Moses of Ufa

Venerable Moses of Ufa (in the world Nikolai Ivanovich Chigvintsev, 1913-1982) was an archimandrite and spiritual father of the Ufa diocese, a strict ascetic gifted with foresight and with healing. After his death his grave remained a place of prayer and consolation, and in 2001 he was numbered among the saints. He is commemorated on 3 June, the day of his repose (21 May by the old calendar).

Youth

He was born on 27 July 1913 in the village of Bobrovka in the Chelyabinsk region, to a peasant family. He finished the village school in 1924 and until 1929 worked in farming with his father. At fifteen he left home secretly, reached Ufa and took a job at the locomotive repair works of Ufa station, as stoker and assistant driver. In his free time he hurried to the church of Saint Sergius. He lived now in a dugout near the city cemetery, now in a shed, a bathhouse or a coach house. Until 1936 he worked on the railway, from 1936 to 1937 he did military service, and from 1937 to 1945 he was a labourer.

Even before he served at the altar, Nikolai drew attention. He walked the streets of Ufa in bast shoes and a long peasant coat tied with a sash, wearing a felt cap, with a wooden cross and small icons on his chest. Boys ran after him, called him a fool for Christ, tugged at his coat and sometimes threw sticks and stones at him. He bore everything calmly, without resentment. Once he said that it had been a happy day, since he had been abused a great deal but not beaten.

Monk and father

The rector of the church of Saint Sergius had long noticed this strange man of prayer, and in 1945 it was proposed that he be tonsured a monk. A few months later Hieromonk Moses began to serve in the cathedral of Saint Sergius. On 19 August 1945 he was ordained hierodeacon by Archbishop John of Ufa and Bashkiria, and on 27 September he was appointed psalm-⁠reader at the same cathedral. In time he received the sash (1946), a pectoral cross from Patriarch Alexy at Pascha 1951, and the rank of archimandrite.

He had no dwelling of his own. For a long time he lived in a small bathhouse beside the Saint Sergius cemetery, belonging to the church warden Pavel Timofeevich Basharin, where he slept half sitting up. When they wished to house him in the bishop's residence, he refused, saying it was not fitting for him, but he agreed to stay in a cellar. He was very thin, eating two potatoes a day, a piece of bread and an onion.

He had the gift of foresight and of healing through prayer. People came for healing from Beloretsk, Sterlitamak, Meleuz, Sverdlovsk, Chelyabinsk, Kiev and the North. He was received with honour in the Kiev Caves, the Pskov Caves and the Holy Trinity Saint Sergius Lavras, where he was regarded as an elder with foresight and a pillar of Orthodoxy in Ufa. He was the spiritual father of the diocese and, in his last years, rector of the cathedral. He reposed on 3 June 1982, and a considerable part of the people of Ufa accompanied him at the funeral. He was buried at the Dyoma cemetery in Ufa.

Glorification

On 29 May 2001 the Synodal Commission for Canonization recognized him as a saint. In 2002 his relics were moved from the cemetery to the cathedral of Saint Sergius, and today they rest in the Cathedral of the Nativity of the Mother of God in Ufa. His grave at the cemetery is visited daily by those seeking healing and comfort. The faithful pray to Venerable Moses for humility and gentleness, for patience under abuse and persecution, and for the protection of children and relatives who have gone away to study or travel.