Menas Diaconescu of Turnu

Mina Diaconescu, born in 1856 at Berislăvești, in Vâlcea, was a monk and cantor at Turnu Monastery, known for his love of birds. He fell asleep in 1936, in the week of Palm Sunday. He is named in the Romanian Paterikon and venerated by the faithful, without synodal canonization.

In youth he had been married and had children. After settling them in their homes, he became a monk at Turnu. He learned the typikon and church chant well and became a known cantor. For twenty-⁠five years he adorned the services with his chants and his love, never absent day or night from the choir and fulfilling the monastic duties in holiness. In his free time he did obedience at the monastery mill, in silence and prayer.

He was accustomed to feeding the birds of the air: daily he put out on the porch of his cell scraps of bread and grain from the mill, and birds from the forest gathered around him, some eating from his hand. He was much loved by people and birds for his goodness.

In 1936, at the feast of Palm Sunday, he entered the refectory and, kneeling before the abbot, said with tears that he asked forgiveness, for now he was going, God was calling him. The abbot told him he would live to chant the axion of the Resurrection, but he answered that he could not stay and asked not to be forgotten at the Liturgy. After a day he fell asleep in peace with prayer on his lips. The Paterikon adds that for several weeks the birds from the forest gathered on the porch of his cell and chirped sadly, then flew in a flock to his grave, chirped again and rested on the arms of the cross before returning to the forest.