Macarius the Roman

Venerable Macarius the Roman was born at the end of the fifteenth century in Rome, into a wealthy family. His parents raised him in piety and gave him an excellent education. He might have hoped for a brilliant career in public service, but he did not desire honours or earthly glory; he thought only of saving his soul. He lived at a time when the Christian West was shaken by the Protestant Reformation and, while others gave themselves to luxury and pleasures, he studied Holy Scripture and the writings of the Holy Fathers. Grieved at the sin and vanity of the world, he asked God with tears to show him the path of salvation and came to understand that he would find a safe harbour in the Orthodox Church.

He left Rome secretly, bound for Russia, without money and wearing an old garment. After many sufferings he reached Novgorod, where he rejoiced to see so many churches and monasteries, among them one founded three centuries earlier by his fellow countryman Saint Anthony the Roman. He came to the river Svir, to the Holy Trinity monastery of Saint Alexander of Svir, who received him into the Orthodox Church and tonsured him a monk. Macarius, however, longed for solitude; he moved to an island on the river Lezna, forty-⁠five miles from Novgorod, where he struggled in unceasing prayer. The winters were hard, the summers hot and humid, and mosquitoes tormented him; he lived on berries, roots and herbs, and sometimes bears came to him for food and let him pet them.

Such a lamp could not remain hidden. One rainy night some men who seemed to be hunters entered his cell, astonished by the divine light on his face, and asked his blessing. The saint moved still farther into the wilderness, to a high place on the left bank of the Lezna, but signs such as a pillar of fire and a fragrant cloud of smoke gave him away. Some visitors begged to live near him and be guided by him; he did not refuse, and their cells were the beginning of the monastery. In 1540 they built a wooden church of the Dormition of the Mother of God. Macarius was ordained a priest by Bishop Macarius of Novgorod, later Metropolitan of All Russia, and was made abbot. He had the gifts of clairvoyance and wonderworking.

After some years he entrusted the monastery to a disciple and returned to the island where he had first lived. There he fell asleep in the Lord on 15 August 1550, and his disciples buried him on the left side of the Dormition church he had founded. The monastery was never rich or populous, but was distinguished by the high level of its spiritual life; it was burned in 1615 by the Swedes and in the eighteenth century became a dependency of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra in Saint Petersburg. Venerable Macarius is commemorated on 19 January (new style).