Venerable Hilarion of Optina (Ponomarev)

Venerable Hilarion was born on April 8, 1805, in the village of Klyuchi, Novokhopyorsk district, Voronezh province, as Rodion Nikitich Ponomarev. He entered the skete of St. John the Baptist at Optina Hermitage; for 20 years he was cell-attendant to Elder Macarius of Optina. He was tonsured a monk in 1849, ordained hieromonk in 1857; in 1863 he was appointed skete superior and general confessor of Optina. In 1872 he received the great schema. He died on September 18, 1873, at Optina Hermitage. He was glorified locally in 1996, canonized for church-wide veneration by the Bishops' Council in 2000 as part of the Synaxis of the Venerable Elders of Optina. His relics rest in the Vladimir Church of Optina Hermitage since 1998.

IMPORTANT NOTICE ON THE SURNAME IN THE ENTRY'S NAME: the surname "Gromov" given in the original stub erroneously conflates Venerable Hilarion (Ponomarev) with an ENTIRELY DIFFERENT person — Venerable Martyr Hilarion (secular name Ivan Andreyevich Gromov, b. 1864), a monk of the Russian St. Panteleimon Monastery on Athos, who later served at the Athonite metochion in Moscow; he was arrested in 1930 and again in 1937, and was shot at the Butovo firing range on October 11 (September 28 O.S.), 1937; he was canonized as a New Martyr by the Synod on May 7, 2003. Hieromonk Gromov had NO connection whatsoever to Optina Hermitage — the image found during verification, inscribed "Venerable Hilarion of Optina," indisputably depicts Venerable Hilarion (Ponomarev), not Gromov.