Theodore of Komogovina

Holy Martyr Theodore of Komogovina (Theodore Sladić) was a Serbian monk of the eighteenth century, who lived in the monasteries of Komogovina and Moštanica and was burned alive by the Turks for not renouncing his faith. He is commemorated on Theodore's Saturday, the first Saturday of Great Lent. He was numbered among the saints by the Holy Assembly of Bishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church on 20 May 1966. The sources do not agree on the time: the English-⁠language source places his death in 1788, but the Serbian source says that he died long before 1693.

He was born in the village of Kukuruzari, under Mount Kozara (today in Croatia), into a humble Serb family named Sladić. As a young man he accompanied a monk of the Komogovina monastery, near his birthplace, to Moštanica monastery, near Kozarska Dubica (today in Bosnia and Herzegovina). He led an austere life both at Komogovina and at Moštanica, where he lived in fasting and prayer.

When the Turks burned Moštanica, they killed many monks and many Serbs from the surrounding villages. According to tradition, the Turks seized Theodore together with 150 other Serbs of the Krajina and put them to death as martyrs. The ascetic Theodore was ordered to renounce his belief in Jesus Christ, but refused. The Turks burned him alive near Moštanica monastery. His body burned, but his right hand is said to have been spared both from the fire and from corruption, which was understood as the first sign of the martyr's holiness.

According to the Serbian source, the hand was brought in 1693 by the monk Svilokos from the destroyed Moštanica monastery to the newly founded Komogovina monastery in Banija. It was then kept at Komogovina, where it was at the beginning of the Second World War. During the war it was moved many times and, at its end, was at the church of Saint Nicholas in Karlovac, where it remained until 1955, when it was returned to Kostajnica for safety. On feast days and days of prayer the holy hand was carried to Komogovina so that the faithful could venerate the martyr. A silver reliquary in which the holy relics were kept was given in 1925 by Dušan and Danica Trninić of Zagreb. Until 1942 the relics were kept at Komogovina, then taken to Zagreb. After the war Archpriest Rajačić took them to Karlovac, and from there Vladimir Bubalo took them to Kostajnica. In the last war in Croatia the reliquary with the saint's relics was stolen and has disappeared.

The decision of the Holy Assembly of Bishops of 20 May 1966 says: let Saint Theodore (Sladić), martyr of Komogovina, be entered in the list of all Serbian holy martyrs for the faith, to be commemorated on Theodore's Saturday. He is commemorated, together with Saint Theodore the Recruit, on the first Saturday of Great Lent.