About halfway through the forest road that connects the Sihăstria Monastery with the Agapia Monastery, you can see the Sihla Monastery. Located at 1000 m altitude in a rocky area of the Sihla hill of Stânișoarei Mountains. The place of worship begins its history as early as the 12th century.
Hermits have lived in the Sihla Monastery area since the 1200s, being one of the most recognized hermitages in Moldova. These rocky places offer peace, solitude, and are hard to penetrate. For these reasons they are appreciated by hermits, who want to preserve tradition, order, piety.
The church was built from wood in the classical style of the Moldovan churches in the 18th century by the Cantacuzino family. In 1813, the church dedicated to the Nativity of St. John the Baptist was renovated, having the same appearance today with stone foundation. It was also completely restored in the second half of the 1900s.
The church has a single tower, the interior being divided between the altar, the nave and the porch. The iconostasis is carved in lime wood and polished in gold, dating from the seventeenth century.
Recently, the whole cell was rebuilt to meet the needs of the monastery.
On the narrow porch of a rock, not far from the church and the cellars of the monastery, the church was built from a fir tree that still preserves the intimacy and atmosphere of an ancient era. The church is ship-shaped.
Known for the life of the clerics, near the monastery, on a secret path, there is the Cave of the Saint Theodora, the place where the saint lived and prayed for years, eager to lead the life of a hermit. Saint Theodora of Sihla spent about 40 years as a hermit near the Sihla Monastery at the end of the 17th century, beginning of the 13th century.
The view that can be admired from above the monastery is superb. You can see both the place of worship and the valley that stretches in front.
