Valaam elder schema-abbot John (1873-1958) spent almost his entire life in the monastery, was rector of the Trifonova Pechenga monastery on the shores of the Arctic Ocean (now the Murmansk region), for the last two decades of his life he was the confessor of the Valaam monastery in Finland. Many letters of the elder were distributed from monastic cell around the world. Even during the life of Father John, his spiritual children collected these letters and released a collection, which has since been reprinted more than once in Russian, Finnish and other languages.