St. Barbara Monastery (Santa Paula, California)

St. Barbara Monastery is a monastic community for women in the Diocese of the West in the Orthodox Church in America. The monastery is located in Santa Paula, California. The community was founded in 1992 under the auspices of His Grace Bishop Tikhon of San Francisco and the West in downtown Santa Barbara, and in 1999, moved 10 miles north. The monastery relocated to its present Santa Paula location in late 2005. It is dedicated to Saint Barbara.
The community consists of women living the monastic tradition of a Christ-centered prayer life. To support the community the nuns produce icon magnets, notecards, greeting cards, as well as through writing, teaching, and operating a small bookstore and online gift shop.
Currently, the community is developing plans to build a larger chapel and additional living quarters.
Mother Melania (previously Sister Elayne) is one of the more active members of the community. She has participated as a guest speaker at various retreats, authored poetry and books and acted as guest presenter of podcasts and lectures for Ancient Faith Radio. Her books published by Conciliar Press include: "The Twelve Great Feasts for Children" (ISBN-10: 1888212411), "The 3-Day Pascha Series" and "The Passions: How we get into this mess and how we get out". 
Some of her more prominent presentations include:
*January 26, 2008 - "Monastic Spirituality in Everyday Life", St. Matthew Antiochian Orthodox Church.
*August 8, 2007 - Project Mexico "Orthodox Basic Training Week"
*April, 2005 - The 29th Annual Southern Californian Diocesan Antiochian Women's Spring Retreat.
==External links==
*OCA Listing of Monastery
*Orthodox Monasteries of North America directory listing
*Photos of 2005 feastday celebrations.
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