Mitrophan or Mitrofan of Voronezh (1623 - 1703) was appointed in 1682 the first

bishop A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...

Voronezh Voronezh ( rus, links=no, Воро́неж, p=vɐˈronʲɪʂ}) is a city and the administrative centre of Voronezh Oblast in southwestern Russia straddling the Voronezh River, located from where it flows into the Don River. The city sits on the ...

. He is reputed to have possessed miracle-working powers. Mikhail (as he was then known) was born in the village of Antilokhovo,

Savinsky District Savinsky District (russian: Са́винский райо́н) is an administrative and municipal district (raion), one of the twenty-one in Ivanovo Oblast, Russia.Law #145-OZ It is located in the south of the oblast. The area of the district is . ...

and took monastic vows after his wife's death in 1663. He managed the Kosmin Monastery near Yuryev-Polsky and the Unzha Monastery in Makaryev before being promoted to a bishop's see in 1682. He supported

Peter the Great Peter I ( – ), most commonly known as Peter the Great,) or Pyotr Alekséyevich ( rus, Пётр Алексе́евич, p=ˈpʲɵtr ɐlʲɪˈksʲejɪvʲɪtɕ, , group=pron was a Russian monarch who ruled the Tsardom of Russia from t ...

in his efforts to build the first Russian warships in

but was generally critical of his Westernization policies. Mitrofan was buried in the Annunciation Monastery in the Tsar's presence in 1703. When 14 years later his tomb was opened, Mitrofan's body was found to be "whole" and his relics were proclaimed to have healing powers. After he was formally canonized in 1832 and Nicholas I paid a visit to his shrine, his fame increased and large numbers of pilgrims from Central Russia started flocking to his tomb in Voronezh. The first Moscow church in his name was consecrated in 1895. The

Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...

had Mitrofan's

relic In religion, a relic is an object or article of religious significance from the past. It usually consists of the physical remains of a saint or the personal effects of the saint or venerated person preserved for purposes of veneration as a tangi ...

s confiscated. It was in 1989 that the relics were returned to the Russian Orthodox Church. There is an ornate statue of Saint Mitrofan in front of the Annunciation Cathedral where his relics have been kept since then.

References

{{authority control 17th-century Eastern Orthodox bishops Russian saints of the Eastern Orthodox Church 1623 births 1703 deaths 17th-century Christian saints People from Voronezh 18th-century Eastern Orthodox bishops