Serapion of Novgorod

Saint Serapion was archbishop of Novgorod the Great and Pskov from 1506 to 1509 and fell asleep in the Lord on 16 March 1516. The Russian Church honours him as a hierarch. He is known as a courageous shepherd who paid with exile for his witness.

Beginnings

He was born in the village of Pekhra, near Moscow, in the family of the priest of the village church of the Protection of the Mother of God. He received the monastic habit at the Dormition Monastery of Dubensk in the region of Vladimir, where he also became abbot. He was then hegumen of the Dormition Monastery at Stromyn. Both monasteries were closed in the eighteenth century. From 1493 he was hegumen of the Monastery of the Holy Trinity, today the Trinity-⁠Sergius Lavra. In 1503 he spoke out against the secularization plans of Ivan III.

Archbishop of Novgorod

With the consent of Grand Prince Vasily III of Moscow he was consecrated archbishop of Novgorod on 15 January 1506, but shepherded the see for little more than three years. His diocese was also that of Joseph of Volokolamsk, who appealed directly to the metropolitan of Moscow, which Serapion thought uncanonical. In his letter of complaint he wrote that Joseph had abandoned heaven, that is, his bishop, and come down to earth. The grand prince took these words as a personal insult.

In July 1509 a council ruled against Serapion. He was found guilty, removed from the see and confined in the Andronikov Monastery in Moscow. In 1511 he was freed and spent the rest of his life in the Trinity Monastery. Some sources say he made peace with Joseph and the others, though other signs show he remained bitter at his removal.

Repose and relics

He fell asleep in the Lord on 16 March 1516, reconciled with all and having received the schema. His relics were found in the same year, on 7 April, and rest under the floor in the southern porch of the Trinity Cathedral of the Lavra, in the chamber called Serapion's, the former cell of Saint Sergius of Radonezh. After his death the see of Novgorod stood vacant for many years.

The saint is commemorated on 16 March.