St. Herman, while he lived on earth, was a simple monk who came from his beloved Valaam Monastery in Russia to the shores of Alaska in the year 1794. In the previous year, Metropolitan Gabriel of St. Petersburg asked Abbot Nazarius of Valaam to gather a small group of monks to form a missionary team that would travel across Russia and Siberia to Alaska (at that time a Russian possession) to bring the Gospel of Christ to the native people. Those...