Theodore

Holy Blessed Theodore of Novgorod was a fool for Christ in the city of Novgorod and is counted as the first fool for Christ in Russia after Saint Procopius of Ustyug († 1303). He is commemorated on 19 January, by the old calendar.

He was the son of honoured and wealthy citizens of Novgorod. Raised in piety, he gave to the poor all the wealth left by his parents and remained until death in complete poverty, without roof or warm clothes even in winter frost. His time was one of strife and quarrels among the people of Novgorod and of fires; so that he could reprove and teach everyone, he took on foolishness for Christ's sake, which he followed until death. At the same time Saint Nicholas Kochanov († 27 July 1392) struggled in the same way in Novgorod. Since Theodore lived on the Market side and Nicholas on the Sophia side, the two, in a pretended quarrel, would not let each other cross over, as a rebuke to the townsmen's feud.

He visited the monasteries around Novgorod and the churches of the city, praying especially at night for the good of his fellow citizens. He loved above all the church of Saint George at the Market, on whose porch he spent many nights in prayer. Sensing the approach of death, he walked the streets saying "farewell, I am going far". After a few days of illness he received communion and fell asleep in peace, leaving instructions to be buried beside the church of Saint George. The people of Novgorod honoured him still more after his death: a chapel was raised over his grave with the archbishop's permission, and miracles were worked at his shrine. A seventeenth-⁠century manuscript says that his relics lie under cover in the chapel at the church of the Great Martyr George at the Market; a service of his own was composed for him.