Ioanuts-Daniel Barbu
St. Seraphim is known and venerated in Romania. There are fourteen books published about the Sarov elder in the Romanian language. Of these, thirteen are translations from Russian, English, French, and Greek. The most popular translation is the book of the Englishman Archimandrite Lazarus (Moore): St. Seraphim of Sarov: A Spiritual Biography. There is a Romanian website dedicated to St. Seraphim of Sarov where you can read recent articles about him.
Monasteries, sketes, parishes, and charitable foundations have been founded in Romania in recent times in the name of St. Seraphim—for example, the Eșanca women’s monastery near the city of Iași. There is a piece of the relics of this Russian saint in the famous men’s monastery of Sihăstria Putnei, as in other sketes and parishes.
... still under the Communist authorities, information about the life and teachings of St. Seraphim was able to enter from the West, in particular through Romanian graduate students who had studied theology in European universities, mainly in France. The Russian emigration left a significant footprint there, influencing Orthodox life and theology in the West. One of these students was His Beatitude Daniel, the current patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church. His Beatitude referred to the teachings of St. Seraphim several times in his graduate thesis, which he defended in 1979 at the University of Strasbourg.
Veneration for St. Seraphim in the Romanian Orthodox Church is also expressed in poetic form. In 1957, St. John (Jacob) the New Chozebite (1913-1960) dedicated profound spiritual verses to the Russian saint: Tears on the Icon of St. Seraphim:
Venerable Seraphim, earthly angel, gazing down from Heaven upon the suffering!
Look how your people are suffering, afflicted by bloodsuckers, and how so many of your orphaned children wander.
To Sarov and Diveyevo there is no path today, and darkness reigns in your vineyard, And poor orphans, like bees from a “bear,”1 are scattered throughout alien countries, and the spring2 has dried up.
Two-legged beasts have ravaged your garden, and the sick can no longer quench their thirst at your fountain. Tame “the bear,” giving him your grace; free your people from the bondage of evil.
Irrigate with holy water from the Heavenly Sarov the faith of those who are languishing in prison.
Enlighten the poor bees, removed from their hive, towards goodness, that they might know their mother.
Endow them, Batiushka, with your heavenly joy and by your fervent love warm the lonely. And grant the suffering to see the glory of Jerusalem, Venerable Seraphim.
Shepherd, strengthen those gathered, with all the hosts of the saints, to labor for the salvation of the oppressed people.
And as you were a source of peace here, on earth, so intercede now to send light to us who cry out to you.
This tradition of venerating St. Seraphim of Sarov, planted in Romania at the beginning of the preceding century, gave its fruit at the end of the twentieth and beginning of the twenty-first. After 1990, the Romanian faithful began to go on pilgrimages to Diveyevo, new translations of the life of St. Seraphim began to appear, and churches were built in his honor.
The holy Sarov elder abides in Romania; and priests, monastics, and the faithful greatly love him. The enthusiastic response of Romanian pilgrims who have visited St. Seraphim-Diveyevo Monastery and venerated St. Seraphim’s holy relics bears witness to this.
In Diveyevo you experience a state of apostolic zeal such as there was in the beginning of Christianity. There are hundreds of sisters in the monastery and its sketes—you don’t often see such monasteries today, when the attraction to monasticism has weakened. “If you desire to become a monk, become like fire,” said the great Romanian elder Hieromonk Arsenie (Boca, 1910-1989), who is often compared with St. Seraphim. Diveyevo Monastery is alive, like the Burning Bush, having inherited this fire of faith from its spiritual father, whose monastic name—Seraphim—means “fiery.” The priests serving in the monastery, the mothers at the services and at their obediences, the glittering purity of the churches, the flowers growing everywhere, the lush, eye-pleasing gardens, and especially the glorious tombs of the nuns who have departed to the Lord, continually testify to the joy of serving the Creator. And, of course, to walk the holy canal is remarkable. Walking this path of the Theotokos in silence, almost no one is ever in a hurry. It seems there isn’t even any time on the canal, and no need to say anything. You can understand there just how precious silence is—a virtue of which there is not enough in the bustling modern world.
Ioanuts-Daniel Barbu
Translated by Jesse Dominick
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