Makaryevskaya Hergozerskaya hermitage is located 16 kilometers
from the village of Morshchinskaya, Kargopol district, Arkhangelsk
region, on the shore of Lake Hergozero. Makaryevskaya Hergozerskaya
hermitage was formed in 1640 by 2 monks of the Alexander-Oshevensky
monastery, Sergius and Longin, in honor of the Monk Makarii
Zheltovodsky and Unzhensky. He was a famous church leader of the
17th century, the founder of a monastery in the town of Makaryevo on
the banks of the Unzha River in the Nizhny Novgorod province. Monk
Sergius in Novgorod from Metropolitan Athos received a charter for
the construction of the Church of the Holy Trinity. Thus, the
history of the Makaryevsky monastery began in honor of one of the
most revered saints of the Kargopol region. After 17 years, the
wooden Trinity Church was damaged by fire. In 1658, a new Trinity
Church and another wooden church of the Presentation of the Most
Holy Theotokos were built. Two years later, the III temple arose -
in the name of the Three Saints of Moscow. Soon the monastery, while
still under the organizers, was filled with brethren and began to
conduct economic work.
The monastery kept the miraculous icon
of Macarius Zheltovodsky and Unzhensky, revered in Kargopol, about
whose miracles a work was written. At the beginning of the 20th
century, the icon was kept in the Vvedensky church of the Hergozersk
parish, and in 1910 it was described in detail by the priest of this
parish A. Kipreev. The length of the icon was about 98 centimeters,
the width - about 72. The face of the saint, depicted in the middle
of the icon, was removed. Along the edges of the icon were depicted
11 brands: from the birth of the saint to his death. In the middle
of the icon is the Monk Macarius, praying for people in the church.
Where the icon is now is unknown. But other icons with the image of
the saint have survived (the second half of the 18th - 19th
centuries).
The miraculous icon, even after the closure of
the monastery, attracted many pilgrims to Makarya (this was the name
of this place). Every year on July 24-25 (old style), on the feast
of Macarius, many people came here. From Kargopol, a procession was
organized, which went to the Chelmogorsk monastery, then to the
church in Trufanovo and turned onto the Trufanovskaya road in
Makarya. People also traveled here from Oshevensk (30 kilometers
away), where the Alexander-Oshevensky monastery, the largest in the
Kargopol region, was located. The Hergozersky, Chelmogorsky and
Oshevensky monasteries, connected by paths along which the pilgrims
walked, were regarded as centers of one sacred space. Therefore, on
some Kargopol icons one can see Makariy Zheltovodsky, Kirill
Chelmogorsky and Alexander Oshevensky depicted together.
In
1764, the monastery was abolished, and its churches became part of
the Hergozersky parish. Also, the parish included the villages
Fedorovskaya, Okatovskaya and Turovo Seltso, which now make up the
village of Porzhenskoye, and the villages of Hernovo, Kurmino and
Navolok (now called Ozhegovo, Dumino and Olsievskaya). And the
Church of St. George the Victorious (1782) in the village of
Fedorovskaya (now Porzhensky churchyard) went to the Hergozersky
parish.
Thanks to the rumor about the miracles of St.
Makaryevskaya icon, through the efforts of the parishioners, the
wooden churches were rebuilt into stone ones. First, the Vvedensky
temple was changed. In 1786-1790 a 5-domed stone church with
Nikolsky side-chapel was built.
In 1857, the wooden Trinity
Church, along with all the utensils, books and icons, burned down.
In 1868, a new Trinity Church was erected with 3 thrones: Trinity,
Makarievsky and Borisoglebsky. A stone bell tower stood along the
axis of the Trinity Church. The parish was closed in the 30s of the
XX century. Back in 1958, the Vvedensky and Trinity churches were
preserved.
Currently, on the peninsula where the monastery
was located, the five-domed Trinity Church has been preserved, which
in 2004 was measured by restorers for subsequent preservation. On
the site of the surviving village N.Ya. Ushakov (the great-grandson
of the last priest of the monastery) installed a vowed cross from
the beam of the collapsed parental house.
In 2008,
restoration work began on the territory of the monastery. In 2009,
between Kenozersky Park and the parish of the Church of the Nativity
of John the Baptist in the city of Kargopol, an agreement was signed
on the joint maintenance and use of the lands of the Makaryevskaya
Hergozerskaya Hermitage, on the revival of the traditions of
Orthodoxy.