Vonifaty of Feofania

Venerable Vonifaty of Feofania, of Kyiv (in the world Damian Feodorovich Vinogradsky, 1785 to 1871), was an abbot and ascetic elder, founder of the Feofania skete near Kyiv. Born in a family of state peasants, he fought in the war of 1812, then lived as a merciful husband and householder, left home with his wife's consent and came to Kyiv, where he fed thousands of wanderers. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church numbered him among the locally venerated saints in 2010, and the Bishops' Council of the Russian Church, in 2017, for veneration throughout the Church, with commemoration on 7 February.

Youth and the war

He was born in 1785 in the village of Mikhailovka, Alexandrovsk district, of the Yekaterinoslav viceroyalty (today in the Kirovohrad region), to Feodor and Evdokia Vinogradsky, state peasants. From childhood he longed for monasticism, but at his mother's insistence he married in 1805. In 1811 he entered the 4th Little Russian Lancer Regiment, took part in the war of 1812 and the foreign campaign of the Russian army. In 1818 he returned to his native village and kept a large farm, being merciful and hospitable to strangers.

With his wife's consent he resolved to take tonsure and, before leaving home, gave half his property to the poor. Leaving his family he settled in the neighbouring village of Khaynovka, gathered gifts for the restoration of a decayed wooden church, visited the Zhabotyn monastery, lived in the monastery of the Ascension of the Lord and of Saints Florus and Laurus at Kyiv, then was watchman at the church of the Holy Trinity at Kyiv. On 8 July 1850 Metropolitan Filaret (Amphiteatrov) of Kyiv assigned him to the Rzhyshchiv monastery, but with his abbot's blessing he remained at Kyiv for the work among strangers.

Almsgiving at Kyiv

From 1848, with the blessed John the Barefoot of Kyiv, he collected gifts with which, in two rooms beside the church of Saint Andrew at Kyiv, he founded a shelter for wanderers and cripples, where up to 500 people ate daily. With the support of the governor of Kyiv, Ivan Fundukley, they set up a hospital for the poor not far from the church. From the gifts collected Vinogradsky ordered vestments and vessels for the churches and monasteries of Kyiv.

With the blessing of the vicar of Kyiv, Bishop Apollinarius (Vigilyansky) of Chyhyryn, on 14 October 1851 he entered the Saint Michael Golden-⁠Domed monastery, where on 19 December 1854 he was tonsured a monk with the name Vonifaty. On 8 December 1856 he was ordained deacon, and on 10 May 1860 priest. From the gifts he collected (30 thousand roubles), a three-⁠storey stone guesthouse with the Smolensk church and a refectory for the poor was built at the Saint Michael monastery. The monastery fed up to 400 wanderers daily.

The Feofania skete

In 1861 Bishop Seraphim (Aretinsky) of Chyhyryn blessed Vonifaty to found a skete on the monastery's farm Feofania, near Kyiv, set up as early as 1802 by Theophanes (Shiyanov). Countrymen from his native village, who came on pilgrimage in 1861 to the Saint Michael monastery, had asked him to return home and make a skete there, but the bishop, giving him an icon of the Archangel Michael and the Great Martyr Barbara, told him to go to the farm Feofania, to found the skete there and that he would build it. Hieromonk Vonifaty, taking from the Saint Michael monastery two hieromonks, two hierodeacons and three novices, took up the task entrusted to him with love and, with God's help, succeeded in laying the beginning of a monastic community at Feofania.

First he adorned the wooden church of the Archangel Michael, repaired outside, with the altar and iconostasis adorned with many icons and with enough vessels. At his wish and initiative up to forty unquenched lamps burned in the church and in the monks' cells before the holy icons. Daily service strictly according to the typikon was established in the hermitage church, the custom of unceasing reading of the Psalter was founded, and the common reading of the akathist to the Archangel Michael each Sunday. At a short distance from the church a wooden bell tower was made and bells bought. By 1864 almost 30 brothers already lived at Feofania, cells were built, the stone church of All Saints (1867), a wooden bell tower, a new summer episcopal house. The holy spring below the hill was cleared, consecrated earlier by Innocent (Borisov) in honour of the icon of the Mother of God "Life-⁠giving Spring". A guesthouse for pilgrims and a house for the needy appeared in the skete. In 1868 Vonifaty was raised to hegumen.

His life and repose

His life was "a constant labour of prayer and contemplation of God", and his particular ascetic work was a lifelong struggle with demonic terrors. In the last year of his life he suffered from an illness of the legs, prayed and received visitors on his knees, and foretold the day of his death. He was buried behind the altar wall of the church of All Saints. According to his testament, the governance of Feofania was entrusted to his spiritual friend, Hieroschemamonk Irinarkh (Dorogavtsev), with keeping the same order without any change and, so far as possible, receiving the needy and strangers. Among his disciples were the future abbot of the Prophet Elijah skete on Athos, Venerable Gabriel of Athos, and the silent Hieroschemamonk Irinarkh. Another disciple, Hieromonk Evstraty (Golovansky), published in 1872 the elder's life, with his instructions and talks kept at Feofania.

In 1993 on the site of the Feofania skete the skete of Saint Panteleimon of the Protection monastery for men in Kyiv was opened, where the elder's memorial is kept. His grave has not been found. By decision of the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of 23 December 2010, Hegumen Vonifaty was numbered among the locally venerated saints of the Kyiv diocese, and on 30 November 2017, by decision of the Bishops' Council of the Russian Church, veneration of Venerable Vonifaty of Feofania was established throughout the Church, with commemoration on 7 February.