ST. INNOCENT/
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FIREBIRD Videos, Audios & Books Producers of Educational Materials about the Orthodox Faith and Cultures 14 Years of Service: 1992-2006
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ST. INNOCENT OF IRKUTSK
St. Innocent was the Apostle to Siberia. He was an educator and missionary bishop to the region around Irkutsk, a city located near Lake Baikal in southeastern Siberia, close to the borders of Mongolia and China. He labored there for the Lord for ten years, 1721-1731, at a time of enormous moral decadence. He had profound intellectual and spiritual gifts: the gifts of teaching, languages, preaching and guiding people to God and moral living; gifts of humility, simplicity, patience, endurance and love for all people. In a few short years he brought many people to the Orthodox Faith and vastly improved the moral and spiritual climate of the "pioneer East" of the Irkutsk region. He established schools and instructed the clergy and the people both by his words and by the power of his own example of holy living. He learned the language of the native inhabitants of the region in order to lead many of them to know and love the Lord. His devotion to serving God as a missionary to all races and classes of people in the far-off land of Siberia, and his great love and kindness to all people, endeared him to his flock as the "Holy Man of Siberia." The last ten years of
his life were very different from his earlier years in In 1731, after only a little more than four years as bishop of Irkutsk, the saint fell asleep in the Lord, and was buried under the altar of the wooden church at the Ascension Monastery where he had lived. In 1766, when the church burned down, it was discovered that not only had the fire not harmed St. Innocent’s body, but that it had remained "incorrupt" (his flesh had not rotted and disappeared from his bones). Between 1766 and 1800, so many miracles were attributed to St. Innocent, that the citizens of Irkutsk appealed to have their local saint formally and universally glorified by the Church, which was granted in 1804.
This article was
written by Jane M. deVyver, M.Th., Ph.D., and the photos are by the author.
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urban European Russia. A priest-monk, scholar, teacher and
administrator in Kiev, Moscow and St. Petersburg, he served at the best and most
prestigious theological schools and cathedrals in the early eighteenth century. St.
Innocent could have lived a comfortable life as an urban monk-priest-professor. But in
1721, with the consent of Peter the Great, St. Innocent was consecrated Bishop of China.
After an entire year of difficult travel, he and his companions finally reached the
Chinese border, near Irkutsk. He was refused entry. He continued trying to gain permission
to enter China for five years. He had to cope with many difficulties: the disappointment
of not fulfilling his mission to China, and of being homeless, unemployed, without income,
thousands of miles from his home. But instead of feeling sorry for himself, he accepted
his suffering and trusted God, realizing that his real mission was to serve where he was,
and not in China. Finally, in 1727, he was appointed the first bishop of Irkutsk, in which
capacity he continued his missionary work.
In 1921 the Communists confiscated
the holy relics
(body) of Irkutsk’s beloved saint. Labeled only as a
"Siberian mummy," his holy remains were displayed in museums until 1990, when
miraculously, St. Innocent’s relics were discovered, identified, given back to the
Church, and returned to the cathedral in Irkutsk on September 2, 1990, amidst great joy
and weeping. Within two months after that, all of the bishop’s vestments in which the
saint had been buried, plus the cross that had been in his hand, were all miraculously
discovered and returned to the saint. The
full-sized reliquary containing the saint's relics (photo to the upper left), is
located in the Bishop's Cathedral in the Znamensky Women's Monastery in Irkutsk,
Siberia (photo to the upper right). A close-up view of St. Innocent's relics is
seen in the third photo, just above.