Saint Blessed Xenia was born in the first half of the 18th century between 1719 and 1730 from pious and noble parents. Upon reaching adulthood, Ksenia Grigorievna married a court singer, Colonel Andrei Feodorovich Petrov, and lived with her husband in St. Petersburg. But the Lord did not judge the young couple for long to walk together along the path of life — the angel of death separated them: Andrei Feodorovich died, leaving Ksenia Grigorievna a widow at the 26th year of her life.
This unexpected blow amazed Ksenia Grigorievna so much, affected the young widow so much that she immediately seemed to have forgotten everything earthly, human, all the joys and pleasures and, as a result, seemed to many to have lost her mind as if crazy... Even her family and friends began to look at her this way, and especially after Ksenia decisively distributed all her property to the poor.
Freed from all earthly care, Saint Xenia chose for herself the difficult path of Christ’s foolishness for the sake of. Dressed in her husband’s clothes: putting on his underwear, caftan, camisole, she began to assure everyone that Andrei Feodorovich did not die at all, but his wife Ksenia Grigorievna died. Then she completely stopped responding if she was called Ksenia Grigorievna, but always responded willingly if she was called Andrei Feodorovich.
Ksenia did not have any specific place of residence. For the most part, she wandered all day along the St. Petersburg side and mainly in the area of the parish of the Church of St. Matthew the Apostle, where at that time poor people lived in small wooden houses. The strange costume of a poor, barely shod woman, who had no place where to incline the head, her allegorical conversations, her complete meekness, and innocence often gave evil people and especially street boys a reason and courage to mock the blessed one.
Gradually we got used to the strange things of the blessed one. They began to offer her warm clothes and money, but Ksenia never agreed to exchange her rags and spent her entire life in a red blouse and green skirt or vice versa — in a green blouse and red skirt. Obviously, these were the colors of her husband's military uniform. She also did not accept alms, but took only from good people the « king on horse» (penny with the image of a rider) and immediately gave this « king on horse» to the same poor as herself.
Wandering the streets of St. Petersburg all day long, Ksenia occasionally came to her friends, dined with them, talked, and then went wandering again. Where she spent her nights remained unknown for a long time. Not only residents of the St. Petersburg side became interested in this, but also the local police, for whom the blessed woman’s stay at night even seemed suspicious. It was decided to find out where this strange woman spends her nights and what she does. It turned out that Ksenia, despite any time of year or weather, went into the field at night and here, in kneeling prayer, stood until dawn, alternately bowing to the ground on all four sides.
Another time, workers who were building a new stone church at the Smolensk cemetery began to notice that at night, during their absence, someone was dragging entire mountains of bricks to the top of the church under construction. The workers marveled at this for a long time and wondered for a long time where the brick above came from. Finally we decided to find out who this tireless gift worker could be, carrying bricks for them every night. It turned out that this tireless worker was Blessed Ksenia.
For her great exploits and patience, the Lord glorified his chosen one during his lifetime. The servant of God Xenia was honored with the gift of insight into hearts and the future. She predicted the death of Empress Elizabeth Petrovna and the young Emperor John Antonovich; She predicted the death of merchant Krapivina secretly, saying: «Green is nettle, but will soon fade», and one poor girl will get married —.
Teaching people truthfulness, Blessed Ksenia often revealed the secrets of those persons whom she visited. The mercy of God overshadowed Xenia so much that even those to whom she visited or from whom she ate food were happy and successful in business. Both traders and cab drivers — all tried to serve her with something; special well-being visited those to whom Blessed Ksenia herself gave anything.
Blessed Ksenia carried the feat of voluntary madness for 45 years, but her earthly wandering also came to an end. Around 1803, she rested in the sleep of a righteous woman. Her body was buried at the Smolensk cemetery. And many signs of God's mercy began to be performed at her tomb.
After many years of popular veneration, in 1988, at the Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church, Blessed Ksenia of St. Petersburg was canonized.
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