18th century
Saint Tikhon of Zadonsk
An eighteenth-century Russian bishop and spiritual writer, known for his pastoral work at Voronezh and his final years at the Zadonsk monastery.
Biography
Tikhon, born Timothy Sokolov, came into the world in 1724 to a poor deacon's family near Novgorod. He lost his father early and grew up in hardship, studying at public expense at the local seminary, where he stood out enough to be made a teacher before he had even graduated.
He became a monk in 1758 and a few years later was elected bishop after a drawing of lots which, by his own account, gave the same result three times over. In 1763 he took charge of the diocese of Voronezh, where he founded a seminary and parish schools and cared zealously for his flock, before later retiring to the Zadonsk monastery, where he died in 1783.