Venerable Pancratius of the Kiev Caves

Venerable Pancratius was a hieromonk and recluse of the Kiev Caves Monastery, the great monastic foundation on the Dnipro at Kyiv that grew from the cave settled by the monk Anthony in the mid-eleventh century. As a priest-monk, Pancratius served the divine offices of the community and, according to the synaxarion, performed them with much grace.

He is remembered chiefly for the gift of healing. The tradition relates that he received the gift of working miracles and shared it with those who came to him, healing the sick through fasting, prayer, and anointing with holy oil. His relics rest among those of the monastery's many ascetics in the Far Caves, the older of the Lavra's two cave systems, which is associated with Saint Theodosius and served from its beginnings as a burial place for the monks and recluses of the community.