Stories about Elder Adrian (Kirsanov)

"Hand in your ticket"

For the third day now we have been trying to get an appointment with Elder Adrian (Kirsanov), but the queues to see the priest are such that there is no way we can get a chance. In a word, we languish in line and sin, condemning those who torment the priest over trifles. Judge for yourself - local women have been standing in line with us all these days, who need to get the priest’s blessing to pick berries in the forest. “We should have gone into the forest long ago and picked berries,” the pilgrim from Moscow grins. - Otherwise, soon they will be blessed like this: “Father, bless the sneeze!” But if the berry pickers are more likely to cause bewilderment, then young Lidochka from St. Petersburg gets the full package. Firstly, Lydia went to Father Adrian without a queue, because the priest gave his blessing. Secondly, she is scheduled for general confession, starting at the age of seven, and this, as we know, is a long process. Through the window of the cell, you can see how Lidochka took a thick notebook from her bag and, tears dripping onto the paper, began to read. I read for about forty minutes. Finally, the notebook slammed shut, and the priest had already placed the epitrachelion on her head, when the girl took out a second notebook from her bag... then a third, a fourth. Or is it already the fifth? “I have to leave, but she’s still sitting there!” – the pilgrim from Vladivostok is nervous. Finally, Lydia left the cell, but immediately returned back: “Oh, father, I forgot to ask... And the father again talks about something with the confessor, affectionately calling her Lidochka.” - “Lidochka”, “Lidochka”! – beautiful Katya explodes with indignation. - It’s been a week at Father’s house, and already it’s “Lidochka”! Katya is clearly jealous of Lydia and her father. And Katya’s story is this: six years ago she left her fiancé and came to the elder, demanding that he tonsure her as a nun. Katya is all about exploits. For example, this Lent she ate, like a rabbit, only cabbage leaves, inviting me, by the way, to join her. I refused, citing weakness. “Well, if you can’t even do that little,” Katya told me arrogantly, “then what good can we expect from you?” True, unlike the rabbit, Katya began to hate cabbage after that. And it’s even more offensive that the priest does not notice Katya’s exploits and does not bless her for tonsure. Looking ahead, I will say that when ten years later I asked my friends if Father had tonsured Katya, they answered: “He didn’t.” But Katya is our iron lady: anyway, I’ll achieve my goal. However, Katya is not the only one who comes to the elder to achieve her goal. The priest’s opinion is not even interesting to such people, because the elder is simply obliged to bless someone’s absurd idea, invention or self-deception. As a result, what is desired is presented as reality, and here is just one, but well-known fact. Several years ago, supposedly with the blessing of Elder Adrian, an action of national repentance for the murder of the king took place. Near the churches, women stood with signature sheets and persuaded passers-by to sign, “otherwise Russia cannot be saved.” For the sake of saving Russia, many signed, but then one monk said: “Excuse me, but yesterday I was with Father Adrian and asked him about these subscription sheets.” And the priest replied: “How could I bless such stupidity? One must repent of personal sins, but there is no repentance for the sins of others in Orthodoxy.” “And we thought...” the women were embarrassed. In general, as the venerable Optina elder Nektary said: “Stop “thinking” - start thinking.”

Adrian (Kirsanov)

"Hand in your ticket"

Archimandrite Adrian (Kirsanov) with his children on the Virgin Hill. Author of the photo: Natalya Borisovna.

“We should have gone into the forest long ago and picked berries,” the pilgrim from Moscow grins. - Otherwise, soon they will be blessed like this: “Father, bless the sneeze!”

But if the berry pickers are more likely to cause bewilderment, then young Lidochka from St. Petersburg gets the full package. Firstly, Lydia went to Father Adrian without a queue, because the priest gave his blessing. Secondly, she is scheduled for general confession, starting at the age of seven, and this, as we know, is a long process. Through the window of the cell, you can see how Lidochka took a thick notebook from her bag and, tears dripping onto the paper, began to read. I read for about forty minutes. Finally, the notebook slammed shut, and the priest had already placed the epitrachelion on her head, when the girl took out a second notebook from her bag... then a third, a fourth. Or is it already the fifth?

“I have to leave, but she’s still sitting there!” – the pilgrim from Vladivostok is nervous.

Finally Lydia left the cell, but immediately returned:

- Oh, father, I forgot to ask...

And the priest again talks about something with the confessor, affectionately calling her Lidochka.

- “Lidochka”, “Lidochka”! – beautiful Katya explodes with indignation. - It’s been a week at Father’s house, and already it’s “Lidochka”!

Katya is clearly jealous of Lydia and her father. And Katya’s story is this: six years ago she left her fiancé and came to the elder, demanding that he tonsure her as a nun. Katya is all about exploits. For example, this Lent she ate, like a rabbit, only cabbage leaves, inviting me, by the way, to join her. I refused, citing weakness.

“Well, if you can’t even do that little,” Katya told me arrogantly, “then what good can we expect from you?”

True, unlike the rabbit, Katya began to hate cabbage after that. And it’s even more offensive that the priest does not notice Katya’s exploits and does not bless her for tonsure. Looking ahead, I will say that when ten years later I asked my friends if Father had tonsured Katya, they answered:

- I didn’t cut my hair. But Katya is our iron lady: anyway, I’ll achieve my goal.

However, Katya is not the only one who comes to the elder to achieve her goal. The priest’s opinion is not even interesting to such people, because the elder is simply obliged to bless someone’s absurd idea, invention or self-deception. As a result, what is desired is presented as reality, and here is just one, but well-known fact. Several years ago, supposedly with the blessing of Elder Adrian, an action of national repentance for the murder of the king took place. Near the churches, women stood with signature sheets and persuaded passers-by to sign, “otherwise Russia cannot be saved.”

Many people signed up for the salvation of Russia, but then one monk said:

- Forgive me, but yesterday I visited Father Adrian and asked him about these subscription sheets. And the priest replied: “How could I bless such stupidity? One must repent of personal sins, but there is no repentance for the sins of others in Orthodoxy.”

“And we thought...” the women were embarrassed.

In general, as the venerable Optina elder Nektary said: “Stop “thinking” - start thinking.”

Archimandrite Adrian (Kirsanov). Photo: V.F. Parkhomenko

* * *

“Look, we’ll get there,” the old pilgrims from Moscow rejoice. “We just need a minute to visit Alyoshenka to give her some gifts.” After all, it’s ours, factory-made – from the Likhachev Automobile Plant.

The old women remember the old man when he was still young, calling him by his former name - Alyosha. And Alyosha was so handsome that many girls admired him.

“We invite Alyosha to dance,” the Muscovites say, “but after work he only went to church.” We, fools in love, were offended by him, and decided that since he doesn’t care about girls, we’ll spit in his jar of holy water for this. They climbed into his dorm and spat on him, and after that everyone fell ill. The temperature is forty, the torment of martyrdom is that you can’t lift your head from the pillow. We are sick, we are suffering, but we guessed that this is our punishment for sin. We wrote a note to Alyosha, asking for forgiveness and for him to pray for us. And through his prayers we were instantly healed and, most importantly, we came to God. Since then, not a step away from the priest. At first he served in the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, and our families already went to see him. Before September 1, children were always brought. And the priest will pray for the schoolchildren, bless the children, and the children, you see, study with zeal and respect their elders and teachers. Through the priest’s prayers we did not know grief. And then the persecution of the elder began, and the party authorities ordered his removal from the Lavra within 24 hours.

* * *

After graduating from the seminary, Father Valery was invited to work at the opera house; the priest had a marvelous voice. But he wanted to be a priest, and the authorities refused to register him at the parish. For three years the priest remained unemployed. And Abbot Peter (Barabash), a prisoner of Christ, who refused to report information received during confession to the KGB, washed the station toilets after the camps, because, according to the instructions of the authorities, he was not hired anywhere else.

In a word, no matter what they say about the priests who served under Soviet rule and allegedly “sold out to the KGB,” this was still the path of confession. In those years, as Archimandrite Adrian once told me, he slept with a skull under his head in order to accustom himself to the thought of death and the inevitability of suffering for Christ. And the Lord gave His confessor the gifts of eldership - the gift of clairvoyance, the gift of helping the sick, and fiery prayer that burns demons. In the Trinity-Sergius Lavra near Fr. Adrian's obedience was to reprimand those possessed by demons. Many were healed, and not only through the reprimand. People, seemingly sentenced to lifelong disability, later worked as kindergarten teachers, doctors in a clinic, and industrial foremen. And one party leader, after healing, put his party card on the table in the district committee and began to openly confess Christ. All this aroused the indignation of the Commissioner for Religious Affairs, and not only from him.

I remember how in the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery one hierarch complained about Father Adrian:

“Here I am walking through the monastery, and all around is silence, grace, splendor. But as soon as Father Adrian leaves his cell, a scandal immediately begins - someone will immediately squeal, bark and grunt. You yourself saw this disgrace! But there are foreigners in the monastery...

Foreigners visited the Trinity-Sergius Lavra especially often. They were brought here to convince them that in the USSR there is no persecution of religion, and only what is sung in the song is true: “I don’t know another country like this, where people can breathe so freely.” Foreigners, in turn, were curious to look at this wild dark people who, unlike enlightened Europe, still believe in God and, according to rumors, walk in bast shoes. So, one day an American delegation of quite high rank was brought to the Lavra, judging by the fact that it was accompanied by leading officials from the CPSU Central Committee. Everything went as usual. The Americans looked at the monks with curiosity, as they look at mammoth bones in a museum - a fragment of the past, antiquity and museum Orthodoxy that has already become obsolete. But then Father Adrian, a confessor of the Living God and a prayer book-besogonian, came out of his cell. He just walked by silently. But the leading American lady suddenly went berserk, screamed, grunted and, not knowing a word in Russian, began to swear in vulgar language, shouting at the same time: “Priest Adrian, I’ll kill you!” Kill the priest!

There was quite a scandal. And a certain leader from the CPSU Central Committee ordered in anger: “Remove Adrian from the Lavra within 24 hours, and so that his spirit is not here!” Officially it was called: transfer Father Adrian to the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery. Father was seriously ill at the time, but they didn’t even let him get ready. And people ran after the priest to the train, asking questions and begging for help.

It’s always like this: even in illness, an old man is not left alone. Once, Muscovites said, a dying woman, Nina, was brought to a sick old man: cancer was in the fourth stage, incurable, and doctors predicted a quick death. Nina was then far from the Church, and despair led her to the elder.

“I’m dying, father,” she cried. - I'll die soon!

“So let’s prepare for death, Nina,” the elder advised.

Probably thirty years have passed since then, and Nina is still preparing for death. They say she is now a nun in secret tonsure and an ascetic in Christ. And the secret of Nina’s extended life is explained only by the words of the holy fathers: “Death will never kidnap a husband who strives for perfection.”

* * *

Servicing the early Divine Liturgy in the Assumption Cathedral. From left to right: Abbot Theodosius, Archimandrite Dosifei, Archimandrite Adrian, Abbot Methodius.

- Only over my dead body! - Katya blocks her way.

“We came from Siberia to see the elder and we can’t get there.” And you? - Siberians are indignant.

But Lidochka does not stop and knocks on the cell window:

- Father, dear, they don’t let me see you!

- What do you want, Lidochka? - Father Adrian comes out onto the porch.

- Father, I just took a bus ticket, but I didn’t take your blessing for the trip.

- Hand in your bus ticket. You'll go by train.

“I can’t take the train,” Lidochka gets excited. – The train arrives at eleven in the morning, I’ll be late for work! The boss will eat me alive and...

“You’ll go by train,” the priest stops this discussion and immediately goes to the local women, blessing them to pick berries.

I’ll tell you about the berry pickers a little later, but first about Lidochka. She, indeed, went by train, childishly trusting the experience of the holy fathers, who affirmed: as the Abba blessed, so one must do. And how good it is that there is this trust, because the next morning terrible news came: a drunk KamAZ driver crashed into the bus on which Lydia was going to travel, and there was a lot of blood and casualties.

“I will only accept those who are leaving tomorrow,” Father Adrian announces from the porch, inviting me into the cell for some reason.

“Follow Him!”

– Saint Ignatius Brianchaninov also wrote that the true elders are no longer around and even in monasteries they do not know the Jesus Prayer.

- Can you make it shorter? - the cell attendant whispers.

- Well, in short, the holy fathers also stated: “Not everyone in the monastery is saved, and not everyone in the world perishes.” Here in our monastery we have not brethren, but lads, and the father governor is a dragon.

- So you want to leave the monastery? - asks the priest. – Do you know, brother, that a monk who leaves his monastery is considered a suicide and is even deprived of Christian burial?

“Mom is sick,” the monk wilts, “and asks permission to return home.”

“My mother asked me the same thing.” And there was, brother, such a story...

However, I already know this story from the elder’s Moscow acquaintances. And it was like this. One day, Father Adrian received a tearful letter from his mother, which said: their house burned down, they were now living in a dugout. And in the dugout, when it rained, the water was knee-deep, and the mother became seriously ill. So the mother begged her son to leave the monastery at least for a while, earn some money and build them a house, because there was no one else to expect help from. Father Adrian did not leave the monastery then, but day and night he prayed to St. Nicholas of Myra to help his sick mother.

I don’t know how long he prayed, but suddenly they bring him a bag with money, and in the bag there is a note asking him to give this money to the monk’s mother, whose house burned down. Who sent this money is still unknown. But when, having bought a house, Fr. Adriana began to examine it, then she discovered a large icon of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker in the attic, and the saint smiled at her.

“It’s hard for you, brother, I understand,” the priest consoles the monk and puts a bundle of money in his pocket. “Here they gave me the money, and you gave it to my mother so that the medicines are the best and the food is good.” The main thing is to believe - the Lord will not leave you.

“I’m dying, father,” the monk cries. “I want to be saved, but I condemn everyone.”

- And to this I’ll say this...

But they are not allowed to finish – the ambulance has arrived. And the priest is still trying to continue the reception, now turning to me:

– Please answer this letter.

I take from my father an unopened letter from the famous champion athlete, from which I later learn: after a spinal injury, the athlete was paralyzed. No treatment helps, but she believes in God, was baptized in infancy, and a priest she knows gives her communion at home.

“Write to her,” the priest dictates the answer, “that she is unbaptized.” And that she was baptized in infancy, she is mistaken. Now many people make this mistake. And after baptism she will feel better - and look, she will get better.

“Father, but you didn’t read the letter and didn’t even open it,” I am perplexed.

-Didn’t you read it? - the elder is surprised and gives the last instructions: - Without me, go to Father John (Krestyankin). He is spiritual, and who am I? These used to be great elders, but now there are only old men left.

Two elders John Krestyankin and Andrian Kirsanov

Much later, Archimandrite John (Krestyankin) will write to me in a letter: “Father Adrian is a true elder, and I am only a counselor.” And word for word he will repeat what Father Adrian said about the great old men of old and the old men of today, meaning himself.

The elders sometimes speak the same way, but they are very different. Archimandrite John had the gift of speech, and at that time eminent intellectuals often came to him to listen to the wise teachings of the elder. And those wretched people, where life is sorrow upon sorrow and are overcome by illness, are increasingly drawn to Father Adrian.

- Why do you follow me in droves? - the priest laments. – I’m not Panteleimon the Healer. Lord, there is no peace and they don’t allow me to pray.

There really is no peace for the priest. And now the ambulance is crowded with people. The women cry, feeling sorry for the priest. And Father Adrian gives them the supplies he has prepared for the journey as a consolation, handing me a bag of fruit as well.

“Father, our house is full of fruit,” I refuse. – It’s better to give some spiritual advice in the end.

- What are you talking about?

- About how to live.

- How to live? - Father thinks. And he speaks heartfeltly, as they say about personal things: “And you live simply.” Look where Christ's feet go and follow Him.

The ambulance takes the priest to the regional hospital, and I suddenly understand that Christ’s feet lead to Calvary. This is a narrow path, but there is no other way.

By the Sea of Tiberias

I met the berry pickers after my father left. It turned out that they were harvesters. The collected berries are handed over to a collection point, and with the money earned they feed their families and even build houses.

“We don’t go into the forest without the priest’s blessing,” the women said. “And the priest will pray, bless us, and we will work the season tirelessly and earn good money.”

One day I asked the women to take me with them to the forest. From August 15, as announced on the radio, it is allowed to pick lingonberries, and we go for the berries. True, the women immediately warned that they take the first berry not for themselves, but for God, giving everything collected to the monastery. Together with us, the cellarer's father sends four pilgrims, led by Katya, into the forest to pick mushrooms, because mushrooms are especially needed during the Dormition Lent.

At the edge of the forest, everyone is praying, and the eldest, Valentina, reads a prayer to the holy martyr Charalampius, the great sufferer to whom the Lord appeared before his execution and said: “Ask me what you want, and I will give it to you.” And the old bishop (Charalampius was 113 years old) began to pray to the Lord for people who “are flesh and blood.” And may the Lord grant them, in memory of his suffering, an abundance of the fruits of the earth, so that people will be satisfied and glorify God.

And on that day we were given such an abundance of earthly fruits that I don’t even know how to tell it. I get stuck at the first lingonberry clearing and gasp in amazement: the entire clearing is so thickly covered with berries that not a single ground is visible. Lingonberries are large, like cherries, and grow in clusters. Here you don’t take one berry at a time, but handfuls at once. Quite quickly I fill up a bucket and go to the pilgrims to pick mushrooms.

But even here it’s a miracle. In the young spruce forest there are rows of strong, elegant porcini mushrooms, and saffron milk caps creep along the green moss. All baskets are already full. But is it possible to get away from such mushrooms? We take off our aprons, scarves and sweaters, tying the collected mushrooms into knots. Finally, the women return from the lingonberry garden, each with two buckets of lingonberries and full of pesteri berries on their backs. They are professionals, picking berries with both hands at once, and at the same time very quickly and deftly.

We rest on the edge of the forest, snacking on bread and tomatoes, and we can’t stop looking at these marvelous large lingonberries.

“I’ve never seen such beautiful lingonberries,” I say.

“I didn’t even notice that lingonberries are beautiful,” admits experienced berry picker Marina.

- Why didn’t you notice?

- How to explain? My husband has been unemployed since spring, and there are three children. I don’t pick berries, I count the money: I’ve collected a hundred, another fifty. I'm in a hurry and don't see anything around. And today I pick lingonberries for free, and the beauty takes my breath away. God, I think I'm so happy. Glory to Thee, Lord, glory to Thee!

“It’s true, it’s joy, it’s like it’s a holiday today,” says Valentina and instructs me: “Be sure to take the first cucumbers and tomatoes from your garden to the church.” And, believe me, you will always have a harvest.

- So, give the Lord a ruble to get a hundred in return? - beautiful Katya denounces Valya. – But this is selfish trade with God!

– What kind of trade? I don’t understand,” Valentina is perplexed.

But I think I understand her. Behind the ancient custom of bringing the firstfruits of the harvest to church is the habit of Christians to sanctify their life and put God first, and not their wealth and proud self.

Marina stands up for Valya, who has been convicted of self-interest:

– Listen, Katyusha, about my brother. He used to work in a fishing cooperative. And the fishermen had a custom - they dedicated the first catch to God and then took the fish to the monastery and to the orphanage. And that first catch was like at the Sea of Tiberias, when it was only a miracle that the nets from the multitude of fish did not break. We used to meet fishermen on the shore, and from afar they would shout with joy: “God’s catch! God's catch! The fish were caught well throughout the fishing season. And then some rich man bought their fishing farm and told the fishermen: “I will not allow fish to be distributed for free. Our goal is to make a profit. And what does God and God’s catch have to do with it?” And without God, the fish stopped being caught. The rich man went bankrupt, and the artel fled. Am I clear, Katya?

- Much clearer! – Katya mocks. - Give God a bribe to get capital!

“And I’ll make it even clearer,” Marina continues calmly. “We, indeed, live by the Sea of Tiberias, but we don’t want to live according to the will of God, we don’t listen to the priest and are only trying to get our way.” And it turns out for us, Katya, like those fishermen who fished all night, tired, exhausted, and they didn’t catch anything. Here, even if you break your forehead, nothing will work out if there is no God’s will for it. You understand me, Katenka, huh?

Katya turns away, and everyone understands what she’s talking about. Katya is not of the monastic dispensation, but once imagined herself to be a nun and since then she has been fighting like a fish on ice. He denounces everyone, quarrels and lives on his parents’ money, putting himself above this world. But they are not offended by Katya, realizing that she is unhappy.

And I also remember the story of one sad geologist. He entered the geological institute for two years only to realize, upon graduating, that he had confused geology with tourism. And how many such confusions are there on earth! According to one American scientist, humanity lives only five percent in reality, and ninety-five percent in illusions. Sooner or later, illusions collapse, and misfortune is the lot of dreamers who built their house on the sand...

But today there is a holiday on our Sea of Tiberias. It’s like being in paradise, enjoying the beauty and marveling at the abundance of God’s harvest. I don’t really want to leave the forest, but Valentina is already putting the pest on her back with the words:

- We rested, and that’s enough. It's time, sisters, to go.

Nina Pavlova.
Stories about Archimandrite Adrian (Kirsanov) Monastery

What was the old man like in his youth?

...Lydia finally leaves the priest, and the line is now moving quickly. The monks are a nice people after all, and out of love for the elder they do not waste his time - they will come in, briefly state their needs and leave, having been blessed. “Look, we’ll get there,” the old pilgrims from Moscow rejoice. “We just need a minute to visit Alyoshenka to give her some gifts.” After all, it’s ours, factory-made – from the Likhachev Automobile Plant. The old women remember the old man when he was still young, calling him by his former name - Alyosha. And Alyosha was so handsome that many girls admired him. “We invite Alyosha to dance,” the Muscovites say, “but after work he only went to church.” We, fools in love, were offended by him, and decided that since he doesn’t care about girls, we’ll spit in his jar of holy water for this. They climbed into his dorm and spat on him, and after that everyone fell ill. The temperature is forty, the torment of martyrdom is that you can’t lift your head from the pillow. We are sick, we are suffering, but we guessed that this is our punishment for sin. We wrote a note to Alyosha, asking for forgiveness and for him to pray for us. And through his prayers we were instantly healed and, most importantly, we came to God. Since then, not a step away from the priest. At first he served in the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, and our families already went to see him. Before September 1, children were always brought. And the priest will pray for the schoolchildren, bless the children, and the children, you see, study with zeal and respect their elders and teachers. Through the priest’s prayers we did not know grief. And then the persecution of the elder began, and the party authorities ordered his removal from the Lavra within 24 hours.

The old man of my youth

In memory of Archimandrite Adrian (Kirsanov).

On April 28, in the 97th year of his life,
Archimandrite Adrian (Kirsanov) , the last of a galaxy of great confessors and elders who labored in the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery since the second half of the last century, reposed in the Lord in the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery. Kingdom of Heaven and Eternal Memory to the Servant of God Archimandrite Adrian!

In the 1970s, the Lavra was plagued by disco. On the eve of the holidays and every Saturday, rock (emphasis anywhere) and dance music was heard in the Lavra. And as luck would have it, the park of culture and recreation, in which discos were held, adjoined the side of the insurmountable walls of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, where the monastic cells were located. On the same side is the Refectory Church, and when I stood at the All-Night Vigil on Saturdays, even during quiet pauses in the service one could hear the sounds of Soviet hits coming from behind the thickness of the walls. What was it like for the monks? Many were surprised then that the monks knew the words of Soviet songs by heart.

But the discos ended early then. Not like now, in the morning. By midnight there was silence. And then the real horror began. Demons began to make noise around Father Adrian’s cell. They never calmed down, did not get tired and disturbed the monks until the morning, preventing them from sleeping and praying.

Various noises were heard. For example, it seemed that someone was walking on the roof above your head. But if you go up to the roof and look out, there’s no one there. Or they make noise behind the wall. Or the sound of a fight on the street. Although no one makes noise behind the wall and no one fights in the monastery back streets. And so on until the morning every night.

The monks asked to transfer Father Adrian away from them, and he was transferred to a special cell, away from the brethren. The doors of this cell opened directly onto the monastery square. Once, just before his departure from the Lavra, at night there was a knock on the door of his cell. Father Adrian opened the door and saw two drunken people standing in front of him, holding each other. “Who let them in at night?” - the elder was perplexed and crossed them. The Lavra was always closed at night. The drunks, staggering, began to move away from the cell, and when they almost reached the bell tower, they... soared above the ground and slowly flew into the sky. Then Father Adrian realized who they were. Demons foreshadowed his removal from the Lavra. But in vain they rejoiced, because in the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery Father Adrian continued his ministry and the reprimands of the possessed there took place even more powerfully and lastingly.

Legends circulated around Moscow about Father Adrian’s reprimands. Incurable patients recovered. And during the lectures, seemingly healthy Soviet citizens suddenly began to yell, scream and writhe on the floor. Demons in some possessed people predicted the approaching end of Soviet power. And in one demoniac the demon cried out: “Grandfather Lenin! Grandfather Lenin, hurry to the rescue, the angelic army is winning!”

Of course, the party members did not like such activities of Father Adrian at all. They then tried to turn the Lavra into a showpiece, so that everyone would understand that religion was not persecuted in the USSR, and it was then called a “historical and cultural reserve”; delegations from all over the world were taken there. And here it is. Unaccounted for entities have appeared in the “reserve”.

One day, bypassing the crowds of tourists, I came for a lecture. I looked into the temple and saw those who were waiting for Father Adrian. This was enough for me. Their appearance was so terrible that I ran away to the relics of St. Sergius, without waiting for the exorcist’s incantatory cries.

In the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery, when I arrived there on pilgrimage, the abbot was Archimandrite Gabriel (Steblyuchenko). I settled down near the entrance to the monastery, with some old women, and spent all my days standing around for services. From the old women I learned when and where Elder Adrian would receive. Of course, getting to him was my dream.

He didn't tell me off then. They said that the father abbot forbade it. This was alarming. We are accustomed to external persecution, but not at all to internal persecution. Long before the agreed time, I approached the entrance to the monastic cells. There was already a line of women dressed in all black, gray and long. And I silently took a place in the back. Suddenly the line ran away. Everyone was looking back at something as they ran. I, too, succumbing to general panic, hastened to hide behind the fountain and saw how the same Father Superior, with whom I was already familiar, with the same stick in his hand that I had already seen in his hand, was scattering a group of women. And he shouted something like this: “How many times have I told you, don’t hang around monastic cells!” And he was ready to use his stick and almost beat these women with it, who ran away from him in different directions, but not far, and stopped. Yes, it was Father Gabriel, and the stick in his hand was actually the abbot’s staff.

And then I noticed with alarm that our empty place in front of the doors to the cells was being occupied by some new, stranger women, and I hastened to stand in line behind them. For some reason, I didn’t think, and it never occurred to me that the abbot could drive me out of the gate with this staff. Now my turn is much closer. Those who were the first did not dare to return. And as I understand now, it was only thanks to Father Gabriel and his staff that I got to the elder. Otherwise I would have been standing in line to this day. I had just one question for Father Adrian. Stupid, of course, but then he bothered me. Is there a demon inside me? I came to this opinion because nothing was going well in my life. No matter what I tried, everything collapsed. Nothing was successful. And I decided to blame everything on the demon. Besides, I felt disgusting. Constant stress and persecution did not improve my health.

The new short line quickly passed, and I entered the elder’s room without hindrance. He was sitting in the corridor on a small sofa, at the door of someone’s cell, as I understood it. At first it seemed incredible to me that the reception was taking place in such a poor environment, literally on the fly. There weren't even icons anywhere. The elder pointed to a place next to him, and I sat down. But before he could even open his mouth, he told me:

- You are healthy!

I probably would have been less surprised if lightning had struck me, I was so amazed. And he looked at Father Adrian questioningly. And he repeated once again, intently peering into the space invisible to me: “You are absolutely healthy!”

And without letting me ask anything again, he began to accuse me:

- You can't stand still. You've been coming to us for a long time. I was baptized a long time ago. And still like a beginner. We must move on. Look what happens next. This is interesting to know.

Here I wanted to justify myself that I couldn’t even hang icons in my house, that they were chasing me away from everywhere, putting me in a madhouse... And other life circumstances popped up in my head. But he didn’t even have time to open his mouth when Father Adrian switched gears and began telling how he lived in the hostel. It's strange, but I remember it verbatim. And I think it's important to bring this up here.

— When I worked at the factory, even before the monastery, I lived in a dormitory; several other people lived in the room. I didn’t have any icons there either. It was impossible to hang him. I sit on the edge of the bed, look out the window, and there I see the Trinity, the Mother of God, and the Savior behind the glass. And I pray to them. And what’s going on around... And partying, and drinking, and everyone has already brought a girl. I sit and pray to myself and see nothing around.

And he also told me an incident from his life, which I had already heard about, and then also heard from many, how he went to save one yogi who had lost his mind. He was brought to his home, where his family lived. This yogi himself no longer went anywhere, he was violent. Father Adrian was unable to heal him. I couldn't report.

- How to save him, he’s not even baptized. And he went far away from us into his fantasies.

He told me this as a warning, having learned that I was reading different books.

Then I asked for a blessing to visit the Pukhtitsa Monastery. This was on my list of pilgrimages. Father Adrian was very surprised.

- After all, this is a convent! “And he began to tell how his spiritual daughter, a nun, left the monastery for a young man, breaking all her monastic vows. — And it all started with conversations, exchanging spiritual books. Now she is spiritually lost.

That's what he said. Although, after thinking and again checking with the space invisible to me, he added: “Although, maybe she’s not completely dead yet.”

Having blessed me for the pilgrimage, he ordered me not to communicate with any of the nuns there.

This meeting felt like it lasted no more than five minutes. And it remained in my memory for the rest of my life.

Lev Alabin, poet, theater critic, Moscow.

During the years of persecution

But before I talk about the persecution of the elder, I will give some facts that characterize the spiritual atmosphere of those years. The recently deceased Archpriest Valery from Kozelsk told how difficult it was to enter the seminary in those years. They immediately began dragging the future priest to the KGB, promising to show him the checkered sky if he did not give up his intentions. And then the police took over - they intercepted the applicant at the station and detained him for several days so that he would be late for the exams and would not get into the seminary. In general, the seminarians had the following tactics: a month before the exams, they left home and hid in the forests near the Trinity-Sergius Lavra. On the day of submitting documents, they sent a patrolman ahead and, at his sign: “The path is clear,” they quickly ran to the monastery in order to have time to submit documents to the admissions committee before the police detained them. Only after this could one feel relatively safe, because there was no official persecution of religion in the USSR. And foreigners were invited to see for themselves: churches are open, students are studying at the seminary. After graduating from the seminary, Father Valery was invited to work at the opera house; the priest had a marvelous voice. But he wanted to be a priest, and the authorities refused to register him at the parish. For three years the priest remained unemployed. And Abbot Peter (Barabash), a prisoner of Christ, who refused to report information received during confession to the KGB, washed the station toilets after the camps, because, according to the instructions of the authorities, he was not hired anywhere else. In a word, no matter what they say about the priests who served under Soviet rule and allegedly “sold out to the KGB,” this was still the path of confession. In those years, as Archimandrite Adrian once told me, he slept with a skull under his head in order to accustom himself to the thought of death and the inevitability of suffering for Christ. And the Lord gave His confessor the gifts of eldership - the gift of clairvoyance, the gift of helping the sick, and fiery prayer that burns demons. In the Trinity-Sergius Lavra near Fr. Adrian's obedience was to reprimand those possessed by demons. Many were healed, and not only through the reprimand. People, seemingly sentenced to lifelong disability, later worked as kindergarten teachers, doctors in a clinic, and industrial foremen. And one party leader, after healing, put his party card on the table in the district committee and began to openly confess Christ. All this aroused the indignation of the Commissioner for Religious Affairs, and not only from him. I remember how in the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery one hierarch complained about Father Adrian: “Here I am walking through the monastery, and there is silence, grace, splendor all around.” But as soon as Father Adrian leaves his cell, a scandal immediately begins - someone will immediately squeal, bark and grunt. You yourself saw this disgrace! But there are foreigners in the monastery... Foreigners visited the Trinity-Sergius Lavra especially often. They were brought here to convince them that in the USSR there is no persecution of religion, and only what is sung in the song is true: “I don’t know another country like this, where people can breathe so freely.” Foreigners, in turn, were curious to look at this wild dark people who, unlike enlightened Europe, still believe in God and, according to rumors, walk in bast shoes. So, one day an American delegation of quite high rank was brought to the Lavra, judging by the fact that it was accompanied by leading officials from the CPSU Central Committee. Everything went as usual. The Americans looked at the monks with curiosity, as they look at mammoth bones in a museum - a fragment of the past, antiquity and museum Orthodoxy that has already become obsolete. But then Father Adrian, a confessor of the Living God and a prayer book-besogonian, came out of his cell. He just walked by silently. But the leading American lady suddenly went berserk, screamed, grunted and, not knowing a word in Russian, began to swear in vulgar language, shouting at the same time: “Priest Adrian, I’ll kill you!” Kill the priest! There was quite a scandal. And a certain leader from the CPSU Central Committee ordered in anger: “Remove Adrian from the Lavra within 24 hours, and so that his spirit is not here!” Officially it was called: transfer Father Adrian to the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery. Father was seriously ill at the time, but they didn’t even let him get ready. And people ran after the priest to the train, asking questions and begging for help. It’s always like this: even in illness, an old man is not left alone. Once, Muscovites said, a dying woman, Nina, was brought to a sick old man: cancer was in the fourth stage, incurable, and doctors predicted a quick death. Nina was then far from the Church, and despair led her to the elder. “I’m dying, father,” she cried. - I'll die soon! “So let’s prepare for death, Nina,” the elder advised. Probably thirty years have passed since then, and Nina is still preparing for death. They say she is now a nun in secret tonsure and an ascetic in Christ. And the secret of Nina’s extended life is explained only by the words of the holy fathers: “Death will never kidnap a husband who strives for perfection.”

On April 28, 2022, at the 97th year of his life, the elder confessor of the Holy Dormition Pskovo-Pechersky Monastery, Archimandrite Adrian (Kirsanov), reposed in the Lord.

Archimandrite Adrian (Kirsanov) was born on March 17, 1922 in the Kursk province. In the world he worked in a hot shop at a defense plant. Veteran of the Great Patriotic War. He took monastic vows after the war at the Trinity-Sergius Lavra with the blessing of Patriarch Pimen. Since 1953, he joined the brethren of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, where he served until 1975.

Archimandrite Andrian has been in the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery since 1975. In the monastery he went from a simple priest to an archimandrite.

Elder Adrian was called a comforting priest and was loved for the special power of prayer. Many turned to him for advice and consolation.

The funeral service and burial will take place on April 30.

The brethren of the monastery ask for holy prayers for the newly deceased R.B. Adrian.

We offer our readers a fragment of memories of the deceased elder:

... The priest comes from the village of Tureika, Oryol district, Oryol region, from a simple peasant family. His father, Andrei Kirsanov, was a good carpenter, he even made furniture, and his mother, Feodosia, did housework. In 1932, another girl was born, and in 1935, a boy. At the same time, the breadwinner of the family died, and the sole owner Agafya Kirsanova had to raise and support the children alone. All the temples in the area were closed even before their birth. The times were difficult not only because of blasphemy and rampant crime, but also because of the terrible famine. Alyosha was in poor health; one day he fell ill and went to the city of Orel to see a doctor. There was still an unclosed church in Orel. Alexey entered the half-empty church, where the liturgy had just begun, and his soul told him that here, in the Church, was his place, God was waiting for him. God also strengthened Alexei with a wonderful revelation. Suddenly, the Virgin Mary descended from the icon in front of which the young man stood, and bloody battles began on the field of the icon and planes with swastikas flew in. The young man understood that, in addition to the spiritual war, there would soon be an interstate war. When it started, Alexey was evacuated to Taganrog to a factory to make airplanes; However, the Germans occupied the city, and the skinny boy was sent home to the village. And he went and reached, measuring 2 thousand kilometers on foot. The Nazis were also rampant in the Oryol region. One day a German entered the hut, looking for workers to send to Germany. His mother put Alyosha in the stove, forced him to use cast iron, and they never found him. Another time they took him away and put him in a barn with others. But the young man was given a German passport, and he was released, and the rest were all burned alive. Then our troops came, Alexei was sent to study to become an artilleryman, but after three months of study, the medical commission discovered he had a heart defect. He was assigned to work for ZIL. This was in 1943, and Alexey Andreevich Kirsanov worked at the plant for 10 years. I went to the Epiphany Cathedral to pray, and often went to Rev. Sergius. In 1953, Alexey Andreevich, having told his comrades that he was going to get married and would live with his wife, quit the factory. To make the legend more convincing, I left the salary “for now” in the cash register. The comrades were delighted at this step of their friend, since they did not understand his asceticism. And Alexey Andreevich came to the Trinity-Sergius Lavra and asked to become one of the brethren. The rector was then Archimandrite John (Razumov). He sternly tested those who came: “We don’t need someone like that, get out of here!” Some monk intervened: “It’s a holiday the other day, we need someone to wash the dishes.” - “Okay, let him wash it.” Alexey Andreevich was very happy and tried hard. Trinity has arrived. One day the abbot comes to the washing room: “Well, do you like washing plates?” - "Thank you. Really like". They were transferred to the refectories. One day, novice Alexey is distributing lunch, and the cat is spinning under his feet, and he accidentally steps on its paw. The cat screamed in a wild voice throughout the refectory, and the governor said: “Go away, we don’t need such an evil monk! You beat cats, but what will people get from you?” “Well, let me cry... They left me,” says the elder. Then they were transferred to a candle box, already under the abbot Pimen (Izvekov) - the future Patriarch. The abbot himself tonsured Alexei a monk with the name Adrian. Confessor Fr. Adrian became Archimandrite Tikhon. A spiritual and educated person who subtly understands the soul. One day, Father Adrian has a dream: the viceroy’s secretary, Fr. Pimen (Khmelevsky) and says: “You will soon be made a hierodeacon.” Monk Adrian woke up and went to his confessor. The dean is coming towards you. He told him the dream. “Yes,” he says, “Father Pimen just went to the Patriarch for a blessing on this issue.” - “I have no need for rank and dignity, I just want to learn to repent and wash dishes, I don’t need anything more.” - “And you ask, as a confessor.” The confessor blessed me to be ordained for obedience. A few months later the same dream again, but prophesied by the hieromonks. Same consequences and answers. After accepting the priesthood, Fr. Adrian was appointed to confess in the Assumption Church, and the elders Father Cyril and Father Naum administered unction. People came seemingly and invisibly. There are a lot of sick people, and among them there are many demoniacs - terrible, unpredictable people, often useless to anyone, sometimes militant, capable of striking. They were a terrible sight. Then Fr. came. Adrian goes to his confessor and says: “I want to help these people; How can I do that"? - There is such a rite - exorcism of demons, but this requires the blessing of the governor. The governor sent to Patriarch Alexy I (Simansky). Father Adrian drew up a petition in which he outlined his desire to help unfortunate people and asked for the blessing of the First Hierarch. The wise Patriarch understood the love of the young but spiritual shepherd and allowed it. And then Calvary began. Huge crowds of screaming, fighting, half-mad people gathered every day to Father Adrian. These people had no idea about spiritual life; prayer, fasting, confession. We had to teach them this. From 5 in the morning the priest confessed, and then until late in the evening he read prayers for the expulsion of evil spirits. That’s when people understood the immeasurable love of the young elder and the height of his spirit. He “selected” useless people with terrible vices, the hopelessly ill, the poor, and after some time they were transformed. As soon as the priest appeared on the street, sick people were waiting for him everywhere, and he spent hours comforting, instructing, speaking humbly, meekly, lovingly - sometimes dozens of times the same thing to these people, until they understood, corrected themselves, and began correct work on themselves. There was envy, of course, and false denunciations to the abbot. One day Father Superior calls Father Adrian and says: “There are complaints about you, Father Adrian, that you are driving out some kind of demons from mentally ill people.” - “How can this be, father governor? After the “reprimands,” they already work in kindergartens,” the elder answered. What words can convey this sacrifice? I can't, I don't have enough of them. God rewarded Father Adrian with the gifts of insight and healing, and also awarded him with the gifts of prayer and love, which comes from great humility. Crowds of sick people disturbed the beauty of the Lavra, where tourists flocked from all over the world, and in May 1975 the elder was transferred to the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery. The old man had a hard time parting with his beloved Lavra; a stomach ulcer opened up, but he only recovered a little when he again took up helping the sick, and until 1990, again, daily confessions and “readings” of the possessed. Only completely deteriorating health forced me to abandon this. But now the elder, realizing that in this difficult time it is difficult for many to live without his advice, continues to accept people asking for guidance and help in resolving difficult issues.

Tatiana Zotova, 1999,

based on materials from open sources

During illness

...Over the years, the elder began to get sick more and more often. And now rumors are circulating: the priest’s temperature has risen again, and the doctor has forbidden him to continue taking him. The queue is nervous, and the excitement is aggravated by the fact that Lidochka appears again and asks to be let through to the old man “for a second.” - Only over my dead body! - Katya blocks her way. “We came from Siberia to see the elder and we can’t get there.” And you? - Siberians are indignant. But Lidochka doesn’t let up and knocks on the cell window: “Father, dear, they won’t let me in!” - What do you want, Lidochka? - Father Adrian comes out onto the porch. - Father, I just took a bus ticket, but I didn’t take your blessing for the journey. - Hand in your bus ticket. You'll go by train. “I can’t take the train,” Lidochka gets excited. – The train arrives at eleven in the morning, I’ll be late for work! The boss will eat me alive and... “You’ll go by train,” the priest stops this discussion and immediately goes to the local women, blessing them to pick berries. I’ll tell you about the berry pickers a little later, but first about Lidochka. She actually went by train, childishly trusting the experience of the holy fathers, who affirmed: as the Abba blessed, so one must do. And how good it is that there is this trust, because the next morning terrible news came: a drunk KamAZ driver crashed into the bus on which Lydia was going to travel, and there was a lot of blood and casualties. “I will only accept those who are leaving tomorrow,” Father Adrian announces from the porch, inviting me into the cell for some reason.

“Follow Him!”

Elder of the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery Adrian (Kirsanov)

The five of us enter the cell under the whisper of the cell attendant: “Father is sick. We already called an ambulance from Pskov to hospitalize him. Don’t detain the priest, okay?!” But even without the cell attendant’s words, it’s clear that the priest feels bad, and the blessing hand burns with fire. Everyone tries to speak briefly, and only one monk breaks out like a nightingale: “St. Ignatius Brianchaninov also wrote that the true elders are no longer around and even in monasteries they do not know the Jesus Prayer.” - Can you make it shorter? - the cell attendant whispers. - Well, in short, the holy fathers also stated: “Not everyone in the monastery is saved, and not everyone in the world perishes.” Here in our monastery we have not brethren, but lads, and the father governor is a dragon. - So you want to leave the monastery? - asks the priest. – Do you know, brother, that a monk who leaves his monastery is considered a suicide and is even deprived of Christian burial? “Mom is sick,” the monk wilts, “and asks permission to return home.” “My mother asked me the same thing.” And there was, brother, such a story... However, I already know this story from the elder’s Moscow acquaintances. And it was like this. One day, Father Adrian received a tearful letter from his mother, which said: their house burned down, they were now living in a dugout. And in the dugout, when it rained, the water was knee-deep, and the mother became seriously ill. So the mother begged her son to leave the monastery at least for a while, earn some money and build them a house, because there was no one else to expect help from. Father Adrian did not leave the monastery then, but day and night he prayed to St. Nicholas of Myra to help his sick mother. I don’t know how long he prayed, but suddenly they bring him a bag with money, and in the bag there is a note asking him to give this money to the monk’s mother, whose house burned down. Who sent this money is still unknown. But when, having bought a house, Fr. Adriana began to examine it, then she discovered a large icon of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker in the attic, and the saint smiled at her. “It’s hard for you, brother, I understand,” the priest consoles the monk and puts a bundle of money in his pocket. “Here they gave me the money, and you gave it to my mother so that the medicines are the best and the food is good.” The main thing is to believe - the Lord will not leave you. “I’m dying, father,” the monk cries. “I want to be saved, but I condemn everyone.” - And to this I’ll say this... But they don’t let them finish - an ambulance has arrived. And the priest is still trying to continue the reception, now turning to me: “Please answer this letter.” I take from my father an unopened letter from the famous champion athlete, from which I later learn: after a spinal injury, the athlete was paralyzed. No treatment helps, but she believes in God, was baptized in infancy, and a priest she knows gives her communion at home. “Write to her,” the priest dictates the answer, “that she is unbaptized.” And that she was baptized in infancy, she is mistaken. Now many people make this mistake. And after baptism she will feel better - and look, she will get better. “Father, but you didn’t read the letter and didn’t even open it,” I am perplexed. -Didn’t you read it? - the elder is surprised and gives the last instructions: - Without me, go to Father John (Krestyankin). He is spiritual, and who am I? These used to be great elders, but now there are only old men left. Much later, Archimandrite John (Krestyankin) will write to me in a letter: “Father Adrian is a true elder, and I am only a counselor.” And word for word he will repeat what Father Adrian said about the great old men of old and the old men of today, meaning himself. The elders sometimes speak the same way, but they are very different. Archimandrite John had the gift of speech, and at that time eminent intellectuals often came to him to listen to the wise teachings of the elder. And those wretched people, where life is sorrow upon sorrow and are overcome by illness, are increasingly drawn to Father Adrian. - Why do you follow me in droves? - the priest laments. – I’m not Panteleimon the Healer. Lord, there is no peace and they don’t allow me to pray. There really is no peace for the priest. And now the ambulance is crowded with people. The women cry, feeling sorry for the priest. And Father Adrian gives them the supplies he has prepared for the journey as a consolation, handing me a bag of fruit as well. “Father, our house is full of fruit,” I refuse. – It’s better to give some spiritual advice in the end. - What are you talking about? - About how to live. - How to live? - Father thinks. And he speaks heartfeltly, as they say about personal things: “And you live simply.” Look where Christ's feet go and follow Him. The ambulance takes the priest to the regional hospital, and I suddenly understand that Christ’s feet lead to Calvary. This is a narrow path, but there is no other way.

Author:

Tatiana
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Laborer at the harvest. In memory of the Pechersk Elder Adrian

Whom have we lost in this world and gained as a prayer book in the other world - in the person of Archimandrite Adrian (Kirsanov) who died in April? This resident of the Holy Dormition Pskovo-Pechersky Monastery, the spiritual mentor of the monks of the monastery and thousands of Orthodox people in Russia and around the world, was sometimes called “Adrian Besogon,” sometimes “comforting elder,” and even more simply and often “dear father.” Many of us were his contemporaries (as well as the previously deceased Pechersk Elder John (Krestyankin)), but due to spiritual laziness we never came to the monastery for communication and advice. Otherwise we didn’t even suspect what lamps of faith were burning next to us. But even now each of us can warm up and be enlightened by these fires. After all, they shine and warm from those shores to those who demand it with their hearts.

Archimandrite Adrian (Kirsanov)

The long-familiar, stone-paved descent of the “bloody path” - from the monastery gates to the Assumption Church and the “God-created caves”, in the cold darkness of which a host of deceased monks and worldly benefactors of the monastery rest until the Second Coming. In the cave niche, framed with flowers, there is an open window (so you can touch the coffin with your hand). This is the grave of Elder John, to which his many spiritual children come and fall. And in the next corridor, to the right of the underground Church of the Resurrection of the Word, in the brick lining there is another window and a completely new house. On the forties, a memorial plaque made of white stone with a gilded inscription appeared here: “Archimandrite Adrian. 1922-2018". I touch the coffin, asking the newly deceased elder for help...

man of God

Having gone to church in his youth, he was honored with a prophetic vision during the service.

In the book of his life, the stages of personal spiritual growth are imprinted in the harsh chronicle of Russian life of the last century. Alexey Andreevich Kirsanov comes from Oryol peasants, and since childhood he has experienced full hardships and sorrows. After the death of the father, the family's poverty turned into poverty. It happened that they asked for alms so as not to die of hunger. Once, in his adolescence and youth, he found himself in the only church in Orel, he - then still an unbeliever - during the service he was honored with a prophetic vision. An abyss opened up before his feet. Archangel Michael showed him where the atheists and unrepentant sinners would go; the boy saw a whole spiritual battle, which was later embodied in reality in his life. After this, young Alexey began to call the people around him to repentance. As a result, he was placed in a psychiatric clinic for some time.

However, this did not stop him from soon getting a job as a mechanic at a power plant. With the beginning of the war, he ended up in Taganrog, where he served aircraft at a military airfield. Before the city was captured by the Germans, he took part in mining and explosion of workshops.

Then - escape from encirclement to his native Oryol region, where Alyosha was hiding at home and in the forests with the partisans. When the Soviet troops advanced, an artilleryman with a military profession joined their ranks. I survived shelling and saw death and suffering up close more than once. He was transferred to Kolomna to guard howitzers, but was soon discharged due to heart disease.

The Lord, as he himself said, saved him from killing at least one person in the war, destining him for high service. Kirsanov became a blacksmith-fitter in the forge shop at the Likhachev plant, where he worked until 1953. He went to pray at the Epiphany Cathedral in Elokhov, and often went to the Holy Trinity Sergius Lavra. Alexei led a lonely life, did not drink or smoke, and the dream of a monastic life grew stronger in his soul. The girls looked at the handsome, strong guy and tried to seduce him; his workmates also tried to marry him off so that he could “be like everyone else,” and they were very angry when they failed. One day the girls, angry at his inattention, climbed into his room and spat in a jar of holy water. After which... they fell ill with a temperature of about forty. Having confessed their actions to Alyosha, they soon recovered through his prayers.

Saved by Nikolai Ugodnik, to whom he prayed with all his might

And somehow, at Epiphany, a real miraculous salvation happened in his life. On the river, where he went to get holy water and take a dip, the ice broke under his feet, and Alexei, as he was, in his clothes, went straight to the bottom. He was saved by Nikolai Ugodnik, to whom he prayed with all his might, “as if he had pulled him up by the hair.” After this incident, the worker Kirsanov firmly decided to go to the monastery.

But he was able to do this only in 1953, going to the Trinity-Sergius Lavra. At the same time, he delighted the factory workers he knew, saying that he was going to get married in another city and would live there. He quit the factory and, confirming his legend, left his salary “for a while” in the cash register.

A young, poorly educated worker was accepted into the monastery “with difficulty” to serve as a dishwasher, which Alexey was incredibly happy about. He was accepted into the ranks of the brethren by the then governor, Archimandrite John (Razumov), later Metropolitan of Pskov and Porkhov. After some time, the humble novice was transferred to the refectory. He did not leave the monastery, even when his sick mother, reporting that the house had burned down, asked him to earn money for a new home by leaving the monastery at least for a while. Instead, he began to pray intensely to St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, and the miracle did not slow down: after a short time, he was unexpectedly given a bag with money and an anonymous note - to give it to “the mother of a monk whose house burned down.” He was tonsured a monk in 1957 with the name Adrian by the next governor of the Lavra, the future Patriarch, Archimandrite Pimen (Izvekov). In 1961, he was ordained as a priest.

Father Adrian confessed in the Assumption Church, observing every day the spiritually sick - the possessed: despised, useless people who came to the monastery in large numbers, expecting at least some kind of help. Since he himself had suffered a lot in life, he took the suffering of others to heart. Sincerely feeling sorry for the unfortunate ones and having received a blessing from his confessor, Elder Kirill (Pavlov), he began to reprimand them for the special rite of expelling evil spirits. There is evidence (first of all, the personal one of Father Adrian himself) about the verbal blessing for this service from His Holiness Patriarch Alexy I (Simansky).

From the very morning, crowds of strange, sometimes insane people, who were rioting from the proximity of the shrine, gathered at his cell. During the exorcism procedure, it was scary for an unprepared person to enter the temple: the possessed grunted, screamed in voices that were not their own, and fell to the floor. And in those years the Lavra was one of the main places visited by foreign delegations. For some time, “Adrian’s disorder” began to irritate the church, and especially the party authorities. Either an American tourist suddenly, with the approach of the priest, will begin to cover ten floors with Russian obscenities, or something else out of the ordinary will happen.

The patience of the Commissioner for Religious Affairs of the Moscow Region, Alexei Trushin, was put to the limit by one egregious incident. A guide accompanying a group of official tourists (with KGB shoulder straps) “brought the clergy out into the open,” accompanying this with various ridicule. Father Adrian was passing by at that time. Seeing him, the merry fellow suddenly folded his hands like a dog and barked naturally. The tourists, thinking that this was a continuation of comic escapades, applauded, and he, trying to stop, began to grab himself by the throat, turn purple, and suffocate. Father Adrian approached and covered the joker with his stole, after which he fell silent for a while. And then he gave the frightened atheist a full-fledged “reprimand.” Delivered from the demon and becoming a frequent guest of his deliverer, the KGB officer turned into a very inconvenient witness for the authorities to the reality of the spiritual world.

The all-powerful boss ordered to “move Adrian’s priest” to hell within 24 hours

Summoning the Lavra exorcist to his place, Trushin asked: “Can you reprimand me too?” The priest replied: “If it is necessary, I will reprimand you too.” Then the all-powerful boss ordered within 24 hours to “move Adrian’s priest” to hell.

In 1975, the future elder was actually exiled to the distant Pskov-Pechersky Monastery. He suffered greatly, parting with his native abode, and a peptic ulcer developed. At the same time, whether he would be accepted into the new place as a resident depended on the local commissioner for religious affairs. The issue was resolved immediately when Father Adrian opened his robe and showed the official on his cassock an impressive row of medals that he received as a war veteran and labor shock worker. Many of the Pechersk brothers were at that time front-line soldiers and order bearers.

Earlier, when he was still a resident of the Lavra, Father Adrian faced a spiritual fork in the road: whether to stay in the cenobitic monastery or go into the desert. He visited the Glinsky elders, traveled to the mountains of Abkhazia to visit the hermits. Then, due to human slander and the machinations of the evil one, a real miracle worker was expelled from the Sergius Monastery - Archimandrite Tikhon (Agrikov), who settled in a remote cell in the Abkhazian mountains. Father Adrian reached him along with another monk who wanted a desert life. Instead of a verbal answer to their question, the hermit Tikhon poured a mug of compote for Adrian’s companion, and placed a whole pan in front of him. The direction of further monastic destiny immediately became clear to both.

Assumption Pskov-Pechersky Monastery. Summer 1970

The settlement of the exiled “troublemaker” in his new monastery did not go smoothly. The imperious Archimandrite Gabriel, who was then the governor, humbled the Lavra for quite a long time, placing him in a common cell and oppressing him in every possible way. One day the Commissioner for Religious Affairs arrived and began to ask him specifically about his relationship with the abbot: “they even say there are complaints from you.” And he responded with fear: “What are you talking about, what complaints! No complaints, I'm happy with everything." After this incident, the governor called him and ordered him to move to an individual cell - it seems like he passed the test. Father Adrian endured all these circumstances meekly and soon resumed the practice of scolding the possessed, continuing it until 1994.

He left exorcism because it was already beyond his physical strength. Three years earlier, Archimandrite Sophrony (Sakharov), a student of St. Silouan of Athos, advised him to stop “reprimanding” him in a letter three years earlier. “It’s like shedding blood,” he wrote. In addition, Father Adrian increasingly began to encounter cases where people whom he had delivered from demons, without repenting or changing their lives, fell into even worse temptations.

One day he received a letter screaming: “Give me back my daughter!” This was written by the mother of a girl who, several years earlier, seemed to have successfully survived the exorcism of a demon. Having freed herself from the formidable “monk”, the girl, overjoyed, stopped praying, going to church, and began to lead a riotous life. It turned out that the demons seemed to simply laugh at the old man. Then he called seven spirits more evil than himself, and together they entered into man. And his last state was worse than his first (cf. Matt. 12:43-45). Such cases were isolated, but they greatly upset Father Adrian.

The rumor about the elder’s foresight spread far beyond the borders of the country.

For the last quarter of a century, Archimandrite Adrian has received pilgrims who came to him in ever-increasing numbers with their questions and troubles. The rumor about the elder’s foresight and miraculous healings through his prayers spread, going far beyond the borders of the country. The Mother of God herself, to strengthen him, at the request of Father Adrian, sent him a cross, which he one morning discovered on his pillow. With it he blessed oil, which healed many.

The elder's modesty was amazing. "And who am I? - he sometimes wondered at those who addressed him with reverence. — All sorts of people come to me. From Canada, from Europe... The governor presented me with a certificate. What about me? I’m sitting in my cell, doing nothing.”

For the last fifteen years he has never left his cell, receiving people every day. They gave him communion there. And the whole cell was 15 square meters...

Conversations about the Elder

Why do people become monks? Why do people come to the monastery as pilgrims, stay as laborers, and become novices? — There is peace in the monastery. Not the one you are looking for in the village after the bustle of the city, but some other one - real, perhaps, like the threshold of those abodes, “where there is neither sadness nor sighing.” But it is also found in a difficult struggle with one’s passions and weaknesses, in a real war with the spirits of evil in heaven, who do not want the salvation of human souls. It is not for nothing that patristic literature defines monks as spiritual warriors with their own “shield” and “sword.”

The duty of a monk is to pray not only for himself, but also for the whole world. But only a select few have the gift of direct spiritual help to other people, including those far from the faith. These are called elders.

In the Petrovskaya gazebo at the top of the monastery’s Holy Mountain, Hierodeacon Nikon, Hieromonk Joasaph and Abbot Chrysanthus, Elder Adrian’s cell attendant, share their memories of the deceased elder.

The domes and crosses below glow brightly in the sun, the wind moves the leaves in the crowns, and the birds punctuate our conversation with a silent, multi-voiced chorus.

“I’ve been in Pechery for 30 years and I’ve known Father all these years,” says Father Nikon. “Many of the brothers came to him. Just like Father John. But to the second - for solving a confusing everyday or complex spiritual issue, and to the first - with everyday monastic needs. Father Adrian healed gently and with love - truly in a fatherly way... You come, you think - the grief is insoluble: the governor shouted, the dean made a remark - now they will kick you out. You confess to the priest, he will pray - and look, after a couple of hours everything has resolved...

People left him inspired, as if resurrected

The effectiveness of his prayer was clear. He often solved complex questions of the laity, which ordinary monks would be afraid to approach, with two or three simple words. And he gave examples all the time in the third person, only then did you understand that the story applied specifically to you - he didn’t have any random words. People left him inspired, as if resurrected. It was such an everyday miracle.

Adrian's father's communication style often seemed paradoxical. Sometimes he will calmly listen to the words of his interlocutor about some serious things, but he will attach himself to the seemingly real little things - he will begin to develop, emphasize. And then it turns out that these are not trifles at all.

The gift of foresight goes without saying. I once went outside the walls of the monastery to collect grass, and the governor caught me AWOL. I told him: “Here, I only went out for five minutes,” and he told me: “Write an explanatory note.” I came to Father Adrian to complain - and received the answer: “You would have said: Father is the governor, I went out for five minutes and walked through the forest for two hours.” And that’s exactly what happened! That is, I lied, and the elder “corrected” me, as if he were next to me.

I ask about a definition that has been popular for some time: why was Father John called the “Easter Father”, and Father Adrian the “Lenten Father”?

“Father John didn’t walk, but flew straight from the church to his cell,” Father Nikon answers, smiling at the memories . “His every word shone with joy, with his smile he warmed everyone. Father Adrian was restrained and outwardly seemingly stern, although he could warm the heart no worse. I would call him not a “Lenten” man, but a “comforting old man.” Father John loved Father Adrian very much. I remember he runs towards him with a hug - he hugs him to himself, and in response he babbles something tongue-tied. It was touching to see them together! They kiss and go their separate ways. Sometimes the elders sent parishioners to each other. Father Adrian said in such cases: “Go to Ivan with this.” That's what he called him...

“I remember well the meeting of two great elders, when Father Adrian was still walking,” Abbot Chrysanthos enters into the conversation . “She is captured in the now famous photograph.” Father Adrian went out into the street one day - well, just like some kind of tramp. A woolen jacket rolled up into balls, hands in pockets, gloomy, elbow sticking out, back bent... And then Father John flew at him - all round, fast, glowing - and let's hug him, whisper something in his ear. It was truly impossible to look at this without tears of tenderness... The two of them had different forms of achievement, but the same content, the same closeness to God. What we can call “Easter”, Father Adrian skillfully hid.

Archimandrite John (Peasant)

“Father John (Krestyankin) was such a bright star that in his backlight many did not notice the other great elders who labored in our monastery,” adds Father Nikon. “And Father Adrian was also, as it were, in his shadow. But only until the person himself has communicated with him, especially with a serious problem. You go out to the construction site, and there Fathers Dionysius and Plato are working. Completely inconspicuous to outsiders. And these are spiritual giants! And there were about a dozen such lights in Pechery. And there are even more concentrated, spiritually experienced monks with persecutions and prisons behind them. We lived in this every day and thought that it would always be like this. And they all started leaving from the beginning of this century...

“I was already a churchgoer when I was advised to meet Elder Adrian in Moscow,” recalls Father Joasaph. “He didn’t make any impression on me then: he started showing pictures that a person has a soul... But I knew that myself... All beginners want some kind of visible miracles, esoteric revelations... But still, I later came to him in Pechory several times, and on one of them he blessed me to go to the army, where I, like my friends, had no intention of going. But for some reason I believed him. And it so happened that this was exactly what turned my life around. You know, it was as if Father Adrian switched the switch - and the train went along a different path, eventually arriving here at the monastery. After the army, I was no longer interested in my previous hobbies and friends, and after a while, with his blessing, I found myself here...

Probably, any monk is haunted until the end of his life by the temptation to leave the monastery for another place, where the abbot will be kinder and his spiritual growth will be stronger,” Father Joasaph continues to reflect. - Well, like any family man - get a divorce, throw off the cross given by the Lord, look for something better. The prayers of Father Adrian stopped such temptations and pacified the souls of many monks.

And sometimes it happened that a person came to the elder with a question, began to communicate with him - and there seemed to be no question. And he leaves - and the question is right there again. This is because next to the elder one felt deep peace of mind. The elders are different in that they know a lot, but say little... Only what is needed.

When unmarried people asked about family life, he didn’t even want to talk to them: “Get married - then come.” There were cases when I didn’t want to accept anyone, “but you, boy, come in.” Moreover, he sometimes called, without seeing him in person, through the wall, who exactly to invite. I felt who really needed it.

He often answered instantly and as if without thinking. Including “stupid” questions like: “Father, which cow should I get - a spotted one or a red one?” He immediately: “Red one, take the red one!” - “My buttons flew off...” - “Well, sew it on!” And all this with patience, love, without the slightest mockery... But, I remember, and complained in recent years: “Everyone asks how to get married, how to sell a house, buy cattle - and almost no one wants to find out how their passion is... then overcome...”

I asked my interlocutors about the elder’s “predictions,” which were widely distributed on the Internet at one time.

Terrible events can be - through the prayers of the righteous - delayed or canceled

“Father Adrian did not make any detailed political predictions that began to be attributed to him on the networks,” answers Father Joasaph. - From short remarks, pilgrim-dreamers sometimes unfolded entire apocalyptic pictures. So, in the 1990s, for several years in a row, indeed, almost every year, he prophesied war. And then suddenly he stopped, and to the questions: “Will there be a war?” began to answer clearly: “No, it won’t.” This means not only that the elders can make mistakes, but also that in the High Council, terrible events can be - by the grace of God, through the prayers of the righteous - delayed or even canceled. It is obvious that God's people are feeling these changes.

“Fr. Adrian suddenly said to one monk: “Misha, you will die after Easter,” Father Nikon recalls by the way. - Misha almost fainted and began to cry. Easter passed one, two, three, we forgot about it all. This monk went to Moscow to the Sretensky Monastery. And there, one day after Easter, he actually died tragically.

What is a miracle

Hegumen Chrysanthus (Lipilin) The cell attendant in the monastery is practically the closest relative. Therefore, with special feeling, trying to be tactful, I ask about the elder abbot Chrysanthos, who carried out this obedience for 12 years.

“From the second or third day of my life at the monastery, in 1991, I found myself connected with Father Adrian,” answers Father Chrysanthos. “Our communication smoothly flowed from my spiritual questioning into closer, more intimate forms and ended with a cell service with him. When, due to weakness, he finished serving the liturgy on his own, the two of us, together with one already deceased priest, gave the elder communion and helped him in his everyday life and serving people.

I’m wondering: “What was he like for you?”

The abbot, thoughtful, admits that in the rich Russian language there are no words for an answer. After a pause, Father Chrysanthos continues:

“I treated him as my father and my child at the same time.” Of course, at the same time, it was difficult to fully get used to the fact that I seemed to be made of glass: my every step, every movement of my soul was visible to the elder. But it was simply impossible to be annoyed with him for certain inconveniences. I, like others, was attracted to it by its deep content, which could be learned endlessly.

“I’ll say a strange thing,” he continues, “for me, almost nothing has changed with his departure.” Although I don’t see him now, as I used to, every day, and now I can’t hear anyone behind the wall of the cell... But I don’t agree to consider this death - in the sense that we mean by this word!

People often treat such lamps selfishly, without thinking about the source of their powers, thinks Abbot Chrysanthos. “Even when the old man was once taken away by ambulance, the people who came to see him managed to ask their questions at the car door. And he answered as best he could! It’s as if you were already hanging on a cross, and they were tugging at your fingers with requests... Sometimes the pressure was such that you had to somehow shield him - with strength, but without rudeness. But I never influenced his decisions to accept or not accept someone, and I could not have done so. Who am I to “edit” his ministry? I had obedience, I was his “crutch”.

For years, some locals asked him how to store potatoes, when to pick berries... This, of course, was sometimes unbearable. But the elder endured all this, understanding the degree of spiritual ill-health of the people, covering it all with love.

A miracle is a powerful and overt act of God's power in our world.

—Have I seen miracles from the elder? - the abbot asks me again. - Certainly. But I wouldn't want you to reduce your description to the level that journalists love: look, he predicted, he foresaw, he exorcised the demon. A miracle is a powerful and overt act of God's power in our world. And in this sense, every conversation of the priest was a miracle, transforming the soul of his interlocutors.

I remember well one conversation with Father Adrian, when, being still very young and worldly, I was just taking a closer look at monastic life, and sang with a blessing in the choir. I went to see him one evening and asked something, and he answered me with something completely different: “Don’t go to two services, otherwise your legs will hurt.” But I had a choice in this sense, and indeed, troubles began with my legs. And then I naively ask him: “How do you know this?” He smiled and suddenly we both started laughing at the same time. I am because it’s all so great: it’s as if a new endless world has opened up before me. And he - apparently because of my naivety and, perhaps, sharing the joy of my discovery. I was 20, and he was 69 - we stood and laughed. This was the very first miracle in our communication...

Well, and another episode, one might say, is simply stupid: at one time I was too carried away by listening to the radio, and I was amused by the speech of the presenter, which penetrated into my consciousness: “And if something doesn’t work out, then the khan will rule.” I walk and spin this expression in my head, smiling to myself. I went to Father Adrian for some business, and he, answering my question, unexpectedly finished: “And if not, then, as the criminals say, it’s a khan.” I then looked at my watch: 20 minutes had passed—that’s the “flight time.”

Once I witnessed the priest expel an evil spirit with just three words. I went to his reception room - and there - a rare case! - few people. A woman stands there and doesn’t say anything, but it’s clear from a distance that she’s possessed. Father called her closer and said sternly: “Come out, demon!” And he answers from her in a rough guttural voice: “I won’t leave.” Father Adrian repeated the order - again a refusal. He said the same thing (without raising his voice) for the third time - the woman swayed and fell, healed. And right before my eyes, such a vibration flew by, a flickering of the air - towards the exit. And at that same second, all the birds sitting on the monastery roofs and church crosses flew into the air screaming...

It is clear that the fallen spirits tried to take revenge on the priest for his work. And at night the door of the cell was pounded, and other insurances and dirty tricks happened. But Father Adrian took this quite calmly.

In his external manner of communication, he often resorted to the image of an unreasonable simpleton, recalls Father Chrysanthos. “If I felt a spiritual pull in my interlocutor, I would reveal my depth to him.

At the end of his life, the priest was left with practically no teeth, but rejected the dentures offered to him. This is how he humbled himself and sometimes made himself “bad.” This caused certain difficulties in communicating with people: he lisped and mumbled. Not everyone understood this manner. But this was a kind of filter from superficial people. If necessary, he clearly pronounced words that were important to the person.

For several decades he lived in full view of people,” says the elder’s cell attendant. — While I was able, I could receive visitors every day for many hours in a row, without food or rest. For a monk, who by definition seeks prayer and solitude, this is a difficult test...

In recent years and especially months, Father Adrian seemed to be “praying for time” - forcing himself to do something else in spiritual work, to help someone, but the main thing had already been determined in his personal relationship with God, with the Most Holy Theotokos. And they clearly had a direct connection. We, monks, tried not to occupy his prayer time with any of our own problems.

His mind and memory remained clear until the last hour, but his soul seemed to be getting younger,” recalls Father Chrysanthos. “On the night before his death, the priest, with a high fever and experiencing physical suffering, found the strength for a diligent confession. And in the morning, shortly before repose, he took communion, having listened to all the rites and prayers of thanks with attention and even some kind of decisive prayer.

After another pause, Abbot Chrysanthos seemed to sum up what had been said:

The appearance of such personalities among us suggests that God never turns away from people

— Elder Adrian, thanks to his righteous life, received grace and a gift from above - to clearly hear the voice of God. This is what he clearly presented to those who came, without introducing anything of his own. The appearance of such personalities among us suggests that God never turns away from people. But people often turn away from God, even in view of his lamps.

I ask my interlocutors a question that has been on the tip of the tongue for a long time, fully understanding its naivety combined with banality: “What do you think about the fact that Father Adrian has already been called “the last Pechersk elder” in many media?

“These definitions—“the last elder,” “the penultimate elder”—are very vain and superficial,” answers Abbot Chrysanthus. — For the appearance of ascetics in the world, human components are important. At the very beginning of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra, there lived 30 monks who could cast out a demon with one word. And now even one or two such spiritual warriors are a miracle. All those ascetics who recently lived in the Pskov-Pechersk Lavra went through the persecution of the Soviet era, through the war. Now the time is different: there is no external totalitarianism, no oppression of the Church by the authorities. On the other hand, now they are no longer taking cities, but are hunting for the hearts of people, and there is a total defeat of human souls. Therefore, the life of God’s chosen ones also became different - more hidden, less bright outwardly. And the miracles that never stop happening have also acquired a more subtle form. But I think that the proportions of the presence of such chosen ones in the world are unchanged.

For the new elders to shine, it is necessary that people want to hear spiritual admonition

“There really are no recognized and publicly known elders in the monastery now,” clarifies Hieromonk Joasaph. “But there are righteous people, of course: without them, even a village, according to the proverb, is not worthwhile, let alone a monastery.” Maybe one of them is a hidden elder whom the Lord has not yet revealed. This is a two-way road... For example, as a priest, I say something to a person at Confession and I feel: he does not hear me, he mumbles his own.

For the new elders to shine, it is necessary that people want to hear spiritual admonition, so that there is, so to speak, a “demand from below.” And now he is clearly weakened...

As the Gospel says: The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Pray that the Lord will send laborers into the harvest (Matthew 9:36-38). The elders are these “workers”, the heirs of the apostles.

***

On June 6, Father Adrian’s fortieth birthday, the sun was shining brightly in the monastery, and a bird choir sounded from both sides as a festive antiphon. In addition to the brethren, about 300 people came from the city, from different parts of the country, and even from abroad (there were about 1,500 at the funeral) for the memorial liturgy and subsequent memorial service. The Divine Liturgy and memorial service in the Sretensky Church of the monastery was led by the new holy archimandrite of the Pskov-Pechersk monastery, Metropolitan of Pskov and Porkhov Tikhon (Shevkunov), as well as the vicar of the Pskov Metropolis, Bishop Thomas (Demchuk) of Gdov.

Father Adrian, now standing at the Throne of God in snow-white robes, of course, heard these prayers, rejoicing at all the “children” who came to remember him. It seems that in the future, to all those who come to Pechory to bow to his grave with love, gratitude, and heartfelt need, the deceased elder will not refuse his blessing, and perhaps even spiritual advice and healing. The main thing is to believe!

Andrey Samokhin
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