Venerable Schema-Igumen John of Valamo

Schema-Igumen John (Russian: Схиигумен Иоанн, Finnish: Skeemaigumeeni Johannes, born Ivan Alekseyevich Alekseyev, Russian: Иван Алексеевич Алексеев; 26 February 1873, village Gubka, Novotorzhsky Uyezd, Tver Governorate, Russian Empire – 5 June 1958, New Valamo, Heinävesi, Finland), canonized as St. John of Valamo (Finnish: Johannes Valamolainen, Russian: Иоанн Валаамский), was a monk in both Old Valamo and New Valamo and the head of the Petsamo Monastery. Some of his letters, containing many pieces of spiritual advice have been published in English in a book called Christ in Our Midst. Letters from a Russian Monk. Fr. John was born to a peasant family in Russia in the Tver Guberniya on 26 February 1873, and his lay name was Ivan Alekseevich Alekseev. The family consisted of the parents and a sister and two brothers, in addition to Ivan. Young Ivan learned to read, taught by a tailor who visited his house and worked on furs there. In his own memoirs, he said he was not a very good student and that his sister learned the Russian letters before him, but in the end he, too, learned to read. Ivan soon developed a liking to reading and acquired Lives of the Saints, published as small booklets. Together with his parents, he often visited e.g. the famous Volokolamsk Monastery. There he idea took root in his mind that he, too, would come to live in a monastery. At the age of thirteen, Ivan Alekseev left home and went to St. Petersburg and began to work in a bar owned by his elder brother; there he would see the dark side of the human nature in all its wretchedness. He said much later, that for a future spiritual guide, there would not have been a better place to get acquainted with the joys and sorrows of human life, especially with its agony and anxiety. In St. Petersburg he bought many new books. From St. Petersburg, life took young Ivan through the Konevets Monastery to the Valamo Monastery, where in 1889 at the age of 16, he became a novice.