, whose family name was Joseph Stoica, was an Orthodox bishop of Maramureș, at a time when Transylvania was under a rule that favoured the Reformed Church. The Romanian Orthodox Church canonized him in 1992 and his commemoration is on 24 April.

He was appointed to the see in the year 1690 by Prince Michael Apafi I, leader of the anti-⁠Habsburg party in the Principality of Transylvania. He came from the Stoica family of Crișănești, which also produced the vice-⁠count Ladislau Stoica, who stopped the Tatar incursion of 1717, and Sigismund Stoica, Roman Catholic bishop of Transylvania.

He served his diocese in Maramureș under Bishop John de Camillis, a native of the island of Chios, who had accepted union with the Church of Rome. In 1701 Bishop Joseph was summoned to Vienna to sign the union with Rome as well. He refused to do so, despite political pressure, and for this he is called the Confessor.

In 1992 Patriarch Teoctist decided on his canonization by the Romanian Orthodox Church and ordained that he be commemorated on 24 April.