Venerable Dionysius the Abbot of Glushetsk, Vologda

Dionysius was a monk of the Vologda country in northern Russia. He first lived near Lake Kubenskoye, east of Vologda, then set out with the monk Pachomius in search of a solitary place. At Luchitsa they built a cell and a church of St Nicholas, and a community grew around them. Leaving Pachomius as abbot, Dionysius went about fifteen versts away to the river Glushitsa, set up a cross, built a little cell under a bird-cherry tree and founded a monastery of the Protection of the Mother of God.

Later he withdrew once more to Sosnovets, four versts south on the same river, with a church of John the Baptist. His Life tells that he dug his own grave seven years before his death in 1437, to keep the hour of his death before his eyes.