In 1587, a young man named Basil was born in the city of Yaroslavl. He was very poor, as his father, Theodore, a merchant in the town, could not make that much money. Because of this, being poor and with really nothing else to do, the young man actually became quite devout, and would rush to the church at every opportunity he had, and became extremely pious, and dare we say extremely saintly. The young man, realizing that there was nothing for him in that town, eventually left to seek work elsewhere, even though at a very young age. He went to the town of Mangazeya, which is near Siberia, and at the time it was a town that had a lot of men in it, very few women, because it was a trading town and very rough.

The young man sought work as an apprentice at one of the shops and was taken on by a certain merchant there. At the time, there was a lot of licentiousness because of the lack of women in the town, whereas many of the men were seeking sexual relations with young men and even young boys. Basil’s master at this particular shop, his employer, happened to be one of these men, and he began to make overtures to Basil, which the young man completely thwarted and said that he was not interested. After he got off work, he would then go home and fast and pray, yet the man continued his overtures to Basil.

As it happened, one evening actually during the Orthros service of Pascha, the shop was broken into, and many things were taken. The master came and decided that it would be most opportune for him to blame the entire theft on young Basil. So Basil was taken before the governorship of that town and was accused and was not even allowed to make any defense for himself except to say that “I am innocent.” They tortured this young man, and yet even when he lost consciousness, he would say, “I am innocent.” Finally, one of the men there who was in charge took a heavy ring of keys and struck the young man so hard that he fell over and died.

They took this young man’s body and put it into a coffin, because it was basically a murder, and threw it into a marsh, where it then stayed for the next 52 years, according to the will of God. But then at that point some of the townspeople began to notice a strange light over the marsh. Some even heard chanting, church chanting, and all were perplexed as to what was going on there. Then many of the more pious people in the area began to have dreams, [wherein] young Basil was appearing to them. Some of them were even healed.

Eventually, the coffin itself rose to the top of the marsh, and the people went and uncovered the incorrupt relics of this holy young man. You can imagine what happened in the town at that time, because the murder was eventually revealed to everyone there, and the holy relics were given great acclaim and were treated in a very pious manner. Over the next 200 years, many of the rulers in Russia would add to the decorative splendor of the coffin and would give great honor to the relics even then that were being translated to different places in Russia to great acclaim and to miraculous incidences of healing among all the populace.

In our day and age, this young man, Basil, would probably be seen—and maybe rightfully so—as a victim, since what has happened to him has become so much more commonplace today. Yet Basil persisted. When he died, he was only 13 years old, yet he possessed a wisdom beyond any that were around him. He protected his virginity and is known today as the virgin martyr. When we look at young Basil, we must understand that even at that young age someone can have a great love of Jesus Christ, a great appreciation of the services of the Church, and although we don’t know it for sure, probably even a great apprehension of the theology of the Church.

We should never sell our young people short, especially, most especially when it comes to the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ who, as he made even the fishermen most wise, can infuse that same sort of godliness, that same sort of piety into a child of young age.

Basil is now one of the most-revered saints in Russia, though we don’t really hear of him a lot, but his story is worth telling as someone who attended the services of the Church and learned to love them even when very young. This should be a sign to all of our parents today that you should have your children in church, because you have no idea how the grace of our Lord is interacting with them and how their angels do always behold their faces. Holy St. Virgin Martyr Basil, pray for all of us in this very difficult and rough age that we find ourselves living in. As we look to him, we know that the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ will never abandon us.