the holy new martyrs of eastern russia - Coptic Orthodox teaching

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"Why are you driving her away from me, bring her here and feed her."
Some said that the love between Dunya and Maria was from the devil,
others - from God. If Maria was in trouble, Dunyushka would not be
separated from her. Maria was beaten by her parents, and Dunya by her
relatives. They kept driving them away from each other, but they held hands
and walked along singing. They also went to church as a couple. When Maria
died, Dunya went every day to the church, and although when Maria had
been alive they had begun to throw stones at them, when she was on her own
they did it even more. They would not let her into the church on feastdays,
and she could only go to liturgies she had ordered.
In her seventeenth year she fell seriously ill. She could only walk with a
stick, but she was able to put wood in the stove herself (her aunt had died by
this time). Later, however, when she was twenty, she became even worse. It
was Christmas, and she cried out:
"I'm dying, I'm on fire."
The two girls who used to come to her took her out into the courtyard and
poured two buckets of cold water onto her. Then she said:
"Take me into the cell."
Then they laid her on a bench, and she never got up again. She never
received treatment from doctors, and no one knows what her illness was, but
everyone says that Dunyushka was a great sufferer. She was completely
chained to her bed for about 35 years and had to be carried to her execution.
Several families in the village took constant care of Dunya, providing her with
everything she needed. She was always surrounded by "nurses" - girls from
various places who were voluntarily called to serve her. She lived in great
poverty, in the same few clothes till she died. She never cut her hair or her
nails.
The Orthodox Russian people does not simply feel compassion for such
sufferers. They are surrounded by a special veneration, which is rooted in a
special faith in the divine election and gifts of grace of all those who
innocently undergo great suffering. Such was Dunyushka's reputation. She
was often visited by people from afar who were seeking spiritual edification
and consolation. And there are still living people who witness from their
personal experience that Dunyushka had the gift of clairvoyance.
When Daria Timagina joined Dunya there were three of them: Dunya,
Daria and Dunya's uncle. In her time Dasha Timagina had been on the point
of marrying, but the Sarov Elder Anatolius (in schema Basil) had blessed her
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