In the capital of Crimea - Simferopol - on Odessa Street there is the Holy Trinity Convent. The main temple of this monastery is called the Holy Trinity Cathedral, but Christians who come here on pilgrimage often call it differently - "the temple of St. Luke", because the relics of St. Luke Krymsky.
Saint Luke was canonized by the Orthodox Church in 1995. This is one of those saints who lived and performed spiritual feats not in the distant past, but quite recently - in the 20th century.
Life of Saint Luke
The future saint was born in 1877 in Kerch. In the world he was called Valentin Feliksovich Voino-Yasenetsky. Already in his youth, he felt the need to help suffering people, so he became a physician - both a practicing doctor and a researcher. While working as a surgeon in Tashkent, he regularly attended divine services and other spiritual events. Once, at a personal meeting, Bishop Innokenty of Tashkent advised him to become a priest, and the young doctor followed the advice.
For three years he served as a priest, and in 1923 he was tonsured a monk under the name Luke, in the same year he became a bishop. It was a difficult time for Christians: the Soviet government persecuted the clergy. Father Luka did not escape repression either: he was arrested and sent into exile until 1942.
After becoming a priest, Luke did not give up medicine. While in exile in a remote village, he treated the sick. During the Great Patriotic War, after the end of exile, he worked in a military hospital. He also did not abandon his scientific activities. In 1934, a medical priest published the book "Essays on Purulent Surgery", and in 1943. - "Late resections of infected gunshot wounds of the joints." These scientific works have still not lost their relevance.
In 1943 Luke was elevated to the rank of archbishop, and in 1946 he was appointed to the Crimean diocese. It was not easy to lead the diocese in the conditions of post-war devastation, but difficulties did not stop Saint Luke. He managed to prevent the closure of churches and seek the creation of new ones, he made sure that the priests strictly observed church rules, fought against various sects. As an archbishop, he remained a practicing physician.
Archbishop Luke died in 1961 and was buried in the cemetery near the Church of All Saints.
Posthumous fate
In 1995, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church ranked Saint Luke among the locally revered saints. In March of the following year, the imperishable relics of the saint were solemnly transferred to the Holy Trinity Cathedral. Even then, miracles began. They are associated, in particular, with the photograph that captured the transfer of the relics: on the plate covering the relics, the outlines of the saint's face were indicated in the photo. During the transfer of the relics, the police were present, according to witnesses, they were in caps, and in the photo they were with their heads uncovered.
In 2000, the Russian Orthodox Church ranked Saint Luke among the new martyrs and confessor. Two years later, the archimandrite of the Church of Greece, Nektarios, presented the monastery with a silver shrine, in which the relics of the saint are now kept.
The saint, who was an excellent doctor during his lifetime, continues to help the sick even after death. There are many known cases when people were healed from the most serious diseases by prayer to St. Luke.
