Our Holy Father Stephen, Bishop of Vladimir.

Commemorated April 27 in the Orthodox Christian Menaion

From the Prologue

A disciple of St Theodosius of the Kiev Caves, Stephen was at one time abbot of the Monastery of the Caves and laboured greatly in the regulation and Organisation of the monastic life and in the beautifying of the churches. But the enemy inflamed an evil monk against him, and he was not only removed from the abbacy but driven from the monastery. But God, who does not leave the righteous long under the humiliation of the unrighteous, so guided the life of blessed Stephen that he was chosen as Bishop of Vladimir. As God's hierarch, Stephen guided the Church to old age and departed this life in the Lord peacefully in 1094.

From The Prologue From Ochrid by Bishop Nikolai Velimirovich
©1985 Lazarica Press, Birmingham UK