Venerable Macarius, Abbot of Kaliazin, wonderworker

Macarius, born Matthew, came from the Kozhin family of Tver boyars near Kashin. His parents persuaded him to marry, but he and his wife Elena agreed that whoever outlived the other would become a monk. Widowed after three years, he gave away his property and took vows at the Klobukov monastery in Kashin.

Seeking solitude, he settled in the forest by the Volga, and other monks soon joined him. The local landowner Ivan Kolyaga at first plotted against him, but later repented, became a monk there and gave his lands, so the monastery was called Kalyazin. Joseph of Volokolamsk visited and recorded its strict common rule. Macarius greeted each brother as "good old man" and died in 1483.