The skete of All Saints
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Skete of All Saints in the winter.
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The skete of All Saints, or Bolshoi,
is the oldest in Valaam. Supposedly in its place, 3.5 km from the monastery, stood
the secluded hermitage of St. Alexander of Svir. To commemorate this place, Abbot
Nazary built a stone church and cells. The skete became famous for its hermits: elders
Kleopa, Feodor and Leonid. Among their disciples were hieromonk Varlaam, adherent
of silence and continuous prayer, Abbot to be, and hieromonk Eufimy, a librarian
and the instructor of father Damaskin, in whose lifetime all buildings remaining
in the skete were erected. Knowing how harmful to ones health natural stone cells
could be, Abbot Damaskin ordered built the prior's house, a refectory and six
monks' houses, walls with Holy Gates, and a fenced chapel (designed supposedly
by K.I. Brandt, who was to become St. Petersburg eparchial architect). The construction
work, accomplished in 1842-1844, was sponsored by F.F. Nabilkov, a merchant from
Fridrichsham (Hamina). In 1846, A.M. Gornostajev designed a five-domed two-storey
church with a hipped belfry in the old Russian style with Byzantine and classical
elements. The lower church was consecrated in honour of All Saints by father Ignaty
(Bryanchaninov).
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The strict rules of the skete did not
allow milk in non-lenten days before 1894, women could get there only once a year,
on the patron saint's day, All Saints' day. Part of the church plate, including
icons painted by V.P. Poshehonov, is in Finland now. Today monastic life in accordance
with the old rule is resumed in the skete, on All Saints'day, 1993, Abbot Pankraty
offered a liturgy in the lower church, the first liturgy after fifty years of 'miserable
desolation'.
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