St. Nilus Island Skete or St. Nilus Serbian Orthodox Skete, founded in 1999, is a woman's monastic institution of the Serbian Orthodox Church in North and South America, situated on Nelson Island in the Ouzinkie Narrow Straits in Alaska, less than an hour's boat ride from Kodiak Island. Many Orthodox monasteries are off-the-beaten-track, however, St. Nilus Island Skete is obviously the remotest of all 80 American Orthodox Christian monasteries in North America. The inlet, owned by the monastery, is void of any other settlement. In the winter months, St. Nilus Skete and the four nuns there can be left desolate from the rest of civilization for days and even weeks at a time. The small community is affiliated with St. Archangel Michael Skete in Alaska and two other monasteries in California, St. Xenia Serbian Orthodox Skete and the Monastery of Saint Herman of Alaska, but only St. Archangel Michael Skete is close to St. Nilus Island Skete. The handful of nuns living at St. Nilus Island Skete -- across Narrow Strait from the northeast tip of Kodiak Island -- use a small boat as a primary means of transport to get to and from their abode for supplies that need to be bought. Throughout the summer when daylights are longer and the seas are calm, the boat brings women pilgrims to the island, and those wishing to stay longer are put up in the guest-house. The monastic community, like the affiliated ones, is under the omophorion of His Grace Bishop Maksim Vasiljević of the Serbian Orthodox Eparchy of Western America. The women strugglers follow the Russian monastic tradition of a small, self-sufficient skete. This model has been handed down by their Patron St. Nilus of Sora and other Russian strugglers for piety. The sisters generally follow the complete daily cycle of services and support themselves through making vestments, prayer ropes, greeting cards of Alaskan Saints, fishing, gardening, and cooking. They are obliged by Orthodox canons to offer hospitality to their non-cleric guests as though they are one of them. Visitors are welcome for the traditional three-day period, and accommodations can be made for female pilgrims to stay longer.
