Saints of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church

Holy Ukrainian Hierarchs of Kozak Ancestry

In the Kyivan Baroque era, there arose a special Choir of Saints who truly revived Orthodox spirituality and missionary vision.  Many of them were tonsured at the Kyivan Caves Lavra.  Chief among them is St. Dmytri Tuptalo, Metropolitan of Rostov, a most Holy Orthodox Bishop and Ascetic who wrote movingly and warmly about devotion to Christ and His most Holy Mother.  He wrote the full Lives of the Saints which continues to inspire generations of Orthodox (and other) believers.  

Taras Shevchenko, the Ukrainian national poet and bard, read from the works of St. Dmytri which inspired his poetry. St. Dmytri always prayed the prayer to the Mother of God, “Rejoice, Theotokos Virgin” at the turn of each and every hour, even at night.  He practised unceasingly the Prayer of Jesus and was, in every way, a true teacher and Doctor of the Church as well as gracious pastor of his flock and the Ukrainian Church.  There is a Saint associated with St Dmytri, St Kornelius of Pereyaslavl, for Whom he had a great veneration, Whose holy relics Dmytri examined in his capacity as Metropolitan and whose process of Glorification he was in charge of.

Others in this same tradition are:  St. John Maximovitch, Metropolitan of Siberia, St. Paul Koniuskevich, St. Joasaph Horlenko, St. Sophrony Krystalsky and St. Tikhon Zadonsky, who worked among the Don Kozaks as a great witness to the power of Gospel simplicity.