Vasian Scripca of Secu

Vasian Scripcă, born in 1887 at Fântâna Mare, in Suceava, was a protosyncellus, hermit at Sihla and for many years abbot of Secu Monastery. He fell asleep in the autumn of 1956. He is named in the Romanian Paterikon and venerated by the faithful, without synodal canonization; the sources available to us give no day of commemoration.

He entered the community of Rașca Monastery and was tonsured a monk in 1915. He led a harsh life, with prayer, fasting, silence and humility, working out his salvation in secret. Wishing a higher struggle, he became a hermit at Sihla Skete and struggled ten years in a hermit's dugout below the rocks, near the cave of Saint Theodora. The old fathers say that he sometimes met Bishop John, who also struggled in the Sihla Mountains, and that he was his confessor for a time. Vasian never spoke of this secret.

In 1934 he was ordained priest, and a year later he was named abbot and confessor of Secu Monastery. He loved stillness, prayer and night vigil much and cared less for the things of Martha, for he had tasted the sweetness of stillness and unceasing prayer. In 1950 he withdrew from the abbacy and spent his last years in prayer, in thought of heavenly things and in preparation for the hour of death.

In the autumn of 1956, feeling his end near, he asked forgiveness of all, confessed to his confessor and received the Holy Mysteries. Then, blessing everyone, he gave up his soul into Christ's hands, leaving as his dying wish to be buried without a coffin, after the tradition of the Holy Mountain.