The Hirova Monastery, dedicated to "St. Simeon the Pillar-bearer", is located on the territory of the village of Neculăieuca, 60 km from the city of Chisinau.
The monastery was founded as a nunnery in 1805 by the Metropolitan of Moldavia Veniamin Costache , on the site of an abandoned hermitage of monks, which was said to have burned down in 1803. Nuns from the Hîrtop hermitage arrived here and built a wooden church dedicated to the Great Hierarch Nicholas. In 1836, the current stone (summer) church was built in place of the wooden church. Among its founders was the nun Pelaghia, sister of the Metropolitan of Moldavia Gavriil Callimachi. She is buried in the church porch. In 1865, with the support of Ioan Botezat, the winter church was also built, which is not functioning today, waiting to be restored.
Before being closed, the Hirova Monastery was one of the richest monasteries in Bessarabia, achieving particularly beautiful development under the leadership of the abbess Tavifa (Ursu), who led the monastery until 1959. The community of nuns consisted of over 190 nuns and a priest-monk spiritual director who officiated at divine services. During this period, the monastery owned many properties, lands, herds of animals (sheep, cows, horses, oxen), three cellars, a refectory, etc. Many found refuge in the monastery during the famine organized by the atheist Soviet regime in the years 1947-1949. Since the monastery was also affected by this famine, however, the situation here was better compared to the difficult situation in the country. Under these conditions, many young women, starting from the age of 12-13, entered the monastery. Before being definitively received into the monastery, the young women first underwent three years of obedience.
The divine services were adorned with the old and beautiful church songs performed by the two multi-voice choirs: the Romanian choir (performed church songs in Romanian) and the Russian choir (performed church songs in Russian).
The monastery was closed by the authorities in 1959, and all its property was confiscated. The nuns were asked to leave. However, they stayed in their cottages and began working on the local collective farm, earning their living. The summer church became a warehouse, and in the winter a hospital for children with disabilities was opened, and then the building was used for household purposes. Only in 1990, the monastery was reopened, but it did not receive any substantial aid.
Hirova Monastery was once a large, beautiful and wealthy place in Moldova. During the interwar period, the monastery had almost 200 nuns. Hirova Monastery is located just 5 km away from Curchi Monastery, a recently restored monastery.
The monastery was reopened only in 1990, initially with parish status, with Archpriest Mitrofor Teodor Cerescu as spiritual administrator. Abbess Iraida (Bârcă) was appointed as abbess, who in November 2020 celebrated her 90th birthday and 70 years of life in the monastery.
In 2014, Father Archimandrite Irinarh Rusu was appointed spiritual director of the monastery. Under his guidance, the reconstruction and restoration works of the winter church dedicated to Saint Simeon the Pillarman, the only church in the Republic of Moldova built in honor of this saint, began. The church, built of sticks and clay about 150 years ago, had been left in ruins since the communist period. The necessary cells for the servants and nuns of the monastery were also built.
The monastery celebrates its patron saint on September 14, the feast day of Saint Simeon the Pillar-bearer, considered the initiator of pillarism, a form of extreme asceticism in which monks lived on high pillars, in prayer and fasting. On this day, the monastery becomes a place of pilgrimage, attracting believers from all over the country. In 2024, His Holiness Siluan, Bishop of Orhei, celebrated the Holy Liturgy on the occasion of the patron saint, surrounded by a council of priests and deacons.